Search Results

Search found 23323 results on 933 pages for 'worst is better'.

Page 373/933 | < Previous Page | 369 370 371 372 373 374 375 376 377 378 379 380  | Next Page >

• Why is this OpenGL ES code slow on iPhone?

  - by f3r3nc

  I've slightly modified the iPhone SDK's GLSprite example while learning OpenGL ES and it turns out to be quite slow. Even in the simulator (on the hw worst) so I must be doing something wrong since it's only 400 textured triangles. const GLfloat spriteVertices[] = { 0.0f, 0.0f, 100.0f, 0.0f, 0.0f, 100.0f, 100.0f, 100.0f }; const GLshort spriteTexcoords[] = { 0,0, 1,0, 0,1, 1,1 }; - (void)setupView { glViewport(0, 0, backingWidth, backingHeight); glMatrixMode(GL_PROJECTION); glLoadIdentity(); glOrthof(0.0f, backingWidth, backingHeight,0.0f, -10.0f, 10.0f); glMatrixMode(GL_MODELVIEW); glClearColor(0.3f, 0.0f, 0.0f, 1.0f); glVertexPointer(2, GL_FLOAT, 0, spriteVertices); glEnableClientState(GL_VERTEX_ARRAY); glTexCoordPointer(2, GL_SHORT, 0, spriteTexcoords); glEnableClientState(GL_TEXTURE_COORD_ARRAY); // sprite data is preloaded. 512x512 rgba8888 glGenTextures(1, &spriteTexture); glBindTexture(GL_TEXTURE_2D, spriteTexture); glTexImage2D(GL_TEXTURE_2D, 0, GL_RGBA, width, height, 0, GL_RGBA, GL_UNSIGNED_BYTE, spriteData); free(spriteData); glTexParameteri(GL_TEXTURE_2D, GL_TEXTURE_MIN_FILTER, GL_LINEAR); glEnable(GL_TEXTURE_2D); glBlendFunc(GL_ONE, GL_ONE_MINUS_SRC_ALPHA); glEnable(GL_BLEND); } - (void)drawView { .. glClear(GL_COLOR_BUFFER_BIT); glLoadIdentity(); glTranslatef(tx-100, ty-100,10); for (int i=0; i<200; i++) { glTranslatef(1, 1, 0); glDrawArrays(GL_TRIANGLE_STRIP, 0, 4); } .. } drawView is called every time the screen is touched or the finger on the screen is moved and tx,ty are set to the x,y coordinates where that touch happened. I've also tried using GLBuffer, when translation was pre-generated and there was only one DrawArray but gave the same performance (~4 FPS). ===EDIT=== Meanwhile I've modified this so that much smaller quads are used (sized: 34x20) and much less overlapping is done. There are ~400 quads-800 triangles spread on the whole screen. Texture size is 512x512 atlas and RGBA_8888 while the texture coordinates are in float. The code is very ugly in terms of API efficiency: there are two MatrixMode change along with two loads and two translation then a drawarrays for a triangle strip (quad). Now this produces ~45 FPS.

  Read the article

• How to keep multiple connectionString passwords safe, separate, and easy to deploy?

  - by Funka

  I know there are plenty of questions here already about this topic (I've read through as many as I could find), but I haven't yet been able to figure out how best to satisfy my particular criteria. Here are the goals: The ASP.NET application will run on a few different web servers, including localhost workstations for development. This means encrypting web.config using a machine key is out. The application will decide which connection string to use based on the server name (using a switch statement). For example, "localhost" and "dev.example.com" will use the DevDatabaseConnectionString, "test.example.com" will use the TestDatabaseConnectionString, and "www.example.com" will use the ProdDatabaseConnectionString, for example. Ideally, the exact same executables and web.config should be able to run on any of these environments, without needing to tailor or configure each environment separately every time that we deploy (something that seems like it would be easy to forget/mess up one day during a deployment, which is why we moved away from having just one connectionstring that has to be changed on each target). Deployment is currently accomplished via FTP. We will not have command-line access to the production web server. This means using aspnet_regiis.exe is out. (I could run on localhost, however, if this would still work.) We would prefer to not have to recompile the application whenever a password changes, so using web.config (or db.config or whatever) seems to make the most sense. A developer should not be able to decrypt the production database password. If a developer checks the source code out onto their localhost laptop (which would determine that it should be using the DevDatabaseConnectionString, remember?) and the laptop gets lost or stolen, it should not be possible to get at the other connection strings. Thus, having a single RSA private key to un-encrypt all three passwords cannot be considered. (Contrary to #3 above, it does seem like we'd need to have three separate key files if we went this route; these could be installed once per machine, and should the wrong key file get deployed to the wrong server, the worst that should happen is that the app can't decrypt anything---and not allow the wrong host to access the wrong database!) I know this is probably a subjective question (asking for a "best" way to do something), but given the criteria I've mentioned, I'm hoping that a single best answer will indeed arise. Thank you!

  Read the article

• How to optimize this SQL query for a rectangular region?

  - by Andrew B.

  I'm trying to optimize the following query, but it's not clear to me what index or indexes would be best. I'm storing tiles in a two-dimensional plane and querying for rectangular regions of that plane. The table has, for the purposes of this question, the following columns: id: a primary key integer world_id: an integer foreign key which acts as a namespace for a subset of tiles tileY: the Y-coordinate integer tileX: the X-coordinate integer value: the contents of this tile, a varchar if it matters. I have the following indexes: "ywot_tile_pkey" PRIMARY KEY, btree (id) "ywot_tile_world_id_key" UNIQUE, btree (world_id, "tileY", "tileX") "ywot_tile_world_id" btree (world_id) And this is the query I'm trying to optimize: ywot=> EXPLAIN ANALYZE SELECT * FROM "ywot_tile" WHERE ("world_id" = 27685 AND "tileY" <= 6 AND "tileX" <= 9 AND "tileX" >= -2 AND "tileY" >= -1 ); QUERY PLAN ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Bitmap Heap Scan on ywot_tile (cost=11384.13..149421.27 rows=65989 width=168) (actual time=79.646..80.075 rows=96 loops=1) Recheck Cond: ((world_id = 27685) AND ("tileY" <= 6) AND ("tileY" >= (-1)) AND ("tileX" <= 9) AND ("tileX" >= (-2))) -> Bitmap Index Scan on ywot_tile_world_id_key (cost=0.00..11367.63 rows=65989 width=0) (actual time=79.615..79.615 rows=125 loops=1) Index Cond: ((world_id = 27685) AND ("tileY" <= 6) AND ("tileY" >= (-1)) AND ("tileX" <= 9) AND ("tileX" >= (-2))) Total runtime: 80.194 ms So the world is fixed, and we are querying for a rectangular region of tiles. Some more information that might be relevant: All the tiles for a queried region may or may not be present The height and width of a queried rectangle are typically about 10x10-20x20 For any given (world, X) or (world, Y) pair, there may be an unbounded number of matching tiles, but the worst case is currently around 10,000, and typically there are far fewer. New tiles are created far less frequently than existing ones are updated (changing the 'value'), and that itself is far less frequent that just reading as in the query above. The only thing I can think of would be to index on (world, X) and (world, Y). My guess is that the database would be able to take those two sets and intersect them. The problem is that there is a potentially unbounded number of matches for either for either of those. Is there some other kind of index that would be more appropriate?

  Read the article

• C++0x Overload on reference, versus sole pass-by-value + std::move?

  - by dean

  It seems the main advice concerning C++0x's rvalues is to add move constructors and move operators to your classes, until compilers default-implement them. But waiting is a losing strategy if you use VC10, because automatic generation probably won't be here until VC10 SP1, or in worst case, VC11. Likely, the wait for this will be measured in years. Here lies my problem. Writing all this duplicate code is not fun. And it's unpleasant to look at. But this is a burden well received, for those classes deemed slow. Not so for the hundreds, if not thousands, of smaller classes. ::sighs:: C++0x was supposed to let me write less code, not more! And then I had a thought. Shared by many, I would guess. Why not just pass everything by value? Won't std::move + copy elision make this nearly optimal? Example 1 - Typical Pre-0x constructor OurClass::OurClass(const SomeClass& obj) : obj(obj) {} SomeClass o; OurClass(o); // single copy OurClass(std::move(o)); // single copy OurClass(SomeClass()); // single copy Cons: A wasted copy for rvalues. Example 2 - Recommended C++0x? OurClass::OurClass(const SomeClass& obj) : obj(obj) {} OurClass::OurClass(SomeClass&& obj) : obj(std::move(obj)) {} SomeClass o; OurClass(o); // single copy OurClass(std::move(o)); // zero copies, one move OurClass(SomeClass()); // zero copies, one move Pros: Presumably the fastest. Cons: Lots of code! Example 3 - Pass-by-value + std::move OurClass::OurClass(SomeClass obj) : obj(std::move(obj)) {} SomeClass o; OurClass(o); // single copy, one move OurClass(std::move(o)); // zero copies, two moves OurClass(SomeClass()); // zero copies, one move Pros: No additional code. Cons: A wasted move in cases 1 & 2. Performance will suffer greatly if SomeClass has no move constructor. What do you think? Is this correct? Is the incurred move a generally acceptable loss when compared to the benefit of code reduction?

  Read the article

• Coping with feelings of technical mediocrity

  - by Karim

  As I've progressed as a programmer, I noticed more nuance and areas I could study in depth. In part, I've come to think of myself from, at one point, a "guru" to now much less, even mediocre or inadequate. Is this normal, or is it a sign of a destructive excessive ambition? Background I started to program when I was still a kid, I had about 10 or 11 years. I really enjoy my work and never get bored from it. It's amazing how somebody could be paid for what he really likes to do and would be doing it anyway even for free. When I first started to program, I was feeling proud of what I was doing, each application I built was for me a success and after 2-3 year I had a feeling that I'm a coding guru. It was a nice feeling. ;-) But the more I was in the field and the more types of software I started to develop, I was starting to have a feeling that I'm completely wrong in thinking I'm a guru. I felt that I'm not even a mediocre developer. Each new field I start to work on is giving me this feeling. Like when I once developed a device driver for a client, I saw how much I need to learn about device drivers. When I developed a video filter for an application, I saw how much do I still need to learn about DirectShow, Color Spaces, and all the theory behind that. The worst thing was when I started to learn algorithms. It was several years ago. I knew then the basic structures and algorithms like the sorting, some types of trees, some hashtables, strings, etc. and when I really wanted to learn a group of structures I learned about 5-6 new types and saw that in fact even this small group has several hundred subtypes of structures. It's depressing how little time people have in their lives to learn all this stuff. I'm now a software developer with about 10 years of experience and I still feel that I'm not a proficient developer when I think about things that others do in the industry.

  Read the article

• RaphaelJS HTML5 Library pathIntersection() bug or alternative optimisation (screenshots)

  - by user1236048

  I have a chart generated using RaphaelJS library. It is just on long path: M 50 122 L 63.230769230769226 130 L 76.46153846153845 130 L 89.6923076923077 128 L 102.92307692307692 56 L 116.15384615384615 106 L 129.3846153846154 88 L 142.6153846153846 114 L 155.84615384615384 52 L 169.07692307692307 30 L 182.3076923076923 62 L 195.53846153846152 130 L 208.76923076923077 74 L 222 130 L 235.23076923076923 66 L 248.46153846153845 102 L 261.6923076923077 32 L 274.9230769230769 130 L 288.15384615384613 130 L 301.38461538461536 32 L 314.6153846153846 86 L 327.8461538461538 130 L 341.07692307692304 70 L 354.30769230769226 130 L 367.53846153846155 102 L 380.7692307692308 120 L 394 112 L 407.2307692307692 68 L 420.46153846153845 48 L 433.6923076923077 92 L 446.9230769230769 128 L 460.15384615384613 110 L 473.38461538461536 78 L 486.6153846153846 130 L 499.8461538461538 56 L 513.0769230769231 116 L 526.3076923076923 80 L 539.5384615384614 58 L 552.7692307692307 40 L 566 130 L 579.2307692307692 94 L 592.4615384615385 64 L 605.6923076923076 122 L 618.9230769230769 98 L 632.1538461538461 120 L 645.3846153846154 70 L 658.6153846153845 82 L 671.8461538461538 76 L 685.0769230769231 124 L 698.3076923076923 110 L 711.5384615384615 94 L 724.7692307692307 130 L 738 130 L 751.2307692307692 66 L 764.4615384615385 118 L 777.6923076923076 70 L 790.9230769230769 130 L 804.1538461538461 44 L 817.3846153846154 130 L 830.6153846153845 36 L 843.8461538461538 92 L 857.076923076923 130 L 870.3076923076923 76 L 883.5384615384614 130 L 896.7692307692307 60 L 910 88 Also below these chart I have a jqueryUI slider of the same width (860px) and centered with the chart. I want when I move the slider to move a dot on the chart accordingly with the slider position. See attached screenshot: As you can see it seems to work fine. I've implemented this behaviour using the pathIntersection() method. On the slide event at each ui.value (x coordinate) I intersect my chartPath (the one from above) with a vertical straight line at the x coordinate. But still there are some problems. One of them is that it runs very hard, and it kinda freezes sometimes.. and very weird sometimes it doesn't seem to intersect at all even it should.. I'll example below 2 cases I identified: M 499.8461538461538 0 L 499.8461538461538 140 M 910 0 L 910 140 Could you please explain why this intersect behaviour happens (it should return a dot).. and the worst part it seems like it happens randomly.. if I use another chartdata. Also if you can identify another (better) solution to syncronise the slider position with the dot on the chart.. would be perfect. I thought about using Element.getPointAtLength(length), but I don't know how. I think I should save the pathSegments and for each to compute the start Length and the finish Length.

  Read the article

• Do you use logical negation operator (!) in "if" statement or check on "== false"

  - by Taras Terebkov

  Hello everyone, I just want to conduct a little survey about code style developers prefer. For me there are two ways to write "if" in such languages as Java, C#, C++, etc. (1) Logical negation operator public void foo() { if (!SessionManager.getInstance().hasActiveSession()) { . . . . . } } (2) Check on "false" public void foo() { if (SessionManager.getInstance().hasActiveSession() == false) { . . . . . } } I always believe that first way is much worst then the second one. Cause usually you don't "read" the code, but "recognize" it in one brief look. And exclamation symbol slipped from your mind, just disturbing you somewhere on the bottom of your unconscious. And only during reading the "if" block below you understand, that the logic is opposite - no sessions in "if" On the other hand in the second way of writing, an eye immediately catches words "SessionManager", "hasActiveSession" and "false". Also for me, the situation with "true" is different. In code like class SessionManager { private bool hasSession; public void foo() { if (hasSession == true) { . . . . . } else { . . . . . } } } I find "true" superfluous. why we repeating the sentence two times? The following is shorter and quicker to catch. class SessionManager { private bool hasSession; public void foo() { if (hasSession) { . . . . . } else { . . . . . } } } What do YOU think, guys?

  Read the article

• How can I improve my select query for storing large versioned data sets?

  - by Jason Francis

  At work, we build large multi-page web applications, consisting mostly of radio and check boxes. The primary purpose of each application is to gather data, but as users return to a page they have previously visited, we report back to them their previous responses. Worst-case scenario, we might have up to 900 distinct variables and around 1.5 million users. For several reasons, it makes sense to use an insert-only approach to storing the data (as opposed to update-in-place) so that we can capture historical data about repeated interactions with variables. The net result is that we might have several responses per user per variable. Our table to collect the responses looks something like this: CREATE TABLE [dbo].[results]( [id] [bigint] IDENTITY(1,1) NOT NULL, [userid] [int] NULL, [variable] [varchar](8) NULL, [value] [tinyint] NULL, [submitted] [smalldatetime] NULL) Where id serves as the primary key. Virtually every request results in a series of insert statements (one per variable submitted), and then we run a select to produce previous responses for the next page (something like this): SELECT t.id, t.variable, t.value FROM results t WITH (NOLOCK) WHERE t.userid = '2111846' AND (t.variable='internat' OR t.variable='veteran' OR t.variable='athlete') AND t.id IN (SELECT MAX(id) AS id FROM results WITH (NOLOCK) WHERE userid = '2111846' AND (t.variable='internat' OR t.variable='veteran' OR t.variable='athlete') GROUP BY variable) Which, in this case, would return the most recent responses for the variables "internat", "veteran", and "athlete" for user 2111846. We have followed the advice of the database tuning tools in indexing the tables, and against our data, this is the best-performing version of the select query that we have been able to come up with. Even so, there seems to be significant performance degradation as the table approaches 1 million records (and we might have about 150x that). We have a fairly-elegant solution in place for sharding the data across multiple tables which has been working quite well, but I am open for any advice about how I might construct a better version of the select query. We use this structure frequently for storing lots of independent data points, and we like the benefits it provides. So the question is, how can I improve the performance of the select query? I assume the nested select statement is a bad idea, but I have yet to find an alternative that performs as well. Thanks in advance. NB: Since we emphasize creating over reading in this case, and since we never update in place, there doesn't seem to be any penalty (and some advantage) for using the NOLOCK directive in this case.

  Read the article

• Which work process in my company should I Improve first?

  - by shoren

  I've just started to work in a new place, and I see several things they do that I find really terrible, and I want to know if they are indeed so wrong, or I am just too strict. Please let me know if my criticism is in place, and your opinion on which problem is the worst and should be fixed first. The developement is all in Java. 1) Not using svnignore. This means svn stat can't be used, and developers forget to add files and break the build. 2) Generated files go to same folders as committed files. Can't use simple maven clean, have to find them one by one. Maven clean doesn't remove all of them. 3) Not fixing IDE analyze warnings. Analyze code returns about 5,000 warning, of many different kinds. 4) Not following conventions: spring beans names sometimes start with uppercase and sometimes not, ant properties sometimes with underline and sometimes with dots delimiter, etc. 5) Incremental build takes 6 minutes, even when nothing is changed. 6) Developers only use remote debug, and don't know how to run the Tomcat server internally from the IDE. 7) Developers always restart the server after every compilation, instead of dynamically reloading the class and saving the server's state. It takes them at least 10 minutes to start checking any change in the code. 8) Developers only compile from command line. When there are compilation errors, they manually open the file and go the the problematic line. 9) A complete mess in project dependencies. Over 200 open sources are depended on, and no one knows what is indeed needed and why. They do know that not all dependencies are necessary. 10) Mixing Maven and Ant in a way that disables the benefits of both. In one case, even dependency checks are not done by Maven. 11) Not using generics properly. 12) Developers don't use Subversion integration with IDE (Eclipse, Intellij Idea). What do you think? Where should I start? Is any of the things I mentioned not really a problem?

  Read the article

• priority_queue with dynamic priorities

  - by Layne

  Hey, I have a server application which accepts incomming queries and executes them. If there are too many queries they should be queued and if some of the other queries got executed the queued queries should be executed as well. Since I want to pass queries with different priorities I think using a priority_queue would be the best choice. e.g. The amout of the axcepting queries (a) hit the limt and new queries will be stored in the queue. All queries have a priority of 1 (lowest) if some of the queries from (a) get executed the programm will pick the query with the highest priority out of the queue and execute it. Still no problem. Now someone is sending a query with a priority of 5 which gets added to the queue. Since this is the query with the highest priority the application will execute this query as soon as the running queries no longer hit the limit. There might be the worst case that 500 queries with a priority of 1 are queued but wont be executed since someone is always sending queries with a priority of 5 hence these 500 queries will be queued for a looooong time. In order to prevent that I want to increase the prioritiy of all queries which have a lower priority than the query with the higher priority, in this example which have a priority lower than 5. So if the query with a priority of 5 gets pulled out of the queue all other queries with a priority < 5 should be increased by 0.2. This way queries with a low priority wont be queued for ever even if there might be 100 queries with a higher priority. I really hope can help me to solve the problem with the priorities: Since my queries consist of an object I thought something like this might work: class Query { public: Query( std::string p_stQuery ) : stQuery( p_stQuery ) {}; std::string getQuery() const {return stQuery;}; void increasePriority( const float fIncrease ) {fPriority += fIncrease;}; friend bool operator < ( const Query& PriorityFirst, const Query& PriorityNext ) { if( PriorityFirst.fPriority < PriorityNext.fPriority ) { if( PriorityFirst.fStartPriority < PriorityNext.fStartPriority ) { Query qTemp = PriorityFirst; qTemp.increasePriority( INCREASE_RATE ); } return true; } else { return false; } }; private: static const float INCREASE_RATE = 0.2; float fPriority; // current priority float fStartPriority; // initialised priority std::string stQuery; };

  Read the article

• Getting OTRS to work with XAMPP

  - by JMeterX

  Setting up a testing environment on a RHEL5 server to test out OTRS ticketing system. I installed XAMPP for the ease of use factor for testing but can't seem to get the ticketing system to start with XAMPP at all. I am new to OTRS and learning on the fly. The documentation says to go to localhost/otrs/installer.pl. First, this file does not exist anywhere in the directory except in /opt/otrs/cgi-bin & fcgi-bin. And when I attempted to start OTRS in general I get " -- Please start the web server first! (service httpd start) <--" So do I need to edit the startup script to force it to use XAMPP? Or am I better off just installing HTTPD & MySQL myself?

  Read the article

• MySQL Replication Over SSH - Last_IO_Errno: 2003 - error connecting to master

  - by Dom

  I have MySQL MASTER/SLAVE replication working on two test boxes (Centos 6.4 / MySQL 5.5.32) over LAN. Securing the connection over ssh causes connection problems from the SLAVE machine: (Sample of show slave status \G Output) Last_IO_Errno: 2003 Last_IO_Error: error connecting to master '[email protected]:3305' - retry-time: 60 I have granted the replication user the relevant privileges on the master server with both 127.0.0.1 and the network IP. I have forwarded the port from slave to master over SSH ssh -f 192.168.0.128 -L 3305:192.168.0.128:3306 -N I can connect to master MySQL from slave with mysql -urep -ppassword -h127.0.0.1 -P3305 The master server setup would seem fine, as it works without a tunnel, and the tunnel seems fine, as I can connect to MySQL between the two. Change Master Statement: CHANGE MASTER TO MASTER_HOST='127.0.0.1', MASTER_PORT=3305, MASTER_USER='rep', MASTER_PASSWORD='password'; Note: I know there are reasons to use SSL, instead of SSH, but I have reasons why SSH is a better choice for my setup.

  Read the article

• OTN Developer Days - Calgary, Alberta March 18 & Atlanta, GA April 1

  - by dana.singleterry

  Discover a Faster Way to Develop Ajax -Enabled Application Based on Java and SOA Standards Get Hands-on with Oracle Jdeveloper, Oracle Application Developer Framework and Oracle Fusion Middleware 11g. You are invited to attend Oracle Technology Network (OTN) Developer Day, a free, hands-on workshop that will give you insight into how to create Ajax-enabled rich Web user interfaces and Java EE-based SOA services with ease. We'll introduce you to the development platform Oracle is using for its Fusion enterprise applications, and show you how to get up to speed with it. The workshop will get you started developing with the latest versions of Oracle JDeveloper and Oracle ADF 11g, including the Ajax-enabled ADF Faces rich client components. Thursday, March 18, 2010 8:00 a.m. - 5:00 p.m. Calgary Marriott hotel 110 9th Avenue, SE Calgary, Alberta T2G 5A6 Wednesday, April 1, 2010 8:00 a.m. - 5:00 p.m. Four Seasons Hotel Atlanta 75 Fourteenth Street Atlanta, Georgia 30309 This workshop is designed for developers, project managers, and architects. Whether you are currently using Java, traditional 4GL tools like Oracle Forms, PeopleTools, and Visual Basic, or just looking for a better development platform - this session is for you. Get explanation from Oracle experts, try your hands at actual development, and get a chance to win an Apple iPod Touch and Oracle prizes. Come see how Oracle can help you deliver cutting edge UIs and standard -based applications faster with the Oracle Fusion Development software stack. At this event you will: * Get to know the Oracle Fusion development architecture and strategy from Oracle's experts. * Learn the easy way to extend your existing development skill sets to incorporate new technologies and architectures that include Service-Oriented Architecture, Java EE, and Web 2.0 * Participate in hands-on labs and experience new technologies in a familiar and productive development environment with Oracle experts guidance. Click on the Register Now Calgary, Alberta to register for the Calgary event and click on the Register Now Atlanta, GA to register for the Atlanta FREE events. Don't miss your exclusive opportunity to network with your peers and discuss today's most vital application development topics with Oracle experts.

  Read the article

• Gacutil.exe on Windows Server 2008 Standard SP2

  - by IrishChieftain

  I'm trying to deploy a Web Part Feature as part of solution. Solution being add to the store and feature being added successfully. Full trust enabled in Web.Config for bin deployment of the .DLL but Web Part not working when page viewed by a non-admin user... So, decided to deploy to GAC but discovered that gacutil.exe is not included with the OS? The only place I can find it is in the Windows SDK with a download size of over 22GB! I know I can choose to download only certain components, but which ones should I select and are there any dependencies? Better yet, is there an easier way to get a copy of the gacutil.exe tool?

  Read the article

• Entity Framework Code-First to Provide Replacement for ASP.NET Profile Provider

  - by Ken Cox [MVP]

  A while back, I coordinated a project to add support for the SQL Table Profile Provider in ASP.NET 4 Web Applications.  We urged Microsoft to improve ASP.NET’s built-in Profile support so our workaround wouldn’t be necessary. Instead, Microsoft plans to provide a replacement for ASP.NET Profile in a forthcoming release. In response to my feature suggestion on Connect, Microsoft says we should look for something even better using Entity Framework: “When code-first is officially released the final piece of a full replacement of the ASP.NET Profile will have arrived. Once code-first for EF4 is released, developers will have a really easy and very approachable way to create any arbitrary class, and automatically have the .NET Framework create a table to provide storage for that class. Furthermore developer will also have full LINQ-query capabilities against code-first classes. “ The downside is that there won’t be a way to retrofit this Profile replacement to pre- ASP.NET 4 Web applications. At least there’ll still be the MVP workaround code. It looks like it’s time for me to dig into a CTP of EF Code-First to see what’s available.   Scott Guthrie has been blogging about Code-First Development with Entity Framework 4. It’s not clear when the EF Code-First is coming, but my guess is that it’ll be part of the VS 2010/.NET 4 service pack.

  Read the article

• Version Assemblies with TFS 2010 Continuous Integration

  - by Steve Michelotti

  When I first heard that TFS 2010 had moved to Workflow Foundation for Team Build, I was *extremely* skeptical. I’ve loved MSBuild and didn’t quite understand the reasons for this change. In fact, given that I’ve been exclusively using Cruise Control for Continuous Integration (CI) for the last 5+ years of my career, I was skeptical of TFS for CI in general. However, after going through the learning process for TFS 2010 recently, I’m starting to become a believer. I’m also starting to see some of the benefits with Workflow Foundation for the overall processing because it gives you constructs not available in MSBuild such as parallel tasks, better control flow constructs, and a slightly better customization story. The first customization I had to make to the build process was to version the assemblies of my solution. This is not new. In fact, I’d recommend reading Mike Fourie’s well known post on Versioning Code in TFS before you get started. This post describes several foundational aspects of versioning assemblies regardless of your version of TFS. The main points are: 1) don’t use source control operations for your version file, 2) use a schema like <Major>.<Minor>.<IncrementalNumber>.0, and 3) do not keep AssemblyVersion and AssemblyFileVersion in sync. To do this in TFS 2010, the best post I’ve found has been Jim Lamb’s post of building a custom TFS 2010 workflow activity. Overall, this post is excellent but the primary issue I have with it is that the assembly version numbers produced are based in a date and look like this: “2010.5.15.1”. This is definitely not what I want. I want to be able to communicate to the developers and stakeholders that we are producing the “1.1 release” or “1.2 release” – which would have an assembly version number of “1.1.317.0” for example. In this post, I’ll walk through the process of customizing the assembly version number based on this method – customizing the concepts in Lamb’s post to suit my needs. I’ll also be combining this with the concepts of Fourie’s post – particularly with regards to the standards around how to version the assemblies. The first thing I’ll do is add a file called SolutionAssemblyVersionInfo.cs to the root of my solution that looks like this: 1: using System; 2: using System.Reflection; 3: [assembly: AssemblyVersion("1.1.0.0")] 4: [assembly: AssemblyFileVersion("1.1.0.0")] I’ll then add that file as a Visual Studio link file to each project in my solution by right-clicking the project, “Add – Existing Item…” then when I click the SolutionAssemblyVersionInfo.cs file, making sure I “Add As Link”: Now the Solution Explorer will show our file. We can see that it’s a “link” file because of the black arrow in the icon within all our projects. Of course you’ll need to remove the AssemblyVersion and AssemblyFileVersion attributes from the AssemblyInfo.cs files to avoid the duplicate attributes since they now leave in the SolutionAssemblyVersionInfo.cs file. This is an extremely common technique so that all the projects in our solution can be versioned as a unit. At this point, we’re ready to write our custom activity. The primary consideration is that I want the developer and/or tech lead to be able to easily be in control of the Major.Minor and then I want the CI process to add the third number with a unique incremental number. We’ll leave the fourth position always “0” for now – it’s held in reserve in case the day ever comes where we need to do an emergency patch to Production based on a branched version.   Writing the Custom Workflow Activity Similar to Lamb’s post, I’m going to write two custom workflow activities. The “outer” activity (a xaml activity) will be pretty straight forward. It will check if the solution version file exists in the solution root and, if so, delegate the replacement of version to the AssemblyVersionInfo activity which is a CodeActivity highlighted in red below:   Notice that the arguments of this activity are the “solutionVersionFile” and “tfsBuildNumber” which will be passed in. The tfsBuildNumber passed in will look something like this: “CI_MyApplication.4” and we’ll need to grab the “4” (i.e., the incremental revision number) and put that in the third position. Then we’ll need to honor whatever was specified for Major.Minor in the SolutionAssemblyVersionInfo.cs file. For example, if the SolutionAssemblyVersionInfo.cs file had “1.1.0.0” for the AssemblyVersion (as shown in the first code block near the beginning of this post), then we want to resulting file to have “1.1.4.0”. Before we do anything, let’s put together a unit test for all this so we can know if we get it right: 1: [TestMethod] 2: public void Assembly_version_should_be_parsed_correctly_from_build_name() 3: { 4: // arrange 5: const string versionFile = "SolutionAssemblyVersionInfo.cs"; 6: WriteTestVersionFile(versionFile); 7: var activity = new VersionAssemblies(); 8: var arguments = new Dictionary<string, object> { 9: { "tfsBuildNumber", "CI_MyApplication.4"}, 10: { "solutionVersionFile", versionFile} 11: }; 12:   13: // act 14: var result = WorkflowInvoker.Invoke(activity, arguments); 15:   16: // assert 17: Assert.AreEqual("1.2.4.0", (string)result["newAssemblyFileVersion"]); 18: var lines = File.ReadAllLines(versionFile); 19: Assert.IsTrue(lines.Contains("[assembly: AssemblyVersion(\"1.2.0.0\")]")); 20: Assert.IsTrue(lines.Contains("[assembly: AssemblyFileVersion(\"1.2.4.0\")]")); 21: } 22: 23: private void WriteTestVersionFile(string versionFile) 24: { 25: var fileContents = "using System.Reflection;\n" + 26: "[assembly: AssemblyVersion(\"1.2.0.0\")]\n" + 27: "[assembly: AssemblyFileVersion(\"1.2.0.0\")]"; 28: File.WriteAllText(versionFile, fileContents); 29: }   At this point, the code for our AssemblyVersion activity is pretty straight forward: 1: [BuildActivity(HostEnvironmentOption.Agent)] 2: public class AssemblyVersionInfo : CodeActivity 3: { 4: [RequiredArgument] 5: public InArgument<string> FileName { get; set; } 6:   7: [RequiredArgument] 8: public InArgument<string> TfsBuildNumber { get; set; } 9:   10: public OutArgument<string> NewAssemblyFileVersion { get; set; } 11:   12: protected override void Execute(CodeActivityContext context) 13: { 14: var solutionVersionFile = this.FileName.Get(context); 15: 16: // Ensure that the file is writeable 17: var fileAttributes = File.GetAttributes(solutionVersionFile); 18: File.SetAttributes(solutionVersionFile, fileAttributes & ~FileAttributes.ReadOnly); 19:   20: // Prepare assembly versions 21: var majorMinor = GetAssemblyMajorMinorVersionBasedOnExisting(solutionVersionFile); 22: var newBuildNumber = GetNewBuildNumber(this.TfsBuildNumber.Get(context)); 23: var newAssemblyVersion = string.Format("{0}.{1}.0.0", majorMinor.Item1, majorMinor.Item2); 24: var newAssemblyFileVersion = string.Format("{0}.{1}.{2}.0", majorMinor.Item1, majorMinor.Item2, newBuildNumber); 25: this.NewAssemblyFileVersion.Set(context, newAssemblyFileVersion); 26:   27: // Perform the actual replacement 28: var contents = this.GetFileContents(newAssemblyVersion, newAssemblyFileVersion); 29: File.WriteAllText(solutionVersionFile, contents); 30:   31: // Restore the file's original attributes 32: File.SetAttributes(solutionVersionFile, fileAttributes); 33: } 34:   35: #region Private Methods 36:   37: private string GetFileContents(string newAssemblyVersion, string newAssemblyFileVersion) 38: { 39: var cs = new StringBuilder(); 40: cs.AppendLine("using System.Reflection;"); 41: cs.AppendFormat("[assembly: AssemblyVersion(\"{0}\")]", newAssemblyVersion); 42: cs.AppendLine(); 43: cs.AppendFormat("[assembly: AssemblyFileVersion(\"{0}\")]", newAssemblyFileVersion); 44: return cs.ToString(); 45: } 46:   47: private Tuple<string, string> GetAssemblyMajorMinorVersionBasedOnExisting(string filePath) 48: { 49: var lines = File.ReadAllLines(filePath); 50: var versionLine = lines.Where(x => x.Contains("AssemblyVersion")).FirstOrDefault(); 51:   52: if (versionLine == null) 53: { 54: throw new InvalidOperationException("File does not contain [assembly: AssemblyVersion] attribute"); 55: } 56:   57: return ExtractMajorMinor(versionLine); 58: } 59:   60: private static Tuple<string, string> ExtractMajorMinor(string versionLine) 61: { 62: var firstQuote = versionLine.IndexOf('"') + 1; 63: var secondQuote = versionLine.IndexOf('"', firstQuote); 64: var version = versionLine.Substring(firstQuote, secondQuote - firstQuote); 65: var versionParts = version.Split('.'); 66: return new Tuple<string, string>(versionParts[0], versionParts[1]); 67: } 68:   69: private string GetNewBuildNumber(string buildName) 70: { 71: return buildName.Substring(buildName.LastIndexOf(".") + 1); 72: } 73:   74: #endregion 75: }   At this point the final step is to incorporate this activity into the overall build template. Make a copy of the DefaultTempate.xaml – we’ll call it DefaultTemplateWithVersioning.xaml. Before the build and labeling happens, drag the VersionAssemblies activity in. Then set the LabelName variable to “BuildDetail.BuildDefinition.Name + "-" + newAssemblyFileVersion since the newAssemblyFileVersion was produced by our activity.   Configuring CI Once you add your solution to source control, you can configure CI with the build definition window as shown here. The main difference is that we’ll change the Process tab to reflect a different build number format and choose our custom build process file:   When the build completes, we’ll see the name of our project with the unique revision number:   If we look at the detailed build log for the latest build, we’ll see the label being created with our custom task:     We can now look at the history labels in TFS and see the project name with the labels (the Assignment activity I added to the workflow):   Finally, if we look at the physical assemblies that are produced, we can right-click on any assembly in Windows Explorer and see the assembly version in its properties:   Full Traceability We now have full traceability for our code. There will never be a question of what code was deployed to Production. You can always see the assembly version in the properties of the physical assembly. That can be traced back to a label in TFS where the unique revision number matches. The label in TFS gives you the complete snapshot of the code in your source control repository at the time the code was built. This type of process for full traceability has been used for many years for CI – in fact, I’ve done similar things with CCNet and SVN for quite some time. This is simply the TFS implementation of that pattern. The new features that TFS 2010 give you to make these types of customizations in your build process are quite easy once you get over the initial curve.

  Read the article

• Upgrading from TFS 2010 RC to TFS 2010 RTM done

  - by Martin Hinshelwood

  Today is the big day, with the Launch of Visual Studio 2010 already done in Asia, and rolling around the world towards us, we are getting ready for the RTM (Released). We have had TFS 2010 in Production for nearly 6 months and have had only minimal problems. Update 12th April 2010  – Added Scott Hanselman’s tweet about the MSDN download release time. SSW was the first company in the world outside of Microsoft to deploy Visual Studio 2010 Team Foundation Server to production, not once, but twice. I am hoping to make it 3 in a row, but with all the hype around the new version, and with it being a production release and not just a go-live, I think there will be a lot of competition. Developers: MSDN will be updated with #vs2010 downloads and details at 10am PST *today*! @shanselman - Scott Hanselman Same as before, we need to Uninstall 2010 RC and install 2010 RTM. The installer will take care of all the complexity of actually upgrading any schema changes. If you are upgrading from TFS 2008 to TFS2010 you can follow our Rules To Better TFS 2010 Migration and read my post on our successes.   We run TFS 2010 in a Hyper-V virtual environment, so we have the advantage of running a snapshot as well as taking a DB backup. Done - Snapshot the hyper-v server Microsoft does not support taking a snapshot of a running server, for very good reason, and Brian Harry wrote a post after my last upgrade with the reason why you should never snapshot a running server. Done - Uninstall Visual Studio Team Explorer 2010 RC You will need to uninstall all of the Visual Studio 2010 RC client bits that you have on the server. Done - Uninstall TFS 2010 RC Done - Install TFS 2010 RTM Done - Configure TFS 2010 RTM Pick the Upgrade option and point it at your existing “tfs_Configuration” database to load all of the existing settings Done - Upgrade the SharePoint Extensions Upgrade Build Servers (Pending) Test the server The back out plan, and you should always have one, is to restore the snapshot. Upgrading to Team Foundation Server 2010 – Done The first thing you need to do is off the TFS server and then log into the Hyper-v server and create a snapshot. Figure: Make sure you turn the server off and delete all old snapshots before you take a new one I noticed that the snapshot that was taken before the Beta 2 to RC upgrade was still there. You should really delete old snapshots before you create a new one, but in this case the SysAdmin (who is currently tucked up in bed) asked me not to. I guess he is worried about a developer messing up his server Turn your server on and wait for it to boot in anticipation of all the nice shiny RTM’ness that is coming next. The upgrade procedure for TFS2010 is to uninstal the old version and install the new one. Figure: Remove Visual Studio 2010 Team Foundation Server RC from the system.   Figure: Most of the heavy lifting is done by the Uninstaller, but make sure you have removed any of the client bits first. Specifically Visual Studio 2010 or Team Explorer 2010.  Once the uninstall is complete, this took around 5 minutes for me, you can begin the install of the RTM. Running the 64 bit OS will allow the application to use more than 2GB RAM, which while not common may be of use in heavy load situations. Figure: It is always recommended to install the 64bit version of a server application where possible. I do not think it is likely, with SharePoint 2010 and Exchange 2010  and even Windows Server 2008 R2 being 64 bit only, I do not think there will be another release of a server app that is 32bit. You then need to choose what it is you want to install. This depends on how you are running TFS and on how many servers. In our case we run TFS and the Team Foundation Build Service (controller only) on out TFS server along with Analysis services and Reporting Services. But our SharePoint server lives elsewhere. Figure: This always confuses people, but in reality it makes sense. Don’t install what you do not need. Every extra you install has an impact of performance. If you are integrating with SharePoint you will need to run this install on every Front end server in your farm and don’t forget to upgrade your Build servers and proxy servers later. Figure: Selecting only Team Foundation Server (TFS) and Team Foundation Build Services (TFBS)   It is worth noting that if you have a lot of builds kicking off, and hence a lot of get operations against your TFS server, you can use a proxy server to cache the source control on another server in between your TFS server and your build servers. Figure: Installing Microsoft .NET Framework 4 takes the most time. Figure: Now run Windows Update, and SSW Diagnostic to make sure all your bits and bobs are up to date. Note: SSW Diagnostic will check your Power Tools, Add-on’s, Check in Policies and other bits as well. Configure Team Foundation Server 2010 – Done Now you can configure the server. If you have no key you will need to pick “Install a Trial Licence”, but it is only £500, or free with a MSDN subscription. Anyway, if you pick Trial you get 90 days to get your key. Figure: You can pick trial and add your key later using the TFS Server Admin. Here is where the real choices happen. We are doing an Upgrade from a previous version, so I will pick Upgrade the same as all you folks that are using the RC or TFS 2008. Figure: The upgrade wizard takes your existing 2010 or 2008 databases and upgraded them to the release.   Once you have entered your database server name you can click “List available databases” and it will show what it can upgrade. Figure: Select your database from the list and at this point, make sure you have a valid backup. At this point you have not made ANY changes to the databases. At this point the configuration wizard will load configuration from your existing database if you have one. If you are upgrading TFS 2008 refer to Rules To Better TFS 2010 Migration. Mostly during the wizard the default values will suffice, but depending on the configuration you want you can pick different options. Figure: Set the application tier account and Authentication method to use. We use NTLM to keep things simple as we host our TFS server externally for our remote developers.  Figure: Setting your TFS server URL’s to be the remote URL’s allows the reports to be accessed without using VPN. Very handy for those remote developers. Figure: Detected the existing Warehouse no problem. Figure: Again we love green ticks. It gives us a warm fuzzy feeling. Figure: The username for connecting to Reporting services should be a domain account (if you are on a domain that is). Figure: Setup the SharePoint integration to connect to your external SharePoint server. You can take the option to connect later.   You then need to run all of your readiness checks. These check can save your life! it will check all of the settings that you have entered as well as checking all the external services are configures and running properly. There are two reasons that TFS 2010 is so easy and painless to install where previous version were not. Microsoft changes the install to two steps, Install and configuration. The second reason is that they have pulled out all of the stops in making the install run all the checks necessary to make sure that once you start the install that it will complete. if you find any errors I recommend that you report them on http://connect.microsoft.com so everyone can benefit from your misery.   Figure: Now we have everything setup the configuration wizard can do its work.  Figure: Took a while on the “Web site” stage for some point, but zipped though after that.  Figure: last wee bit. TFS Needs to do a little tinkering with the data to complete the upgrade. Figure: All upgraded. I am not worried about the yellow triangle as SharePoint was being a little silly Exception Message: TF254021: The account name or password that you specified is not valid. (type TfsAdminException) Exception Stack Trace:    at Microsoft.TeamFoundation.Management.Controls.WizardCommon.AccountSelectionControl.TestLogon(String connectionString)    at System.ComponentModel.BackgroundWorker.WorkerThreadStart(Object argument) [Info   @16:10:16.307] Benign exception caught as part of verify: Exception Message: TF255329: The following site could not be accessed: http://projects.ssw.com.au/. The server that you specified did not return the expected response. Either you have not installed the Team Foundation Server Extensions for SharePoint Products on this server, or a firewall is blocking access to the specified site or the SharePoint Central Administration site. For more information, see the Microsoft Web site (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=161206). (type TeamFoundationServerException) Exception Stack Trace:    at Microsoft.TeamFoundation.Client.SharePoint.WssUtilities.VerifyTeamFoundationSharePointExtensions(ICredentials credentials, Uri url)    at Microsoft.TeamFoundation.Admin.VerifySharePointSitesUrl.Verify() Inner Exception Details: Exception Message: TF249064: The following Web service returned an response that is not valid: http://projects.ssw.com.au/_vti_bin/TeamFoundationIntegrationService.asmx. This Web service is used for the Team Foundation Server Extensions for SharePoint Products. Either the extensions are not installed, the request resulted in HTML being returned, or there is a problem with the URL. Verify that the following URL points to a valid SharePoint Web application and that the application is available: http://projects.ssw.com.au. If the URL is correct and the Web application is operating normally, verify that a firewall is not blocking access to the Web application. (type TeamFoundationServerInvalidResponseException) Exception Data Dictionary: ResponseStatusCode = InternalServerError I’ll look at SharePoint after, probably the SharePoint box just needs a restart or a kick If there is a problem with SharePoint it will come out in testing, But I will definatly be passing this on to Microsoft.   Upgrading the SharePoint connector to TFS 2010 You will need to upgrade the Extensions for SharePoint Products and Technologies on all of your SharePoint farm front end servers. To do this uninstall  the TFS 2010 RC from it in the same way as the server, and then install just the RTM Extensions. Figure: Only install the SharePoint Extensions on your SharePoint front end servers. TFS 2010 supports both SharePoint 2007 and SharePoint 2010.   Figure: When you configure SharePoint it uploads all of the solutions and templates. Figure: Everything is uploaded Successfully. Figure: TFS even remembered the settings from the previous installation, fantastic.   Upgrading the Team Foundation Build Servers to TFS 2010 Just like on the SharePoint servers you will need to upgrade the Build Server to the RTM. Just uninstall TFS 2010 RC and then install only the Team Foundation Build Services component. Unlike on the SharePoint server you will probably have some version of Visual Studio installed. You will need to remove this as well. (Coming Soon) Connecting Visual Studio 2010 / 2008 / 2005 and Eclipse to TFS2010 If you have developers still on Visual Studio 2005 or 2008 you will need do download the respective compatibility pack: Visual Studio Team System 2005 Service Pack 1 Forward Compatibility Update for Team Foundation Server 2010 Visual Studio Team System 2008 Service Pack 1 Forward Compatibility Update for Team Foundation Server 2010 If you are using Eclipse you can download the new Team Explorer Everywhere install for connecting to TFS. Get your developers to check that you have the latest version of your applications with SSW Diagnostic which will check for Service Packs and hot fixes to Visual Studio as well.   Technorati Tags: TFS,TFS2010,TFS 2010,Upgrade

  Read the article

• SQL SERVER – Subquery or Join – Various Options – SQL Server Engine knows the Best

  - by pinaldave

  This is followup post of my earlier article SQL SERVER – Convert IN to EXISTS – Performance Talk, after reading all the comments I have received I felt that I could write more on the same subject to clear few things out. First let us run following four queries, all of them are giving exactly same resultset. USE AdventureWorks GO -- use of = SELECT * FROM HumanResources.Employee E WHERE E.EmployeeID = ( SELECT EA.EmployeeID FROM HumanResources.EmployeeAddress EA WHERE EA.EmployeeID = E.EmployeeID) GO -- use of in SELECT * FROM HumanResources.Employee E WHERE E.EmployeeID IN ( SELECT EA.EmployeeID FROM HumanResources.EmployeeAddress EA WHERE EA.EmployeeID = E.EmployeeID) GO -- use of exists SELECT * FROM HumanResources.Employee E WHERE EXISTS ( SELECT EA.EmployeeID FROM HumanResources.EmployeeAddress EA WHERE EA.EmployeeID = E.EmployeeID) GO -- Use of Join SELECT * FROM HumanResources.Employee E INNER JOIN HumanResources.EmployeeAddress EA ON E.EmployeeID = EA.EmployeeID GO Let us compare the execution plan of the queries listed above. Click on image to see larger image. It is quite clear from the execution plan that in case of IN, EXISTS and JOIN SQL Server Engines is smart enough to figure out what is the best optimal plan of Merge Join for the same query and execute the same. However, in the case of use of Equal (=) Operator, SQL Server is forced to use Nested Loop and test each result of the inner query and compare to outer query, leading to cut the performance. Please note that here I no mean suggesting that Nested Loop is bad or Merge Join is better. This can very well vary on your machine and amount of resources available on your computer. When I see Equal (=) operator used in query like above, I usually recommend to see if user can use IN or EXISTS or JOIN. As I said, this can very much vary on different system. What is your take in above query? I believe SQL Server Engines is usually pretty smart to figure out what is ideal execution plan and use it. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.SQLAuthority.com) Filed under: Pinal Dave, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Joins, SQL Optimization, SQL Performance, SQL Query, SQL Scripts, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL, Technology

  Read the article

• Apple iPhone 4S Launch In India On Nov 25

  - by Gopinath

  Aircel, one of the leading wireless mobile services provider of India has just announced that iPhone 4S will be available to its customers on November 25. You can start pre-booking the phone from November 18 through Aircel website or walking into an Aircel showroom near you. My multiple calls to Aircel customer care division were no use to get the details on the price information. Three times the call got disconnected before a customer care executive tried fetching the details on price and models. We hear from BGR India blog that iPhone 4S price is going start at Rs. 40,000 for a 16GB model and may go up to Rs. 50,000 for a 64 GB model. Airtel, another leading mobile service provider in India, who sells iPhone in India is not sure when they are going to start offering iPhone 4S to its customer. I reached customer care regarding the iPhone 4S and they don’t have any details to offer at the moment. It’s good to see Apple releasing iPhone 4S to India markets just after couple of months of International release. Apple was earlier criticized for releasing iPhone 2, iPhone 3G in India almost an year after the international launch while companies like Nokia release their flagship models just after weeks of international launch. One of the most sought after feature of iPhone 4S is Siri and my friends in US told that it works amazingly good. Siri does not have any problem in understanding Indian English accent and it is very good at recognizing the Indian names in contacts list. But at the same time we do hear reports that Siri does not help much if it’s used outside USA. Considering that Siri is a software it should be possible for Apple to improve it to work better outside USA. But who know the priorities of Apple! This article titled,Apple iPhone 4S Launch In India On Nov 25, was originally published at Tech Dreams. Grab our rss feed or fan us on Facebook to get updates from us.

  Read the article

• Dell Optiplex 980 vs. Dell Studio XPS 9000?

  - by Dave

  My company is allowing me to upgrade to either the XPS 9000 or the Optiplex 980. I haven't bought an Optiplex in over a decade, and the only thing I can remember is that the Optiplex is really meant for corporate IT environments, and we're not even close being large enough to have IT issues. I think the components might be of higher quality as well, like the motherboard and power supply. The XPS 9000 is about $150 cheaper than the Optiplex, but the Optiplex has 4GB more RAM, a 2nd video card, and an extra year of service. Seems like the Optiplex is a better deal overall, but since I haven't ever used one, I wanted to see what everyone else here thought.

  Read the article

• Comments syntax for Idoc Script

  - by kyle.hatlestad

  Maybe this is widely known and I'm late to the party, but I just ran across the syntax for making comments in Idoc Script. It's been something I've been hoping to see for a long time. And it looks like it quietly snuck into the 10gR3 release. So for comments in Idoc Script, you simply [[% surround your comments in these symbols. %]] They can be on the same line or span multiple lines. If you look in the documentation, it still mentions making comments using the syntax. Well, that's certainly not an ideal approach. You're stuffing your comment into an actual variable, it's taking up memory, and you have to watch double-quotes in your comment. A perhaps better way in the old method is to start with my comments . Still not great, but now you're not assigning something to a variable and worrying about quotes. Unfortunately, this syntax only works in places that use the Idoc format. It can't be used in Idoc files that get indexed (.hcsp & .hcsf) and use the <!--$...--> format. For those, you'll need to continue using the older methods. While on the topic, I thought I would highlight a great plug-in to Notepad++ that Arnoud Koot here at Oracle wrote for Idoc Script. It does script highlighting as well as type-ahead/auto-completion for common variables, functions, and services. For some reason, I can never seem to remember if it's DOC_INFO_LATESTRELEASE or DOC_INFO_LATEST_RELEASE, so this certainly comes in handy. I've updated his plug-in to use this new comments syntax. You can download a copy of the plug-in here which includes installation instructions.

  Read the article

• Is there a Telecommunications Reference Architecture?

  - by raul.goycoolea

  @font-face { font-family: "Arial"; }@font-face { font-family: "Courier New"; }@font-face { font-family: "Wingdings"; }@font-face { font-family: "Cambria"; }p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraph, li.MsoListParagraph, div.MsoListParagraph { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; }ol { margin-bottom: 0cm; }ul { margin-bottom: 0cm; } Abstract   Reference architecture provides needed architectural information that can be provided in advance to an enterprise to enable consistent architectural best practices. Enterprise Reference Architecture helps business owners to actualize their strategies, vision, objectives, and principles. It evaluates the IT systems, based on Reference Architecture goals, principles, and standards. It helps to reduce IT costs by increasing functionality, availability, scalability, etc. Telecom Reference Architecture provides customers with the flexibility to view bundled service bills online with the provision of multiple services. It provides real-time, flexible billing and charging systems, to handle complex promotions, discounts, and settlements with multiple parties. This paper attempts to describe the Reference Architecture for the Telecom Enterprises. It lays the foundation for a Telecom Reference Architecture by articulating the requirements, drivers, and pitfalls for telecom service providers. It describes generic reference architecture for telecom enterprises and moves on to explain how to achieve Enterprise Reference Architecture by using SOA.   Introduction   A Reference Architecture provides a methodology, set of practices, template, and standards based on a set of successful solutions implemented earlier. These solutions have been generalized and structured for the depiction of both a logical and a physical architecture, based on the harvesting of a set of patterns that describe observations in a number of successful implementations. It helps as a reference for the various architectures that an enterprise can implement to solve various problems. It can be used as the starting point or the point of comparisons for various departments/business entities of a company, or for the various companies for an enterprise. It provides multiple views for multiple stakeholders.   Major artifacts of the Enterprise Reference Architecture are methodologies, standards, metadata, documents, design patterns, etc.   Purpose of Reference Architecture   In most cases, architects spend a lot of time researching, investigating, defining, and re-arguing architectural decisions. It is like reinventing the wheel as their peers in other organizations or even the same organization have already spent a lot of time and effort defining their own architectural practices. This prevents an organization from learning from its own experiences and applying that knowledge for increased effectiveness.   Reference architecture provides missing architectural information that can be provided in advance to project team members to enable consistent architectural best practices.   Enterprise Reference Architecture helps an enterprise to achieve the following at the abstract level:   ·       Reference architecture is more of a communication channel to an enterprise ·       Helps the business owners to accommodate to their strategies, vision, objectives, and principles. ·       Evaluates the IT systems based on Reference Architecture Principles ·       Reduces IT spending through increasing functionality, availability, scalability, etc ·       A Real-time Integration Model helps to reduce the latency of the data updates Is used to define a single source of Information ·       Provides a clear view on how to manage information and security ·       Defines the policy around the data ownership, product boundaries, etc. ·       Helps with cost optimization across project and solution portfolios by eliminating unused or duplicate investments and assets ·       Has a shorter implementation time and cost   Once the reference architecture is in place, the set of architectural principles, standards, reference models, and best practices ensure that the aligned investments have the greatest possible likelihood of success in both the near term and the long term (TCO).     Common pitfalls for Telecom Service Providers   Telecom Reference Architecture serves as the first step towards maturity for a telecom service provider. During the course of our assignments/experiences with telecom players, we have come across the following observations – Some of these indicate a lack of maturity of the telecom service provider:   ·       In markets that are growing and not so mature, it has been observed that telcos have a significant amount of in-house or home-grown applications. In some of these markets, the growth has been so rapid that IT has been unable to cope with business demands. Telcos have shown a tendency to come up with workarounds in their IT applications so as to meet business needs. ·       Even for core functions like provisioning or mediation, some telcos have tried to manage with home-grown applications. ·       Most of the applications do not have the required scalability or maintainability to sustain growth in volumes or functionality. ·       Applications face interoperability issues with other applications in the operator's landscape. Integrating a new application or network element requires considerable effort on the part of the other applications. ·       Application boundaries are not clear, and functionality that is not in the initial scope of that application gets pushed onto it. This results in the development of the multiple, small applications without proper boundaries. ·       Usage of Legacy OSS/BSS systems, poor Integration across Multiple COTS Products and Internal Systems. Most of the Integrations are developed on ad-hoc basis and Point-to-Point Integration. ·       Redundancy of the business functions in different applications • Fragmented data across the different applications and no integrated view of the strategic data • Lot of performance Issues due to the usage of the complex integration across OSS and BSS systems   However, this is where the maturity of the telecom industry as a whole can be of help. The collaborative efforts of telcos to overcome some of these problems have resulted in bodies like the TM Forum. They have come up with frameworks for business processes, data, applications, and technology for telecom service providers. These could be a good starting point for telcos to clean up their enterprise landscape.   Industry Trends in Telecom Reference Architecture   Telecom reference architectures are evolving rapidly because telcos are facing business and IT challenges.   “The reality is that there probably is no killer application, no silver bullet that the telcos can latch onto to carry them into a 21st Century.... Instead, there are probably hundreds – perhaps thousands – of niche applications.... And the only way to find which of these works for you is to try out lots of them, ramp up the ones that work, and discontinue the ones that fail.” – Martin Creaner President & CTO TM Forum.   The following trends have been observed in telecom reference architecture:   ·       Transformation of business structures to align with customer requirements ·       Adoption of more Internet-like technical architectures. The Web 2.0 concept is increasingly being used. ·       Virtualization of the traditional operations support system (OSS) ·       Adoption of SOA to support development of IP-based services ·       Adoption of frameworks like Service Delivery Platforms (SDPs) and IP Multimedia Subsystem ·       (IMS) to enable seamless deployment of various services over fixed and mobile networks ·       Replacement of in-house, customized, and stove-piped OSS/BSS with standards-based COTS products ·       Compliance with industry standards and frameworks like eTOM, SID, and TAM to enable seamless integration with other standards-based products   Drivers of Reference Architecture   The drivers of the Reference Architecture are Reference Architecture Goals, Principles, and Enterprise Vision and Telecom Transformation. The details are depicted below diagram. @font-face { font-family: "Cambria"; }p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoCaption, li.MsoCaption, div.MsoCaption { margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt; font-size: 9pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: rgb(79, 129, 189); font-weight: bold; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; } Figure 1. Drivers for Reference Architecture @font-face { font-family: "Arial"; }@font-face { font-family: "Courier New"; }@font-face { font-family: "Wingdings"; }@font-face { font-family: "Cambria"; }p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraph, li.MsoListParagraph, div.MsoListParagraph { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; }ol { margin-bottom: 0cm; }ul { margin-bottom: 0cm; } Today’s telecom reference architectures should seamlessly integrate traditional legacy-based applications and transition to next-generation network technologies (e.g., IP multimedia subsystems). This has resulted in new requirements for flexible, real-time billing and OSS/BSS systems and implications on the service provider’s organizational requirements and structure.   Telecom reference architectures are today expected to:   ·       Integrate voice, messaging, email and other VAS over fixed and mobile networks, back end systems ·       Be able to provision multiple services and service bundles • Deliver converged voice, video and data services ·       Leverage the existing Network Infrastructure ·       Provide real-time, flexible billing and charging systems to handle complex promotions, discounts, and settlements with multiple parties. ·       Support charging of advanced data services such as VoIP, On-Demand, Services (e.g.  Video), IMS/SIP Services, Mobile Money, Content Services and IPTV. ·       Help in faster deployment of new services • Serve as an effective platform for collaboration between network IT and business organizations ·       Harness the potential of converging technology, networks, devices and content to develop multimedia services and solutions of ever-increasing sophistication on a single Internet Protocol (IP) ·       Ensure better service delivery and zero revenue leakage through real-time balance and credit management ·       Lower operating costs to drive profitability   Enterprise Reference Architecture   The Enterprise Reference Architecture (RA) fills the gap between the concepts and vocabulary defined by the reference model and the implementation. Reference architecture provides detailed architectural information in a common format such that solutions can be repeatedly designed and deployed in a consistent, high-quality, supportable fashion. This paper attempts to describe the Reference Architecture for the Telecom Application Usage and how to achieve the Enterprise Level Reference Architecture using SOA.   • Telecom Reference Architecture • Enterprise SOA based Reference Architecture   Telecom Reference Architecture   Tele Management Forum’s New Generation Operations Systems and Software (NGOSS) is an architectural framework for organizing, integrating, and implementing telecom systems. NGOSS is a component-based framework consisting of the following elements:   ·       The enhanced Telecom Operations Map (eTOM) is a business process framework. ·       The Shared Information Data (SID) model provides a comprehensive information framework that may be specialized for the needs of a particular organization. ·       The Telecom Application Map (TAM) is an application framework to depict the functional footprint of applications, relative to the horizontal processes within eTOM. ·       The Technology Neutral Architecture (TNA) is an integrated framework. TNA is an architecture that is sustainable through technology changes.   NGOSS Architecture Standards are:   ·       Centralized data ·       Loosely coupled distributed systems ·       Application components/re-use  ·       A technology-neutral system framework with technology specific implementations ·       Interoperability to service provider data/processes ·       Allows more re-use of business components across multiple business scenarios ·       Workflow automation   The traditional operator systems architecture consists of four layers,   ·       Business Support System (BSS) layer, with focus toward customers and business partners. Manages order, subscriber, pricing, rating, and billing information. ·       Operations Support System (OSS) layer, built around product, service, and resource inventories. ·       Networks layer – consists of Network elements and 3rd Party Systems. ·       Integration Layer – to maximize application communication and overall solution flexibility.   Reference architecture for telecom enterprises is depicted below. @font-face { font-family: "Arial"; }@font-face { font-family: "Courier New"; }@font-face { font-family: "Wingdings"; }@font-face { font-family: "Cambria"; }p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoCaption, li.MsoCaption, div.MsoCaption { margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt; font-size: 9pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: rgb(79, 129, 189); font-weight: bold; }p.MsoListParagraph, li.MsoListParagraph, div.MsoListParagraph { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; }ol { margin-bottom: 0cm; }ul { margin-bottom: 0cm; } Figure 2. Telecom Reference Architecture   The major building blocks of any Telecom Service Provider architecture are as follows:   1. Customer Relationship Management   CRM encompasses the end-to-end lifecycle of the customer: customer initiation/acquisition, sales, ordering, and service activation, customer care and support, proactive campaigns, cross sell/up sell, and retention/loyalty.   CRM also includes the collection of customer information and its application to personalize, customize, and integrate delivery of service to a customer, as well as to identify opportunities for increasing the value of the customer to the enterprise.   The key functionalities related to Customer Relationship Management are   ·       Manage the end-to-end lifecycle of a customer request for products. ·       Create and manage customer profiles. ·       Manage all interactions with customers – inquiries, requests, and responses. ·       Provide updates to Billing and other south bound systems on customer/account related updates such as customer/ account creation, deletion, modification, request bills, final bill, duplicate bills, credit limits through Middleware. ·       Work with Order Management System, Product, and Service Management components within CRM. ·       Manage customer preferences – Involve all the touch points and channels to the customer, including contact center, retail stores, dealers, self service, and field service, as well as via any media (phone, face to face, web, mobile device, chat, email, SMS, mail, the customer's bill, etc.). ·       Support single interface for customer contact details, preferences, account details, offers, customer premise equipment, bill details, bill cycle details, and customer interactions.   CRM applications interact with customers through customer touch points like portals, point-of-sale terminals, interactive voice response systems, etc. The requests by customers are sent via fulfillment/provisioning to billing system for ordering processing.   2. Billing and Revenue Management   Billing and Revenue Management handles the collection of appropriate usage records and production of timely and accurate bills – for providing pre-bill usage information and billing to customers; for processing their payments; and for performing payment collections. In addition, it handles customer inquiries about bills, provides billing inquiry status, and is responsible for resolving billing problems to the customer's satisfaction in a timely manner. This process grouping also supports prepayment for services.   The key functionalities provided by these applications are   ·       To ensure that enterprise revenue is billed and invoices delivered appropriately to customers. ·       To manage customers’ billing accounts, process their payments, perform payment collections, and monitor the status of the account balance. ·       To ensure the timely and effective fulfillment of all customer bill inquiries and complaints. ·       Collect the usage records from mediation and ensure appropriate rating and discounting of all usage and pricing. ·       Support revenue sharing; split charging where usage is guided to an account different from the service consumer. ·       Support prepaid and post-paid rating. ·       Send notification on approach / exceeding the usage thresholds as enforced by the subscribed offer, and / or as setup by the customer. ·       Support prepaid, post paid, and hybrid (where some services are prepaid and the rest of the services post paid) customers and conversion from post paid to prepaid, and vice versa. ·       Support different billing function requirements like charge prorating, promotion, discount, adjustment, waiver, write-off, account receivable, GL Interface, late payment fee, credit control, dunning, account or service suspension, re-activation, expiry, termination, contract violation penalty, etc. ·       Initiate direct debit to collect payment against an invoice outstanding. ·       Send notification to Middleware on different events; for example, payment receipt, pre-suspension, threshold exceed, etc.   Billing systems typically get usage data from mediation systems for rating and billing. They get provisioning requests from order management systems and inquiries from CRM systems. Convergent and real-time billing systems can directly get usage details from network elements.   3. Mediation   Mediation systems transform/translate the Raw or Native Usage Data Records into a general format that is acceptable to billing for their rating purposes.   The following lists the high-level roles and responsibilities executed by the Mediation system in the end-to-end solution.   ·       Collect Usage Data Records from different data sources – like network elements, routers, servers – via different protocol and interfaces. ·       Process Usage Data Records – Mediation will process Usage Data Records as per the source format. ·       Validate Usage Data Records from each source. ·       Segregates Usage Data Records coming from each source to multiple, based on the segregation requirement of end Application. ·       Aggregates Usage Data Records based on the aggregation rule if any from different sources. ·       Consolidates multiple Usage Data Records from each source. ·       Delivers formatted Usage Data Records to different end application like Billing, Interconnect, Fraud Management, etc. ·       Generates audit trail for incoming Usage Data Records and keeps track of all the Usage Data Records at various stages of mediation process. ·       Checks duplicate Usage Data Records across files for a given time window.   4. Fulfillment   This area is responsible for providing customers with their requested products in a timely and correct manner. It translates the customer's business or personal need into a solution that can be delivered using the specific products in the enterprise's portfolio. This process informs the customers of the status of their purchase order, and ensures completion on time, as well as ensuring a delighted customer. These processes are responsible for accepting and issuing orders. They deal with pre-order feasibility determination, credit authorization, order issuance, order status and tracking, customer update on customer order activities, and customer notification on order completion. Order management and provisioning applications fall into this category.   The key functionalities provided by these applications are   ·       Issuing new customer orders, modifying open customer orders, or canceling open customer orders; ·       Verifying whether specific non-standard offerings sought by customers are feasible and supportable; ·       Checking the credit worthiness of customers as part of the customer order process; ·       Testing the completed offering to ensure it is working correctly; ·       Updating of the Customer Inventory Database to reflect that the specific product offering has been allocated, modified, or cancelled; ·       Assigning and tracking customer provisioning activities; ·       Managing customer provisioning jeopardy conditions; and ·       Reporting progress on customer orders and other processes to customer.   These applications typically get orders from CRM systems. They interact with network elements and billing systems for fulfillment of orders.   5. Enterprise Management   This process area includes those processes that manage enterprise-wide activities and needs, or have application within the enterprise as a whole. They encompass all business management processes that   ·       Are necessary to support the whole of the enterprise, including processes for financial management, legal management, regulatory management, process, cost, and quality management, etc.;   ·       Are responsible for setting corporate policies, strategies, and directions, and for providing guidelines and targets for the whole of the business, including strategy development and planning for areas, such as Enterprise Architecture, that are integral to the direction and development of the business;   ·       Occur throughout the enterprise, including processes for project management, performance assessments, cost assessments, etc.     (i) Enterprise Risk Management:   Enterprise Risk Management focuses on assuring that risks and threats to the enterprise value and/or reputation are identified, and appropriate controls are in place to minimize or eliminate the identified risks. The identified risks may be physical or logical/virtual. Successful risk management ensures that the enterprise can support its mission critical operations, processes, applications, and communications in the face of serious incidents such as security threats/violations and fraud attempts. Two key areas covered in Risk Management by telecom operators are:   ·       Revenue Assurance: Revenue assurance system will be responsible for identifying revenue loss scenarios across components/systems, and will help in rectifying the problems. The following lists the high-level roles and responsibilities executed by the Revenue Assurance system in the end-to-end solution. o   Identify all usage information dropped when networks are being upgraded. o   Interconnect bill verification. o   Identify where services are routinely provisioned but never billed. o   Identify poor sales policies that are intensifying collections problems. o   Find leakage where usage is sent to error bucket and never billed for. o   Find leakage where field service, CRM, and network build-out are not optimized.   ·       Fraud Management: Involves collecting data from different systems to identify abnormalities in traffic patterns, usage patterns, and subscription patterns to report suspicious activity that might suggest fraudulent usage of resources, resulting in revenue losses to the operator.   The key roles and responsibilities of the system component are as follows:   o   Fraud management system will capture and monitor high usage (over a certain threshold) in terms of duration, value, and number of calls for each subscriber. The threshold for each subscriber is decided by the system and fixed automatically. o   Fraud management will be able to detect the unauthorized access to services for certain subscribers. These subscribers may have been provided unauthorized services by employees. The component will raise the alert to the operator the very first time of such illegal calls or calls which are not billed. o   The solution will be to have an alarm management system that will deliver alarms to the operator/provider whenever it detects a fraud, thus minimizing fraud by catching it the first time it occurs. o   The Fraud Management system will be capable of interfacing with switches, mediation systems, and billing systems   (ii) Knowledge Management   This process focuses on knowledge management, technology research within the enterprise, and the evaluation of potential technology acquisitions.   Key responsibilities of knowledge base management are to   ·       Maintain knowledge base – Creation and updating of knowledge base on ongoing basis. ·       Search knowledge base – Search of knowledge base on keywords or category browse ·       Maintain metadata – Management of metadata on knowledge base to ensure effective management and search. ·       Run report generator. ·       Provide content – Add content to the knowledge base, e.g., user guides, operational manual, etc.   (iii) Document Management   It focuses on maintaining a repository of all electronic documents or images of paper documents relevant to the enterprise using a system.   (iv) Data Management   It manages data as a valuable resource for any enterprise. For telecom enterprises, the typical areas covered are Master Data Management, Data Warehousing, and Business Intelligence. It is also responsible for data governance, security, quality, and database management.   Key responsibilities of Data Management are   ·       Using ETL, extract the data from CRM, Billing, web content, ERP, campaign management, financial, network operations, asset management info, customer contact data, customer measures, benchmarks, process data, e.g., process inputs, outputs, and measures, into Enterprise Data Warehouse. ·       Management of data traceability with source, data related business rules/decisions, data quality, data cleansing data reconciliation, competitors data – storage for all the enterprise data (customer profiles, products, offers, revenues, etc.) ·       Get online update through night time replication or physical backup process at regular frequency. ·       Provide the data access to business intelligence and other systems for their analysis, report generation, and use.   (v) Business Intelligence   It uses the Enterprise Data to provide the various analysis and reports that contain prospects and analytics for customer retention, acquisition of new customers due to the offers, and SLAs. It will generate right and optimized plans – bolt-ons for the customers.   The following lists the high-level roles and responsibilities executed by the Business Intelligence system at the Enterprise Level:   ·       It will do Pattern analysis and reports problem. ·       It will do Data Analysis – Statistical analysis, data profiling, affinity analysis of data, customer segment wise usage patterns on offers, products, service and revenue generation against services and customer segments. ·       It will do Performance (business, system, and forecast) analysis, churn propensity, response time, and SLAs analysis. ·       It will support for online and offline analysis, and report drill down capability. ·       It will collect, store, and report various SLA data. ·       It will provide the necessary intelligence for marketing and working on campaigns, etc., with cost benefit analysis and predictions.   It will advise on customer promotions with additional services based on loyalty and credit history of customer   ·       It will Interface with Enterprise Data Management system for data to run reports and analysis tasks. It will interface with the campaign schedules, based on historical success evidence.   (vi) Stakeholder and External Relations Management   It manages the enterprise's relationship with stakeholders and outside entities. Stakeholders include shareholders, employee organizations, etc. Outside entities include regulators, local community, and unions. Some of the processes within this grouping are Shareholder Relations, External Affairs, Labor Relations, and Public Relations.   (vii) Enterprise Resource Planning   It is used to manage internal and external resources, including tangible assets, financial resources, materials, and human resources. Its purpose is to facilitate the flow of information between all business functions inside the boundaries of the enterprise and manage the connections to outside stakeholders. ERP systems consolidate all business operations into a uniform and enterprise wide system environment.   The key roles and responsibilities for Enterprise System are given below:   ·        It will handle responsibilities such as core accounting, financial, and management reporting. ·       It will interface with CRM for capturing customer account and details. ·       It will interface with billing to capture the billing revenue and other financial data. ·       It will be responsible for executing the dunning process. Billing will send the required feed to ERP for execution of dunning. ·       It will interface with the CRM and Billing through batch interfaces. Enterprise management systems are like horizontals in the enterprise and typically interact with all major telecom systems. E.g., an ERP system interacts with CRM, Fulfillment, and Billing systems for different kinds of data exchanges.   6. External Interfaces/Touch Points   The typical external parties are customers, suppliers/partners, employees, shareholders, and other stakeholders. External interactions from/to a Service Provider to other parties can be achieved by a variety of mechanisms, including:   ·       Exchange of emails or faxes ·       Call Centers ·       Web Portals ·       Business-to-Business (B2B) automated transactions   These applications provide an Internet technology driven interface to external parties to undertake a variety of business functions directly for themselves. These can provide fully or partially automated service to external parties through various touch points.   Typical characteristics of these touch points are   ·       Pre-integrated self-service system, including stand-alone web framework or integration front end with a portal engine ·       Self services layer exposing atomic web services/APIs for reuse by multiple systems across the architectural environment ·       Portlets driven connectivity exposing data and services interoperability through a portal engine or web application   These touch points mostly interact with the CRM systems for requests, inquiries, and responses.   7. Middleware   The component will be primarily responsible for integrating the different systems components under a common platform. It should provide a Standards-Based Platform for building Service Oriented Architecture and Composite Applications. The following lists the high-level roles and responsibilities executed by the Middleware component in the end-to-end solution.   ·       As an integration framework, covering to and fro interfaces ·       Provide a web service framework with service registry. ·       Support SOA framework with SOA service registry. ·       Each of the interfaces from / to Middleware to other components would handle data transformation, translation, and mapping of data points. ·       Receive data from the caller / activate and/or forward the data to the recipient system in XML format. ·       Use standard XML for data exchange. ·       Provide the response back to the service/call initiator. ·       Provide a tracking until the response completion. ·       Keep a store transitional data against each call/transaction. ·       Interface through Middleware to get any information that is possible and allowed from the existing systems to enterprise systems; e.g., customer profile and customer history, etc. ·       Provide the data in a common unified format to the SOA calls across systems, and follow the Enterprise Architecture directive. ·       Provide an audit trail for all transactions being handled by the component.   8. Network Elements   The term Network Element means a facility or equipment used in the provision of a telecommunications service. Such terms also includes features, functions, and capabilities that are provided by means of such facility or equipment, including subscriber numbers, databases, signaling systems, and information sufficient for billing and collection or used in the transmission, routing, or other provision of a telecommunications service.   Typical network elements in a GSM network are Home Location Register (HLR), Intelligent Network (IN), Mobile Switching Center (MSC), SMS Center (SMSC), and network elements for other value added services like Push-to-talk (PTT), Ring Back Tone (RBT), etc.   Network elements are invoked when subscribers use their telecom devices for any kind of usage. These elements generate usage data and pass it on to downstream systems like mediation and billing system for rating and billing. They also integrate with provisioning systems for order/service fulfillment.   9. 3rd Party Applications   3rd Party systems are applications like content providers, payment gateways, point of sale terminals, and databases/applications maintained by the Government.   Depending on applicability and the type of functionality provided by 3rd party applications, the integration with different telecom systems like CRM, provisioning, and billing will be done.   10. Service Delivery Platform   A service delivery platform (SDP) provides the architecture for the rapid deployment, provisioning, execution, management, and billing of value added telecom services. SDPs are based on the concept of SOA and layered architecture. They support the delivery of voice, data services, and content in network and device-independent fashion. They allow application developers to aggregate network capabilities, services, and sources of content. SDPs typically contain layers for web services exposure, service application development, and network abstraction.   SOA Reference Architecture   SOA concept is based on the principle of developing reusable business service and building applications by composing those services, instead of building monolithic applications in silos. It’s about bridging the gap between business and IT through a set of business-aligned IT services, using a set of design principles, patterns, and techniques.   In an SOA, resources are made available to participants in a value net, enterprise, line of business (typically spanning multiple applications within an enterprise or across multiple enterprises). It consists of a set of business-aligned IT services that collectively fulfill an organization’s business processes and goals. We can choreograph these services into composite applications and invoke them through standard protocols. SOA, apart from agility and reusability, enables:   ·       The business to specify processes as orchestrations of reusable services ·       Technology agnostic business design, with technology hidden behind service interface ·       A contractual-like interaction between business and IT, based on service SLAs ·       Accountability and governance, better aligned to business services ·       Applications interconnections untangling by allowing access only through service interfaces, reducing the daunting side effects of change ·       Reduced pressure to replace legacy and extended lifetime for legacy applications, through encapsulation in services   ·       A Cloud Computing paradigm, using web services technologies, that makes possible service outsourcing on an on-demand, utility-like, pay-per-usage basis   The following section represents the Reference Architecture of logical view for the Telecom Solution. The new custom built application needs to align with this logical architecture in the long run to achieve EA benefits.   Packaged implementation applications, such as ERP billing applications, need to expose their functions as service providers (as other applications consume) and interact with other applications as service consumers.   COT applications need to expose services through wrappers such as adapters to utilize existing resources and at the same time achieve Enterprise Architecture goal and objectives.   The following are the various layers for Enterprise level deployment of SOA. This diagram captures the abstract view of Enterprise SOA layers and important components of each layer. Layered architecture means decomposition of services such that most interactions occur between adjacent layers. However, there is no strict rule that top layers should not directly communicate with bottom layers.   The diagram below represents the important logical pieces that would result from overall SOA transformation. @font-face { font-family: "Arial"; }@font-face { font-family: "Courier New"; }@font-face { font-family: "Wingdings"; }@font-face { font-family: "Cambria"; }p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoCaption, li.MsoCaption, div.MsoCaption { margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt; font-size: 9pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: rgb(79, 129, 189); font-weight: bold; }p.MsoListParagraph, li.MsoListParagraph, div.MsoListParagraph { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; }ol { margin-bottom: 0cm; }ul { margin-bottom: 0cm; } Figure 3. Enterprise SOA Reference Architecture 1.          Operational System Layer: This layer consists of all packaged applications like CRM, ERP, custom built applications, COTS based applications like Billing, Revenue Management, Fulfilment, and the Enterprise databases that are essential and contribute directly or indirectly to the Enterprise OSS/BSS Transformation.   ERP holds the data of Asset Lifecycle Management, Supply Chain, and Advanced Procurement and Human Capital Management, etc.   CRM holds the data related to Order, Sales, and Marketing, Customer Care, Partner Relationship Management, Loyalty, etc.   Content Management handles Enterprise Search and Query. Billing application consists of the following components:   ·       Collections Management, Customer Billing Management, Invoices, Real-Time Rating, Discounting, and Applying of Charges ·       Enterprise databases will hold both the application and service data, whether structured or unstructured.   MDM - Master data majorly consists of Customer, Order, Product, and Service Data.     2.          Enterprise Component Layer:   This layer consists of the Application Services and Common Services that are responsible for realizing the functionality and maintaining the QoS of the exposed services. This layer uses container-based technologies such as application servers to implement the components, workload management, high availability, and load balancing.   Application Services: This Service Layer enables application, technology, and database abstraction so that the complex accessing logic is hidden from the other service layers. This is a basic service layer, which exposes application functionalities and data as reusable services. The three types of the Application access services are:   ·       Application Access Service: This Service Layer exposes application level functionalities as a reusable service between BSS to BSS and BSS to OSS integration. This layer is enabled using disparate technology such as Web Service, Integration Servers, and Adaptors, etc.   ·       Data Access Service: This Service Layer exposes application data services as a reusable reference data service. This is done via direct interaction with application data. and provides the federated query.   ·       Network Access Service: This Service Layer exposes provisioning layer as a reusable service from OSS to OSS integration. This integration service emphasizes the need for high performance, stateless process flows, and distributed design.   Common Services encompasses management of structured, semi-structured, and unstructured data such as information services, portal services, interaction services, infrastructure services, and security services, etc.   3.          Integration Layer:   This consists of service infrastructure components like service bus, service gateway for partner integration, service registry, service repository, and BPEL processor. Service bus will carry the service invocation payloads/messages between consumers and providers. The other important functions expected from it are itinerary based routing, distributed caching of routing information, transformations, and all qualities of service for messaging-like reliability, scalability, and availability, etc. Service registry will hold all contracts (wsdl) of services, and it helps developers to locate or discover service during design time or runtime.   • BPEL processor would be useful in orchestrating the services to compose a complex business scenario or process. • Workflow and business rules management are also required to support manual triggering of certain activities within business process. based on the rules setup and also the state machine information. Application, data, and service mediation layer typically forms the overall composite application development framework or SOA Framework.   4.          Business Process Layer: These are typically the intermediate services layer and represent Shared Business Process Services. At Enterprise Level, these services are from Customer Management, Order Management, Billing, Finance, and Asset Management application domains.   5.          Access Layer: This layer consists of portals for Enterprise and provides a single view of Enterprise information management and dashboard services.   6.          Channel Layer: This consists of various devices; applications that form part of extended enterprise; browsers through which users access the applications.   7.          Client Layer: This designates the different types of users accessing the enterprise applications. The type of user typically would be an important factor in determining the level of access to applications.   8.          Vertical pieces like management, monitoring, security, and development cut across all horizontal layers Management and monitoring involves all aspects of SOA-like services, SLAs, and other QoS lifecycle processes for both applications and services surrounding SOA governance.     9.          EA Governance, Reference Architecture, Roadmap, Principles, and Best Practices:   EA Governance is important in terms of providing the overall direction to SOA implementation within the enterprise. This involves board-level involvement, in addition to business and IT executives. At a high level, this involves managing the SOA projects implementation, managing SOA infrastructure, and controlling the entire effort through all fine-tuned IT processes in accordance with COBIT (Control Objectives for Information Technology).   Devising tools and techniques to promote reuse culture, and the SOA way of doing things needs competency centers to be established in addition to training the workforce to take up new roles that are suited to SOA journey.   Conclusions   Reference Architectures can serve as the basis for disparate architecture efforts throughout the organization, even if they use different tools and technologies. Reference architectures provide best practices and approaches in the independent way a vendor deals with technology and standards. Reference Architectures model the abstract architectural elements for an enterprise independent of the technologies, protocols, and products that are used to implement an SOA. Telecom enterprises today are facing significant business and technology challenges due to growing competition, a multitude of services, and convergence. Adopting architectural best practices could go a long way in meeting these challenges. The use of SOA-based architecture for communication to each of the external systems like Billing, CRM, etc., in OSS/BSS system has made the architecture very loosely coupled, with greater flexibility. Any change in the external systems would be absorbed at the Integration Layer without affecting the rest of the ecosystem. The use of a Business Process Management (BPM) tool makes the management and maintenance of the business processes easy, with better performance in terms of lead time, quality, and cost. Since the Architecture is based on standards, it will lower the cost of deploying and managing OSS/BSS applications over their lifecycles.

  Read the article

• Webby Nominations for Retail

  - by David Dorf

  The Webby Awards were created back in 1996 when the internet was just a baby. This is their 14th year of highlighting excellence on the Web, and there are lots of great nominations. Its quite amazing to see the rich content and interactivity of today's websites. Some interesting nominees for this year are: Sephora did a campaign at Christmas, and what remains of the Sephora Clause website is a bunch of wishes. The Starbucks "All you need is Love" campaign has lots of cool videos. The Sound Check from Walmart highlights raising music artists. Refinery29 has their fashion info hub. The five nominees in the retail category are: Bugaboo.com's website for selling high-end baby strollers. If you're looking for a high-end bag, check out Crumpler's flash-based e-commerce site. It's highly interactive, but a little on the slow side. I Make My Case sells custom designed iPod/iPhone and Blackberry cases. At MOO.com, they love to print. Tons of art for printing customized business cards, post cards, etc. If you want light shoes, check out Puma L.I.F.T. and see just how light shoes can weigh. Check them out, cast a few votes, and see if you're inspired to create something even better.

  Read the article

• Testing radius server from Mac OS X client

  - by Calvin Froedge

  I have a radius server set up on a server running Ubuntu 11.04. I have configured my switch to use the authentication server's IP (192.168.1.2) for RADIUS / 802.1x authentication, and I created a connection to test connecting from my Mac OSX client. Here is my radius configuration for the client: client 192.168.1.0/16 { secret = testing123 } I can successfully authenticate using both 127.0.0.1 (localhost) and 192.168.1.2 (ip of eth1), so I know radius is getting those requests. I set up a connection to test from my macbook, and my requests are timing out. http://screencast.com/t/tMhRLS3H7 Is there a better way to test the radius connection from my macbook? Thanks! UPDATE: I was able to successfully test on Mac OSX client using RadPerf. This is available as a cross-platform command line tool.

  Read the article

• Microsoft Office document is "locked for editing by 'another user'"

  - by Chris

  A few of my users are in and out of various Excel 2007 spreadsheets all day. One of them reports that "50% of the time" she tries to open a spreadsheet from the file server, an information message comes up stating: foo.xlsx is locked for editing by 'another user'. Open "Read-Only" or click "Notify" to open read-only and receive notification when the document is no longer in use. Nine times out of ten the document is not open by another user. My users immediately try to open the same document again, and it works. I imagine this is caused by Excel leaving owner files on the server, but I do not know why. An added clue: When one of my users selects "Notify," a dialog pops up in a moment informing them the file is available for them to edit. Any guidance on how to solve this issue and make my users' days flow better?

  Read the article

< Previous Page | 369 370 371 372 373 374 375 376 377 378 379 380  | Next Page >