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  • Simple Merging Of PDF Documents with iTextSharp 5.4.5.0

    - by Mladen Prajdic
    As we were working on our first SQL Saturday in Slovenia, we came to a point when we had to print out the so-called SpeedPASS's for attendees. This SpeedPASS file is a PDF and contains thier raffle, lunch and admission tickets. The problem is we have to download one PDF per attendee and print that out. And printing more than 10 docs at once is a pain. So I decided to make a little console app that would merge multiple PDF files into a single file that would be much easier to print. I used an open source PDF manipulation library called iTextSharp version 5.4.5.0 This is a console program I used. It’s brilliantly named MergeSpeedPASS. It only has two methods and is really short. Don't let the name fool you It can be used to merge any PDF files. The first parameter is the name of the target PDF file that will be created. The second parameter is the directory containing PDF files to be merged into a single file. using iTextSharp.text; using iTextSharp.text.pdf; using System; using System.IO; namespace MergeSpeedPASS { class Program { static void Main(string[] args) { if (args.Length == 0 || args[0] == "-h" || args[0] == "/h") { Console.WriteLine("Welcome to MergeSpeedPASS. Created by Mladen Prajdic. Uses iTextSharp 5.4.5.0."); Console.WriteLine("Tool to create a single SpeedPASS PDF from all downloaded generated PDFs."); Console.WriteLine(""); Console.WriteLine("Example: MergeSpeedPASS.exe targetFileName sourceDir"); Console.WriteLine(" targetFileName = name of the new merged PDF file. Must include .pdf extension."); Console.WriteLine(" sourceDir = path to the dir containing downloaded attendee SpeedPASS PDFs"); Console.WriteLine(""); Console.WriteLine(@"Example: MergeSpeedPASS.exe MergedSpeedPASS.pdf d:\Downloads\SQLSaturdaySpeedPASSFiles"); } else if (args.Length == 2) CreateMergedPDF(args[0], args[1]); Console.WriteLine(""); Console.WriteLine("Press any key to exit..."); Console.Read(); } static void CreateMergedPDF(string targetPDF, string sourceDir) { using (FileStream stream = new FileStream(targetPDF, FileMode.Create)) { Document pdfDoc = new Document(PageSize.A4); PdfCopy pdf = new PdfCopy(pdfDoc, stream); pdfDoc.Open(); var files = Directory.GetFiles(sourceDir); Console.WriteLine("Merging files count: " + files.Length); int i = 1; foreach (string file in files) { Console.WriteLine(i + ". Adding: " + file); pdf.AddDocument(new PdfReader(file)); i++; } if (pdfDoc != null) pdfDoc.Close(); Console.WriteLine("SpeedPASS PDF merge complete."); } } } } Hope it helps you and have fun.

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  • Rotating WebLogic Server logs to avoid large files using WLST.

    - by adejuanc
    By default, when WebLogic Server instances are started in development mode, the server automatically renames (rotates) its local server log file as SERVER_NAME.log.n.  For the remainder of the server session, log messages accumulate in SERVER_NAME.log until the file grows to a size of 500 kilobytes.Each time the server log file reaches this size, the server renames the log file and creates a new SERVER_NAME.log to store new messages. By default, the rotated log files are numbered in order of creation filenamennnnn, where filename is the name configured for the log file. You can configure a server instance to include a time and date stamp in the file name of rotated log files; for example, server-name-%yyyy%-%mm%-%dd%-%hh%-%mm%.log.By default, when server instances are started in production mode, the server rotates its server log file whenever the file grows to 5000 kilobytes in size. It does not rotate the local server log file when the server is started. For more information about changing the mode in which a server starts, see Change to production mode in the Administration Console Online Help.You can change these default settings for log file rotation. For example, you can change the file size at which the server rotates the log file or you can configure a server to rotate log files based on a time interval. You can also specify the maximum number of rotated files that can accumulate. After the number of log files reaches this number, subsequent file rotations delete the oldest log file and create a new log file with the latest suffix.  Note: WebLogic Server sets a threshold size limit of 500 MB before it forces a hard rotation to prevent excessive log file growth. To Rotate via WLST : #invoke WLSTC:\>java weblogic.WLST#connect WLST to an Administration Serverawls:/offline> connect('username','password')#navigate to the ServerRuntime MBean hierarchywls:/mydomain/serverConfig> serverRuntime()wls:/mydomain/serverRuntime>ls()#navigate to the server LogRuntimeMBeanwls:/mydomain/serverRuntime> cd('LogRuntime/myserver')wls:/mydomain/serverRuntime/LogRuntime/myserver> ls()-r-- Name myserver-r-- Type LogRuntime-r-x forceLogRotation java.lang.Void :#force the immediate rotation of the server log filewls:/mydomain/serverRuntime/LogRuntime/myserver> cmo.forceLogRotation()wls:/mydomain/serverRuntime/LogRuntime/myserver> The server immediately rotates the file and prints the following message: <Mar 2, 2012 3:23:01 PM EST> <Info> <Log Management> <BEA-170017> <The log file C:\diablodomain\servers\myserver\logs\myserver.log will be rotated. Reopen the log file if tailing has stopped. This can happen on some platforms like Windows.><Mar 2, 2012 3:23:01 PM EST> <Info> <Log Management> <BEA-170018> <The log file has been rotated to C:\diablodomain\servers\myserver\logs\myserver.log00001. Log messages will continue to be logged in C:\diablodomain\servers\myserver\logs\myserver.log.> To specify the Location of the archived Log Files The following command specifies the directory location for the archived log files using the -Dweblogic.log.LogFileRotationDir Java startup option: java -Dweblogic.log.LogFileRotationDir=c:\foo-Dweblogic.management.username=installadministrator-Dweblogic.management.password=installadministrator weblogic.Server For more information read the following documentation ; Using the WebLogic Scripting Tool http://download.oracle.com/docs/cd/E13222_01/wls/docs103/config_scripting/using_WLST.html Configuring WebLogic Logging Services http://download.oracle.com/docs/cd/E12840_01/wls/docs103/logging/config_logs.html

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  • Java EE 7 Roadmap

    - by Linda DeMichiel
    The Java EE 6 Platform, released in December 2009, has seen great uptake from the community with its POJO-based programming model, lightweight Web Profile, and extension points. There are now 13 Java EE 6 compliant appserver implementations today! When we announced the Java EE 7 JSR back in early 2011, our plans were that we would release it by Q4 2012. This target date was slightly over three years after the release of Java EE 6, but at the same time it meant that we had less than two years to complete a fairly comprehensive agenda — to continue to invest in significant enhancements in simplification, usability, and functionality in updated versions of the JSRs that are currently part of the platform; to introduce new JSRs that reflect emerging needs in the community; and to add support for use in cloud environments. We have since announced a minor adjustment in our dates (to the spring of 2013) in order to accommodate the inclusion of JSRs of importance to the community, such as Web Sockets and JSON-P. At this point, however, we have to make a choice. Despite our best intentions, our progress has been slow on the cloud side of our agenda. Partially this has been due to a lack of maturity in the space for provisioning, multi-tenancy, elasticity, and the deployment of applications in the cloud. And partially it is due to our conservative approach in trying to get things "right" in view of limited industry experience in the cloud area when we started this work. Because of this, we believe that providing solid support for standardized PaaS-based programming and multi-tenancy would delay the release of Java EE 7 until the spring of 2014 — that is, two years from now and over a year behind schedule. In our opinion, that is way too long. We have therefore proposed to the Java EE 7 Expert Group that we adjust our course of action — namely, stick to our current target release dates, and defer the remaining aspects of our agenda for PaaS enablement and multi-tenancy support to Java EE 8. Of course, we continue to believe that Java EE is well-suited for use in the cloud, although such use might not be quite ready for full standardization. Even today, without Java EE 7, Java EE vendors such as Oracle, Red Hat, IBM, and CloudBees have begun to offer the ability to run Java EE applications in the cloud. Deferring the remaining cloud-oriented aspects of our agenda has several important advantages: It allows Java EE Platform vendors to gain more experience with their implementations in this area and thus helps us avoid risks entailed by trying to standardize prematurely in an emerging area. It means that the community won't need to wait longer for those features that are ready at the cost of those features that need more time. Because we have already laid some of the infrastructure for cloud support in Java EE 7, including resource definition metadata, improved security configuration, JPA schema generation, etc., it will allow us to expedite a Java EE 8 release. We therefore plan to target the Java EE 8 Platform release for the spring of 2015. This shift in the scope of Java EE 7 allows us to better retain our focus on enhancements in simplification and usability and to deliver on schedule those features that have been most requested by developers. These include the support for HTML 5 in the form of Web Sockets and JSON-P; the simplified JMS 2.0 APIs; improved Managed Bean alignment, including transactional interceptors; the JAX-RS 2.0 client API; support for method-level validation; a much more comprehensive expression language; and more. We feel strongly that this is the right thing to do, and we hope that you will support us in this proposed direction.

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  • Library order is important

    - by Darryl Gove
    I've written quite extensively about link ordering issues, but I've not discussed the interaction between archive libraries and shared libraries. So let's take a simple program that calls a maths library function: #include <math.h int main() { for (int i=0; i<10000000; i++) { sin(i); } } We compile and run it to get the following performance: bash-3.2$ cc -g -O fp.c -lm bash-3.2$ timex ./a.out real 6.06 user 6.04 sys 0.01 Now most people will have heard of the optimised maths library which is added by the flag -xlibmopt. This contains optimised versions of key mathematical functions, in this instance, using the library doubles performance: bash-3.2$ cc -g -O -xlibmopt fp.c -lm bash-3.2$ timex ./a.out real 2.70 user 2.69 sys 0.00 The optimised maths library is provided as an archive library (libmopt.a), and the driver adds it to the link line just before the maths library - this causes the linker to pick the definitions provided by the static library in preference to those provided by libm. We can see the processing by asking the compiler to print out the link line: bash-3.2$ cc -### -g -O -xlibmopt fp.c -lm /usr/ccs/bin/ld ... fp.o -lmopt -lm -o a.out... The flag to the linker is -lmopt, and this is placed before the -lm flag. So what happens when the -lm flag is in the wrong place on the command line: bash-3.2$ cc -g -O -xlibmopt -lm fp.c bash-3.2$ timex ./a.out real 6.02 user 6.01 sys 0.01 If the -lm flag is before the source file (or object file for that matter), we get the slower performance from the system maths library. Why's that? If we look at the link line we can see the following ordering: /usr/ccs/bin/ld ... -lmopt -lm fp.o -o a.out So the optimised maths library is still placed before the system maths library, but the object file is placed afterwards. This would be ok if the optimised maths library were a shared library, but it is not - instead it's an archive library, and archive library processing is different - as described in the linker and library guide: "The link-editor searches an archive only to resolve undefined or tentative external references that have previously been encountered." An archive library can only be used resolve symbols that are outstanding at that point in the link processing. When fp.o is placed before the libmopt.a archive library, then the linker has an unresolved symbol defined in fp.o, and it will search the archive library to resolve that symbol. If the archive library is placed before fp.o then there are no unresolved symbols at that point, and so the linker doesn't need to use the archive library. This is why libmopt needs to be placed after the object files on the link line. On the other hand if the linker has observed any shared libraries, then at any point these are checked for any unresolved symbols. The consequence of this is that once the linker "sees" libm it will resolve any symbols it can to that library, and it will not check the archive library to resolve them. This is why libmopt needs to be placed before libm on the link line. This leads to the following order for placing files on the link line: Object files Archive libraries Shared libraries If you use this order, then things will consistently get resolved to the archive libraries rather than to the shared libaries.

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  • Caching factory design

    - by max
    I have a factory class XFactory that creates objects of class X. Instances of X are very large, so the main purpose of the factory is to cache them, as transparently to the client code as possible. Objects of class X are immutable, so the following code seems reasonable: # module xfactory.py import x class XFactory: _registry = {} def get_x(self, arg1, arg2, use_cache = True): if use_cache: hash_id = hash((arg1, arg2)) if hash_id in _registry: return _registry[hash_id] obj = x.X(arg1, arg2) _registry[hash_id] = obj return obj # module x.py class X: # ... Is it a good pattern? (I know it's not the actual Factory Pattern.) Is there anything I should change? Now, I find that sometimes I want to cache X objects to disk. I'll use pickle for that purpose, and store as values in the _registry the filenames of the pickled objects instead of references to the objects. Of course, _registry itself would have to be stored persistently (perhaps in a pickle file of its own, in a text file, in a database, or simply by giving pickle files the filenames that contain hash_id). Except now the validity of the cached object depends not only on the parameters passed to get_x(), but also on the version of the code that created these objects. Strictly speaking, even a memory-cached object could become invalid if someone modifies x.py or any of its dependencies, and reloads it while the program is running. So far I ignored this danger since it seems unlikely for my application. But I certainly cannot ignore it when my objects are cached to persistent storage. What can I do? I suppose I could make the hash_id more robust by calculating hash of a tuple that contains arguments arg1 and arg2, as well as the filename and last modified date for x.py and every module and data file that it (recursively) depends on. To help delete cache files that won't ever be useful again, I'd add to the _registry the unhashed representation of the modified dates for each record. But even this solution isn't 100% safe since theoretically someone might load a module dynamically, and I wouldn't know about it from statically analyzing the source code. If I go all out and assume every file in the project is a dependency, the mechanism will still break if some module grabs data from an external website, etc.). In addition, the frequency of changes in x.py and its dependencies is quite high, leading to heavy cache invalidation. Thus, I figured I might as well give up some safety, and only invalidate the cache only when there is an obvious mismatch. This means that class X would have a class-level cache validation identifier that should be changed whenever the developer believes a change happened that should invalidate the cache. (With multiple developers, a separate invalidation identifier is required for each.) This identifier is hashed along with arg1 and arg2 and becomes part of the hash keys stored in _registry. Since developers may forget to update the validation identifier or not realize that they invalidated existing cache, it would seem better to add another validation mechanism: class X can have a method that returns all the known "traits" of X. For instance, if X is a table, I might add the names of all the columns. The hash calculation will include the traits as well. I can write this code, but I am afraid that I'm missing something important; and I'm also wondering if perhaps there's a framework or package that can do all of this stuff already. Ideally, I'd like to combine in-memory and disk-based caching.

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  • Construction Paper, Legos, and Architectural Modeling

    I can remember as a kid playing with construction paper and Legos to explore my imagination. Through my exploration I was able to build airplanes, footballs, guns, and more, out of paper. Additionally I could create entire cities, robots, or anything else I could image out of Legos.  These toys, I now realize were in fact tools that gave me an opportunity to explore my ideas in the physical world through the use of modeling.  My imagination was allowed to run wild as I, unknowingly at the time, made design decisions that directly affected the models I was building from the raw materials.  To prove my point further, I can remember building a paper airplane that seemed to go nowhere when I tried to throw it. So I decided to attach a paper clip to the plane before I decided to throw it the next time to test my concept that by adding more weight to the plane that it would fly better and for longer distances. The paper airplane allowed me to model my design decision through the use of creating an artifact in that I created a paper airplane that was carrying extra weight through the incorporation of the paper clip in to the design. Also, I remember using Legos to build all sorts of creations, and these creations became artifacts of my imagination. As I further and further defined my Lego creations through the process of playing I was able to create elaborate artifacts of my imagination. These artifacts represented design decision I had made in the evolution of my creation through my child like design process. In some form or fashion the artifacts I created as a kid are very similar to the artifacts that I create when I model a software architectural concept or a software design in that the process of making decisions is directly translated in to a tangible model in the form of an architectural model. Architectural models have been defined as artifacts that depict design decisions of a system’s architecture.  The act of creating architectural models is the act of architectural modeling. Furthermore, architectural modeling is the process of creating a physical model based architectural concepts and documenting these design decisions. In the process of creating models, the standard notation used is Architectural modeling notation. This notation is the primary method of capturing the essence of design decisions regarding architecture.  Modeling notations can vary based on the need and intent of a project; typically they range from natural language to a diagram based notation. Currently, Unified Markup Language (UML) is the industry standard in terms of architectural modeling notation  because allows for architectures to be defined through a series of boxes, lines, arrows and other basic symbols that encapsulate design designs in to virtual components, connectors, configurations and interfaces.  Furthermore UML allows for additional break down of models through the use of natural language as to explain each section of the model in plain English. One of the major factors in architectural modeling is to define what is to be modeled. As a basic rule of thumb, I tend to model architecture based on the complexity of systems or sub sub-systems of architecture. Another key factor is the level of detail that is actually needed for a model. For example if I am modeling a system for a CEO to view then the low level details will be omitted. In comparison, if I was modeling a system for another engineer to actually implement I would include as much detailed information as I could to help the engineer implement my design.

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  • Call For Papers Tips and Tricks

    - by speakjava
    This year's JavaOne session review has just been completed and by now everyone who submitted papers should know whether they were successful or not.  I had the pleasure again this year of leading the review of the 'JavaFX and Rich User Experiences' track.  I thought it would be useful to write up a few comments to help people in future when submitting session proposals, not just for JavaOne, but for any of the many developer conferences that run around the world throughout the year.  This also draws on conversations I recently had with various Java User Group leaders at the Oracle User Group summit in Riga.  Many of these leaders run some of the biggest and most successful Java conferences in Europe. Try to think of a title which will sound interesting.  For example, "Experiences of performance tuning embedded Java for an ARM architecture based single board computer" probably isn't going to get as much attention as "Do you like coffee with your dessert? Java on the Raspberry Pi".  When thinking of the subject and title for your talk try to steer clear of sessions that might be too generic (and so get lost in a group of similar sessions).  Introductory talks are great when the audience is new to a subject, but beware of providing sessions that are too basic when the technology has been around for a while and there are lots of tutorials already available on the web. JavaOne, like many other conferences has a number of fields that need to be filled in when submitting a paper.  Many of these are selected from pull-down lists (like which track the session is applicable to).  Check these lists carefully.  A number of sessions we had needed to be shuffled between tracks when it was thought that the one selected was not appropriate.  We didn't count this against any sessions, but it's always a good idea to try and get the right one from the start, just in case. JavaOne, again like many other conferences, has two fields that describe the session being submitted: abstract and summary.  These are the most critical to a successful submission.  The two fields have different names and that is significant; a frequent mistake people make is to write an abstract for a session and then duplicate it for the summary.  The abstract (at least in the case of JavaOne) is what gets printed in the show guide and is typically what will be used by attendees when deciding what sessions to attend.  This is where you need to sell your session, not just to the reviewers, but also the people who you want in your audience.  Submitting a one line abstract (unless it's a really good one line) is not usually enough to decide whether this is worth investing an hour of conference time.  The abstract typically has a limit of a few hundred characters.  Try to use as many of them as possible to get as much information about your session across.  The summary should be different from the abstract (and don't leave it blank as some people do).  This field is where you can give the reviewers more detail about things like the structure of the talk, possible demonstrations and so on.  As a reviewer I look to this section to help me decide whether the hard-sell of the title and abstract will actually be reflected in the final content.  Try to make this comprehensive, but don't make it excessively long.  When you have to review possibly hundreds of sessions a certain level of conciseness can make life easier for reviewers and help the cause of your session. If you've not made many submissions for talks in the past, or if this is your first, try to give reviewers places to find background on you as a presenter.  Having an active blog and Twitter handle can also help reviewers if they're not sure what your level of expertise is.  Many call-for-papers have places for you to include this type of information.  It's always good to have new and original presenters and presentations for conferences.  Hopefully these tips will help you be successful when you answer the next call-for-papers.

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  • Managing common code on Windows 7 (.NET) and Windows 8 (WinRT)

    - by ryanabr
    Recent announcements regarding Windows Phone 8 and the fact that it will have the WinRT behind it might make some of this less painful but I  discovered the "XmlDocument" object is in a new location in WinRT and is almost the same as it's brother in .NET System.Xml.XmlDocument (.NET) Windows.Data.Xml.Dom.XmlDocument (WinRT) The problem I am trying to solve is how to work with both types in the code that performs the same task on both Windows Phone 7 and Windows 8 platforms. The first thing I did was define my own XmlNode and XmlNodeList classes that wrap the actual Microsoft objects so that by using the "#if" compiler directive either work with the WinRT version of the type, or the .NET version from the calling code easily. public class XmlNode     { #if WIN8         public Windows.Data.Xml.Dom.IXmlNode Node { get; set; }         public XmlNode(Windows.Data.Xml.Dom.IXmlNode xmlNode)         {             Node = xmlNode;         } #endif #if !WIN8 public System.Xml.XmlNode Node { get; set ; } public XmlNode(System.Xml.XmlNode xmlNode)         {             Node = xmlNode;         } #endif     } public class XmlNodeList     { #if WIN8         public Windows.Data.Xml.Dom.XmlNodeList List { get; set; }         public int Count {get {return (int)List.Count;}}         public XmlNodeList(Windows.Data.Xml.Dom.XmlNodeList list)         {             List = list;         } #endif #if !WIN8 public System.Xml.XmlNodeList List { get; set ; } public int Count { get { return List.Count;}} public XmlNodeList(System.Xml.XmlNodeList list)         {             List = list;        } #endif     } From there I can then use my XmlNode and XmlNodeList in the calling code with out having to clutter the code with all of the additional #if switches. The challenge after this was the code that worked directly with the XMLDocument object needed to be seperate on both platforms since the method for populating the XmlDocument object is completly different on both platforms. To solve this issue. I made partial classes, one partial class for .NET and one for WinRT. Both projects have Links to the Partial Class that contains the code that is the same for the majority of the class, and the partial class contains the code that is unique to the version of the XmlDocument. The files with the little arrow in the lower left corner denotes 'linked files' and are shared in multiple projects but only exist in one location in source control. You can see that the _Win7 partial class is included directly in the project since it include code that is only for the .NET platform, where as it's cousin the _Win8 (not pictured above) has all of the code specific to the _Win8 platform. In the _Win7 partial class is this code: public partial class WUndergroundViewModel     { public static WUndergroundData GetWeatherData( double lat, double lng)         { WUndergroundData data = new WUndergroundData();             System.Net. WebClient c = new System.Net. WebClient(); string req = "http://api.wunderground.com/api/xxx/yesterday/conditions/forecast/q/[LAT],[LNG].xml" ;             req = req.Replace( "[LAT]" , lat.ToString());             req = req.Replace( "[LNG]" , lng.ToString()); XmlDocument doc = new XmlDocument();             doc.Load(c.OpenRead(req)); foreach (XmlNode item in doc.SelectNodes("/response/features/feature" ))             { switch (item.Node.InnerText)                 { case "yesterday" :                         ParseForecast( new FishingControls.XmlNodeList (doc.SelectNodes( "/response/forecast/txt_forecast/forecastdays/forecastday" )), new FishingControls.XmlNodeList (doc.SelectNodes( "/response/forecast/simpleforecast/forecastdays/forecastday" )), data); break ; case "conditions" :                         ParseCurrent( new FishingControls.XmlNode (doc.SelectSingleNode("/response/current_observation" )), data); break ; case "forecast" :                         ParseYesterday( new FishingControls.XmlNodeList (doc.SelectNodes( "/response/history/observations/observation" )),data); break ;                 }             } return data;         }     } in _win8 partial class is this code: public partial class WUndergroundViewModel     { public async static Task< WUndergroundData > GetWeatherData(double lat, double lng)         { WUndergroundData data = new WUndergroundData (); HttpClient c = new HttpClient (); string req = "http://api.wunderground.com/api/xxxx/yesterday/conditions/forecast/q/[LAT],[LNG].xml" ;             req = req.Replace( "[LAT]" , lat.ToString());             req = req.Replace( "[LNG]" , lng.ToString()); HttpResponseMessage msg = await c.GetAsync(req); string stream = await msg.Content.ReadAsStringAsync(); XmlDocument doc = new XmlDocument ();             doc.LoadXml(stream, null); foreach ( IXmlNode item in doc.SelectNodes("/response/features/feature" ))             { switch (item.InnerText)                 { case "yesterday" :                         ParseForecast( new FishingControls.XmlNodeList (doc.SelectNodes( "/response/forecast/txt_forecast/forecastdays/forecastday" )), new FishingControls.XmlNodeList (doc.SelectNodes( "/response/forecast/simpleforecast/forecastdays/forecastday" )), data); break; case "conditions" :                         ParseCurrent( new FishingControls.XmlNode (doc.SelectSingleNode("/response/current_observation" )), data); break; case "forecast" :                         ParseYesterday( new FishingControls.XmlNodeList (doc.SelectNodes( "/response/history/observations/observation")), data); break;                 }             } return data;         }     } Summary: This method allows me to have common 'business' code for both platforms that is pretty clean, and I manage the technology differences separately. Thank you tostringtheory for your suggestion, I was considering that approach.

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  • Dont Throw Duplicate Exceptions

    In your code, youll sometimes have write code that validates input using a variety of checks.  Assuming you havent embraced AOP and done everything with attributes, its likely that your defensive coding is going to look something like this: public void Foo(SomeClass someArgument) { if(someArgument == null) { throw new InvalidArgumentException("someArgument"); } if(!someArgument.IsValid()) { throw new InvalidArgumentException("someArgument"); }   // Do Real Work } Do you see a problem here?  Heres the deal Exceptions should be meaningful.  They have value at a number of levels: In the code, throwing an exception lets the develop know that there is an unsupported condition here In calling code, different types of exceptions may be handled differently At runtime, logging of exceptions provides a valuable diagnostic tool Its this last reason I want to focus on.  If you find yourself literally throwing the exact exception in more than one location within a given method, stop.  The stack trace for such an exception is likely going to be identical regardless of which path of execution led to the exception being thrown.  When that happens, you or whomever is debugging the problem will have to guess which exception was thrown.  Guessing is a great way to introduce additional problems and/or greatly increase the amount of time require to properly diagnose and correct any bugs related to this behavior. Dont Guess Be Specific When throwing an exception from multiple code paths within the code, be specific.  Virtually ever exception allows a custom message use it and ensure each case is unique.  If the exception might be handled differently by the caller, than consider implementing a new custom exception type.  Also, dont automatically think that you can improve the code by collapsing the if-then logic into a single call with short-circuiting (e.g. if(x == null || !x.IsValid()) ) that will guarantee that you cant easily throw different information into the message as easily as constructing the exception separately in each case. The code above might be refactored like so:   public void Foo(SomeClass someArgument) { if(someArgument == null) { throw new ArgumentNullException("someArgument"); } if(!someArgument.IsValid()) { throw new InvalidArgumentException("someArgument"); }   // Do Real Work } In this case its taking advantage of the fact that there is already an ArgumentNullException in the framework, but if you didnt have an IsValid() method and were doing validation on your own, it might look like this: public void Foo(SomeClass someArgument) { if(someArgument.Quantity < 0) { throw new InvalidArgumentException("someArgument", "Quantity cannot be less than 0. Quantity: " + someArgument.Quantity); } if(someArgument.Quantity > 100) { throw new InvalidArgumentException("someArgument", "SomeArgument.Quantity cannot exceed 100. Quantity: " + someArgument.Quantity); }   // Do Real Work }   Note that in this last example, Im throwing the same exception type in each case, but with different Message values.  Im also making sure to include the value that resulted in the exception, as this can be extremely useful for debugging.  (How many times have you wished NullReferenceException would tell you the name of the variable it was trying to reference?) Dont add work to those who will follow after you to maintain your application (especially since its likely to be you).  Be specific with your exception messages follow DRY when throwing exceptions within a given method by throwing unique exceptions for each interesting case of invalid state. Did you know that DotNetSlackers also publishes .net articles written by top known .net Authors? We already have over 80 articles in several categories including Silverlight. Take a look: here.

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  • My shiny new gadget

    - by TechTwaddle
    About 3 months ago when I had tweeted (or twit?) that the HD7 could be my next phone I wasn’t a 100 percent sure, and when the HTC Mozart came out it was switch at first sight. I wanted to buy the Mozart mainly for three reasons; its unibody construction, smaller screen and the SLCD display. But now, holding a HD7 in my hand, I reminisce and think about how fate had its own plan. Too dramatic for a piece of gadget? Well, sort of, but seriously, this has been most exciting. So in short, I bought myself a HTC HD7 and am really loving it so far. Here are some pics (taken from my HD2 which now lies in a corner, crying),     Most of my day was spent setting up the device. Email accounts, Facebook, Marketplace etc. Since marketplace isn’t officially launched in India yet, my primary live id did not work. Whenever I tried launching marketplace it would say ‘marketplace is not currently supported in your country’. Searching the forums I found an easy work around. Just create a dummy live id with the country set to UK or US and log in to the device using this id. I was worried if the contacts and feeds from my primary live account would not be updated but that was not a problem. Adding another live account into the device does import your contacts, calendar and feeds from it. And that’s it, marketplace now works perfectly. I installed a few trial and free applications; haven’t checked if I can purchase apps though, will check that later and update this post. There is one issue I am still facing with the device, I can’t access the internet over GPRS. Windows Phone 7 only gives you the option to add an ‘APN’ and nothing else. Checking the connection settings on my HD2, I found out that there is also a proxy server I need to add to access GPRS, but so far I haven’t found a way to do that on WP7. Ideally HTC should have taken care of this, detect the operator and apply that operators settings on the device, but looks like that’s not happening. I also tried the ‘Connection Settings’ application that HTC bundled with the device, but it did nothing magical. If you’re reading this and know how to fix this problem please leave a comment. The next thing I did is install apps, a lot of apps. Read Engadget’s guide to essential apps for WP7. The apps and games I installed so far include Beezz (twitter app with push notifications), twitter (the official twitter app), Facebook, Youtube, NFS Undercover, Rocket Riot, Krashlander, Unite and the list goes on. All the apps run super smooth. The display looks fine indoors but I know it’s going to suck in bright sunlight. Anyhow, I am really impressed with what I’ve seen so far. I leave you with a few more photos. Have a great year ahead. Ciao!

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  • ORE graphics using Remote Desktop Protocol

    - by Sherry LaMonica
    Oracle R Enterprise graphics are returned as raster, or bitmap graphics. Raster images consist of tiny squares of color information referred to as pixels that form points of color to create a complete image. Plots that contain raster images render quickly in R and create small, high-quality exported image files in a wide variety of formats. However, it is a known issue that the rendering of raster images can be problematic when creating graphics using a Remote Desktop connection. Raster images do not display in the windows device using Remote Desktop under the default settings. This happens because Remote Desktop restricts the number of colors when connecting to a Windows machine to 16 bits per pixel, and interpolating raster graphics requires many colors, at least 32 bits per pixel.. For example, this simple embedded R image plot will be returned in a raster-based format using a standalone Windows machine:  R> library(ORE) R> ore.connect(user="rquser", sid="orcl", host="localhost", password="rquser", all=TRUE)  R> ore.doEval(function() image(volcano, col=terrain.colors(30))) Here, we first load the ORE packages and connect to the database instance using database login credentials. The ore.doEval function executes the R code within the database embedded R engine and returns the image back to the client R session. Over a Remote Desktop connection under the default settings, this graph will appear blank due to the restricted number of colors. Users who encounter this issue have two options to display ORE graphics over Remote Desktop: either raise Remote Desktop's Color Depth or direct the plot output to an alternate device. Option #1: Raise Remote Desktop Color Depth setting In a Remote Desktop session, all environment variables, including display variables determining Color Depth, are determined by the RCP-Tcp connection settings. For example, users can reduce the Color Depth when connecting over a slow connection. The different settings are 15 bits, 16 bits, 24 bits, or 32 bits per pixel. To raise the Remote Desktop color depth: On the Windows server, launch Remote Desktop Session Host Configuration from the Accessories menu.Under Connections, right click on RDP-Tcp and select Properties.On the Client Settings tab either uncheck LimitMaximum Color Depth or set it to 32 bits per pixel. Click Apply, then OK, log out of the remote session and reconnect.After reconnecting, the Color Depth on the Display tab will be set to 32 bits per pixel.  Raster graphics will now display as expected. For ORE users, the increased color depth results in slightly reduced performance during plot creation, but the graph will be created instead of displaying an empty plot. Option #2: Direct plot output to alternate device Plotting to a non-windows device is a good option if it's not possible to increase Remote Desktop Color Depth, or if performance is degraded when creating the graph. Several device drivers are available for off-screen graphics in R, such as postscript, pdf, and png. On-screen devices include windows, X11 and Cairo. Here we output to the Cairo device to render an on-screen raster graphic.  The grid.raster function in the grid package is analogous to other grid graphical primitives - it draws a raster image within the current plot's grid.  R> options(device = "CairoWin") # use Cairo device for plotting during the session R> library(Cairo) # load Cairo, grid and png libraries  R> library(grid) R> library(png)  R> res <- ore.doEval(function()image(volcano,col=terrain.colors(30))) # create embedded R plot  R> img <- ore.pull(res, graphics = TRUE)$img[[1]] # extract image  R> grid.raster(as.raster(readPNG(img)), interpolate = FALSE) # generate raster graph R> dev.off() # turn off first device   By default, the interpolate argument to grid.raster is TRUE, which means that what is actually drawn by R is a linear interpolation of the pixels in the original image. Setting interpolate to FALSE uses a sample from the pixels in the original image.A list of graphics devices available in R can be found in the Devices help file from the grDevices package: R> help(Devices)

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  • Getting Wrong Answer in range maximum query [on hold]

    - by user3186829
    I've just learnt range minimum and maximum queries using segment trees.But when I implemented it on my own I'm getting wrong answer.Logically I don't find any mistake in my code but if any one can point it out then I would be really thankful. Code in C++: #include<bits/stdc++.h> using namespace std; #define LL long long #define mp make_pair #define pb push_back #define gc getchar_unlocked #define pc putchar_unlocked #define LD long double #define MAXN 19999999 #define max(a,b) ((a)>(b)?(a):(b)) LL P[MAXN+15]; LL ST[2*MAXN+25]; long N,M,i,A,B,K; void build(long id,long L,long R) { long M=(L+R)>>1L; long LCT=id<<1L; long RCT=LCT+1L; if(L==R) { ST[id]=P[L]; return; } build(LCT,L,M); build(RCT,M+1,R); } //Range Update of segment tree void updateST(long id,long L,long R,long Q1,long Q2,long val) { long M=(L+R)>>1L; long LCT=id<<1L; long RCT=LCT+1L; if(L>Q2||R<Q1) { return; } if(L==Q1&&R==Q2) { ST[id]+=val; return; } if(Q2<=M) { updateST(LCT,L,M,Q1,Q2,val); } else if(Q1>M) { updateST(RCT,M+1,R,Q1,Q2,val); } else { updateST(LCT,L,M,Q1,M,val); updateST(RCT,M+1,R,M+1,Q2,val); } } //Query for finding maximum element in a given range[Q1,Q2] and 1<=Q1,Q2<=N LL query2(long id,long L,long R,long Q1,long Q2) { long M=(L+R)>>1; long LCT=id<<1; long RCT=LCT+1; if(L>Q2||R<Q1) { return 0; } if(L==Q1&&R==Q2) { return ST[id]; } if(Q2<=M) { return query2(LCT,L,M,Q1,Q2); } else if(Q1>M) { return query2(RCT,M+1,R,Q1,Q2); } else { LL G=query2(LCT,L,M,Q1,M); LL H=query2(RCT,M+1,R,M+1,Q2); LL RES=max(G,H); return RES; } } int main() { scanf("%ld %ld",&N,&M); build(1,1,N); for(i=0;i<M;i++) { scanf("%ld %ld %ld",&A,&B,&K); updateST(1,1,N,A,B,K); } //Finding maximum element in range[1,N]] cout<<query2(1,1,N,1,N); return 0; }

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  • Working Towards Specialization? Your VAD Can Help You Score!

    - by Kristin Rose
    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-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman","serif";} TOUCH DOWN! That’s right folks, football is in full swing and what better way to kickoff football season than with a great Oracle play? Partners can now score big by side passing the ball to their VADs, enabling them to help in the process of becoming a Specialized partner. With the new functionality now available on the OPN Competency Center, Partner PRM Administrators can grant access to their VADs and have them assist in achieving their Specialization requirements. Here are the rules of the game: Partner Administrator must provide authorization Details do not include individual users data Access can be removed anytime Follow the steps below to grant your VAD access to your company Specialization progress reports. It’s as simple as 1,2,3…Go team go! Login to the OPN Competency Center and go to “My Preferences” on the top right corner of the screen. Under “My VAD”, select your Region, Country and Value Added Distributor name, then simple click in “ADD VAD”. Your VAD can now access your Specialization Tracker report! For those MVP’s who want to learn more, be sure to watch this 3 minute play by play video on the new OPN Competency Center VAD/VAR Specialization Tracker below, and click here before game day! 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-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman","serif";} Are You Ready For Some Oracle Football? The OPN Communications Team 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-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman","serif";}

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  • Cleaner ClientID's with ASP.NET 4.0

    - by amaniar
    Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE HI /* 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-top:0in; mso-para-margin-right:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:10.0pt; mso-para-margin-left:0in; line-height:115%; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;} A common complain we have had when using ASP.NET web forms is the inability to control the ID attributes being rendered in the HTML markup when using server controls. Our Interface Engineers want to be able to predict the ID’s of controls thereby having more control over their client side code for selecting/manipulating elements by ID or using CSS to target them. While playing with the just released VS2010 and .NET 4.0 I discovered some real cool improvements. One of them is the ability to now have full control over the ID being rendered for server controls. ASP.NET 4.0 controls now have a new ClientIDMode property which gives the developer complete control over the ID’s being rendered making it easy to write JavaScript and CSS against the rendered html. By default the ClientIDMode is set to Predictable which results in clean and predictable ID’s by concatenating the ID’s of the Parent and child controls. So the following markup: <asp:Content ID="ParentContainer" ContentPlaceHolderID="MainContentPlaceHolder" runat="server">     <asp:Label runat="server" ID="MyLabel">My Label</asp:Label> </asp:Content>                                                                                                                                                             Will render:   <span id="ParentContainer_MyLabel">My Label</span> Instead of something like this: (current) <span id="ct100_ParentContainer_MyLabel">My Label</span> Other modes include AutoID (renders ID’s like it currently does in .NET 3.5), Static (renders the ID exactly as specified in the code) and Inherit (defers the mode to the parent control). So now I can write my jQuery selector as: $(“ParentContainer_MyLabel”).text(“My new Text”); Instead of: $(‘<%=this. MyLabel.ClientID%>’).text(“My new Text”); Scott Mitchell has a great article about this new feature: http://bit.ly/ailEJ2 Am excited about this and some other improvements. Many thanks to the ASP.NET team for Listening!

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  • Pro/con of using Angular directives for complex form validation/ GUI manipulation

    - by tengen
    I am building a new SPA front end to replace an existing enterprise's legacy hodgepodge of systems that are outdated and in need of updating. I am new to angular, and wanted to see if the community could give me some perspective. I'll state my problem, and then ask my question. I have to generate several series of check boxes based on data from a .js include, with data like this: $scope.fieldMappings.investmentObjectiveMap = [ {'id':"CAPITAL PRESERVATION", 'name':"Capital Preservation"}, {'id':"STABLE", 'name':"Moderate"}, {'id':"BALANCED", 'name':"Moderate Growth"}, // etc {'id':"NONE", 'name':"None"} ]; The checkboxes are created using an ng-repeat, like this: <div ng-repeat="investmentObjective in fieldMappings.investmentObjectiveMap"> ... </div> However, I needed the values represented by the checkboxes to map to a different model (not just 2-way-bound to the fieldmappings object). To accomplish this, I created a directive, which accepts a destination array destarray which is eventually mapped to the model. I also know I need to handle some very specific gui controls, such as unchecking "None" if anything else gets checked, or checking "None" if everything else gets unchecked. Also, "None" won't be an option in every group of checkboxes, so the directive needs to be generic enough to accept a validation function that can fiddle with the checked state of the checkbox group's inputs based on what's already clicked, but smart enough not to break if there is no option called "NONE". I started to do that by adding an ng-click which invoked a function in the controller, but in looking around Stack Overflow, I read people saying that its bad to put DOM manipulation code inside your controller - it should go in directives. So do I need another directive? So far: (html): <input my-checkbox-group type="checkbox" fieldobj="investmentObjective" ng-click="validationfunc()" validationfunc="clearOnNone()" destarray="investor.investmentObjective" /> Directive code: .directive("myCheckboxGroup", function () { return { restrict: "A", scope: { destarray: "=", // the source of all the checkbox values fieldobj: "=", // the array the values came from validationfunc: "&" // the function to be called for validation (optional) }, link: function (scope, elem, attrs) { if (scope.destarray.indexOf(scope.fieldobj.id) !== -1) { elem[0].checked = true; } elem.bind('click', function () { var index = scope.destarray.indexOf(scope.fieldobj.id); if (elem[0].checked) { if (index === -1) { scope.destarray.push(scope.fieldobj.id); } } else { if (index !== -1) { scope.destarray.splice(index, 1); } } }); } }; }) .js controller snippet: .controller( 'SuitabilityCtrl', ['$scope', function ( $scope ) { $scope.clearOnNone = function() { // naughty jQuery DOM manipulation code that // looks at checkboxes and checks/unchecks as needed }; The above code is done and works fine, except the naughty jquery code in clearOnNone(), which is why I wrote this question. And here is my question: after ALL this, I think to myself - I could be done already if I just manually handled all this GUI logic and validation junk with jQuery written in my controller. At what point does it become foolish to write these complicated directives that future developers will have to puzzle over more than if I had just written jQuery code that 99% of us would understand with a glance? How do other developers draw the line? I see this all over Stack Overflow. For example, this question seems like it could be answered with a dozen lines of straightforward jQuery, yet he has opted to do it the angular way, with a directive and a partial... it seems like a lot of work for a simple problem. Specifically, I suppose I would like to know: how SHOULD I be writing the code that checks whether "None" has been selected (if it exists as an option in this group of checkboxes), and then check/uncheck the other boxes accordingly? A more complex directive? I can't believe I'm the only developer that is having to implement code that is more complex than needed just to satisfy an opinionated framework.

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  • Please Help - PHP Form, when no text is entered [migrated]

    - by Joe Turner
    I'm creating a mobile landing page and I have also created a form that allows me to create more, by duplicating a folder that's host to a template file. The script then takes you to a page where you input the company details one by one and press submit. Then the page is created. My problem is, when a field is left out (YouTube for instance), the button is created and is blank. I would like there to be a default text for when there is no text. I've tried a few things and have been struggling to make this work for DAYS! <?php $company = $_POST["company"]; $phone = $_POST["phone"]; $colour = $_POST["colour"]; $email = $_POST["email"]; $website = $_POST["website"]; $video = $_POST["video"]; ?> <div id="contact-area"> <form method="post" action="generate.php"><br> <input type="text" name="company" placeholder="Company Name" /><br> <input type="text" name="slogan" placeholder="Slogan" /><br> <input class="color {required:false}" name="colour" placeholder="Company Colour"><br> <input type="text" name="phone" placeholder="Phone Number" /><br> <input type="text" name="email" placeholder="Email Address" /><br> <input type="text" name="website" placeholder="Full Website - Include http://" /><br> <input type="text" name="video" placeholder="Video URL" /><br> <input type="submit" value="Generate QuickLinks" style="background:url(images/submit.png) repeat-x; color:#FFF"/> </form> That's the form. It takes the variables and post's them to the file below. <?php $File = "includes/details.php"; $Handle = fopen($File, 'w'); ?> <?php $File = "includes/details.php"; $Handle = fopen($File, 'w'); $Data = "<div id='logo'> <h1 style='color:#$_POST[colour]'>$_POST[company]</h1> <h2>$_POST[slogan]</h2> </div> <ul data-role='listview' data-inset='true' data-theme='b'> <li style='background-color:#$_POST[colour]'><a href='tel:$_POST[phone]'>Phone Us</a></li> <li style='background-color:#$_POST[colour]'><a href='mailto:$_POST[email]'>Email Us</a></li> <li style='background-color:#$_POST[colour]'><a href='$_POST[website]'>View Full Website</a></li> <li style='background-color:#$_POST[colour]'><a href='$_POST[video]'>Watch Us</a></li> </ul> \n"; fwrite($Handle, $Data); fclose($Handle); ?> and there is what the form turns into. I need there to be a default link put in incase the field is left blank, witch it is sometimes. Thanks in advance guys.

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  • Would this be a good web application architecture?

    - by Gustav Bertram
    My problem Our MVC based framework does not allow us to cache only part of our output. Ideally we want to cahce static and semi-static bits, and run dynamic bits. In addition, we need to consider data caching that reacts to database changes. My idea The concept I came up with was to represent a page as a tree of XML fragment objects. (I say XML, but I mean XHTML). Some of the fragments are dynamic, and can pull their data directly from models or other sources, but most of the fragments are static scaffolding. If a subtree of fragments is completely static, then I imagine that they could unfold into pure XML that would then be cached as the text representation of their parent element. This process would ideally continue until we are left with a root element that contains all of the static XML, and has a couple of dynamic XML fragments that are resolved and attached to the relevant nodes of the XML tree just before the page is displayed. In addition to separating content into dynamic and static fragments, some fragments could be dynamic and cached. A simple expiry time which propagates up through the XML fragment tree would indicate that a specific fragment should periodically be refreshed. A newspaper section or front page does not need to be updated each second. Minutes or sometimes even longer is sufficient. Other fragments would be dynamic and uncached. Typically too many articles are viewed for them to be cached - the cache would overflow. Some individual articles may be cached if they are extremely popular. Functional notes The folding mechanism could be to be smart enough to judge when it would be more profitable to fold a dynamic cached fragment and propagate the expiry date to the parent fragment, or to keep it separate and simple attach to the XML tree when resolving the page. If some dynamic cached fragments are associated to database objects through mechanisms like a globally unique content id, then changes to the database could trigger changes to the output cache. If fragments store the identifiers of parent fragments, then they could trigger a refolding process that would then include the updated data. A set of pure XML with an ordered array of fragment objects (that each store the identifying information of the node to which they should be attached), can be resolved in a fairly simple way by walking the XML tree, and merging the data from the fragments. Because it is not necessary to parse and construct the entire tree in memory before attaching nodes, processing should be fairly fast. The identifiers of each fragment would be a combination of relevant identity data and the type of fragment object. Cached parent fragments would contain references to these identifiers, in order to then either pull them from the fragment cache, or to run their code. The controller's responsibility is reduced to making changes to the database, and telling the root XML fragment object to render itself. The Question My question has two parts: Is this a good design? Are there any obvious flaws I'm missing? Has somebody else thought of this before? References? Is there an existing alternative that I should consider? A cool templating engine maybe?

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  • Should I manage authentication on my own if the alternative is very low in usability and I am already managing roles?

    - by rumtscho
    As a small in-house dev department, we only have experience with developing applications for our intranet. We use the existing Active Directory for user account management. It contains the accounts of all company employees and many (but not all) of the business partners we have a cooperation with. Now, the top management wants a technology exchange application, and I am the lead dev on the new project. Basically, it is a database containing our know-how, with a web frontend. Our employees, our cooperating business partners, and people who wish to become our cooperating business partners should have access to it and see what technologies we have, so they can trade for them with the department which owns them. The technologies are not patented, but very valuable to competitors, so the department bosses are paranoid about somebody unauthorized gaining access to their technology description. This constraint necessitates a nightmarishly complicated multi-dimensional RBAC-hybrid model. As the Active Directory doesn't even contain all the information needed to infer the roles I use, I will have to manage roles plus per-technology per-user granted access exceptions within my system. The current plan is to use Active Directory for authentication. This will result in a multi-hour registration process for our business partners where the database owner has to manually create logins in our Active Directory and send them credentials. If I manage the logins in my own system, we could improve the usability a lot, for example by letting people have an active (but unprivileged) account as soon as they register. It seems to me that, after I am having a users table in the DB anyway (and managing ugly details like storing historical user IDs so that recycled user IDs within the Active Directory don't unexpectedly get rights to view someone's technologies), the additional complexity from implementing authentication functionality will be minimal. Therefore, I am starting to lean towards doing my own user login management and forgetting the AD altogether. On the other hand, I see some reasons to stay with Active Directory. First, the conventional wisdom I have heard from experienced programmers is to not do your own user management if you can avoid it. Second, we have code I can reuse for connection to the active directory, while I would have to code the authentication if done in-system (and my boss has clearly stated that getting the project delivered on time has much higher priority than delivering a system with high usability). Third, I am not a very experienced developer (this is my first lead position) and have never done user management before, so I am afraid that I am overlooking some important reasons to use the AD, or that I am underestimating the amount of work left to do my own authentication. I would like to know if there are more reasons to go with the AD authentication mechanism. Specifically, if I want to do my own authentication, what would I have to implement besides a secure connection for the login screen (which I would need anyway even if I am only transporting the pw to the AD), lookup of a password hash and a mechanism for password recovery (which will probably include manual identity verification, so no need for complex mTAN-like solutions)? And, if you have experience with such security-critical systems, which one would you use and why?

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  • Blind As a Bat in Multi-Monitor Hell &ndash; Free Program Inside!

    - by ToStringTheory
    If you know me personally, then you probably know that I am going blind thanks to a rare genetic eye disease.  My eye disease has already been a huge detriment to my eyesight.  One of the big things to suffer is my ability to see small things moving fast right in front of me.  On a multi-monitor setup, this makes finding the cursor absolute hell. The Problem I’ll keep this short, as I’ve basically already told you what the problem is.  On my three monitor development computer, I am constantly losing the mouse during the day.  I had used the Microsoft accessibility mousefinder (press CTRL, and it pings around the mouse).  The problem with this is, there is only an effect around 50-100 PX around the mouse, and it is a very light gray, almost unnoticeable.. For someone like me, if I am not looking at the monitor when I click the CTRL button, I have to click it multiple times and dart my eyes back and forth in a futile attempt to catch a glimpse of the action…  I had tried other cursor finders, but none I liked… The Solution So what’s a guy to do when he doesn’t like his options?  MAKE A NEW OPTION…  What else should we as developers do, am I right?  So, I went ahead and made a mousefinder of my own, with 6 separate settings to change the effect.  I am releasing it here for anyone else that may also have problems finding their mouse at times. Some of its features include: Multiple options to change to achieve the exact effect you want. If your mouse moves while it is honing in, it will hone in on its current position. Many times, I would press the button and move my mouse at the same time, and many times, the mouse happened to be at a screen edge, so I would miss it. This program will restart its animation on a new screen if the mouse changes its screen while playing. Tested on Windows 7 x64 Stylish color changing from green to red. Deployed as a ClickOnce, so easy to remove if you don't like it. Press Right CTRL to trigger effect Application lives in notification area so that you can easily reach configuration or close it. To get it to run on startup, copy its application shortcut from its startmenu directory to the “Startup” folder in your startmenu. Conclusion I understand if you don’t download this…  You don’t know me and I don’t know you.  I can only say that I have honestly NOT added any virus’ or malware to the package. Yeah, I know it’s weird Download: ‘ToString(theory) Mousefinder.zip’ CRC32: EEBCE300 MD5: 0394DA581BE6F3371B5BA11A8B24BC91 SHA-1: 2080C4930A2E7D98B81787BB5E19BB24E118991C Finally, if you do use this application - please leave a comment, or email me and tell me what you think of it. Encounter a bug or hashes no longer match? I want to know that too! <warning type=”BadPun”>Now, stop messing around and start mousing around!</warning>

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  • Introduction to WebCenter Personalization: &ldquo;The Conductor&rdquo;

    - by Steve Pepper
    There are some new faces in the town of WebCenter with the latest 11g PS3 release.  A new component has introduced itself as "Oracle WebCenter Personalization", a.k.a WCP, to simplify delivery of a personalized experience and content to end users.  This posting reviews one of the primary components within WCP: "The Conductor". The Conductor: This ain't just an ordinary cloud... One of the founding principals behind WebCenter Personalization was to provide an open client-side API that remains independent of the technology invoking it, in addition to independence from the architecture running it.  The Conductor delivers this, and much, much more. The Conductor is the engine behind WebCenter Personalization that allows flow-based documents, called "Scenarios", to be managed and executed on the server-side through a well published and RESTful api.      The Conductor also supports an extensible model for custom provider integration that can be easily invoked within a Scenario to promote seamless integration with existing business assets. Introducing the Scenario Conductor Scenarios are declarative offline-authored documents using the custom Personalization JDeveloper bundle included with WebCenter.  A Scenario contains one (or more) statements that can: Create variables that are scoped to the current execution context Iterate over collections, or loop until a specific condition is met Execute one or more statements when a condition is met Invoke other scenarios that exist within the same namespace Invoke a data provider that integrates with custom applications Once a variable is assigned within the Scenario's execution context, it can be referenced anywhere within the same Scenario using the common Expression Language syntax used in J2EE web containers. Scenarios are then published and tested to the Integrated WebLogic Server domain, or published remotely to other domains running WebCenter Personalization. Various Client-side Models The Conductor server API is built upon RESTful services that support a wide variety of clients able to communicate over HTTP.  The Conductor supports the following client-side models: REST:  Popular browser-based languages can be used to manage and execute Conductor Scenarios.  There are other public methods to retrieve configured provider metadata that can be used by custom applications. The Conductor currently supports XML and JSON for it's API syntax. Java: WebCenter Personalization delivers a robust and light-weight java client with the popular Jersey framework as it's foundation.  It has never been easier to write a remote java client to manage remote RESTful services. Expression Language (EL): Allow the results of Scenario execution to control your user interface or embed personalized content using the session-scoped managed bean.  The EL client can also be used in straight JSP pages with minimal configuration. Extensible Provider Framework The Conductor supports a pluggable provider framework for integrating custom code with Scenario execution.  There are two types of providers supported by the Conductor: Function Provider: Function Providers are simple java annotated classes with static methods that are meant to be served as utilities.  Some common uses would include: object creation or instantiation, data transformation, and the like.  Function Providers can be invoked using the common EL syntax from variable assignments, conditions, and loops. For example:  ${myUtilityClass:doStuff(arg1,arg2))} If you are familiar with EL Functions, Function Providers are based on the same concept. Data Provider: Like Function Providers, Data Providers are annotated java classes, but they must adhere to a much more strict object model.  Data Providers have access to a wealth of Conductor services, such as: Access to namespace-scoped configuration API that can be managed by Oracle Enterprise Manager, Scenario execution context for expression resolution, and more.  Oracle ships with three out-of-the-box data providers that supports integration with: Standardized Content Servers(CMIS),  Federated Profile Properties through the Properties Service, and WebCenter Activity Graph. Useful References If you are looking to immediately get started writing your own application using WebCenter Personalization Services, you will find the following references helpful in getting you on your way: Personalizing WebCenter Applications Authoring Personalized Scenarios in JDeveloper Using Personalization APIs Externally Implementing and Calling Function Providers Implementing and Calling Data Providers

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  • Basic collision direction detection on 2d objects

    - by Osso Buko
    I am trying to develop a platform game for Android by using ANdroid GL Engine (ANGLE). And I am having trouble with collision detection. I have two objects which is shaped as rectangular. And no change in rotation. Here is a scheme of attributes of objects. What i am trying to do is when objects collide they block each other's movement on that direction. Every object has 4 boolean (bTop, bBottom, bRight, bLeft). For example when bBottom is true object can't advance on that direction. I came up with a solution but it seems it only works on one dimensional. Bottom and top or right and left. public void collisionPlatform (MyObject a, MyObject b) { // first obj is player and second is a wall or a platform Vector p1 = a.mPosition; // p1 = middle point of first object Vector d1 = a.mPosition2; // width(mX) and height of first object Vector mSpeed1 = a.mSpeed; // speed vector of first object Vector p2 = b.mPosition; // p1 = middle point of second object Vector d2 = b.mPosition2; // width(mX) and height of second object Vector mSpeed2 = b.mSpeed; // speed vector of second object float xDist, yDist; // distant between middle of two object float width , height; // this is average of two objects measurements width=(width1+width2)/2 xDist=(p1.mX - p2.mX); // calculate distance // if positive first object is at the right yDist=(p1.mY - p2.mY); // if positive first object is below width = d1.mX + d2.mX; // average measurements calculate height = d1.mY + d2.mY; width/=2; height/=2; if (Math.abs(xDist) < width && Math.abs(yDist) < height) { // Two object is collided if(p1.mY>p2.mY) { // first object is below second one a.bTop = true; if(a.mSpeed.mY<0) a.mSpeed.mY=0; b.bBottom = true; if(b.mSpeed.mY>0) b.mSpeed.mY=0; } else { a.bBottom = true; if(a.mSpeed.mY>0) a.mSpeed.mY=0; b.bTop = true; if(b.mSpeed.mY<0) b.mSpeed.mY=0; } } As seen in my code it simply will not work. when object comes from right or left it doesn't work. I tried couple of ways other than this one but none worked. I am guessing right method will include mSpeed vector. But I have no idea how to do it. I really appreciate if you could help. Sorry for my bad english.

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  • New Version 3.1 Endeca Information Discovery Now Available

    - by Mike.Hallett(at)Oracle-BI&EPM
    Normal 0 false false false EN-GB X-NONE X-NONE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 Business User Self-Service Data Mash-up Analysis and Discovery integrated with OBI11g and Hadoop Oracle Endeca Information Discovery 3.1 (OEID) is a major release that incorporates significant new self-service discovery capabilities for business users, including agile data mashup, extended support for unstructured analytics, and an even tighter integration with Oracle BI.  · Self-Service Data Mashup and Discovery Dashboards: business users can combine information from multiple sources, including their own up-loaded spreadsheets, to conduct analysis on the complete set.  Creating discovery dashboards has been made even easier by intuitive drag-and drop layouts and wizard-based configuration.  Business users can now build new discovery applications in minutes, without depending on IT. · Enhanced Integration with Oracle BI: OEID 3.1 enhances its’ native integration with Oracle Business Intelligence Foundation. Business users can now incorporate information from trusted BI warehouses, leveraging dimensions and attributes defined in Oracle’s Common Enterprise Information Model, but evolve them based on the varying day-to-day demands and requirements that they personally manage. · Deep Unstructured Analysis: business users can gain new insights from a wide variety of enterprise and public sources, helping companies to build an actionable Big Data strategy.  With OEID’s long-standing differentiation in correlating unstructured information with structured data, business users can now perform their own text mining to identify hidden concepts, without having to request support from IT. They can augment these insights with best in class keyword search and pattern matching, all in the context of rich, interactive visualizations and analytic summaries. · Enterprise-Class Self-Service Discovery:  OEID 3.1 enables IT to provide a powerful self-service platform to the business as part of a broader Business Analytics strategy, preserving the value of existing investments in data quality, governance, and security.  Business users can take advantage of IT-curated information to drive discovery across high volumes and varieties of data, and share insights with colleagues at a moment’s notice. · Harvest Content from the Web with the Endeca Web Acquisition Toolkit:  Oracle now provides best-of-breed data access to website content through the Oracle Endeca Web Acquisition Toolkit.  This provides an agile, graphical interface for developers to rapidly access and integrate any information exposed through a web front-end.  Organizations can now cost-effectively include content from consumer sites, industry forums, government or supplier portals, cloud applications, and myriad other web sources as part of their overall strategy for data discovery and unstructured analytics. For more information: OEID 3.1 OTN Software and Documentation Download And Endeca available for download on Software Delivery Cloud (eDelivery) New OEID 3.1 Videos on YouTube Oracle.com Endeca Site /* 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:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt; mso-para-margin-top:0cm; mso-para-margin-right:0cm; mso-para-margin-bottom:10.0pt; mso-para-margin-left:0cm; line-height:115%; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi; mso-fareast-language:EN-US;}

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  • How to upgrade a remote server from 8.10 to newer version?

    - by DisgruntledGoat
    I have a remote server still running Ubuntu 8.10 9.04 that I can only access via SSH. If I run apt-get update I get a bunch of 404 errors on the packages. I've asked a few questions on Server Fault but got nowhere. Here's what I've done: Run apt-get update which returns errors like: Err http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com intrepid/main Packages 404 Not Found [and same for many other packages] Run do-release-upgrade which returns: Checking for a new ubuntu release Failed Upgrade tool signature Failed Upgrade tool Done downloading extracting 'jaunty.tar.gz' Failed to extract Extracting the upgrade failed. There may be a problem with the network or with the server. Edited /etc/update-manager/release-upgrades and changed from Prompt=normal to Prompt=lts (as suggested here). Running do-release-upgrade after this returns: Checking for a new ubuntu release current dist not found in meta-release file No new release found (Updated) I have followed the advice in this question and changed /etc/apt/sources.list to refer to jaunty instead of intrepid. However, that distro is not online anymore either. A comment there says I have to upgrade in chronological order... So basically, it seems like I cannot upgrade because my current distro is out of date and not supported. Is there a way to upgrade direct to 10.x or 11.x? Note, as this is a server I only have command-line access. UPDATE 24/11: I have managed to upgrade from 8.10 to 9.04. Ubuntu's EOL Upgrades page provides some alternate URLs for apt sources. I also needed to update /var/lib/update-manager/meta-release to point to the old-releases server too. However, now I cannot upgrade from 9.04 to 9.10. Running do-release-upgrade produces the same error as #2 above, except it "Failed to fetch" (the URLs in meta-release are valid). The Ubuntu Jaunty upgrade page says it's necessary to upgrade using a CD image. I followed the instructions here, but it didn't work: A fatal error occurred Please report this as a bug and include the files /var/log/dist-upgrade/main.log and /var/log/dist-upgrade/apt.log in your report. The upgrade is now aborted. Your original sources.list was saved in /etc/apt/sources.list.distUpgrade. Traceback (most recent call last): File "/tmp/tmp.JLhTwVUugb/karmic", line 7, in sys.exit(main()) File "/tmp/tmp.JLhTwVUugb/DistUpgradeMain.py", line 132, in main if app.run(): File "/tmp/tmp.JLhTwVUugb/DistUpgradeController.py", line 1590, in run return self.fullUpgrade() File "/tmp/tmp.JLhTwVUugb/DistUpgradeController.py", line 1506, in fullUpgrade if not self.doPostInitialUpdate(): File "/tmp/tmp.JLhTwVUugb/DistUpgradeController.py", line 762, in doPostInitialUpdate self.quirks.run("PostInitialUpdate") File "/tmp/tmp.JLhTwVUugb/DistUpgradeQuirks.py", line 83, in run for plugin in self.plugin_manager.get_plugins(condition): File "/tmp/tmp.JLhTwVUugb/computerjanitor/plugin.py", line 167, in get_plugins filenames = self.get_plugin_files() File "/tmp/tmp.JLhTwVUugb/computerjanitor/plugin.py", line 120, in get_plugin_files basenames = [x for x in os.listdir(dirname) OSError: [Errno 2] No such file or directory: './plugins' It does say to report the bug, but since this is an old unsupported release I don't know if it's worth doing. However, is there a way round this, to upgrade from 9.04 to 9.10 (And then finally to 10.04 LTS.)

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  • Managing software projects - advice needed

    - by Callum
    I work for a large government department as part of an IT team that manages and develops websites as well as stand alone web applications. We’re running in to problems somewhere in the SDLC that don’t rear their ugly head until time and budget are starting to run out. We try to be “Agile” (software specifications are not as thorough as possible, clients have direct access to the developers any time they want) and we are also in a reasonably peculiar position in that we are not allowed to make profit from the services we provide. We only service the divisions within our government department, and can only charge for the time and effort we actually put in to a project. So if we deliver a project that we have over-quoted on, we will only invoice for the actual time spent. Our software specifications are not as thorough as they could be, but they always include at a minimum: Wireframe mockups for every form view A data dictionary of all field inputs Descriptions of any business rules that affect the system Descriptions of the outputs I’m new to software management, but I’ve overseen enough software projects now to know that as soon as users start observing demos of the system, they start making a huge amount of requests like “Can we add a few more fields to this report.. can we redesign the look of this interface.. can we send an email at this part of the workflow.. can we take this button off this view.. can we make this function redirect to a different screen.. can we change some text on this screen… can we create a special account where someone can log in and get access to X… this report takes too long to run can it be optimised.. can we remove this step in the workflow… there’s got to be a better image we can put here…” etc etc etc. Some changes are tiny and can be implemented reasonably quickly.. but there could be up to 50-100 or so of such requests during the course of the SDLC. Other change requests are what clients claim they “just assumed would be part of the system” even if not explicitly spelled out in the spec. We are having a lot of difficulty managing this process. With no experienced software project managers in our team, we need to come up with a better way to both internally identify whether work being requested is “out of spec”, and be able to communicate this to a client in such a manner that they can understand why what they are asking for is “extra” work. We need a way to track this work and be transparent with it. In the spirit of Agile development where we are not spec'ing software systems in to the ground and back again before development begins, and bearing in mind that clients have access to any developer any time they want it, I am looking for some tips and pointers from experienced software project managers on how to handle this sort of "scope creep" problem, in tracking it, being transparent with it, and communicating it to clients such that they understand it. Happy to clarify anything as needed. I really appreciate anyone who takes the time to offer some advice. Thanks.

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  • Monitoring Windows Azure Service Bus Endpoint with BizTalk 360?

    - by Michael Stephenson
    I'm currently working with a customer who is undergoing an initiative to expose some of their line of business applications to external partners and SAAS applications and as part of this we have been looking at using the Windows Azure Service Bus. For the first part of the project we were focused on some synchronous request response scenarios where an external application would use the Service Bus relay functionality to get data from some internal applications. When we were looking at the operational monitoring side of the solution it was obvious that although most of the normal server monitoring capabilities would be required for the on premise components we would have to look at new approaches to validate that the operation of the service from outside of the organization was working as expected. A number of months ago one of my colleagues Elton Stoneman wrote about an approach I have introduced with a number of clients in the past where we implement a diagnostics service in each service component we build. This service would allow us to make a call which would flex some of the working parts of the system to prove it was working within any SLA. This approach is discussed on the following article: http://geekswithblogs.net/EltonStoneman/archive/2011/12/12/the-value-of-a-diagnostics-service.aspx In our solution we wanted to take the same approach but we had to consider that the service clients were external to the service. We also had to consider that by going through Windows Azure Service Bus it's not that easy to make most of your standard monitoring solutions just give you an easy way to do this. In a previous article I have described how you can use BizTalk 360 to monitor things using a custom extension to the Web Endpoint Manager and I felt that we could use this approach to provide an excellent way to monitor our service bus endpoint. The previous article is available on the following link: http://geekswithblogs.net/michaelstephenson/archive/2012/09/12/150696.aspx   The Monitoring Solution BizTalk 360 currently has an easy way to hook up the endpoint manager to a url which it will then call and if a successful response is returned it then considers the endpoint to be in a healthy state. We would take advantage of this by creating an ASP.net web page which would be called by BizTalk 360 and behind this page we would implement the functionality to call the diagnostics service on our Service Bus endpoint. The ASP.net page could include logic to work out how to handle the response from the diagnostics service. For example if the overall result of the diagnostics service was successful but the call to the diagnostics service was longer than a certain amount of time then we could return an error and indicate the service is taking too long. The following diagram illustrates the monitoring pattern.   The diagnostics service which is hosted in the line of business application allows us to ping a simple message through the Azure Service Bus relay to the WCF services in the LOB application and we they get a response back indicating that the service is working fine. To implement this I used the exact same approach I described in my previous post to create a custom web page which calls the diagnostics service and then it would return an HTTP response code which would depend on the error condition returned or a 200 if it was successful. One of the limitations of this approach is that the competing consumer pattern for listening to messages from service bus means that you cannot guarantee which server would process your diagnostics check message but with BizTalk 360 you could simply add multiple endpoint checks so that it could access the individual on-premise web servers directly to ensure that each server is working fine and then check that messages can also be processed through the cloud. Conclusion It took me about 15 minutes to get a proof of concept of this up and running which was able to monitor our web services which had been exposed via Windows Azure Service Bus. I was then able to inherit all of the monitoring benefits of BizTalk 360 to provide an enterprise class monitoring solution for our cloud enabled API.

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