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• SQL SERVER – DMV – sys.dm_exec_query_optimizer_info – Statistics of Optimizer

  - by pinaldave

  Incredibly, SQL Server has so much information to share with us. Every single day, I am amazed with this SQL Server technology. Sometimes I find several interesting information by just querying few of the DMV. And when I present this info in front of my client during performance tuning consultancy, they are surprised with my findings. Today, I am going to share one of the hidden gems of DMV with you, the one which I frequently use to understand what’s going on under the hood of SQL Server. SQL Server keeps the record of most of the operations of the Query Optimizer. We can learn many interesting details about the optimizer which can be utilized to improve the performance of server. SELECT * FROM sys.dm_exec_query_optimizer_info WHERE counter IN ('optimizations', 'elapsed time','final cost', 'insert stmt','delete stmt','update stmt', 'merge stmt','contains subquery','tables', 'hints','order hint','join hint', 'view reference','remote query','maximum DOP', 'maximum recursion level','indexed views loaded', 'indexed views matched','indexed views used', 'indexed views updated','dynamic cursor request', 'fast forward cursor request') All occurrence values are cumulative and are set to 0 at system restart. All values for value fields are set to NULL at system restart. I have removed a few of the internal counters from the script above, and kept only documented details. Let us check the result of the above query. As you can see, there is so much vital information that is revealed in above query. I can easily say so many things about how many times Optimizer was triggered and what the average time taken by it to optimize my queries was. Additionally, I can also determine how many times update, insert or delete statements were optimized. I was able to quickly figure out that my client was overusing the Query Hints using this dynamic management view. If you have been reading my blog, I am sure you are aware of my series related to SQL Server Views SQL SERVER – The Limitations of the Views – Eleven and more…. With this, I can take a quick look and figure out how many times Views were used in various solutions within the query. Moreover, you can easily know what fraction of the optimizations has been involved in tuning server. For example, the following query would tell me, in total optimizations, what the fraction of time View was “reference“. As this View also includes system Views and DMVs, the number is a bit higher on my machine. SELECT (SELECT CAST (occurrence AS FLOAT) FROM sys.dm_exec_query_optimizer_info WHERE counter = 'view reference') / (SELECT CAST (occurrence AS FLOAT) FROM sys.dm_exec_query_optimizer_info WHERE counter = 'optimizations') AS ViewReferencedFraction Reference : Pinal Dave (http://blog.SQLAuthority.com) Filed under: Pinal Dave, PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL DMV, SQL Optimization, SQL Performance, SQL Query, SQL Scripts, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, SQLServer, T SQL, Technology

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• SQL SERVER – DMV – sys.dm_os_waiting_tasks and sys.dm_exec_requests – Wait Type – Day 4 of 28

  - by pinaldave

  Previously, we covered the DMV sys.dm_os_wait_stats, and also saw how it can be useful to identify the major resource bottleneck. However, at the same time, we discussed that this is only useful when we are looking at an instance-level picture. Quite often we want to know about the processes going in our server at the given instant. Here is the query for the same. This DMV is written taking the following into consideration: we want to analyze the queries that are currently running or which have recently ran and their plan is still in the cache. SELECT dm_ws.wait_duration_ms, dm_ws.wait_type, dm_es.status, dm_t.TEXT, dm_qp.query_plan, dm_ws.session_ID, dm_es.cpu_time, dm_es.memory_usage, dm_es.logical_reads, dm_es.total_elapsed_time, dm_es.program_name, DB_NAME(dm_r.database_id) DatabaseName, -- Optional columns dm_ws.blocking_session_id, dm_r.wait_resource, dm_es.login_name, dm_r.command, dm_r.last_wait_type FROM sys.dm_os_waiting_tasks dm_ws INNER JOIN sys.dm_exec_requests dm_r ON dm_ws.session_id = dm_r.session_id INNER JOIN sys.dm_exec_sessions dm_es ON dm_es.session_id = dm_r.session_id CROSS APPLY sys.dm_exec_sql_text (dm_r.sql_handle) dm_t CROSS APPLY sys.dm_exec_query_plan (dm_r.plan_handle) dm_qp WHERE dm_es.is_user_process = 1 GO You can change CROSS APPLY to OUTER APPLY if you want to see all the details which are omitted because of the plan cache. Let us analyze the result of the above query and see how it can be helpful to identify the query and the kind of wait type it creates. Click to Enlarage The above query will return various columns. There are various columns that provide very important details. e.g. wait_duration_ms – it indicates current wait for the query that executes at that point of time. wait_type – it indicates the current wait type for the query text – indicates the query text query_plan – when clicked on the same, it will display the query plans There are many other important information like CPU_time, memory_usage, and logical_reads, which can be read from the query as well. In future posts on this series, we will see how once identified wait type we can attempt to reduce the same. Read all the post in the Wait Types and Queue series. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com) Filed under: DMV, Pinal Dave, PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL DMV, SQL Query, SQL Scripts, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, SQL Wait Stats, SQL Wait Types, T SQL, Technology

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• Windows Azure Use Case: Infrastructure Limits

  - by BuckWoody

  This is one in a series of posts on when and where to use a distributed architecture design in your organization's computing needs. You can find the main post here: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/buckwoody/archive/2011/01/18/windows-azure-and-sql-azure-use-cases.aspx  Description: Physical hardware components take up room, use electricity, create heat and therefore need cooling, and require wiring and special storage units. all of these requirements cost money to rent at a data-center or to build out at a local facility. In some cases, this can be a catalyst for evaluating options to remove this infrastructure requirement entirely by moving to a distributed computing environment. Implementation: There are three main options for moving to a distributed computing environment. Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) The first option is simply to virtualize the current hardware and move the VM’s to a provider. You can do this with Microsoft’s Hyper-V product or other software, build the systems and host them locally on fewer physical machines. This is a good option for canned-applications (where you have to type setup.exe) but not as useful for custom applications, as you still have to license and patch those servers, and there are hard limits on the VM sizes. Software as a Service (SaaS) If there is already software available that does what you need, it may make sense to simply purchase not only the software license but the use of it on the vendor’s servers. Microsoft’s Exchange Online is an example of simply using an offering from a vendor on their servers. If you do not need a great deal of customization, have no interest in owning or extending the source code, and need to implement a solution quickly, this is a good choice. Platform as a Service (PaaS) If you do need to write software for your environment, your next choice is a Platform as a Service such as Windows Azure. In this case you no longer manager physical or even virtual servers. You start at the code and data level of control and responsibility, and your focus is more on the design and maintenance of the application itself. In this case you own the source code and can extend or change it as you see fit. An interesting side-benefit to using Windows Azure as a PaaS is that the Application Fabric component allows a hybrid approach, which gives you a basis to allow on-premise applications to leverage distributed computing paradigms. No one solution fits every situation. It’s common to see organizations pick a mixture of on-premise, IaaS, SaaS and PaaS components. In fact, that’s a great advantage to this form of computing - choice. References: 5 Enterprise steps for adopting a Platform as a Service: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/davidmcg/archive/2010/12/02/5-enterprise-steps-for-adopting-a-platform-as-a-service.aspx?wa=wsignin1.0  Application Patterns for the Cloud: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/kashif/archive/2010/08/07/application-patterns-for-the-cloud.aspx

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• SQL SERVER – SQL Server High Availability Options – Notes from the Field #032

  - by Pinal Dave

  [Notes from Pinal]: When it is about High Availability or Disaster Recovery, I often see people getting confused. There are so many options available that when the user has to select what is the most optimal solution for their organization they are often confused. Most of the people even know the salient features of various options, but when they have to figure out one single option to use they are often not sure which option to use. I like to give ask my dear friend time all these kinds of complicated questions. He has a skill to make a complex subject very simple and easy to understand. Linchpin People are database coaches and wellness experts for a data driven world. In this 26th episode of the Notes from the Fields series database expert Tim Radney (partner at Linchpin People) explains in a very simple words the best High Availability Option for your SQL Server.  Working with SQL Server a common challenge we are faced with is providing the maximum uptime possible.  To meet these demands we have to design a solution to provide High Availability (HA). Microsoft SQL Server depending on your edition provides you with several options.  This could be database mirroring, log shipping, failover clusters, availability groups or replication. Each possible solution comes with pro’s and con’s.  Not anyone one solution fits all scenarios so understanding which solution meets which need is important.  As with anything IT related, you need to fully understand your requirements before trying to solution the problem.  When it comes to building an HA solution, you need to understand the risk your organization needs to mitigate the most. I have found that most are concerned about hardware failure and OS failures. Other common concerns are data corruption or storage issues.  For data corruption or storage issues you can mitigate those concerns by having a second copy of the databases. That can be accomplished with database mirroring, log shipping, replication or availability groups with a secondary replica.  Failover clustering and virtualization with shared storage do not provide redundancy of the data. I recently created a chart outlining some pros and cons of each of the technologies that I posted on my blog. I like to use this chart to help illustrate how each technology provides a certain number of benefits.  Each of these solutions carries with it some level of cost and complexity.  As a database professional we should all be familiar with these technologies so we can make the best possible choice for our organization. If you want me to take a look at your server and its settings, or if your server is facing any issue we can Fix Your SQL Server. Note: Tim has also written an excellent book on SQL Backup and Recovery, a must have for everyone. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com)Filed under: Notes from the Field, PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Performance, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL Tagged: Shrinking Database

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• It's Coming: Chalk Talk with John

  - by Tanu Sood

  ...John Brunswick that is. Who is this John Brunswick, you ask? John Brunswick is an Enterprise Architect with Oracle. As an Oracle Enterprise Architect, John focuses on the alignment of technical capabilities in support of business vision and objectives, as well as the overall business value of technology. What's more he is pretty handy with animation and digital videos as you will see shortly. Starting tomorrow, we will host a bi-weekly column with John called "Chalk Talk with John". Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii- mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi- mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;} In our "Chalk Talk with John" series, John will leverage his skills, experience and expertise (& his passion in digital animation) to discuss technology in business terms or as he puts it "so my ma understands what I do for a living". Through this series, John will explore the practical value of Middleware in the context of two fictional communities, shared through analogies aligned to enterprise technology.  This format offers business stakeholders and IT a common language for understanding the benefits of technology in support of their business initiatives, regardless of their current level of technical knowledge. So, be sure to tune in tomorrow and every 2 weeks for "Chalk Talk with John".

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• Cloud Application Management for Platforms

  - by user756764

  Today Oracle, along with CloudBees, Cloudsoft, Huawei, Rackspace, Red Hat, and Software AG, published the Cloud Application Management for Platforms (CAMP) specification. This spec deals with application management in the context of PaaS. It defines a model (consisting of a set resources and their relationships), a REST-based API for manipulating that model, and a packaging format for getting applications (and their attendant metadata) into and out of the platform. My colleague, Mark Carlson, has already provided an excellent writeup on the spec here. The following, additional points bear emphasizing: CAMP is language, framework and platform neutral; it should be equally applicable to the task of deploying and managing Ruby on Rails applications as Java/Spring applications (as Node.js applications, etc.) CAMP only covers the interactions between a Cloud Consumer and a Cloud Provider (using the definitions of these terms provided in the NIST Cloud Computing Reference Architecture). The internal APIs used by the Cloud Provider to, for example, deploy additional platform services (e.g. a new message queuing service) are out of CAMP's scope. CAMP supports the management of the entire lifecycle of the application (e.g. start/stop, suspend/resume, etc.) not just the deployment of the components that make up the application. Complexity is the antithesis of interoperability. One of CAMP's goals is to be as broadly interoperable as possible. To this end, the authors of CAMP tried to "make things as simple as possible, but no simpler". For example, JSON is the only serialization format used in the spec (although Providers can extend this to support additional serialization formats such as XML). It remains to be seen whether we can preserve this simplicity as the spec is processed by OASIS. So far, those who have indicated an interest in collaborating on the spec seem to be of a like mind with regards to the need for simplicity. The flip side to simplicity is the knowledge that you undoubtedly missed something that is important to someone. To make up for this, CAMP is designed to be extensible. The idea is to ship what we know will work, allow implementers to extend the spec, then re-factor the spec to incorporate the most popular extensions. Anyone interested in this effort, particularly those of you using PaaS-level services, is encouraged to join the forthcoming OASIS TC. As you may have noticed, CAMP is a bit of a departure from some of the more monolithic management standards that have preceded it. The idea is to develop simple, discrete standards targeted to address specific interoperability and portability problems and tie these standards together with common patterns based on REST and HATEOAS. I'm excited to see how this idea plays out.

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• Bancassurers Seek IT Solutions to Support Distribution Model

  - by [email protected]

  Oracle Insurance's director of marketing for EMEA, John Sinclair, attended the third annual Bancassurance Forum in Vienna last month. He reports that the outlook for bancassurance in EMEA remains positive, despite changing market conditions that have led a number of bancassurers to re-examine their business models. Vienna is at the crossroads between mature Western European markets, where bancassurance is now an established best practice, and more recently tapped Eastern European markets that offer the greatest growth potential. Attendance at the Bancassurance Forum was good, with 87 bancassurance attendees, most in very senior positions in the industry. The conference provided the chance for a lively discussion among bancassurers looking to keep abreast of the latest trends in one of Europe's most successful distribution models for insurance. Even under normal business conditions, there is a great demand for best practice sharing within the industry as there is no standard formula for success.  Each company has to chart its own course and choose the strategies for sales, products development and the structure of ownership that make sense for their business, and as soon as they get it right bancassurers need to adapt the mix to keep up with ever changing regulations, completion and economic conditions.  To optimize the overall relationship between banking and insurance for mutual benefit, a balance needs to be struck between potentially conflicting interests. The banking side of the house is looking for greater wallet share from its customers and the ability to increase profitability by bundling insurance products with higher margins - especially in light of the recent economic crisis, where margins for traditional banking products are low and completion high. The insurance side of the house seeks access to new customers through a complementary distribution channel that is efficient and cost effective. To make the relationship work, it is important that both sides of the same house forge strategic and long term relationships - irrespective of whether the underlying business model is supported by a distribution agreement, cross-ownership or other forms of capital structure. However, this third annual conference was not held under normal business conditions. The conference took place in challenging, yet interesting times. ING's forced spinoff of its insurance operations under pressure by the EU Commission and the troubling losses suffered by Allianz as a result of the Dresdner bank sale were fresh in everyone's mind. One year after markets crashed, there is now enough hindsight to better understand the implications for bancassurance and best practices that are emerging to deal with them. The loan-driven business that has been crucial to bancassurance up till now evaporated during the crisis, leaving bancassurers grappling with how to change their overall strategy from a loan-driven to a more diversified model.  Attendees came to the conference to learn what strategies were working - not only to cope with the market shift, but to take advantage of it as markets pick up. Over the course of 14 customer case studies and numerous analyst presentations, topical issues ranging from getting the business model right to the impact on capital structuring of Solvency II were debated openly. Many speakers alluded to the need to specifically design insurance products with the banking distribution channel in mind, which brings with it specific requirements such as a high degree of standardization to achieve efficiency and reduce training costs. Moreover, products must be engineered to suit end consumers who consider banks a one-stop shop. The importance of IT to the successful implementation of bancassurance strategies was a theme that surfaced regularly throughout the conference.  The cross-selling opportunity - that will ultimately determine the success or failure of any bancassurance model - can only be fully realized through a flexible IT architecture that enables banking and insurance processes to be integrated and presented to front-line staff through a common interface. However, the reality is that most bancassurers have legacy IT systems, which constrain the businesses' ability to implement new strategies to maintaining competitiveness in turbulent times. My colleague Glenn Lottering, who chaired the conference, believes that the primary opportunities for bancassurers to extract value from their IT infrastructure investments lie in distribution management, risk management with the advent of Solvency II, and achieving operational excellence. "Oracle is ideally suited to meet the needs of bancassurance," Glenn noted, "supplying market-leading software for both banking and insurance. Oracle provides adaptive systems that let customers easily integrate hybrid business processes from both worlds while leveraging existing IT infrastructure." Overall, the consensus at the conference was that the outlook for bancassurance in EMEA remains positive, despite changing market conditions that have led a number of bancassurers to re-examine their business models. John Sinclair is marketing director for Oracle Insurance in EMEA. He has more than 20 years of experience in insurance and financial services.    

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• Skechers Leverages Oracle Applications, Business Intelligence and On Demand Offerings to Drive Long-Term Growth

  - by user801960

  This month Oracle Retail in the USA announced that Skechers - a world leading lifestyle footwear retailer - would be adopting several Oracle Retail products as part of their global growth strategy and to maximise business efficiency.  While based primarily in the USA, Skechers is a respected retailer across the world and has been an Oracle customer since 1997.  The key information about the announcement is below.  To find out more about Skechers visit their website: http://www.skechers.com/  Skechers U.S.A. Inc., an award-winning global leader in the lifestyle footwear industry, has upgraded and expanded its Oracle® Applications investment, implemented Oracle Database and moved to Oracle On Demand, Oracle’s premier cloud service to support rapid growth across its retail and wholesale channels. The new business information systems are part of a larger initiative for the billion-dollar-plus footwear company to fuel growth, reduce total cost of ownership and enable the business to respond faster to market opportunities. With more than 3,000 styles of shoes to design, develop and market, Skechers upgraded to Oracle’s PeopleSoft Enterprise Financial Management and PeopleSoft Supply Chain Management to increase operational efficiencies and improve controls by establishing an integrated, industry-specific platform. An Oracle customer since 1997, Skechers implemented PeopleSoft Enterprise Real Estate Management to meet the rapid growth of its retail stores worldwide. The company is the first customer to go live on the Real Estate Management module and worked closely with Oracle to provide development insight. Skechers also implemented Oracle Fusion Governance, Risk, and Compliance applications. This deployment enabled the company to leverage its existing corporate governance and compliance efforts throughout the global enterprise and more effectively manage the audit processes across multiple business units, processes and systems while reducing audit costs. Next, Skechers leveraged Oracle Financial Analytics, a pre-built Oracle Business Intelligence Application and PeopleSoft Enterprise Project Costing and PeopleSoft Enterprise Contracts to develop a custom Royalty Management dashboard, providing managers with better financial visibility to the company’s licensing contracts. The company switched to Oracle Database and moved database hosting and management to Oracle On Demand to reduce maintenance, implementation and system administration costs. As a result, Skechers is also achieving a better response time and is delivering a higher level of 24x7 support. OSI Consulting, a Platinum partner in Oracle PartnerNetwork (OPN), provided implementation and integration services to Skechers.   To view the full announcement please click here

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• Travelling MVP #4: DevReach 2012

  - by DigiMortal

  Our next stop after Varna was Sofia where DevReach happens. DevReach is one of my favorite conferences in Europe because of sensible prices and strong speakers line-up. Also they have VIP-party after conference and this is good event to meet people you don’t see every day, have some discussion with speakers and find new friends. Our trip from Varna to Sofia took about 6.5 hours on bus. As I was tired from last evening it wasn’t problem for me as I slept half the trip. After smoking pause in Velike Tarnovo I watched movies from bus TV. We had supper later in city center Happy’s – place with good meat dishes and nice service. And next day it begun…. :) DevReach 2012 DevReach is held usually in Arena Mladost. It’s near airport and Telerik office. The event is organized by local MVP Martin Kulov together with Telerik. Two days of sessions with strong speakers is good reason enough for me to go to visit some event. Some topics covered by sessions: Windows 8 development web development SharePoint Windows Azure Windows Phone architecture Visual Studio Practically everybody can find some interesting session in every time slot. As the Arena is not huge it is very easy to go from one sessions to another if selected session for time slot is not what you expected. On the second floor of Arena there are many places where you can eat. There are simple chunk-food places like Burger King and also some restaurants. If you are hungry you will find something for your taste for sure. Also you can buy beer if it is too hot outside :) Weather was very good for October – practically Estonian summer – 25C and over. Sessions I visited Here is the list of sessions I visited at DevReach 2012: DevReach 2012 Opening & Welcome Messsage with Martin Kulov and Stephen Forte Principled N-Tier Solution Design with Steve Smith Data Patterns for the Cloud with Brian Randell .NET Garbage Collection Performance Tips with Sasha Goldshtein Building Secured, Scalable, Low-latency Web Applications with the Windows Azure Platform with Ido Flatow It’s a Knockout! MVVM Style Web Applications with Charles Nurse Web Application Architecture – Lessons Learned from Adobe Brackets with Brian Rinaldi Demystifying Visual Studio 2012 Performance Tools with Martin Kulov SPvNext – A Look At All the Exciting And New Features In SharePoint with Sahil Malik Portable Libraries – Why You Should Care with Lino Tadros I missed some sessions because of some death march projects that are going and that I have to coordinate but it was not big loss as I had time to walk around in session venue neighborhood and see Sofia Business Park. Next year again! I will be there again next year and hopefully more guys from Estonia will join me. I think it’s good idea to take short vacation for DevReach time and do things like we did this time – Bucharest, Varna, Sofia. It’s only good idea to plan some more free time so we are not very much in hurry and also we have no work stuff to do on the trip. This far this trip has been one of best trips I have organized and I will go and meet all those guys in this region again! :)

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• Have you really fixed that problem?

  - by DavidWimbush

  The day before yesterday I saw our main live server's CPU go up to constantly 100% with just the occasional short drop to a lower level. The exact opposite of what you'd want to see. We're log shipping every 15 minutes and part of that involves calling WinRAR to compress the log backups before copying them over. (We're on SQL2005 so there's no native compression and we have bandwidth issues with the connection to our remote site.) I realised the log shipping jobs were taking about 10 minutes and that most of that was spent shipping a 'live' reporting database that is completely rebuilt every 20 minutes. (I'm just trying to keep this stuff alive until I can improve it.) We can rebuild this database in minutes if we have to fail over so I disabled log shipping of that database. The log shipping went down to less than 2 minutes and I went off to the SQL Social evening in London feeling quite pleased with myself. It was a great evening - fun, educational and thought-provoking. Thanks to Simon Sabin & co for laying that on, and thanks too to the guests for making the effort when they must have been pretty worn out after doing DevWeek all day first. The next morning I came down to earth with a bump: CPU still at 100%. WTF? I looked in the activity monitor but it was confusing because some sessions have been running for a long time so it's not a good guide what's using the CPU now. I tried the standard reports showing queries by CPU (average and total) but they only show the top 10 so they just show my big overnight archiving and data cleaning stuff. But the Profiler showed it was four queries used by our new website usage tracking system. Four simple indexes later the CPU was back where it should be: about 20% with occasional short spikes. So the moral is: even when you're convinced you've found the cause and fixed the problem, you HAVE to go back and confirm that the problem has gone. And, yes, I have checked the CPU again today and it's still looking sweet.

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• Know Your Audience, And/Or Your Customer

  - by steve.diamond

  Yesterday I gave an internal presentation to about 20 Oracle employees on "messaging," not messaging technology, but embarking on the process of building messages. One of the elements I covered was the importance of really knowing and understanding your audience. As a humorous reference I included two side-by-side photos of Oakland A's fans and Oakland Raiders fans. The Oakland A's fans looked like happy-go-lucky drunk types. The Oakland Raiders fans looked like angry extras from a low budget horror flick. I then asked my presentation attendees what these two groups had in common. Here's what I heard. --They're human (at least I THINK they're human). --They're from Oakland. --They're sports fans. After that, it was anyone's guess. A few days earlier we were putting the finishing touches on a sales presentation for one of our product lines. We had included an upfront "lead in" addressing how the economy is improving, yet that doesn't mean sales executives will have any more resources to add to their teams, invest in technology, etc. This "lead in" included miscellaneous news article headlines and statistics validating the slowly improving economy. When we subjected this presentation to internal review two days ago, this upfront section in particular was scrutinized. "Is the economy really getting better? I (exclamation point) don't think it's really getting better. Haven't you seen the headlines coming out of Greece and Europe?" Then the question TO ME became, "Who will actually be in the audience that sees and hears this presentation? Will s/he be someone like me? Or will s/he be someone like the critic who didn't like our lead-in?" We took the safe route and removed that lead in. After all, why start a "pitch" with a component that is arguably subjective? What if many of our audience members are individuals at organizations still facing a strong headwind? For reasons I won't go into here, it was the right decision to make. The moral of the story: Make sure you really know your audience. Harness the wisdom of the information your organization's CRM systems collect to get that fully informed "customer view." Conduct formal research. Conduct INFORMAL research. Ask lots of questions. Study industries and scenarios that have nothing to do with yours to see "how they do it." Stop strangers in coffee shops and on the street...seriously. Last week I caught up with an old friend from high school who recently retired from a 25 year career with the USMC. He said, "I can learn something from every single person I come into contact with." What a great way of approaching the world. Then, think about and write down what YOU like and dislike as a customer. But also remember that when it comes to your company's products, you are most likely NOT the customer, so don't go overboard in superimposing your own world view. Approaching the study of customers this way adds rhyme, reason and CONTEXT to lengthy blog posts like this one. Know your audience.

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• Clone a Hard Drive Using an Ubuntu Live CD

  - by Trevor Bekolay

  Whether you’re setting up multiple computers or doing a full backup, cloning hard drives is a common maintenance task. Don’t bother burning a new boot CD or paying for new software – you can do it easily with your Ubuntu Live CD. Not only can you do this with your Ubuntu Live CD, you can do it right out of the box – no additional software needed! The program we’ll use is called dd, and it’s included with pretty much all Linux distributions. dd is a utility used to do low-level copying – rather than working with files, it works directly on the raw data on a storage device. Note: dd gets a bad rap, because like many other Linux utilities, if misused it can be very destructive. If you’re not sure what you’re doing, you can easily wipe out an entire hard drive, in an unrecoverable way. Of course, the flip side of that is that dd is extremely powerful, and can do very complex tasks with little user effort. If you’re careful, and follow these instructions closely, you can clone your hard drive with one command. We’re going to take a small hard drive that we’ve been using and copy it to a new hard drive, which hasn’t been formatted yet. To make sure that we’re working with the right drives, we’ll open up a terminal (Applications > Accessories > Terminal) and enter in the following command sudo fdisk –l We have two small drives, /dev/sda, which has two partitions, and /dev/sdc, which is completely unformatted. We want to copy the data from /dev/sda to /dev/sdc. Note: while you can copy a smaller drive to a larger one, you can’t copy a larger drive to a smaller one with the method described below. Now the fun part: using dd. The invocation we’ll use is: sudo dd if=/dev/sda of=/dev/sdc In this case, we’re telling dd that the input file (“if”) is /dev/sda, and the output file (“of”) is /dev/sdc. If your drives are quite large, this can take some time, but in our case it took just less than a minute. If we do sudo fdisk –l again, we can see that, despite not formatting /dev/sdc at all, it now has the same partitions as /dev/sda.  Additionally, if we mount all of the partitions, we can see that all of the data on /dev/sdc is now the same as on /dev/sda. Note: you may have to restart your computer to be able to mount the newly cloned drive. And that’s it…If you exercise caution and make sure that you’re using the right drives as the input file and output file, dd isn’t anything to be scared of. Unlike other utilities, dd copies absolutely everything from one drive to another – that means that you can even recover files deleted from the original drive in the clone! Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Reset Your Ubuntu Password Easily from the Live CDHow to Browse Without a Trace with an Ubuntu Live CDRecover Deleted Files on an NTFS Hard Drive from a Ubuntu Live CDCreate a Bootable Ubuntu 9.10 USB Flash DriveWipe, Delete, and Securely Destroy Your Hard Drive’s Data the Easy Way TouchFreeze Alternative in AutoHotkey The Icy Undertow Desktop Windows Home Server – Backup to LAN The Clear & Clean Desktop Use This Bookmarklet to Easily Get Albums Use AutoHotkey to Assign a Hotkey to a Specific Window Latest Software Reviews Tinyhacker Random Tips Xobni Plus for Outlook All My Movies 5.9 CloudBerry Online Backup 1.5 for Windows Home Server Snagit 10 Windows Media Player Glass Icons (icons we like) How to Forecast Weather, without Gadgets Outlook Tools, one stop tweaking for any Outlook version Zoofs, find the most popular tweeted YouTube videos Video preview of new Windows Live Essentials 21 Cursor Packs for XP, Vista & 7

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• Using MAC Authentication for simple Web API’s consumption

  - by cibrax

  For simple scenarios of Web API consumption where identity delegation is not required, traditional http authentication schemas such as basic, certificates or digest are the most used nowadays. All these schemas rely on sending the caller credentials or some representation of it in every request message as part of the Authorization header, so they are prone to suffer phishing attacks if they are not correctly secured at transport level with https. In addition, most client applications typically authenticate two different things, the caller application and the user consuming the API on behalf of that application. For most cases, the schema is simplified by using a single set of username and password for authenticating both, making necessary to store those credentials temporally somewhere in memory. The true is that you can use two different identities, one for the user running the application, which you might authenticate just once during the first call when the application is initialized, and another identity for the application itself that you use on every call. Some cloud vendors like Windows Azure or Amazon Web Services have adopted an schema to authenticate the caller application based on a Message Authentication Code (MAC) generated with a symmetric algorithm using a key known by the two parties, the caller and the Web API. The caller must include a MAC as part of the Authorization header created from different pieces of information in the request message such as the address, the host, and some other headers. The Web API can authenticate the caller by using the key associated to it and validating the attached MAC in the request message. In that way, no credentials are sent as part of the request message, so there is no way an attacker to intercept the message and get access to those credentials. Anyways, this schema also suffers from some deficiencies that can generate attacks. For example, brute force can be still used to infer the key used for generating the MAC, and impersonate the original caller. This can be mitigated by renewing keys in a relative short period of time. This schema as any other can be complemented with transport security. Eran Rammer, one of the brains behind OAuth, has recently published an specification of a protocol based on MAC for Http authentication called Hawk. The initial version of the spec is available here. A curious fact is that the specification per se does not exist, and the specification itself is the code that Eran initially wrote using node.js. In that implementation, you can associate a key to an user, so once the MAC has been verified on the Web API, the user can be inferred from that key. Also a timestamp is used to avoid replay attacks. As a pet project, I decided to port that code to .NET using ASP.NET Web API, which is available also in github under https://github.com/pcibraro/hawknet Enjoy!.

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• SQL SERVER – Online Index Rebuilding Index Improvement in SQL Server 2012

  - by pinaldave

  Have you ever faced situation when you see something working and you feel it should not be working? Well, I had similar moments few days ago. I know that SQL Server 2008 supports online indexing. However, I also know that I cannot rebuild index ONLINE if I have used VARCHAR(MAX), NVARCHAR(MAX) or few other data types. While I held my belief very strongly I came across situation, where I had to go online and do little bit reading from Book Online. Here is the similar example. First of all – run following code in SQL Server 2008 or SQL Server 2008 R2. USE TempDB GO CREATE TABLE TestTable (ID INT, FirstCol NVARCHAR(10), SecondCol NVARCHAR(MAX)) GO CREATE CLUSTERED INDEX [IX_TestTable] ON TestTable (ID) GO CREATE NONCLUSTERED INDEX [IX_TestTable_Cols] ON TestTable (FirstCol) INCLUDE (SecondCol) GO USE [tempdb] GO ALTER INDEX [IX_TestTable_Cols] ON [dbo].[TestTable] REBUILD WITH (ONLINE = ON) GO DROP TABLE TestTable GO Now run the same code in SQL Server 2012 version. Observe the difference between both of the execution. You will be get following resultset. In SQL Server 2008/R2 it will throw following error: Msg 2725, Level 16, State 2, Line 1 An online operation cannot be performed for index ‘IX_TestTable_Cols’ because the index contains column ‘SecondCol’ of data type text, ntext, image, varchar(max), nvarchar(max), varbinary(max), xml, or large CLR type. For a non-clustered index, the column could be an include column of the index. For a clustered index, the column could be any column of the table. If DROP_EXISTING is used, the column could be part of a new or old index. The operation must be performed offline. In SQL Server 2012 it will run successfully and will not throw any error. Command(s) completed successfully. I always thought it will throw an error if there is VARCHAR(MAX) or NVARCHAR(MAX) used in table schema definition. When I saw this result it was clear to me that it will be for sure not bug enhancement in SQL Server 2012. For matter for the fact, I always wanted this feature to be added in SQL Server Engine as this will enable ONLINE Index Rebuilding for mission critical tables which needs to be always online. I quickly searched online and landed on Jacob Sebastian’s blog where he has blogged about it as well. Well, is there any other new feature in SQL Server 2012 which gave you good surprise? Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com) Filed under: PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Index, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL, Technology

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• SQL SERVER – 2011 – Introduction to SEQUENCE – Simple Example of SEQUENCE

  - by pinaldave

  SQL Server 2011 will contain one of the very interesting feature called SEQUENCE. I have waited for this feature for really long time. I am glad it is here finally. SEQUENCE allows you to define a single point of repository where SQL Server will maintain in memory counter. USE AdventureWorks2008R2 GO CREATE SEQUENCE [Seq] AS [int] START WITH 1 INCREMENT BY 1 MAXVALUE 20000 GO SEQUENCE is very interesting concept and I will write few blog post on this subject in future. Today we will see only working example of the same. Let us create a sequence. We can specify various values like start value, increment value as well maxvalue. -- First Run SELECT NEXT VALUE FOR Seq, c.CustomerID FROM Sales.Customer c GO -- Second Run SELECT NEXT VALUE FOR Seq, c.AccountNumber FROM Sales.Customer c GO Once the sequence is defined, it can be fetched using following method. Every single time new incremental value is provided, irrespective of sessions. Sequence will generate values till the max value specified. Once the max value is reached, query will stop and will return error message. Msg 11728, Level 16, State 1, Line 2 The sequence object ‘Seq’ has reached its minimum or maximum value. Restart the sequence object to allow new values to be generated. We can restart the sequence from any particular value and it will work fine. -- Restart the Sequence ALTER SEQUENCE [Seq] RESTART WITH 1 GO -- Sequence Restarted SELECT NEXT VALUE FOR Seq, c.CustomerID FROM Sales.Customer c GO Let us do final clean up. -- Clean Up DROP SEQUENCE [Seq] GO There are lots of things one can find useful about this feature. We will see that in future posts. Here is the complete code for easy reference. USE AdventureWorks2008R2 GO CREATE SEQUENCE [Seq] AS [int] START WITH 1 INCREMENT BY 1 MAXVALUE 20000 GO -- First Run SELECT NEXT VALUE FOR Seq, c.CustomerID FROM Sales.Customer c GO -- Second Run SELECT NEXT VALUE FOR Seq, c.AccountNumber FROM Sales.Customer c GO -- Restart the Sequence ALTER SEQUENCE [Seq] RESTART WITH 1 GO -- Sequence Restarted SELECT NEXT VALUE FOR Seq, c.CustomerID FROM Sales.Customer c GO -- Clean Up DROP SEQUENCE [Seq] GO Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.SQLAuthority.com) Filed under: Pinal Dave, PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Query, SQL Scripts, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, SQLServer, T SQL, Technology

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• Ad-hoc taxonomy: owning the chess set doesn't mean you decide how the little horsey moves

  - by Roger Hart

  There was one of those little laugh-or-cry moments recently when I heard an anecdote about content strategy failings at a major online retailer. The story goes a bit like this: successful company in a highly commoditized marketplace succeeds on price and largely ignores its content team. Being relatively entrepreneurial, the founders are still knocking around, and occasionally like to "take an interest". One day, they decree that clothing sold on the site can no longer be described as "unisex", because this sounds old fashioned. Sad now. Let me just reiterate for the folks at the back: large retailer, commoditized market place, differentiating on price. That's inherently unstable. Sooner or later, they're going to need one or both of competitive differentiation and significant optimization. I can't speak for the latter, since I'm hypothesizing off a raft of rumour, but one of the simpler paths to the former is to become - or rather acknowledge that they are - a content business. Regardless, they need highly-searchable terminology. Even in the face of tooth and claw resistance to noticing the fundamental position content occupies in driving sales (and SEO) on the web, there's a clear information problem here. Dilettante taxonomy is a disaster. Ok, so this is a small example, but that kind of makes it a good one. Unisex probably is the best way of describing clothing designed to suit either men or women interchangeably. It certainly takes less time to type (and read). It's established terminology, and as a single word, it's significantly better for web readability than a phrasal workaround. Something like "fits men or women" is short, by could fall foul of clause-level discard in web scanning. It's not an adjective, so for intuitive reading it's never going to be near the start of a title or description. It would also clutter up search results, and impose cognitive load in list scanning. Sorry kids, it's just worse. Even if "unisex" were an archaism (which it isn't), the only thing that would weigh against its being more usable and concise terminology would be evidence that this archaism were hurting conversions. Good luck with that. We once - briefly - called one of our products a "Can of worms". It was a bundle in a bug-tracking suite, and we thought it sounded terribly cool. Guess how well that sold. We have information and content professionals for a reason: to make sure that whatever we put in front of users is optimised to meet user and business goals. If that thinking doesn't inform style guides, taxonomy, messaging, title structure, and so forth, you might as well be finger painting.

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• Oracle Data Integration 12c: Simplified, Future-Ready, High-Performance Solutions

  - by Thanos Terentes Printzios

  In today’s data-driven business environment, organizations need to cost-effectively manage the ever-growing streams of information originating both inside and outside the firewall and address emerging deployment styles like cloud, big data analytics, and real-time replication. Oracle Data Integration delivers pervasive and continuous access to timely and trusted data across heterogeneous systems. Oracle is enhancing its data integration offering announcing the general availability of 12c release for the key data integration products: Oracle Data Integrator 12c and Oracle GoldenGate 12c, delivering Simplified and High-Performance Solutions for Cloud, Big Data Analytics, and Real-Time Replication. The new release delivers extreme performance, increase IT productivity, and simplify deployment, while helping IT organizations to keep pace with new data-oriented technology trends including cloud computing, big data analytics, real-time business intelligence. With the 12c release Oracle becomes the new leader in the data integration and replication technologies as no other vendor offers such a complete set of data integration capabilities for pervasive, continuous access to trusted data across Oracle platforms as well as third-party systems and applications. Oracle Data Integration 12c release addresses data-driven organizations’ critical and evolving data integration requirements under 3 key themes: Future-Ready Solutions : Supporting Current and Emerging Initiatives Extreme Performance : Even higher performance than ever before Fast Time-to-Value : Higher IT Productivity and Simplified Solutions  With the new capabilities in Oracle Data Integrator 12c, customers can benefit from: Superior developer productivity, ease of use, and rapid time-to-market with the new flow-based mapping model, reusable mappings, and step-by-step debugger. Increased performance when executing data integration processes due to improved parallelism. Improved productivity and monitoring via tighter integration with Oracle GoldenGate 12c and Oracle Enterprise Manager 12c. Improved interoperability with Oracle Warehouse Builder which enables faster and easier migration to Oracle Data Integrator’s strategic data integration offering. Faster implementation of business analytics through Oracle Data Integrator pre-integrated with Oracle BI Applications’ latest release. Oracle Data Integrator also integrates simply and easily with Oracle Business Analytics tools, including OBI-EE and Oracle Hyperion. Support for loading and transforming big and fast data, enabled by integration with big data technologies: Hadoop, Hive, HDFS, and Oracle Big Data Appliance. Only Oracle GoldenGate provides the best-of-breed real-time replication of data in heterogeneous data environments. With the new capabilities in Oracle GoldenGate 12c, customers can benefit from: Simplified setup and management of Oracle GoldenGate 12c when using multiple database delivery processes via a new Coordinated Delivery feature for non-Oracle databases. Expanded heterogeneity through added support for the latest versions of major databases such as Sybase ASE v 15.7, MySQL NDB Clusters 7.2, and MySQL 5.6., as well as integration with Oracle Coherence. Enhanced high availability and data protection via integration with Oracle Data Guard and Fast-Start Failover integration. Enhanced security for credentials and encryption keys using Oracle Wallet. Real-time replication for databases hosted on public cloud environments supported by third-party clouds. Tight integration between Oracle Data Integrator 12c and Oracle GoldenGate 12c and other Oracle technologies, such as Oracle Database 12c and Oracle Applications, provides a number of benefits for organizations: Tight integration between Oracle Data Integrator 12c and Oracle GoldenGate 12c enables developers to leverage Oracle GoldenGate’s low overhead, real-time change data capture completely within the Oracle Data Integrator Studio without additional training. Integration with Oracle Database 12c provides a strong foundation for seamless private cloud deployments. Delivers real-time data for reporting, zero downtime migration, and improved performance and availability for Oracle Applications, such as Oracle E-Business Suite and ATG Web Commerce . Oracle’s data integration offering is optimized for Oracle Engineered Systems and is an integral part of Oracle’s fast data, real-time analytics strategy on Oracle Exadata Database Machine and Oracle Exalytics In-Memory Machine. Oracle Data Integrator 12c and Oracle GoldenGate 12c differentiate the new offering on data integration with these many new features. This is just a quick glimpse into Oracle Data Integrator 12c and Oracle GoldenGate 12c. Find out much more about the new release in the video webcast "Introducing 12c for Oracle Data Integration", where customer and partner speakers, including SolarWorld, BT, Rittman Mead will join us in launching the new release. Resource Kits Meet Oracle Data Integration 12c  Discover what's new with Oracle Goldengate 12c  Oracle EMEA DIS (Data Integration Solutions) Partner Community is available for all your questions, while additional partner focused webcasts will be made available through our blog here, so stay connected. For any questions please contact us at partner.imc-AT-beehiveonline.oracle-DOT-com Stay Connected Oracle Newsletters

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• 2D Barcode Addendum

  - by Tim Dexter

  Having finally got my external drive back(long story) today from Oklahoma (thank you so much Sammy) Im back with a full compliment of Oracle and blogging tools at my disposal. I have missed JDeveloper this past week, which I have found, I immensely prefer over Eclipse (let the flaming commence :0) I use Zoundry Raven for writing articles and its not installed locally but on my external drove, so I have been soldiering on with the blog server's pain in the backside UI for writing. Now I have my favority editor back and things are calming down workwise, I will start to get the Excel template posts out. Today thou, a note about 2D barcode support or more specifically any barcode that needs some data manipulation before the barcode font is applied. I wrote about these fonts a long time back and laid out the java class you would need to write if you had an algorithm from the font manufacturer to use. I missed out a valuable point and James at Luminex fell into the trap. He was wanting to use the datamatrix font from IDAutomation but and had built the java class to be called from the RTF template but it was not encoding or at least did not appear to be. New debugging feature to the rescue. Kan over at the bipconsultng blog documented the feature a while back. Just adding <?xdo-debug-level:'STATEMENT'?> to my test template generated all the debug files in my c:\temp directory. No messing with files, just a simple command ... at last! Kan has documented the feature here. With the log in hand I spotted a java error stack referencing a missing code128a method, huh? Looking at James' class he had the following snippet: ENCODERS.put("code128a",mUtility.getClass().getMethod("code128a",clazz)); ENCODERS.put("code128b",mUtility.getClass().getMethod("code128b", clazz)); ENCODERS.put("code128c",mUtility.getClass().getMethod("code128c", clazz)); ENCODERS.put("pdf417",mUtility.getClass().getMethod("pdf417", clazz)); ENCODERS.put("datamatrix",mUtility.getClass().getMethod("datamatrix", clazz)); His class did not include the other code128 and pdf147 methods and BIP was expecting them. An easy fix, just comment them out, rebuild and deploy and the encoding started working. If you are hitting similar problems, check that class and ensure all of the referenced methods are available, if not, delete or get commenting. James now has purdy labels popping out that his hard ware can read, sweet!

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• FREE Windows Azure evening in London on April 15th including FREE access to Windows Azure

  - by Eric Nelson

  [Did I overdo the use of FREE in the title? :-)] April 12th to 16th is Microsoft Tech Days – 5 days of sessions on Visual Studio 2010 through to Windows 7 Phone Series. Many of these days are now full (Tip - Thursday still has room if rich client applications is your thing) but the good news is the development community in the UK has pulled together an awesome series of “fringe events” during April in London and elsewhere in the UK. There are sessions on Silverlight, SQL Server 2008 R2, Sharepoint 2010 and … the Windows Azure Platform. The UK AzureNET user group is planning to put on a great evening and AzureNET will be giving away hundreds of free subscriptions to the Windows Azure Platform during the evening. The subscription includes up to 20 Windows Azure Compute nodes and 3 SQL Azure databases for you to play with over the 2 weeks following the event. This is a great opportunity to really explore the Windows Azure Platform in detail – without a credit card! Register now! (and you might also want to join the UK Fans of Azure Community while I have your attention) FYI The Thursday day time event includes an introduction to Windows Azure session delivered by my colleague David – which would be an ideal session to attend if you are new to Azure and want to get the most out of the evening session. 7:00pm: See the difference: How Windows Azure helped build a new way of giving Simon Evans and James Broome (@broomej) They will cover the business context for Azure and then go into patterns used and lessons learnt from the project....as well as showing off the app of course! 8:00pm: UK AzureNET update 8:15pm: NoSQL databases or: How I learned to love the hash table Mark Rendle (@markrendle) In this session Mark will look at how Azure Table Service works and how to use it. We’ll look briefly at the high-level Data Services SDK, talk about its limitations, and then quickly move on to the REST API and how to use it to improve performance and reduce costs. We’ll make-up some pretend real-world problems and solve them in new and interesting ways. We’ll denormalise data (for fun and profit). We’ll talk about how certain social networking sites can deal with huge volumes of data so quickly, and why it sometimes goes wrong. Check out the complete list of fringe events which covers the UK fairly well:

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• Tips to Make Your Website Cell Phone Friendly

  - by Aditi

  Working on a new website design? or Redesigning your website? There is a lot more to consider now a days not just user experience, clean code, CSS etc. one of the important attribute one must not miss, which is making them mobile friendly! With the growing use of handhelds & unlimited data plans, people browse on their cellphones! and All come in different sizes! it is tough to make a website that would look great not just on a high resolution widescreen monitor/LCD, but also should look equally impressive on the low resolutions of cellphones. We are today going to discuss about such factors that can help you make a website Cellphone Friendly. Fluid Width Layouts As we start discussing about this, Most people speak of the Fluid Width Layouts as vital step in moving your website to be mobile friendly. Fluid width allows the width of your website stretch or shrink depending on the browser size. However, having a layout which flows with the width of the screen’s resolution is certainly convenient, more often than not the website was originally laid out for a desktop in mind. Compressing a fluid layout to 320 pixels can do some serious damage to layout, Thus some people strongly believe it is far better to have a mobile style sheet and lay out the content specifically for that screen and have more control on the display. The best thing to do is to detect the type of platform that is connected to your website and disabling or changing some tools and effects to make it look better if not perfect. Keep Your Web Pages Short length One must avoid long pages on their website, a lot of scroll makes it very non user friendly for people, especially on mobile devices this is a huge draw back because of the longer load time it takes to download the webpage. Everyone likes crisp & concise content such pages are easier to load & browse. This makes your website accessible across all platforms. Also try to keep shorter urls, if they have to type..save them from that much work especially if someone is using a cellphone with no QWERTY keyboard it can be tough. Usable Navigation & Search Unlike Desktops, your website’s Navigation won’t super work on a cellphone. Keep in mind the user experience for cellphone users as you design your Navigation. Try to keep your content centered as they do have difficulty in reading the webpage. I always look upto Google and their pages as available on mobile as a great example. Keeping a functional & very visible search bar helps mobile users navigate by searching. Understanding Clean Website Code : Evolved for Mobile Clean code is important when you consider the diversity out there for handheld devices. Some cell phones may only understand WAP. More capable phones may understand WAP2, which allows rendering websites with XHTML and CSS. Most mobiles won’t display tables, floats, frames, JavaScript, and dynamic menus. Most cellphone will not support cookies. Devices at the high end of the mobile market such as BlackBerry, Palm, or the upcoming iPhone are highly capable and support nearly as much as a standard computer..but masses still do not have such phones. You can use specific emulators to test your website on mobile devices. Make sure your color combinations provide good contrast between foreground and background colors, particularly for devices with fewer color options.

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• The Kids Are Alright. With Facebook and SMS. But Not Twitter

  - by ultan o'broin

  I delivered a lecture to business and technology freshmen (late teens, I reckon) in Trinity College Dublin recently. I spoke about user experience in enterprise applications, trends that UX pros need to be aware of such as social media, community support, mobile and tablet platforms and a bunch of nuances around those areas (data and device security, privacy, reputation, branding, and so on). It was all fairly high level stuff given the audience, and I included lots of colorful screenshots. Irish-related examples helped to get the message across. During the lecture I did a quick poll. “How many students here use Twitter?” Answer: None. “How many use Facebook?” All (pretty much). So what do these guys like to use instead of Twitter? Easy - text messaging (or SMS if you like). They all had phones. Perhaps I should not have been so surprised about Twitter, but it’s always great to have research validated by some guerilla UX research on the street. There’s already quite a bit of research about teen uptake (or lack) of Twitter, telling us young adults don’t tweet. Twitter is seen as something for er, older people. Affordable devices and data plans that allow students to text really quickly are also popular (BlackBerry, for example). Younger people just luuurve to text each other. A lot.  Facebook versus Twitter for younger folks? Well, we know the story. No contest. I would love to engage more with students like these. I’ll plan for it. It will also be interesting to see if Twitter becomes more important to them over time. There were a few other interesting observations about the lack of uptake of Foursquare, Gowalla and mobile apps like that. I  don’t think there’s a huge uptake in these kind of apps in Ireland anyway, but maybe students have different priorities anyway?   I’ll return to that another day. Technorati Tags: Gowalla,FourSquare,Twitter,UX,user experience,user assistance,Trinity College Dublin

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• Ubuntu 14.04 Failed to load module udlfb

  - by jar276705

  DisplayLink doesn't load and run. The adapter is recognized and /dev/FB1 is created. USB bus info: Bus 001 Device 006: ID 17e9:0198 DisplayLink Xorg.0.log: X.Org X Server 1.15.1 Release Date: 2014-04-13 [ 44708.386] X Protocol Version 11, Revision 0 [ 44708.389] Build Operating System: Linux 3.2.0-37-generic i686 Ubuntu [ 44708.392] Current Operating System: Linux rrl 3.13.0-24-generic #46-Ubuntu SMP Thu Apr 10 19:08:14 UTC 2014 i686 [ 44708.392] Kernel command line: BOOT_IMAGE=/boot/vmlinuz-3.13.0-24-generic root=UUID=6b719a77-29e0-4668-8f16-57d0d3a73a3f ro quiet splash vt.handoff=7 [ 44708.399] Build Date: 16 April 2014 01:40:08PM [ 44708.402] xorg-server 2:1.15.1-0ubuntu2 (For technical support please see http://www.ubuntu.com/support) [ 44708.405] Current version of pixman: 0.30.2 [ 44708.412] Before reporting problems, check http://wiki.x.org to make sure that you have the latest version. [ 44708.412] Markers: (--) probed, (**) from config file, (==) default setting, (++) from command line, (!!) notice, (II) informational, (WW) warning, (EE) error, (NI) not implemented, (??) unknown. [ 44708.427] (==) Log file: "/var/log/Xorg.0.log", Time: Thu May 1 09:38:27 2014 [ 44708.431] (==) Using config file: "/etc/X11/xorg.conf" [ 44708.434] (==) Using system config directory "/usr/share/X11/xorg.conf.d" [ 44708.435] (==) ServerLayout "X.org Configured" [ 44708.435] (**) |-->Screen "DisplayLinkScreen" (0) [ 44708.435] (**) | |-->Monitor "DisplayLinkMonitor" [ 44708.435] (**) | |-->Device "DisplayLinkDevice" [ 44708.435] (**) |-->Screen "Screen0" (1) [ 44708.435] (**) | |-->Monitor "Monitor0" [ 44708.435] (**) | |-->Device "Card0" [ 44708.435] (**) |-->Input Device "Mouse0" [ 44708.435] (**) |-->Input Device "Keyboard0" [ 44708.435] (==) Automatically adding devices [ 44708.435] (==) Automatically enabling devices [ 44708.435] (==) Automatically adding GPU devices [ 44708.435] (WW) The directory "/usr/share/fonts/X11/cyrillic" does not exist. [ 44708.435] Entry deleted from font path. [ 44708.435] (WW) The directory "/usr/share/fonts/X11/75dpi/" does not exist. [ 44708.435] Entry deleted from font path. [ 44708.435] (WW) The directory "/usr/share/fonts/X11/75dpi" does not exist. [ 44708.435] Entry deleted from font path. [ 44708.435] (WW) The directory "/usr/share/fonts/X11/cyrillic" does not exist. [ 44708.435] Entry deleted from font path. [ 44708.435] (WW) The directory "/usr/share/fonts/X11/75dpi/" does not exist. [ 44708.435] Entry deleted from font path. [ 44708.435] (WW) The directory "/usr/share/fonts/X11/75dpi" does not exist. [ 44708.435] Entry deleted from font path. [ 44708.435] (**) FontPath set to: /usr/share/fonts/X11/misc, /usr/share/fonts/X11/100dpi/:unscaled, /usr/share/fonts/X11/Type1, /usr/share/fonts/X11/100dpi, built-ins, /usr/share/fonts/X11/misc, /usr/share/fonts/X11/100dpi/:unscaled, /usr/share/fonts/X11/Type1, /usr/share/fonts/X11/100dpi, built-ins [ 44708.435] (**) ModulePath set to "/usr/lib/xorg/modules" [ 44708.435] (WW) Hotplugging is on, devices using drivers 'kbd', 'mouse' or 'vmmouse' will be disabled. [ 44708.435] (WW) Disabling Mouse0 [ 44708.435] (WW) Disabling Keyboard0 [ 44708.435] (II) Loader magic: 0xb77106c0 [ 44708.435] (II) Module ABI versions: [ 44708.435] X.Org ANSI C Emulation: 0.4 [ 44708.435] X.Org Video Driver: 15.0 [ 44708.435] X.Org XInput driver : 20.0 [ 44708.435] X.Org Server Extension : 8.0 [ 44708.436] (II) xfree86: Adding drm device (/dev/dri/card0) [ 44708.436] (II) xfree86: Adding drm device (/dev/dri/card1) [ 44708.437] (--) PCI:*(0:1:5:0) 1002:9616:105b:0e26 rev 0, Mem @ 0xf0000000/134217728, 0xfeae0000/65536, 0xfe900000/1048576, I/O @ 0x0000b000/256 [ 44708.441] Initializing built-in extension Generic Event Extension [ 44708.444] Initializing built-in extension SHAPE [ 44708.448] Initializing built-in extension MIT-SHM [ 44708.452] Initializing built-in extension XInputExtension [ 44708.456] Initializing built-in extension XTEST [ 44708.460] Initializing built-in extension BIG-REQUESTS [ 44708.464] Initializing built-in extension SYNC [ 44708.468] Initializing built-in extension XKEYBOARD [ 44708.471] Initializing built-in extension XC-MISC [ 44708.475] Initializing built-in extension SECURITY [ 44708.479] Initializing built-in extension XINERAMA [ 44708.483] Initializing built-in extension XFIXES [ 44708.487] Initializing built-in extension RENDER [ 44708.491] Initializing built-in extension RANDR [ 44708.494] Initializing built-in extension COMPOSITE [ 44708.498] Initializing built-in extension DAMAGE [ 44708.502] Initializing built-in extension MIT-SCREEN-SAVER [ 44708.506] Initializing built-in extension DOUBLE-BUFFER [ 44708.510] Initializing built-in extension RECORD [ 44708.513] Initializing built-in extension DPMS [ 44708.517] Initializing built-in extension Present [ 44708.521] Initializing built-in extension DRI3 [ 44708.525] Initializing built-in extension X-Resource [ 44708.528] Initializing built-in extension XVideo [ 44708.532] Initializing built-in extension XVideo-MotionCompensation [ 44708.535] Initializing built-in extension SELinux [ 44708.539] Initializing built-in extension XFree86-VidModeExtension [ 44708.542] Initializing built-in extension XFree86-DGA [ 44708.546] Initializing built-in extension XFree86-DRI [ 44708.549] Initializing built-in extension DRI2 [ 44708.549] (II) "glx" will be loaded. This was enabled by default and also specified in the config file. [ 44708.549] (WW) "xmir" is not to be loaded by default. Skipping. [ 44708.549] (II) LoadModule: "glx" [ 44708.549] (II) Loading /usr/lib/xorg/modules/extensions/libglx.so [ 44708.550] (II) Module glx: vendor="X.Org Foundation" [ 44708.550] compiled for 1.15.1, module version = 1.0.0 [ 44708.550] ABI class: X.Org Server Extension, version 8.0 [ 44708.550] (==) AIGLX enabled [ 44708.553] Loading extension GLX [ 44708.553] (II) LoadModule: "udlfb" [ 44708.554] (WW) Warning, couldn't open module udlfb [ 44708.554] (II) UnloadModule: "udlfb" [ 44708.554] (II) Unloading udlfb [ 44708.554] (EE) Failed to load module "udlfb" (module does not exist, 0) [ 44708.554] (II) LoadModule: "modesetting" [ 44708.554] (II) Loading /usr/lib/xorg/modules/drivers/modesetting_drv.so [ 44708.554] (II) Module modesetting: vendor="X.Org Foundation" [ 44708.554] compiled for 1.15.0, module version = 0.8.1 [ 44708.554] Module class: X.Org Video Driver [ 44708.554] ABI class: X.Org Video Driver, version 15.0 [ 44708.554] (==) Matched fglrx as autoconfigured driver 0 [ 44708.554] (==) Matched ati as autoconfigured driver 1 [ 44708.554] (==) Matched fglrx as autoconfigured driver 2 [ 44708.554] (==) Matched ati as autoconfigured driver 3 [ 44708.554] (==) Matched modesetting as autoconfigured driver 4 [ 44708.554] (==) Matched fbdev as autoconfigured driver 5 [ 44708.554] (==) Matched vesa as autoconfigured driver 6 [ 44708.554] (==) Assigned the driver to the xf86ConfigLayout [ 44708.554] (II) LoadModule: "fglrx" [ 44708.554] (WW) Warning, couldn't open module fglrx [ 44708.554] (II) UnloadModule: "fglrx" [ 44708.554] (II) Unloading fglrx [ 44708.554] (EE) Failed to load module "fglrx" (module does not exist, 0) [ 44708.554] (II) LoadModule: "ati" [ 44708.554] (II) Loading /usr/lib/xorg/modules/drivers/ati_drv.so [ 44708.554] (II) Module ati: vendor="X.Org Foundation" [ 44708.554] compiled for 1.15.0, module version = 7.3.0 [ 44708.554] Module class: X.Org Video Driver [ 44708.554] ABI class: X.Org Video Driver, version 15.0 [ 44708.554] (II) LoadModule: "radeon" [ 44708.555] (II) Loading /usr/lib/xorg/modules/drivers/radeon_drv.so [ 44708.555] (II) Module radeon: vendor="X.Org Foundation" [ 44708.555] compiled for 1.15.0, module version = 7.3.0 [ 44708.555] Module class: X.Org Video Driver [ 44708.555] ABI class: X.Org Video Driver, version 15.0 [ 44708.555] (II) LoadModule: "modesetting" [ 44708.555] (II) Loading /usr/lib/xorg/modules/drivers/modesetting_drv.so [ 44708.555] (II) Module modesetting: vendor="X.Org Foundation" [ 44708.555] compiled for 1.15.0, module version = 0.8.1 [ 44708.555] Module class: X.Org Video Driver [ 44708.555] ABI class: X.Org Video Driver, version 15.0 [ 44708.555] (II) UnloadModule: "modesetting" [ 44708.555] (II) Unloading modesetting [ 44708.555] (II) Failed to load module "modesetting" (already loaded, 0) [ 44708.555] (II) LoadModule: "fbdev" [ 44708.555] (II) Loading /usr/lib/xorg/modules/drivers/fbdev_drv.so [ 44708.555] (II) Module fbdev: vendor="X.Org Foundation" [ 44708.555] compiled for 1.15.0, module version = 0.4.4 [ 44708.555] Module class: X.Org Video Driver [ 44708.555] ABI class: X.Org Video Driver, version 15.0 [ 44708.555] (II) LoadModule: "vesa" [ 44708.555] (II) Loading /usr/lib/xorg/modules/drivers/vesa_drv.so [ 44708.555] (II) Module vesa: vendor="X.Org Foundation" [ 44708.555] compiled for 1.15.0, module version = 2.3.3 [ 44708.555] Module class: X.Org Video Driver [ 44708.555] ABI class: X.Org Video Driver, version 15.0 [ 44708.555] (II) modesetting: Driver for Modesetting Kernel Drivers: kms [ 44708.555] (II) RADEON: Driver for ATI Radeon chipsets: [ 44708.560] (II) FBDEV: driver for framebuffer: fbdev [ 44708.560] (II) VESA: driver for VESA chipsets: vesa [ 44708.560] (--) using VT number 7 [ 44708.578] (II) modesetting(0): using drv /dev/dri/card0 [ 44708.578] (II) modesetting(G0): using drv /dev/dri/card1 [ 44708.578] (WW) Falling back to old probe method for fbdev [ 44708.578] (II) Loading sub module "fbdevhw" [ 44708.578] (II) LoadModule: "fbdevhw" [ 44708.578] (II) Loading /usr/lib/xorg/modules/libfbdevhw.so [ 44708.578] (II) Module fbdevhw: vendor="X.Org Foundation" [ 44708.578] compiled for 1.15.1, module version = 0.0.2 [ 44708.578] ABI class: X.Org Video Driver, version 15.0 [ 44708.578] (WW) Falling back to old probe method for vesa [ 44708.578] (**) modesetting(0): Depth 16, (--) framebuffer bpp 16 [ 44708.578] (==) modesetting(0): RGB weight 565 [ 44708.578] (==) modesetting(0): Default visual is TrueColor [ 44708.578] (II) modesetting(0): ShadowFB: preferred YES, enabled YES [ 44708.608] (II) modesetting(0): Output VGA-0 using monitor section DisplayLinkMonitor [ 44708.610] (II) modesetting(0): Output DVI-0 has no monitor section [ 44708.640] (II) modesetting(0): EDID for output VGA-0 [ 44708.640] (II) modesetting(0): Manufacturer: ACR Model: 74 Serial#: 2483090993 [ 44708.640] (II) modesetting(0): Year: 2009 Week: 40 [ 44708.640] (II) modesetting(0): EDID Version: 1.3 [ 44708.640] (II) modesetting(0): Analog Display Input, Input Voltage Level: 0.700/0.700 V [ 44708.640] (II) modesetting(0): Sync: Separate [ 44708.640] (II) modesetting(0): Max Image Size [cm]: horiz.: 53 vert.: 29 [ 44708.640] (II) modesetting(0): Gamma: 2.20 [ 44708.640] (II) modesetting(0): DPMS capabilities: StandBy Suspend Off; RGB/Color Display [ 44708.641] (II) modesetting(0): First detailed timing is preferred mode [ 44708.641] (II) modesetting(0): redX: 0.649 redY: 0.338 greenX: 0.289 greenY: 0.609 [ 44708.641] (II) modesetting(0): blueX: 0.146 blueY: 0.070 whiteX: 0.313 whiteY: 0.329 [ 44708.641] (II) modesetting(0): Supported established timings: [ 44708.641] (II) modesetting(0): 720x400@70Hz [ 44708.641] (II) modesetting(0): 640x480@60Hz [ 44708.641] (II) modesetting(0): 640x480@72Hz [ 44708.641] (II) modesetting(0): 640x480@75Hz [ 44708.641] (II) modesetting(0): 800x600@56Hz [ 44708.641] (II) modesetting(0): 800x600@60Hz [ 44708.641] (II) modesetting(0): 800x600@72Hz [ 44708.641] (II) modesetting(0): 800x600@75Hz [ 44708.641] (II) modesetting(0): 1024x768@60Hz [ 44708.641] (II) modesetting(0): 1024x768@70Hz [ 44708.641] (II) modesetting(0): 1024x768@75Hz [ 44708.641] (II) modesetting(0): 1280x1024@75Hz [ 44708.641] (II) modesetting(0): Manufacturer's mask: 0 [ 44708.641] (II) modesetting(0): Supported standard timings: [ 44708.641] (II) modesetting(0): #0: hsize: 1280 vsize 1024 refresh: 60 vid: 32897 [ 44708.641] (II) modesetting(0): #1: hsize: 1152 vsize 864 refresh: 75 vid: 20337 [ 44708.641] (II) modesetting(0): #2: hsize: 1440 vsize 900 refresh: 60 vid: 149 [ 44708.641] (II) modesetting(0): #3: hsize: 1440 vsize 900 refresh: 75 vid: 3989 [ 44708.641] (II) modesetting(0): #4: hsize: 1600 vsize 1200 refresh: 60 vid: 16553 [ 44708.641] (II) modesetting(0): #5: hsize: 1680 vsize 1050 refresh: 60 vid: 179 [ 44708.641] (II) modesetting(0): Supported detailed timing: [ 44708.641] (II) modesetting(0): clock: 138.5 MHz Image Size: 531 x 298 mm [ 44708.641] (II) modesetting(0): h_active: 1920 h_sync: 1968 h_sync_end 2000 h_blank_end 2080 h_border: 0 [ 44708.641] (II) modesetting(0): v_active: 1080 v_sync: 1083 v_sync_end 1088 v_blanking: 1111 v_border: 0 [ 44708.641] (II) modesetting(0): Monitor name: H243H [ 44708.641] (II) modesetting(0): Ranges: V min: 56 V max: 76 Hz, H min: 31 H max: 83 kHz, PixClock max 185 MHz [ 44708.641] (II) modesetting(0): Serial No: LEW0C0044002 [ 44708.641] (II) modesetting(0): EDID (in hex): [ 44708.641] (II) modesetting(0): 00ffffffffffff000472740031f60094 [ 44708.641] (II) modesetting(0): 2813010368351d78ea6085a6564a9c25 [ 44708.641] (II) modesetting(0): 125054afcf008180714f9500950fa940 [ 44708.641] (II) modesetting(0): b300010101011a3680a070381f403020 [ 44708.641] (II) modesetting(0): 3500132a2100001a000000fc00483234 [ 44708.642] (II) modesetting(0): 33480a20202020202020000000fd0038 [ 44708.642] (II) modesetting(0): 4c1f5312000a202020202020000000ff [ 44708.642] (II) modesetting(0): 004c45573043303034343030320a003c [ 44708.642] (II) modesetting(0): Printing probed modes for output VGA-0 [ 44708.642] (II) modesetting(0): Modeline "1280x1024"x75.0 135.00 1280 1296 1440 1688 1024 1025 1028 1066 +hsync +vsync (80.0 kHz UeP) [ 44708.642] (II) modesetting(0): Modeline "1920x1080"x59.9 138.50 1920 1968 2000 2080 1080 1083 1088 1111 +hsync -vsync (66.6 kHz eP) [ 44708.642] (II) modesetting(0): Modeline "1600x1200"x60.0 162.00 1600 1664 1856 2160 1200 1201 1204 1250 +hsync +vsync (75.0 kHz e) [ 44708.642] (II) modesetting(0): Modeline "1680x1050"x60.0 146.25 1680 1784 1960 2240 1050 1053 1059 1089 -hsync +vsync (65.3 kHz e) [ 44708.642] (II) modesetting(0): Modeline "1280x1024"x60.0 108.00 1280 1328 1440 1688 1024 1025 1028 1066 +hsync +vsync (64.0 kHz e) [ 44708.642] (II) modesetting(0): Modeline "1440x900"x75.0 136.75 1440 1536 1688 1936 900 903 909 942 -hsync +vsync (70.6 kHz e) [ 44708.642] (II) modesetting(0): Modeline "1440x900"x59.9 106.50 1440 1520 1672 1904 900 903 909 934 -hsync +vsync (55.9 kHz e) [ 44708.642] (II) modesetting(0): Modeline "1152x864"x75.0 108.00 1152 1216 1344 1600 864 865 868 900 +hsync +vsync (67.5 kHz e) [ 44708.642] (II) modesetting(0): Modeline "1024x768"x75.1 78.80 1024 1040 1136 1312 768 769 772 800 +hsync +vsync (60.1 kHz e) [ 44708.642] (II) modesetting(0): Modeline "1024x768"x70.1 75.00 1024 1048 1184 1328 768 771 777 806 -hsync -vsync (56.5 kHz e) [ 44708.642] (II) modesetting(0): Modeline "1024x768"x60.0 65.00 1024 1048 1184 1344 768 771 777 806 -hsync -vsync (48.4 kHz e) [ 44708.642] (II) modesetting(0): Modeline "800x600"x72.2 50.00 800 856 976 1040 600 637 643 666 +hsync +vsync (48.1 kHz e) [ 44708.642] (II) modesetting(0): Modeline "800x600"x75.0 49.50 800 816 896 1056 600 601 604 625 +hsync +vsync (46.9 kHz e) [ 44708.642] (II) modesetting(0): Modeline "800x600"x60.3 40.00 800 840 968 1056 600 601 605 628 +hsync +vsync (37.9 kHz e) [ 44708.642] (II) modesetting(0): Modeline "800x600"x56.2 36.00 800 824 896 1024 600 601 603 625 +hsync +vsync (35.2 kHz e) [ 44708.642] (II) modesetting(0): Modeline "640x480"x75.0 31.50 640 656 720 840 480 481 484 500 -hsync -vsync (37.5 kHz e) [ 44708.642] (II) modesetting(0): Modeline "640x480"x72.8 31.50 640 664 704 832 480 489 491 520 -hsync -vsync (37.9 kHz e) [ 44708.642] (II) modesetting(0): Modeline "640x480"x60.0 25.20 640 656 752 800 480 490 492 525 -hsync -vsync (31.5 kHz e) [ 44708.642] (II) modesetting(0): Modeline "720x400"x70.1 28.32 720 738 846 900 400 412 414 449 -hsync +vsync (31.5 kHz e) [ 44708.645] (II) modesetting(0): EDID for output DVI-0 [ 44708.645] (II) modesetting(0): Output VGA-0 connected [ 44708.645] (II) modesetting(0): Output DVI-0 disconnected [ 44708.645] (II) modesetting(0): Using user preference for initial modes [ 44708.645] (II) modesetting(0): Output VGA-0 using initial mode 1280x1024 [ 44708.645] (II) modesetting(0): Using default gamma of (1.0, 1.0, 1.0) unless otherwise stated. [ 44708.645] (==) modesetting(0): DPI set to (96, 96) [ 44708.645] (II) Loading sub module "fb" [ 44708.645] (II) LoadModule: "fb" [ 44708.645] (II) Loading /usr/lib/xorg/modules/libfb.so [ 44708.645] (II) Module fb: vendor="X.Org Foundation" [ 44708.645] compiled for 1.15.1, module version = 1.0.0 [ 44708.645] ABI class: X.Org ANSI C Emulation, version 0.4 [ 44708.645] (II) Loading sub module "shadow" [ 44708.645] (II) LoadModule: "shadow" [ 44708.646] (II) Loading /usr/lib/xorg/modules/libshadow.so [ 44708.646] (II) Module shadow: vendor="X.Org Foundation" [ 44708.646] compiled for 1.15.1, module version = 1.1.0 [ 44708.646] ABI class: X.Org ANSI C Emulation, version 0.4 [ 44708.646] (**) modesetting(G0): Depth 16, (--) framebuffer bpp 16 [ 44708.646] (==) modesetting(G0): RGB weight 565 [ 44708.646] (==) modesetting(G0): Default visual is TrueColor [ 44708.646] (II) modesetting(G0): ShadowFB: preferred NO, enabled NO [ 44708.727] (II) modesetting(G0): Output DVI-1-0 using monitor section DisplayLinkMonitor [ 44708.808] (II) modesetting(G0): EDID for output DVI-1-0 [ 44708.808] (II) modesetting(G0): Manufacturer: WDE Model: 1702 Serial#: 0 [ 44708.808] (II) modesetting(G0): Year: 2005 Week: 14 [ 44708.808] (II) modesetting(G0): EDID Version: 1.3 [ 44708.808] (II) modesetting(G0): Analog Display Input, Input Voltage Level: 0.700/0.700 V [ 44708.808] (II) modesetting(G0): Sync: Separate [ 44708.808] (II) modesetting(G0): Max Image Size [cm]: horiz.: 34 vert.: 27 [ 44708.808] (II) modesetting(G0): Gamma: 2.20 [ 44708.808] (II) modesetting(G0): DPMS capabilities: StandBy Suspend Off; RGB/Color Display [ 44708.808] (II) modesetting(G0): Default color space is primary color space [ 44708.808] (II) modesetting(G0): First detailed timing is preferred mode [ 44708.808] (II) modesetting(G0): GTF timings supported [ 44708.808] (II) modesetting(G0): redX: 0.643 redY: 0.352 greenX: 0.283 greenY: 0.608 [ 44708.808] (II) modesetting(G0): blueX: 0.147 blueY: 0.102 whiteX: 0.313 whiteY: 0.329 [ 44708.808] (II) modesetting(G0): Supported established timings: [ 44708.808] (II) modesetting(G0): 720x400@70Hz [ 44708.808] (II) modesetting(G0): 640x480@60Hz [ 44708.808] (II) modesetting(G0): 640x480@67Hz [ 44708.808] (II) modesetting(G0): 640x480@72Hz [ 44708.808] (II) modesetting(G0): 640x480@75Hz [ 44708.808] (II) modesetting(G0): 800x600@56Hz [ 44708.808] (II) modesetting(G0): 800x600@60Hz [ 44708.808] (II) modesetting(G0): 800x600@72Hz [ 44708.808] (II) modesetting(G0): 800x600@75Hz [ 44708.808] (II) modesetting(G0): 832x624@75Hz [ 44708.808] (II) modesetting(G0): 1024x768@60Hz [ 44708.808] (II) modesetting(G0): 1024x768@70Hz [ 44708.808] (II) modesetting(G0): 1024x768@75Hz [ 44708.809] (II) modesetting(G0): 1280x1024@75Hz [ 44708.809] (II) modesetting(G0): Manufacturer's mask: 0 [ 44708.809] (II) modesetting(G0): Supported standard timings: [ 44708.809] (II) modesetting(G0): #0: hsize: 1280 vsize 1024 refresh: 60 vid: 32897 [ 44708.809] (II) modesetting(G0): #1: hsize: 1152 vsize 864 refresh: 75 vid: 20337 [ 44708.809] (II) modesetting(G0): Supported detailed timing: [ 44708.809] (II) modesetting(G0): clock: 108.0 MHz Image Size: 338 x 270 mm [ 44708.809] (II) modesetting(G0): h_active: 1280 h_sync: 1328 h_sync_end 1440 h_blank_end 1688 h_border: 0 [ 44708.809] (II) modesetting(G0): v_active: 1024 v_sync: 1025 v_sync_end 1028 v_blanking: 1066 v_border: 0 [ 44708.809] (II) modesetting(G0): Ranges: V min: 50 V max: 75 Hz, H min: 30 H max: 82 kHz, PixClock max 145 MHz [ 44708.809] (II) modesetting(G0): Monitor name: WDE LCM-17v2 [ 44708.809] (II) modesetting(G0): Serial No: 0 [ 44708.809] (II) modesetting(G0): EDID (in hex): [ 44708.809] (II) modesetting(G0): 00ffffffffffff005c85021700000000 [ 44708.809] (II) modesetting(G0): 0e0f010368221b78ef8bc5a45a489b25 [ 44708.809] (II) modesetting(G0): 1a5054bfef008180714f010101010101 [ 44708.809] (II) modesetting(G0): 010101010101302a009851002a403070 [ 44708.809] (II) modesetting(G0): 1300520e1100001e000000fd00324b1e [ 44708.809] (II) modesetting(G0): 520e000a202020202020000000fc0057 [ 44708.809] (II) modesetting(G0): 4445204c434d2d313776320a000000ff [ 44708.809] (II) modesetting(G0): 00300a202020202020202020202000e7 [ 44708.809] (II) modesetting(G0): Printing probed modes for output DVI-1-0 [ 44708.809] (II) modesetting(G0): Modeline "1280x1024"x60.0 108.00 1280 1328 1440 1688 1024 1025 1028 1066 +hsync +vsync (64.0 kHz UeP) [ 44708.809] (II) modesetting(G0): Modeline "1280x1024"x75.0 135.00 1280 1296 1440 1688 1024 1025 1028 1066 +hsync +vsync (80.0 kHz e) [ 44708.809] (II) modesetting(G0): Modeline "1280x960"x60.0 108.00 1280 1376 1488 1800 960 961 964 1000 +hsync +vsync (60.0 kHz e) [ 44708.809] (II) modesetting(G0): Modeline "1280x800"x74.9 106.50 1280 1360 1488 1696 800 803 809 838 -hsync +vsync (62.8 kHz e) [ 44708.809] (II) modesetting(G0): Modeline "1280x800"x59.8 83.50 1280 1352 1480 1680 800 803 809 831 +hsync -vsync (49.7 kHz e) [ 44708.809] (II) modesetting(G0): Modeline "1152x864"x75.0 108.00 1152 1216 1344 1600 864 865 868 900 +hsync +vsync (67.5 kHz e) [ 44708.809] (II) modesetting(G0): Modeline "1280x768"x74.9 102.25 1280 1360 1488 1696 768 771 778 805 +hsync -vsync (60.3 kHz e) [ 44708.809] (II) modesetting(G0): Modeline "1280x768"x59.9 79.50 1280 1344 1472 1664 768 771 778 798 -hsync +vsync (47.8 kHz e) [ 44708.810] (II) modesetting(G0): Modeline "1024x768"x75.1 78.80 1024 1040 1136 1312 768 769 772 800 +hsync +vsync (60.1 kHz e) [ 44708.810] (II) modesetting(G0): Modeline "1024x768"x70.1 75.00 1024 1048 1184 1328 768 771 777 806 -hsync -vsync (56.5 kHz e) [ 44708.810] (II) modesetting(G0): Modeline "1024x768"x60.0 65.00 1024 1048 1184 1344 768 771 777 806 -hsync -vsync (48.4 kHz e) [ 44708.810] (II) modesetting(G0): Modeline "1024x576"x60.0 46.97 1024 1064 1168 1312 576 577 580 597 -hsync +vsync (35.8 kHz) [ 44708.810] (II) modesetting(G0): Modeline "832x624"x74.6 57.28 832 864 928 1152 624 625 628 667 -hsync -vsync (49.7 kHz e) [ 44708.810] (II) modesetting(G0): Modeline "800x600"x72.2 50.00 800 856 976 1040 600 637 643 666 +hsync +vsync (48.1 kHz e) [ 44708.810] (II) modesetting(G0): Modeline "800x600"x75.0 49.50 800 816 896 1056 600 601 604 625 +hsync +vsync (46.9 kHz e) [ 44708.810] (II) modesetting(G0): Modeline "800x600"x60.3 40.00 800 840 968 1056 600 601 605 628 +hsync +vsync (37.9 kHz e) [ 44708.810] (II) modesetting(G0): Modeline "800x600"x56.2 36.00 800 824 896 1024 600 601 603 625 +hsync +vsync (35.2 kHz e) [ 44708.810] (II) modesetting(G0): Modeline "848x480"x60.0 33.75 848 864 976 1088 480 486 494 517 +hsync +vsync (31.0 kHz e) [ 44708.810] (II) modesetting(G0): Modeline "640x480"x75.0 31.50 640 656 720 840 480 481 484 500 -hsync -vsync (37.5 kHz e) [ 44708.810] (II) modesetting(G0): Modeline "640x480"x72.8 31.50 640 664 704 832 480 489 491 520 -hsync -vsync (37.9 kHz e) [ 44708.810] (II) modesetting(G0): Modeline "640x480"x66.7 30.24 640 704 768 864 480 483 486 525 -hsync -vsync (35.0 kHz e) [ 44708.810] (II) modesetting(G0): Modeline "640x480"x60.0 25.20 640 656 752 800 480 490 492 525 -hsync -vsync (31.5 kHz e) [ 44708.810] (II) modesetting(G0): Modeline "720x400"x70.1 28.32 720 738 846 900 400 412 414 449 -hsync +vsync (31.5 kHz e) [ 44708.810] (II) modesetting(G0): Using default gamma of (1.0, 1.0, 1.0) unless otherwise stated. [ 44708.810] (==) modesetting(G0): DPI set to (96, 96) [ 44708.810] (II) Loading sub module "fb" [ 44708.810] (II) LoadModule: "fb" [ 44708.810] (II) Loading /usr/lib/xorg/modules/libfb.so [ 44708.810] (II) Module fb: vendor="X.Org Foundation" [ 44708.810] compiled for 1.15.1, module version = 1.0.0 [ 44708.811] ABI class: X.Org ANSI C Emulation, version 0.4 [ 44708.811] (II) UnloadModule: "radeon" [ 44708.811] (II) Unloading radeon [ 44708.811] (II) UnloadModule: "fbdev" [ 44708.811] (II) Unloading fbdev [ 44708.811] (II) UnloadSubModule: "fbdevhw" [ 44708.811] (II) Unloading fbdevhw [ 44708.811] (II) UnloadModule: "vesa" [ 44708.811] (II) Unloading vesa [ 44708.811] (==) modesetting(G0): Backing store enabled [ 44708.811] (==) modesetting(G0): Silken mouse enabled [ 44708.812] (II) modesetting(G0): RandR 1.2 enabled, ignore the following RandR disabled message. [ 44708.812] (==) modesetting(G0): DPMS enabled [ 44708.812] (WW) modesetting(G0): Option "fbdev" is not used [ 44708.812] (==) modesetting(0): Backing store enabled [ 44708.812] (==) modesetting(0): Silken mouse enabled [ 44708.812] (II) modesetting(0): RandR 1.2 enabled, ignore the following RandR disabled message. [ 44708.812] (==) modesetting(0): DPMS enabled [ 44708.812] (WW) modesetting(0): Option "fbdev" is not used [ 44708.856] (--) RandR disabled [ 44708.867] (II) SELinux: Disabled on system [ 44708.868] (II) AIGLX: Screen 0 is not DRI2 capable [ 44708.868] (EE) AIGLX: reverting to software rendering [ 44708.878] (II) AIGLX: Loaded and initialized swrast [ 44708.878] (II) GLX: Initialized DRISWRAST GL provider for screen 0 [ 44708.879] (II) modesetting(G0): Damage tracking initialized [ 44708.879] (II) modesetting(0): Damage tracking initialized [ 44708.879] (II) modesetting(0): Setting screen physical size to 338 x 270 [ 44708.900] (II) XKB: generating xkmfile /tmp/server-B20D7FC79C7F597315E3E501AEF10E0D866E8E92.xkm [ 44708.918] (II) config/udev: Adding input device Power Button (/dev/input/event1) [ 44708.918] (**) Power Button: Applying InputClass "evdev keyboard catchall" [ 44708.918] (II) LoadModule: "evdev" [ 44708.918] (II) Loading /usr/lib/xorg/modules/input/evdev_drv.so [ 44708.918] (II) Module evdev: vendor="X.Org Foundation" [ 44708.918] compiled for 1.15.0, module version = 2.8.2 [ 44708.918] Module class: X.Org XInput Driver [ 44708.918] ABI class: X.Org XInput driver, version 20.0 [ 44708.918] (II) Using input driver 'evdev' for 'Power Button' [ 44708.918] (**) Power Button: always reports core events [ 44708.918] (**) evdev: Power Button: Device: "/dev/input/event1" [ 44708.918] (--) evdev: Power Button: Vendor 0 Product 0x1 [ 44708.918] (--) evdev: Power Button: Found keys [ 44708.918] (II) evdev: Power Button: Configuring as keyboard [ 44708.918] (**) Option "config_info" "udev:/sys/devices/LNXSYSTM:00/LNXPWRBN:00/input/input1/event1" [ 44708.918] (II) XINPUT: Adding extended input device "Power Button" (type: KEYBOARD, id 6) [ 44708.918] (**) Option "xkb_rules" "evdev" [ 44708.918] (**) Option "xkb_model" "pc105" [ 44708.918] (**) Option "xkb_layout" "us" [ 44708.919] (II) config/udev: Adding input device Power Button (/dev/input/event0) [ 44708.919] (**) Power Button: Applying InputClass "evdev keyboard catchall" [ 44708.919] (II) Using input driver 'evdev' for 'Power Button' [ 44708.919] (**) Power Button: always reports core events [ 44708.919] (**) evdev: Power Button: Device: "/dev/input/event0" [ 44708.919] (--) evdev: Power Button: Vendor 0 Product 0x1 [ 44708.919] (--) evdev: Power Button: Found keys [ 44708.919] (II) evdev: Power Button: Configuring as keyboard [ 44708.919] (**) Option "config_info" "udev:/sys/devices/LNXSYSTM:00/device:00/PNP0C0C:00/input/input0/event0" Is there anything I can do to fix this problem.

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• SQL SERVER – A Puzzle – Fun with NULL – Fix Error 8117

  - by pinaldave

  During my 8 years of career, I have been involved in many interviews. Quite often, I act as the  interview. If I am the interviewer, I ask many questions – from easy questions to difficult ones. When I am the interviewee, I frequently get an opportunity to ask the interviewer some questions back. Regardless of the my capacity in attending the interview, I always make it a point to ask the interviewer at least one question. What is NULL? It’s always fun to ask this question during interviews, because in every interview, I get a different answer. NULL is often confused with false, absence of value or infinite value. Honestly, NULL is a very interesting subject as it bases its behavior in server settings. There are a few properties of NULL that are universal, but the knowledge about these properties is not known in a universal sense. Let us run this simple puzzle. Run the following T-SQL script: SELECT SUM(data) FROM (SELECT NULL AS data) t It will return the following error: Msg 8117, Level 16, State 1, Line 1 Operand data type NULL is invalid for sum operator. Now the error makes it very clear that NULL is invalid for sum Operator. Frequently enough, I have showed this simple query to many folks whom I came across. I asked them if they could modify the subquery and return the result as NULL. Here is what I expected: Even though this is a very simple looking query, so far I’ve got the correct answer from only 10% of the people to whom I have asked this question. It was common for me to receive this kind of answer – convert the NULL to some data type. However, doing so usually returns the value as 0 or the integer they passed. SELECT SUM(data) FROM (SELECT ISNULL(NULL,0) AS data) t I usually see many people modifying the outer query to get desired NULL result, but that is not allowed in this simple puzzle. This small puzzle made me wonder how many people have a clear understanding about NULL. Well, here is the answer to my simple puzzle. Just CAST NULL AS INT and it will return the final result as NULL: SELECT SUM(data) FROM (SELECT CAST(NULL AS INT) AS data) t Now that you know the answer, don’t you think it was very simple indeed? This blog post is especially dedicated to my friend Madhivanan who has written an excellent blog post about NULL. I am confident that after reading the blog post from Madhivanan, you will have no confusion regarding NULL in the future. Read: NULL, NULL, NULL and nothing but NULL. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com) Filed under: PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Puzzle, SQL Query, SQL Scripts, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL, Technology

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• Create Custom Sized Thumbnail Images with Simple Image Resizer [Cross-Platform]

  - by Asian Angel

  Are you looking for an easy way to create custom sized thumbnail images for use in blog posts, photo albums, and more? Whether is it a single image or a CD full, Simple Image Resizer is the right app to get the job done for you. To add the new PPA for Simple Image Resizer open the Ubuntu Software Center, go to the Edit Menu, and select Software Sources. Access the Other Software Tab in the Software Sources Window and add the first of the PPAs shown below (outlined in red). The second PPA will be automatically added to your system. Once you have the new PPAs set up, go back to the Ubuntu Software Center and click on the PPA listing for Rafael Sachetto on the left (highlighted with red in the image). The listing for Simple Image Resizer will be right at the top…click Install to add the program to your system. After the installation is complete you can find Simple Image Resizer listed as Sir in the Graphics sub-menu. When you open Simple Image Resizer you will need to browse for the directory containing the images you want to work with, select a destination folder, choose a target format and prefix, enter the desired pixel size for converted images, and set the quality level. Convert your image(s) when ready… Note: You will need to determine the image size that best suits your needs before-hand. For our example we chose to convert a single image. A quick check shows our new “thumbnailed” image looking very nice. Simple Image Resizer can convert “into and from” the following image formats: .jpeg, .png, .bmp, .gif, .xpm, .pgm, .pbm, and .ppm Command Line Installation Note: For older Ubuntu systems (9.04 and previous) see the link provided below. sudo add-apt-repository ppa:rsachetto/ppa sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get install sir Links Note: Simple Image Resizer is available for Ubuntu, Slackware Linux, and Windows. Simple Image Resizer PPA at Launchpad Simple Image Resizer Homepage Command Line Installation for Older Ubuntu Systems Bonus The anime wallpaper shown in the screenshots above can be found here: The end where it begins [DesktopNexus] Latest Features How-To Geek ETC Macs Don’t Make You Creative! So Why Do Artists Really Love Apple? MacX DVD Ripper Pro is Free for How-To Geek Readers (Time Limited!) HTG Explains: What’s a Solid State Drive and What Do I Need to Know? How to Get Amazing Color from Photos in Photoshop, GIMP, and Paint.NET Learn To Adjust Contrast Like a Pro in Photoshop, GIMP, and Paint.NET Have You Ever Wondered How Your Operating System Got Its Name? Create Shortcuts for Your Favorite or Most Used Folders in Ubuntu Create Custom Sized Thumbnail Images with Simple Image Resizer [Cross-Platform] Etch a Circuit Board using a Simple Homemade Mixture Sync Blocker Stops iTunes from Automatically Syncing The Journey to the Mystical Forest [Wallpaper] Trace Your Browser’s Roots on the Browser Family Tree [Infographic]

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• Data validation best practices: how can I better construct user feedback?

  - by Cory Larson

  Data validation, whether it be domain object, form, or any other type of input validation, could theoretically be part of any development effort, no matter its size or complexity. I sometimes find myself writing informational or error messages that might seem harsh or demanding to unsuspecting users, and frankly I feel like there must be a better way to describe the validation problem to the user. I know that this topic is subjective and argumentative. I've migrated this question from StackOverflow where I originally asked it with little response. Basically, I'm looking for good resources on data validation and user feedback that results from it at a theoretical level. Topics and questions I'm interested in are: Content Should I be describing what the user did correctly or incorrectly, or simply what was expected? How much detail can the user read before they get annoyed? (e.g. Is "Username cannot exceed 20 characters." enough, or should it be described more fully, such as "The username cannot be empty, and must be at least 6 characters but cannot exceed 30 characters."?) Grammar How do I decide between phrases like "must not," "may not," or "cannot"? Delivery This can depend on the project, but how should the information be delivered to the user? Should it be obtrusive (e.g. JavaScript alerts) or friendly? Should they be displayed prominently? Immediately (i.e. without confirmation steps, etc.)? Logging Do you bother logging validation errors? Internationalization Some cultures prefer or better understand directness over subtlety and vice-versa (e.g. "Don't do that!" vs. "Please check what you've done."). How do I cater to the majority of users? I may edit this list as I think more about the topic, but I'm genuinely interested in proper user feedback techniques. I'm looking for things like research results, poll results, etc. I've developed and refined my own techniques over the years that users seem to be okay with, but I work in an environment where the users prefer to adapt to what you give them over speaking up about things they don't like. I'm interested in hearing your experiences in addition to any resources to which you may be able to point me.

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