Search Results

Search found 5196 results on 208 pages for 'black friday'.

Page 5/208 | < Previous Page | 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 | Next Page >

Friday Tips #34

- by Chris Kawalek

Happy Friday! I wanted to take the opportunity this week to not give out a tip per se, but to point you to a really fantastic white paper that you might have missed. It's called What It Takes to Deploy and Manage a Private Cloud with Oracle VM. The paper is filled with useful information and it's written in a really entertaining style, tackling the IT challenges of a friendly systems administrator named Dave. It gives a great overview of application-driven virtualization and covers Oracle VM, Oracle VM Templates, Oracle VM Storage Connect, and Oracle Enterprise Manager. Read the white paper What It Takes to Deploy and Manage a Private Cloud with Oracle VM. See you next week! -Chris

Read the article
Welcome to our Friday tips series!

- by Chris Kawalek

Today we're starting a brand new blog series. For your Friday afternoon reading, we'll be posting a technical tip or question and answer on a technical topic. We'll start by introducing ideas on our own, but we'd really like it if you were involved and asked us questions via Twitter! Tag your tweet with #AskOracleVirtualization and we'll consider your question for the blog. Today's tip is on Storage and Oracle Virtual Desktop Infrastructure: Question: I run Oracle Virtual Desktop 3.4.1 on Solaris and use a local ZFS storage pool. How should I configure my ZFS ARC cache? Answer by John Renko, Consulting Developer, Oracle: Oracle recommends about 5G of ARC cache per template in use to achieve up to a 90% disk read offload. Set your ARC min=max to reserve the maximum amount of your remaining memory for your running VMs. In /etc/system: set zfs:zfs_arc_min = 5368709120 set zfs:zfs_arc_max = 5368709120 The amount you need to reserve will depend on your template but this has proven to be a great start for a typical windows 7 VM running productivity applications.

Read the article
Ubuntu 13.04 under Parallels Desktop - Black Desktop after X Windows Update

- by Bob Reckhow

I have been running Ubuntu 13.04 successfully on a MacBook Pro in a virtual machine in Parallels Desktop 9. Today (2013-10-17) after applying today's Ubuntu update, which included updates to X Windows, my Ubuntu 13.04 virtual machine launches, the launcher comes up, but the screen background is solid black, rather than the shaded orange colour of the default desktop background (and my desktop icons are "hidden behind this blackness", as well). I can launch applications from the launcher, and there is a very brief white flash on the screen, and then it returns to black. It's as if there is a "black blanket" covering the entire screen, so there is no way to interact with any application windows using the keyboard or mouse. The icons of the launcher are responsive to the mouse, so I can right-click and quit any application I have launched. But the rest of the screen is non-responsive to keyboard or mouse. This same behaviour happens with two different versions of Parallels Tools, so I am quite sure this is not a Parallels problem per se, although I could believe that it could be a paroblem with the interface between Parallels and this new updated X Windows code. Could anyone tell me what has happened, and how I might be able to fix this problem, so I can continue to use my Ubuntu 13.04 virtual machine? (I do have the option of reverting to a previous version of my virtual machine from before this update, but if possible I would prefer to keep my version of Ubuntu 13.04 up to date with the latest updates.) Thanks, Bob

Read the article
Ubuntu black screen after Installation of 12.10 Live USB

- by Lime0fHint

My computer was made in 2004, but I'm sure it doesn't matter since it's a durable machine. So recently, I decided to breathe new life to it with Linux. I tried Lubuntu 12.10, Nope. Black screen after install. So I tried Ubuntu 12.10 when I gave up, and same exact thing. Except, this time I'm fighting for it, since Ubuntu is the best OS I've ever seen. So back on-topic, when I start the installation, it says that something is already mounted (Sda or something of the sorts) So I just figure that it's the Live USB I'm using. So I let it ignore it, and move on. The rest of the installation goes smooth, all looks fine. Then I get to the screen with the introductory to Ubuntu. Meanwhile, it's still installing, but finishing up. I'm not sure if the install actually finishes, but I do know that after a bit, the screen goes back to the desktop. The install closes and I'm back at the desktop, and the cursor is showing the "loading" symbol, as if it were still working. Then the screen goes black, with the same cursor. After that, nothing. I left it over night like that thinking it was doing something, in the morning it was still black with the cursor circling or whatever. So what could be causing this? One concern I have is that I have a Nvidia graphics card (7300 GT). I heard that Nvidia isn't compatible with Linux? I did notice that it was marked as unreconigsed by Ubuntu, so is that the problem perhaps?

Read the article
Friday Tips #33

- by Chris Kawalek

Happy Friday, everyone! Our tip this week is from an excellent white paper written by our own Greg King titled Oracle VM 3: Building a Demo Environment using Oracle VM VirtualBox. In it, Greg gives you everything you need to know to set up Oracle VM Server inside of Oracle VM VirtualBox for testing and demoing. The section we're highlighting below is on how to configure the network interfaces of your virtual machines: VirtualBox comes with a few different types of network interfaces that can be used to allow communication between the VM guests and the host operating system, including network interfaces that will allow the VM guests to communicate with local and wide area networks accessed from your laptop or personal computer. However, for the purpose of the demonstration environment we will limit the network communication to include access just between your desktop and the virtual machines being managed by VirtualBox. The install process for Oracle VM VirtualBox creates a single host-only network device on your laptop or personal computer. Using the host-only network device will allow you to open a browser on your desktop to access the Oracle VM Manager running within the VirtualBox VM guest. The device will only allow network traffic between the VM guests and your host operating system, but nothing outside the confines of your laptop or personal computer. We will need to add a second host-only network since the Oracle VM Server appliance has both eth0 and eth1 configured. You can choose to use eth1 on the Oracle VM Servers or not use them – the choice is yours. But, at least the host side network device will exist if you decide to use it. Greg goes on to describe in detail how to setup the network interfaces, so you can head on over to the paper and get even more info. See you next week! -Chris

Read the article
Friday Tips #4

- by Chris Kawalek

It's time once again for our Friday tip. Our question today is about how to determine how much video RAM to allocate for your virtual machines in a VDI deployment: Question: How much video RAM do I really need on my VirtualBox VMs? Answer by John Renko, Consulting Developer, Oracle: The answer is in the VirtualBox admin guide but it's seldom followed correctly, usually resulting in excess unused RAM to be allocated. The formula for determining how much RAM to allocate is shown below for a 32 bit fullscreen 22" monitor supporting 1680x1050: bit depth / 8 x horizontal res x vertical res / 1024 / 1024 = MB RAM Which translates to: 32 bits / 8 x 1680 x 1050 / 1024 / 1024 = 6.7 MB If you wanted to support dual 22" monitors, you would need twice that, so 13.4 MB. Anything in excess of what is needed is readily allocated but not used and would be better suited for running more VMs! Thanks John, that tip should help folks squeeze a little more out of their VDI servers. And remember, if you have a question for us, use hash tag #AskOracleVirtualization on Twitter. We'll see you next week with another tip! -Chris

Read the article
Friday Spotlight: Network Troubleshooting with Oracle Linux

- by Chris Kawalek

Happy Friday, everyone! Our Spotlight this week is on a fantastic new article by Oracle's Robert Chase and posted on Oracle Technology Network. The article steps through, with command line examples, several strategies for tracking down network connectivity issues. From the article: "When applications that use network connectivity for communication are not working, the cause is often a mystery. Despite advances in modern operating systems, many users believe there is no way to directly "see" what's going over the wire, and that often leads to confusion and difficulties when something goes wrong. The reality is that you can actually see what's going over the wire, and there are a number of tools built into Oracle Linux for troubleshooting network issues. This article will help solve some of the mystery and make network connectivity a bit more user friendly." I highly recommend checking this article out, it's a good one! Network Troubleshooting with Oracle Linux We'll see you next week! -Chris

Read the article
Friday Fun: Building Blasters 2

- by Mysticgeek

After dealing with unnecessary spreadsheets and TPS reports all week, it’s time to waste time playing a flash game. Today we take a look at Building Blasters 2 where you strategically place explosives to bring down structures. Building Blasters 2 You need to place explosives carefully to clear areas in the red level, keep bystanders safe, and manage your budget. After placing the explosives on the structure, you can set the amount of time that passes before they blow. This comes in handy when you reach advanced levels. When you’re ready to start the demolition click on the Detonate button and watch the buildings fall. If you don’t achieve the objectives, you will get the Demolition Error screen and can replay the level. After you’ve received enough money, you’ll get a message between missions telling you there is enough money to buy items in the shop. You can get enhanced destructive devices such as nitroglycerin, a wrecking ball, call in an air strike and more… If you’re sick of the pointy haired boss dragging you down all week, pretend the structures are the office building and destroy away. Building Blasters 2 is a great way to have fun and let off steam so you can enjoy your weekend. Play Building Blasters 2 For additional fun games to play, make sure and check out the How-To Geek Arcade. Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Friday Fun: Demolition CityFriday Fun: Cargo BridgeFriday Fun: Portal, the Flash VersionFriday Fun: VehiclesFriday Fun: Play Bubble Quod 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 10 Superb Firefox Wallpapers OpenDNS Guide Google TV The iPod Revolution Ultimate Boot CD can help when disaster strikes Windows Firewall with Advanced Security – How To Guides

Read the article
Friday Fun: Abduction

- by Mysticgeek

Finally another Friday has arrived and it’s time to waste the afternoon on company time playing a flash game. Today we take a look at a fun game called Abduction. Abduction Abduction is a neat game where you snatch people and livestock to sell them on the intergalactic market. The controls are basic using the arrow keys or W,A,S,D and the left mouse button. Here is the tutorial that you can play first to get the hang of it. While you’re abducting hillbillies, they throw pitch forks and other objects at your craft so you need to avoid them. The game has several levels to keep you distracted until quitting time. Play Abduction at FreeWebArcade Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Take Screenshots in Firefox the Easy WayFriday Fun: Portal, the Flash VersionFriday Fun: Play Bubble QuodFriday Fun: Gravitee 2Friday Fun: Compulse TouchFreeze Alternative in AutoHotkey The Icy Undertow Desktop Windows Home Server – Backup to LAN The Clear & Clean Desktop Use This Bookmarklet to Easily Get Albums Use AutoHotkey to Assign a Hotkey to a Specific Window Latest Software Reviews Tinyhacker Random Tips Revo Uninstaller Pro Registry Mechanic 9 for Windows PC Tools Internet Security Suite 2010 PCmover Professional How to Browse Privately in Firefox Kill Processes Quickly with Process Assassin Need to Come Up with a Good Name? Try Wordoid StockFox puts a Lightweight Stock Ticker in your Statusbar Explore Google Public Data Visually The Ultimate Excel Cheatsheet

Read the article
Got that Friday feeling?

- by Rebecca Amos

Saturday is just around the corner, and we’re all starting to wrap up for the weekend. If you’re the DBA that ‘Friday feeling’ might be as much about checking and preparing your SQL Servers for the next two days, as about looking forward to spending time with friends and family. Whether you’re double-checking your disaster recovery strategy, or know that it’s your turn to be on-call this weekend, it’s likely you’re preparing for the worst, just in case. The fact that you’re making these checks, and caring about both your servers and your users, means that you might be an exceptional DBA. You’re already putting in that extra effort to make other people’s lives easier. So why not take some time for your professional development and enter the Exceptional DBA Awards? If you’re looking for some inspiration for your entry, download our Judges’ Top Tips poster for advice on what the judges are looking for from this year’s entrants. Not only will you be boosting your professional development, but you could win full conference registration for the 2011 PASS Summit in Seattle (where the awards ceremony will take place), four nights' hotel accommodation, and a copy of Red Gate’s SQL DBA Bundle. So take some time out for yourself this weekend and get started on your entry: www.exceptionaldba.com

Read the article
Challenge Ends on Friday!

- by Yolande Poirier

This is your last chance to win a JavaOne trip. Submit a project video and code for the IoT Developer Challenge by this Friday, May 30. 12 JavaOne trips will be awarded to 3 professional teams and one student team. Members of two student teams will win laptops and certification training vouchers. Ask your last minute questions on the coaching form or the Challenge forum. They will be answered promptly. Your project video should explain how your project works. Any common video format such as mp4, avi, mov is fine. Your project must use Java Embedded - whether it is Java SE Embedded or ME Embedded - with the hardware of your choice, including any devices, boards and IoT technology. The project will be judged based on the project implementation, innovation and business usefulness. More details on the IoT Developer Challenge website Just for fun! Here is a video of Vinicius Senger giving a tour of his home lab, and showing his boards and gadgets. <span id="XinhaEditingPostion"></span>

Read the article
Friday tips #2

- by Chris Kawalek

Welcome to our second Friday tips blog! You can ask us questions using the hash tag #AskOracleVirtualization on Twitter and we'll do our best to answer them. Today we've got a VDI related question on linked clones: Question: I want to use linked clones with Oracle Virtual Desktop Infrastructure. What are my options? Answer by John Renko, Consulting Developer, Oracle: First, linked clones are available with the Oracle VirtualBox hypervisor only. Second, your choice of storage will affect the rest of your architecture. If you are using a SAN presenting ISCSI LUNS, you can have linked clones with a Oracle Enterprise Linux based hypervisor running VirtualBox. OEL will use OCFS2 to allow VirtualBox to create the linked clones. Because of the OCFS2 requirement, a Solaris based VirtualBox hypervisor will not be able to support linked clones on remote ISCSI storage. If you using the local storage option on your hypervisors, you will have linked clones with Solaris or Linux based hypervisors running VirtualBox. In all cases, Oracle Virtual Desktop Infrastructure makes the right selection for creating clones - sparse or linked - behind the scenes. Plan your architecture accordingly if you want to ensure you have the higher performing linked clones.

Read the article
Blank screen after Switch User or Resume

- by matt wilkie

About half the time when I switch users or resume from standby or resume the screen goes blank (black). If I work the cursor keys I can hear the system bell when it gets to the end of the user list. I can also successfully login, going from memory, but screen stays black. Sometimes closing and re-opening the lid will light up the screen again. Pressing the special Function key to enable/disable external monitor connection has no effect [Fn]-[F5],[Fn]-[F6]. If none of the previous work I need to put the computer into hibernation or full power off to restore screen function. If I watch closely when switching users I think I can see the screen initially start to light up and then quickly fade to black. The computer is an Acer Aspire 3500, model ZL6, running Ubuntu 10.10 installed 2 days ago. No proprietary drivers are in use. I'll provide a list of hardware details as soon as I can figure out how to generate that (didn't there used to be an entry for hardware details under the System menu?). Possibly related questions: No resume after Hibernate or Standby When I resume from suspension - the screen is blank Switch user fails to complete successfully For what it's worth, blank after resume also used to happen occasionally when the laptop was running XP-Home, but nowhere near as often, perhaps 6 or 8 times a year. UPDATE: I found System Administration System Testing and ran the Monitor test. It went very very dark, but the window elements could be discerned, and the whole screen flashed (from very very dark to black). On the third repeat of that same test the screen went to full blaupck and stayed there. Moving the mouse, via touchpad, or touch keys did not wake it up again. I had to close the lid and put the computer into hibernate, and press the power button to restore it. UPDATE2: output of lshw: http://pastebin.com/q7n8676r, lspci: http://pastebin.com/6ujzVK4r UPDATE3: sometimes I can restore the screen by flipping to console 1 with ctrl-alt-F1 and then back to graphical with ctrl-alt-F7.

Read the article
Friday Fun: Play 3D Rally Racing in Google Chrome

- by Asian Angel

Are you a racing fan in need of a short (or long) break from work? Then get ready to enjoy a mid-day speed boost with the 3D Rally Racing extension for Google Chrome. 3D Rally Racing in Action This is the opening screen for 3D Rally Racing. You can start game play, view current best times, and read through the instructions from here. The first thing that you should do is have a quick look at the instructions to help you get set up and started. Click on “Play” to start the process. Before you can go further you will need to choose a “User Name”. Once you have done that click “Select Track”… Note: The extension will retain your name for later use even if you close your browser. When you first start out you will only have access to two tracks…the others require reaching a certain score/level to unlock them. Once you select a track you will be taken to the next screen. After you have selected a track you will need to choose your car and car color. All that is left to do afterwards is click on “Go Race”. Note: You will be competing against three other vehicles in the race. Here is a look at the “Desert Race Track”… And a look at the “Snow Race Track”. This game moves quickly and it is easy to fall behind if you are not careful! You can have a lot of fun playing this game while you are waiting for the day to end. Conclusion If you love racing games and want a fun way to waste the rest of afternoon at work, then you should definitely give 3D Rally Racing a try. Links Download the 3d Rally Racing extension (Google Chrome Extensions) Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Friday Fun: Uphill RushFriday Fun: Racing Fun with SuperTuxKart RacerHow to Make Google Chrome Your Default BrowserEnable Vista Black Style Theme for Google Chrome in XPIncrease Google Chrome’s Omnibox Popup Suggestion Count With an Undocumented Switch TouchFreeze Alternative in AutoHotkey The Icy Undertow Desktop Windows Home Server – Backup to LAN The Clear & Clean Desktop Use This Bookmarklet to Easily Get Albums Use AutoHotkey to Assign a Hotkey to a Specific Window Latest Software Reviews Tinyhacker Random Tips Revo Uninstaller Pro Registry Mechanic 9 for Windows PC Tools Internet Security Suite 2010 PCmover Professional Enable Check Box Selection in Windows 7 OnlineOCR – Free OCR Service Betting on the Blind Side, a Vanity Fair article 30 Minimal Logo Designs that Say More with Less LEGO Digital Designer – Free Create a Personal Website Quickly using Flavors.me

Read the article
Friday Fun: Play 3D Rally Racing in Google Chrome

- by Asian Angel

Are you a racing fan in need of a short (or long) break from work? Then get ready to enjoy a mid-day speed boost with the 3D Rally Racing extension for Google Chrome. 3D Rally Racing in Action This is the opening screen for 3D Rally Racing. You can start game play, view current best times, and read through the instructions from here. The first thing that you should do is have a quick look at the instructions to help you get set up and started. Click on “Play” to start the process. Before you can go further you will need to choose a “User Name”. Once you have done that click “Select Track”… Note: The extension will retain your name for later use even if you close your browser. When you first start out you will only have access to two tracks…the others require reaching a certain score/level to unlock them. Once you select a track you will be taken to the next screen. After you have selected a track you will need to choose your car and car color. All that is left to do afterwards is click on “Go Race”. Note: You will be competing against three other vehicles in the race. Here is a look at the “Desert Race Track”… And a look at the “Snow Race Track”. This game moves quickly and it is easy to fall behind if you are not careful! You can have a lot of fun playing this game while you are waiting for the day to end. Conclusion If you love racing games and want a fun way to waste the rest of afternoon at work, then you should definitely give 3D Rally Racing a try. Links Download the 3d Rally Racing extension (Google Chrome Extensions) Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Friday Fun: Uphill RushFriday Fun: Racing Fun with SuperTuxKart RacerHow to Make Google Chrome Your Default BrowserEnable Vista Black Style Theme for Google Chrome in XPIncrease Google Chrome’s Omnibox Popup Suggestion Count With an Undocumented Switch TouchFreeze Alternative in AutoHotkey The Icy Undertow Desktop Windows Home Server – Backup to LAN The Clear & Clean Desktop Use This Bookmarklet to Easily Get Albums Use AutoHotkey to Assign a Hotkey to a Specific Window Latest Software Reviews Tinyhacker Random Tips Revo Uninstaller Pro Registry Mechanic 9 for Windows PC Tools Internet Security Suite 2010 PCmover Professional Enable Check Box Selection in Windows 7 OnlineOCR – Free OCR Service Betting on the Blind Side, a Vanity Fair article 30 Minimal Logo Designs that Say More with Less LEGO Digital Designer – Free Create a Personal Website Quickly using Flavors.me

Read the article
Friday Fun: Play Tetris in Google Chrome

- by Asian Angel

Do you prefer playing classic games rather than the newer ones? Then get ready for some classic goodness with the JC-Tetris extension for Google Chrome. JC-Tetris in Action When you click on your new “JC-Tetris Toolbar Button” a new mini-Chrome window will open with the game displayed inside. This could be very convenient for those who would like or need to pause the game, minimize the window, and finish the game later. All that is needed to play are the four “Arrow Keys & the Space Bar”. Note: The text was small when the window first opened during our test so we used the “Ctrl +” keyboard shortcut twice to enlarge it. You may or may not experience similar text size results. Like any Tetris game things start out “quietly enough” but this one speeds up quickly, so be prepared! Notice that you do get a warning of what is waiting to drop onto the game board on the left side. Whenever you complete a game you will see this small window asking if you would like to enter a name for the score…you can easily ignore/bypass the window by clicking “Cancel”. Another game and a much better result. Do not be surprised if you feel that little burst of “rushed panic” at the end! Conclusion JC-Tetris is an enjoyable way to relax when you need a break. The ability to pause the game and minimize it for later makes it even better. Have fun! Links Download the JC-Tetris extension (Google Chrome Extensions) Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Friday Fun: Get Your Mario OnFriday Fun: First Person TetrisFriday Fun: Play MineSweeper in Google ChromeFriday Fun: Play 3D Rally Racing in Google ChromeHow to Make Google Chrome Your Default Browser 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 DVDFab 6 Revo Uninstaller Pro Registry Mechanic 9 for Windows PC Tools Internet Security Suite 2010 Dark Side of the Moon (8-bit) Norwegian Life If Web Browsers Were Modes of Transportation Google Translate (for animals) Out of 100 Tweeters Roadkill’s Scan Port scans for open ports

Read the article
Friday Fun: Factory Balls – Christmas Edition

- by Asian Angel

Your weekend is almost here, but until the work day is over we have another fun holiday game for you. This week your job is to correctly decorate/paint the ornaments that go on the Christmas tree. Simple you say? Maybe, but maybe not! Factory Balls – Christmas Edition The object of the game is to correctly decorate/paint each Christmas ornament exactly as shown in the “sample image” provided for each level. What starts off as simple will quickly have you working to figure out the correct combination or sequence to complete each ornament. Are you ready? The first level serves as a tutorial to help you become comfortable with how to decorate/paint the ornaments. To move an ornament to a paint bucket or cover part of it with one of the helper items simply drag the ornament towards that area. The ornament will automatically move back to its’ starting position when the action is complete. First, a nice coat of red paint followed by covering the middle area with a horizontal belt. Once the belt is on move the ornament to the bucket of yellow paint. Next, you will need to remove the belt, so move the ornament back to the belt’s original position. One ornament finished! As soon as you complete decorating/painting an ornament, you move on to the next level and will be shown the next “sample Image” in the upper right corner. Starting with a coat of orange paint sounds good… Pop the little serrated edge cap on top… Add some blue paint… Almost have it… Place the large serrated edge cap on top… Another dip in the orange paint… And the second ornament is finished. Level three looks a little bit tougher…just work out your pattern of helper items & colors and you will definitely get it! Have fun decorating/painting those ornaments! Note: Starting with level four you will need to start using a combination of two helper items combined at times to properly complete the ornaments. Play Factory Balls – Christmas Edition Latest Features How-To Geek ETC The Complete List of iPad Tips, Tricks, and Tutorials The 50 Best Registry Hacks that Make Windows Better The How-To Geek Holiday Gift Guide (Geeky Stuff We Like) LCD? LED? Plasma? The How-To Geek Guide to HDTV Technology The How-To Geek Guide to Learning Photoshop, Part 8: Filters Improve Digital Photography by Calibrating Your Monitor Exploring the Jungle Ruins Wallpaper Protect Your Privacy When Browsing with Chrome and Iron Browser Free Shipping Day is Friday, December 17, 2010 – National Free Shipping Day Find an Applicable Quote for Any Programming Situation Winter Theme for Windows 7 from Microsoft Score Free In-Flight Wi-Fi Courtesy of Google Chrome

Read the article
XNA `tex2Dlod` always returns transparent black

- by feralin

I want to sample a texture in a vertex shader, so at first I just tried using float2 texcoords = ...; color = tex2D(texture, texcoords); But apparently I cannot use tex2D in a vertex shader, and must use tex2Dlod. So then I changed the above code to color = tex2Dlod(texture, float4(texcoords, 0, 0)); But now color is always float4(0, 0, 0, 0) (i.e. transparent black). Why is this, and how can I fix it? EDIT: I know for a fact that the texture does not contain just transparent black pixels.

Read the article
Cosmic Journeys – Supermassive Black Hole at the Center of the Galaxy

- by Akemi Iwaya

Even though the center of our galaxy is obscured by thick dust and blinding starlight, that has not stopped scientists from piecing together clues about what may lie there. Sit back and enjoy a ‘cosmic journey’ with this excellent half-hour video from YouTube channel SpaceRip discussing what scientists have learned about the supermassive black hole at the center of our galaxy, and their work on getting a ‘direct image’ of it. Cosmic Journeys: Supermassive Black Hole at the Center of the Galaxy [YouTube]

Read the article
Architecture Forum in the North 2010 - Hosted by Black Marble

- by Stuart Brierley

On Thursday the 8th of December I attended the "Architecture Forum in the North 2010" hosted by Black Marble. The third time this annual event has been held, it was pitched as featuring Black Marble and Microsoft UK architecture experts focusing on “Tools and Methods for Architects.... a unique opportunity to provide IT Managers, IT and software architects from Northern businesses the chance to learn about the latest technologies and best practices from Microsoft in the field of Architecture....insightful information about the latest techniques, demonstrating how with Microsoft’s architecture tools and technologies you can address your current business needs." Following a useful overview of the Architecture features of Visual Studio 2010, the rest of the day was given over to various features and ways to make use of Microsoft's Azure offerings. While I did feel that a wider spread of technologies could have been covered (maybe a bit of Sharepoint or BizTalk even), the technological and architectural overviews of the Azure platform were well presented, informative and useful. The day was well organised and all those involved were friendly and approachable for questions and discussions. If you are in "the North" and get a chance to attend next year I would highly recommend it.

Read the article
Purple Screen then Black Screen while Booting from CD or Windows Install

- by Tyler

Whenever I try to run Ubuntu from my internal CD drive, I see this screen minus the Ubuntu Text: Then the screen goes black, not even the internal light stays on. Sometimes it restarts itself, other times the black screen is indefinite until I restart the laptop myself. I'm on an HP Quad-Core AMD A8-3500M APU with 8 GB RAM and a Radeon AMD 6620g Discrete-Graphics Card. (HP dv6-6145dx) This is my first time using Linux, I am not too technically-inclined so any simplification would be welcomed. I am good at following technical instructions though which is how I was able to partition my hard drive and change the boot order to allow the internal CD drive first. Thanks in advance!

Read the article
Bloom shader makes it impossible to render black?

- by Mathias Lykkegaard Lorenzen

I am playing around with the bloom shader from the XNA sample page, to do some glow shading. I am rendering primitive vector-ish squares of linelists/linestrips, on a background. However, I am facing a few problems. With a black background and white squares, I can actually see the squares. However, with a white background and black squares, I can't see them at all. Why is this happening, and is there any way of me fixing it? Can I modify my bloom shader to also "glow" dark elements, if that's what is causing it?

Read the article
Cycles through black screen on login after changing password

- by John L

On my laptop, I forgot the password to my Ubuntu partition, so I logged into the root command shell on the recovery start up option in GRUB so that I could change the password. On my first attempt to change my user password, I got this error: root@username-PC:~# passwd username (*not my actual user name*) Enter new UNIX password: Retype new UNIX password: passwd: Authentication token manipulation error passwd: password unchanged After doing some research, I discovered that I was stuck as read only on the file system, so I ran the following command to remount the file partition as read/write: mount -rw -o remount / Afterwards, I change my user password using passwd and it was changed successfully. I restarted my laptop and tried to login using the new password but the only thing that happened was after entering my password it flashed to a black screen with some text that I couldn't make out except for "Ubuntu 12.04" then another black screen half a second later, and finally back to the login screen. Repeated attempts to login results in only this action.

Read the article
Ouya build experiencing odd graphical artifacts, screen half black

- by Neeko

I'm witnessing very odd graphical artifacts when I run my Unity game on Ouya. After the Unity splash screen, the game loads with the screen half black. This seemingly has started occurring out of the blue. It also doesn't occur in the editor or the standalone build, only on Ouya. I can't think of a single reason why this would be happening. If I open the Ouya menu screen and close it, the game returns to normal; somewhat, as there may be some artifacts lingering but the screen isn't half black like in the screen shot above. I know there's not much to go off of, but any insight into why this may be happening is greatly appreciated.

Read the article
XNA windows phone release black textures

- by Lukasz Kajstura

i just made a 3d game in XNA for windows phone 7. I build it in release mode on visual studio 2010 and suddenly when I run game there is no textures on models - 2 models are black and one is transparent. Models are in .X format exported from 3dsmax and have textures in .jpg also added to game content. I set build action to none and all worked fine in debug mode. When I change to release mode - black textures. When I set build action to compile it gives me warning: Asset was built 2 times with different settings: using TextureImporter and TextureProcessor using TextureImporter and TextureProcessor, referenced by... and still no textures. What can I do?

Read the article

< Previous Page | 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 | Next Page >