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• Get height of DIV and it's content with JQuery

  - by user1012403

  I have a div which contains several elements: <div class="menuItem designMenu" id="dMenu"> <ul class="menuList menu"> <li class="menuHeader">Design</li> <li class="projectHeader">Mother</li> <li class="projectBody">Some text here</li> <li class="more">More</li> </ul> </div> I need to get the height of the dMenu items that I can animate it upwards, including all the content inside. My Javascript currently: var designHeight = $("#dMenu").height(); Returns nothing. I've tried offsetHeight, scrollHeight, and everything else Google turns up. I'm running the JQuery at the end of the body, inside a document ready function. The reason to get the height to animate, instead of doing it manually, is that a: I'd like to learn how and b: I don't yet know how many items will be int he div. Thanks.

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• Update MySQl table onDrop?

  - by dougvt

  Hi all. I am writing a PHP/MySQL application (using CodeIgniter) that uses some jQuery functionality for dragging table rows. I have a table in which the user can drag rows to the desired order (kind of a queue for which I need to preserve the rank of each row). I've been trying to figure out how to (and whether I should) update the database each time the user drops a row, in order to simplify the UI and avoid a "Save" button. I have the jQuery working and can send a serialized list back to the server onDrop, but is it good design practice to run an update query this often? The table will usually have 30-40 rows max, but if the user drags row 1 far down the list, then potentially all the rows would need to be updated to update the rank field. I've been wondering whether to send a giant query to the server, to loop through the rows in PHP and update each row with its own Update query, to send a small serialized list to a stored procedure to let the server do all the work, or perhaps a better method I haven't considered. I've read that stored procedures in MySQL are not very efficient and use a separate process for each call. Any advice as to the right solution here? Thanks very much for your help!

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• Best strategies for reading J code

  - by estanford

  I've been using J for a few months now, and I find that reading unfamiliar code (e.g. that I didn't write myself) is one of the most challenging aspects of the language, particularly when it's in tacit. After a while, I came up with this strategy: 1) Copy the code segment into a word document 2) Take each operator from (1) and place it on a separate line, so that it reads vertically 3) Replace each operator with its verbal description in the Vocabulary page 4) Do a rough translation from J syntax into English grammar 5) Use the translation to identify conceptually related components and separate them with line breaks 6) Write a description of what each component from (5) is supposed to do, in plain English prose 7) Write a description of what the whole program is supposed to do, based on (6) 8) Write an explanation of why the code from (1) can be said to represent the design concept from (7). Although I learn a lot from this process, I find it to be rather arduous and time-consuming -- especially if someone designed their program using a concept I never encountered before. So I wonder: do other people in the J community have favorite ways to figure out obscure code? If so, what are the advantages and disadvantages of these methods?

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• Write a completely fluid HTML page (using '%' instead of 'px' for EVERY element height/width)

  - by barak manos

  I am designing my HTML pages to be completely fluid: For every element in the mark-up (HTML), I am using 'style="height:%;width:%"' (instead of 'style="height:*px;width:*px"'). This approach seems to work pretty well, except for when changing the window measurements, in which case, the web page elements change their position and end up "on top of each other". I have come up with a pretty good run-time (java-script) solution to that: var elements = document.getElementsByTagName("*"); for (var i=0; i < elements.length; i++) { if (elements[i].style.height) elements[i].style.height = elements[i].offsetHeight+"px"; if (elements[i].style.width ) elements[i].style.width = elements[i].offsetWidth +"px"; } The only problem remaining is, that if the user opens up the website by entering the URL into a non-maximized window, then the page fits that portion of the window. Then, when maximizing the window, the page remains in its previous measurements. So in essence, I have solved the initial problem (when changing the window measurements), but only when the window is initially in its maximum size. Any ideas on how to tackle this problem? (given that I would like to keep my "% page-design" as is).

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• Is there any trick to match two XML by one XSLT?

  - by brain_pusher

  Is there any trick to match two XML by one XSLT? I mean the way I can apply XSLT to a parameter passed. For example (I missed declarations to be short). XML1: XML to be transformed: <myData> <Collection> </Collection> </myData> XSLT need to be applied to the previous XML: <xsl:param name='items' /> <xsl:template match='Collection'> <!-- some transformation here --> </xsl:template> XML2: XML data passed as the parameter 'items': <newData> <Item>1</Item> <Item>2</Item> <Item>3</Item> </newData> And I need to create a set of nodes in the 'Collection' node in XML1 for each 'Item' element in XML2 using XSLT. And I do not know what XML2 contains exactly at design time. It is generated at runtime, so I can't place it inside XSLT, I know only its schema.

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• Alert Box Methods

  - by Vecta

  I just need a little advice on what may be the best method for handling my situation. I'm in need of placing three buttons in the sidebar of the website I maintain. The website is massive and hard to handle. Currently, it's all HTML files (there are over 10,000 of them believe it or not). We're transitioning to a database website so I don't want to make any sweeping changes that are site-wide, as they may just be scrapped in our re-design process in coming months. However, these buttons are for an application process. When you click on them, an alert box will need to pop up to give you a bit of information and they either allow you to cancel the action or proceed. The buttons are currently located in the left nav which is included on every page of the website. Would it be possible to accomplish this using JS or jQuery? I'd be unable to easily add scripts into the tags on all of the applicable pages, but I'd like to avoid the browser driven "http://www...Says: blah blah" message if possible. Any insight is greatly appreciated! Thank you!

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• jQuery removeClass(), how it works

  - by centro

  I have images on my page. User can add more images onto the page by clicking a button. New images are added asynchronously. Initially, each image on page use a special class to be used when the image is loaded. After the image is loaded, that class is removed. Each image being loaded has the class imageLoading: <img class="imageLoading" scr="someimage.png"> After those images are loaded, I remove that class (simplified code without details): $('img.imageLoading') .each(function(){ $(this) .load(function(){ $(this) .removeClass('imageloading'); });}); Visually, I see that style is removed. But when I run the query again: $('img.imageLoading') I see via debugging that all images, not just loading ones, are returned, i.e. it works like I didn't remove the class for the images that were already loaded. I had a look into the page source, and I saw that actually in HTML the class was not removed, though removeClass() was called. Is that behavior by design that all visual changes are applied but the class attribute is not removed in HTML code? If so, how it can be workarounded in this case. Or, probably, I missed something.

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• A loop (while/foreach) with "offset" wrapping and

  - by DarkGhostHunter

  After applying what wrapping objects using math operator, I just tought it will be over. But no. By far. <?php $faces= array( 1 => '<div class="block">happy</div>', 2 => '<div class="block">sad</div>', (sic) 21 => '<div class="block">angry</div>' ); $i = 1; foreach ($faces as $face) { echo $face; if ($i == 3) echo '<div class="block">This is and ad</div>'; if ($i % 3 == 0) { echo "<br />"; // or some other wrapping thing } $i++; } ?> In the code I have to put and ad after the second one, becoming by that the third object. And then wrap the three all in a <div class="row"> (a br after won't work out by design reasons). I thought I will going back to applying a switch, but if somebody put more elements in the array that the switch can properly wrap, the last two remaining elements are wrapped openly. Can i add the "ad" to the array in the third position? That would make things simplier, only leaving me with guessing how to wrap the first and the third, the fourth and the sixth, an so on.

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• interface abstract in php real world scenario

  - by jason

  The goal is to learn whether to use abstract or interface or both... I'm designing a program which allows a user to de-duplicate all images but in the process rather then I just build classes I'd like to build a set of libraries that will allow me to re-use the code for other possible future purposes. In doing so I would like to learn interface vs abstract and was hoping someone could give me input into using either. Here is what the current program will do: recursive scan directory for all files determine file type is image type compare md5 checksum against all other files found and only keep the ones which are not duplicates Store total duplicates found at the end and display size taken up Copy files that are not duplicates into folder by date example Year, Month folder with filename is file creation date. While I could just create a bunch of classes I'd like to start learning more on interfaces and abstraction in php. So if I take the scan directory class as the first example I have several methods... ScanForFiles($path) FindMD5Checksum() FindAllImageTypes() getFileList() The scanForFiles could be public to allow anyone to access it and it stores in an object the entire directory list of files found and many details about them. example extension, size, filename, path, etc... The FindMD5Checksum runs against the fileList object created from scanForFiles and adds the md5 if needed. The FindAllImageTypes runs against the fileList object as well and adds if they are image types. The findmd5checksum and findallimagetypes are optionally run methods because the user might not intend to run these all the time or at all. The getFileList returns the fileList object itself. While I have a working copy I've revamped it a few times trying to figure out whether I need to go with an interface or abstract or both. I'd like to know how an expert OO developer would design it and why?

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• include ::before pseudo class in javascript

  - by user1955837

  Why is this thing not working? If I remove ::before from javascript and css it works. But due to the design needs there has to be a ::before. How do I point to the class + ::before? $(function () { var sections = $("section"); var navigation_links = $("nav a"); sections.waypoint({ handler: function (event, direction) { var active_section; active_section = $(this); if (direction === "up") active_section = active_section.prev(); var active_link = $('nav a[href="#' + active_section.attr("id") + '"]'); navigation_links.removeClass("selected::before"); active_link.addClass("selected::before"); }, offset: '25%' }) }); css: .selected::before { display: block; content: ""; margin-top: 6px; width: 8px; height: 8px; background: url(../img/sprite.png) -126px -196px; background-size: 400px 480px; float: left; margin-left: 20px; margin-right: 20px; }

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• How to process more that one XML document in XSLT?

  - by brain_pusher

  Is there any trick to match two XML by one XSLT? I mean the way I can apply XSLT to a parameter passed. For example (I missed declarations to be short). XML1: XML to be transformed: <myData> <Collection> </Collection> </myData> XSLT need to be applied to the previous XML: <xsl:param name='items' /> <xsl:template match='Collection'> <!-- some transformation here --> </xsl:template> XML2: XML data passed as the parameter 'items': <newData> <Item>1</Item> <Item>2</Item> <Item>3</Item> </newData> And I need to create a set of nodes in the 'Collection' node in XML1 for each 'Item' element in XML2 using XSLT. And I do not know what XML2 contains exactly at design time. It is generated at runtime, so I can't place it inside XSLT, I know only its schema.

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• Main purpose of this task is to calculate volumes and surface areas of three dimensional geometric shapes like, cylinders, cones.

  - by Csc_Girl_Geek

  In Java Language Design your classes as below introducing: an Interface named “GeometricShapes” an abstract class named “ThreeDShapes” two child classes of ThreeDShapes: Cylinders and Cones. One test class names “TestShapes” Get the output for volumes and surface areas of cylinders and cones along with respective values of their appropriate input variables. Try to use toString() method and array. Your classes should be designed with methods that are required for Object-Oriented programming. So Far I Have: package Assignment2; public interface GeometricShapes { public void render(); public int[] getPosition(); public void setPosition(int x, int y); } package Assignment2; public abstract class ThreeDShapes implements GeometricShapes { public int[] position; public int[] size; public ThreeDShapes() { } public int[] getPosition() { return position; } public void setPosition(int x, int y) { position[0] = x; position[1] = y; } } package Assignment2; public class Cylinders extends ThreeDShapes { public Cylinder() { } public void render() { } } I don't think this is right and I do not know how to fix it. :( Please help.

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• Storing data in XML or MongoDB

  - by user766473

  Here is my usecase. 1.Have some data, which I am storing now in the xml files. The data that I am storing is not persistent i.e I would be deleting the user data once the user logs out. 2.My server communicates with the client using the XML requests and responses. So initially we decided, since we are sending the XML as response, lets store it in XML so that conversion from database to XML format time is saved. 3.Client will request for XML based on some filter conditions. So will have to use XQUERY. 4.Maximum of 100 entries will be there in an XML, atleast as of now. Now I would like to hear some advice on whether I should use XML or mongodb. My Concerns : 1. How good is it to store temporary data in mongodb and delete/take backup once done with session 2. Conversion from mongodb json format to XML. 3. Handling the changes in the schema design. Cant use any other DB than mongodb. As some persistent operation or still done on mongodb. Thanks in advance.

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• SQL Server: Why use shorter VARCHAR(n) fields?

  - by chryss

  It is frequently advised to choose database field sizes to be as narrow as possible. I am wondering to what degree this applies to SQL Server 2005 VARCHAR columns: Storing 10-letter English words in a VARCHAR(255) field will not take up more storage than in a VARCHAR(10) field. Are there other reasons to restrict the size of VARCHAR fields to stick as closely as possible to the size of the data? I'm thinking of Performance: Is there an advantage to using a smaller n when selecting, filtering and sorting on the data? Memory, including on the application side (C++)? Style/validation: How important do you consider restricting colunm size to force non-sensical data imports to fail (such as 200-character surnames)? Anything else? Background: I help data integrators with the design of data flows into a database-backed system. They have to use an API that restricts their choice of data types. For character data, only VARCHAR(n) with n <= 255 is available; CHAR, NCHAR, NVARCHAR and TEXT are not. We're trying to lay down some "good practices" rules, and the question has come up if there is a real detriment to using VARCHAR(255) even for data where real maximum sizes will never exceed 30 bytes or so. Typical data volumes for one table are 1-10 Mio records with up to 150 attributes. Query performance (SELECT, with frequently extensive WHERE clauses) and application-side retrieval performance are paramount.

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• C++0x Smart Pointer Comparisons: Inconsistent, what's the rationale?

  - by GManNickG

  In C++0x (n3126), smart pointers can be compared, both relationally and for equality. However, the way this is done seems inconsistent to me. For example, shared_ptr defines operator< be equivalent to: template <typename T, typename U> bool operator<(const shared_ptr<T>& a, const shared_ptr<T>& b) { return std::less<void*>()(a.get(), b.get()); } Using std::less provides total ordering with respect to pointer values, unlike a vanilla relational pointer comparison, which is unspecified. However, unique_ptr defines the same operator as: template <typename T1, typename D1, typename T2, typename D2> bool operator<(const unique_ptr<T1, D1>& a, const unique_ptr<T2, D2>& b) { return a.get() < b.get(); } It also defined the other relational operators in similar fashion. Why the change in method and "completeness"? That is, why does shared_ptr use std::less while unique_ptr uses the built-in operator<? And why doesn't shared_ptr also provide the other relational operators, like unique_ptr? I can understand the rationale behind either choice: with respect to method: it represents a pointer so just use the built-in pointer operators, versus it needs to be usable within an associative container so provide total ordering (like a vanilla pointer would get with the default std::less predicate template argument) with respect to completeness: it represents a pointer so provide all the same comparisons as a pointer, versus it is a class type and only needs to be less-than comparable to be used in an associative container, so only provide that requirement But I don't see why the choice changes depending on the smart pointer type. What am I missing? Bonus/related: std::shared_ptr seems to have followed from boost::shared_ptr, and the latter omits the other relational operators "by design" (and so std::shared_ptr does too). Why is this?

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• Determining difference in timestamps for two values in the same MySQL table

  - by JayRizzo03

  I am relatively new to programming in PHP, so I apologize if this is a rather simple question. I have a MySQL database table called MachineReports that contains the following values: ReportNum(primary key, auto increment), MachineID and Timestamp Here is some example data: |ReportNum | MachineID | Timestamp | |1 | AD3203 | 2012-11-18 06:32:28| |2 | AD3203 | 2012-11-19 04:00:15| |3 | BC4300 | 2012-11-19 04:00:15| What I am attempting to do is find the difference in timestamps in seconds for each machine ID by iterating over each row set. I am getting stuck on the best way to do this, however. Here is the code I've written so far: <?php include '../dbconnect/dbconnect.php'; $machineID=[]; //Get a list of all MachineIDs in the database foreach($dbh->query('SELECT DISTINCT(MachineID) FROM MachineReports') as $row) { array_push($machineID, $row[0]); } for($i=0;$i<count($machineID);$i++){ foreach($dbh->query("SELECT MachineID FROM MachineReports WHERE MachineID='$machineID[$i]' ORDER BY MachineID") as $row) { //code to associate each machineID with two time stamps goes here } } ? This code just lists out the contents of the table row by row. My ultimate goal is to find the difference in timestamps for a certain MachineID. One of the things I've considered is using a multidimensional array in php - using the $machineID as the key and then storing the timestamp inside the array the key points to. However, I'm uncertain how to do that since my query parses row by row. I have quite a few questions. 1) Is this the most efficient way to be doing this? I suspect my database table design may not be the best. 2)What would be the best way to determine the difference in timestamps for a certain machineID? Even just a pointer to a topic that would prompt me to think about this in a different way would be helpful - I'm not afraid to do research. Thanks!

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• Parallel features in .Net 4.0

  - by Jonathan.Peppers

  I have been going over the practicality of some of the new parallel features in .Net 4.0. Say I have code like so: foreach (var item in myEnumerable) myDatabase.Insert(item.ConvertToDatabase()); Imagine myDatabase.Insert is performing some work to insert to a SQL database. Theoretically you could write: Parallel.ForEach(myEnumerable, item => myDatabase.Insert(item.ConvertToDatabase())); And automatically you get code that takes advantage of multiple cores. But what if myEnumerable can only be interacted with by a single thread? Will the Parallel class enumerate by a single thread and only dispatch the result to worker threads in the loop? What if myDatabase can only be interacted with by a single thread? It would certainly not be better to make a database connection per iteration of the loop. Finally, what if my "var item" happens to be a UserControl or something that must be interacted with on the UI thread? What design pattern should I follow to solve these problems? It's looking to me that switching over to Parallel/PLinq/etc is not exactly easy when you are dealing with real-world applications.

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• Generic list/sublist handling

  - by user628661

  Let's say we have a class class ComplexCls { public int Fld1; public string Fld2; //could be more fields } class Cls { public int SomeField; } and then some code class ComplexClsList: List<ComplexCls>; ComplexClsList myComplexList; // fill myComplexList // same for Cls class ClsList : List<Cls>; ClsList myClsList; We want to populate myClsList from myComplexList, something like (pseudocode): foreach Complexitem in myComplexList { Cls ClsItem = new Cls(); ClsItem.SomeField = ComplexItem.Fld1; } The code to do this is easy and will be put in some method in myClsList. However I'd like to design this as generic as possible, for generic ComplexCls. Note that the exact ComplexCls is known at the moment of using this code, only the algorithm shd be generic. I know it can be done using (direct) reflection but is there other solution? Let me know if the question is not clear enough. (probably isn't). [EDIT] Basically, what I need is this: having myClsList, I need to specify a DataSource (ComplexClsList) and a field from that DataSource (Fld1) that will be used to populate my SomeField

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• How do I size a second div to be 100% height underneath a fixed image?

  - by mk

  I'm using semi-transparent PNGs (due to the designer's overlapping of elements) and trying to achieve a layout that represents the design while still working well on the web. Thus I have simple HTML: <div id="right"> <div id="welcome"></div> <div id="welcomeRepeatingBottom"></div> </div> And I'm trying to use CSS as follows: #right { height: 100%; position: absolute; right: 0px; top: 0px; width: 430px; } #welcome { background-image: url("welcome.png"); height: 614px; width: 430px; position: absolute; top: 0px; left: 0px; } #welcomeRepeatingBottom { background: url("welcomeBottom.png") repeat-y; height: 100%; left: 0px; position: absolute; top: 614px; width: 430px; } The problem is...the #welcomeRepeatingBottom div can't overlap the #welcome div because of the transparency. What I really want is the #welcomeRepeatingBottom div to be height: 100% - 614px, but of course you can't do that. Am I missing something here or do I need to manipulate these values with JavaScript/JQuery?

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• WCF WS-Security and WSE Nonce Authentication

  - by Rick Strahl

  WCF makes it fairly easy to access WS-* Web Services, except when you run into a service format that it doesn't support. Even then WCF provides a huge amount of flexibility to make the service clients work, however finding the proper interfaces to make that happen is not easy to discover and for the most part undocumented unless you're lucky enough to run into a blog, forum or StackOverflow post on the matter. This is definitely true for the Password Nonce as part of the WS-Security/WSE protocol, which is not natively supported in WCF. Specifically I had a need to create a WCF message on the client that includes a WS-Security header that looks like this from their spec document:<soapenv:Header> <wsse:Security soapenv:mustUnderstand="1" xmlns:wsse="http://docs.oasis-open.org/wss/2004/01/oasis-200401-wss-wssecurity-secext-1.0.xsd"> <wsse:UsernameToken wsu:Id="UsernameToken-8" xmlns:wsu="http://docs.oasis-open.org/wss/2004/01/oasis-200401-wss-wssecurity-utility-1.0.xsd"> <wsse:Username>TeStUsErNaMe1</wsse:Username> <wsse:Password Type="http://docs.oasis-open.org/wss/2004/01/oasis-200401-wss-username-token-profile-1.0#PasswordText" >TeStPaSsWoRd1</wsse:Password> <wsse:Nonce EncodingType="http://docs.oasis-open.org/wss/2004/01/oasis-200401-wss-soap-message-security-1.0#Base64Binary" >f8nUe3YupTU5ISdCy3X9Gg==</wsse:Nonce> <wsu:Created>2011-05-04T19:01:40.981Z</wsu:Created> </wsse:UsernameToken> </wsse:Security> </soapenv:Header> Specifically, the Nonce and Created keys are what WCF doesn't create or have a built in formatting for. Why is there a nonce? My first thought here was WTF? The username and password are there in clear text, what does the Nonce accomplish? The Nonce and created keys are are part of WSE Security specification and are meant to allow the server to detect and prevent replay attacks. The hashed nonce should be unique per request which the server can store and check for before running another request thus ensuring that a request is not replayed with exactly the same values. Basic ServiceUtl Import - not much Luck The first thing I did when I imported this service with a service reference was to simply import it as a Service Reference. The Add Service Reference import automatically detects that WS-Security is required and appropariately adds the WS-Security to the basicHttpBinding in the config file:<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?> <configuration> <system.serviceModel> <bindings> <basicHttpBinding> <binding name="RealTimeOnlineSoapBinding"> <security mode="Transport" /> </binding> <binding name="RealTimeOnlineSoapBinding1" /> </basicHttpBinding> </bindings> <client> <endpoint address="https://notarealurl.com:443/services/RealTimeOnline" binding="basicHttpBinding" bindingConfiguration="RealTimeOnlineSoapBinding" contract="RealTimeOnline.RealTimeOnline" name="RealTimeOnline" /> </client> </system.serviceModel> </configuration> If if I run this as is using code like this:var client = new RealTimeOnlineClient(); client.ClientCredentials.UserName.UserName = "TheUsername"; client.ClientCredentials.UserName.Password = "ThePassword"; … I get nothing in terms of WS-Security headers. The request is sent, but the the binding expects transport level security to be applied, rather than message level security. To fix this so that a WS-Security message header is sent the security mode can be changed to: <security mode="TransportWithMessageCredential" /> Now if I re-run I at least get a WS-Security header which looks like this:<s:Envelope xmlns:s="http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/envelope/" xmlns:u="http://docs.oasis-open.org/wss/2004/01/oasis-200401-wss-wssecurity-utility-1.0.xsd"> <s:Header> <o:Security s:mustUnderstand="1" xmlns:o="http://docs.oasis-open.org/wss/2004/01/oasis-200401-wss-wssecurity-secext-1.0.xsd"> <u:Timestamp u:Id="_0"> <u:Created>2012-11-24T02:55:18.011Z</u:Created> <u:Expires>2012-11-24T03:00:18.011Z</u:Expires> </u:Timestamp> <o:UsernameToken u:Id="uuid-18c215d4-1106-40a5-8dd1-c81fdddf19d3-1"> <o:Username>TheUserName</o:Username> <o:Password Type="http://docs.oasis-open.org/wss/2004/01/oasis-200401-wss-username-token-profile-1.0#PasswordText" >ThePassword</o:Password> </o:UsernameToken> </o:Security> </s:Header> Closer! Now the WS-Security header is there along with a timestamp field (which might not be accepted by some WS-Security expecting services), but there's no Nonce or created timestamp as required by my original service. Using a CustomBinding instead My next try was to go with a CustomBinding instead of basicHttpBinding as it allows a bit more control over the protocol and transport configurations for the binding. Specifically I can explicitly specify the message protocol(s) used. Using configuration file settings here's what the config file looks like:<?xml version="1.0"?> <configuration> <system.serviceModel> <bindings> <customBinding> <binding name="CustomSoapBinding"> <security includeTimestamp="false" authenticationMode="UserNameOverTransport" defaultAlgorithmSuite="Basic256" requireDerivedKeys="false" messageSecurityVersion="WSSecurity10WSTrustFebruary2005WSSecureConversationFebruary2005WSSecurityPolicy11BasicSecurityProfile10"> </security> <textMessageEncoding messageVersion="Soap11"></textMessageEncoding> <httpsTransport maxReceivedMessageSize="2000000000"/> </binding> </customBinding> </bindings> <client> <endpoint address="https://notrealurl.com:443/services/RealTimeOnline" binding="customBinding" bindingConfiguration="CustomSoapBinding" contract="RealTimeOnline.RealTimeOnline" name="RealTimeOnline" /> </client> </system.serviceModel> <startup> <supportedRuntime version="v4.0" sku=".NETFramework,Version=v4.0"/> </startup> </configuration> This ends up creating a cleaner header that's missing the timestamp field which can cause some services problems. The WS-Security header output generated with the above looks like this:<s:Header> <o:Security s:mustUnderstand="1" xmlns:o="http://docs.oasis-open.org/wss/2004/01/oasis-200401-wss-wssecurity-secext-1.0.xsd"> <o:UsernameToken u:Id="uuid-291622ca-4c11-460f-9886-ac1c78813b24-1"> <o:Username>TheUsername</o:Username> <o:Password Type="http://docs.oasis-open.org/wss/2004/01/oasis-200401-wss-username-token-profile-1.0#PasswordText" >ThePassword</o:Password> </o:UsernameToken> </o:Security> </s:Header> This is closer as it includes only the username and password. The key here is the protocol for WS-Security:messageSecurityVersion="WSSecurity10WSTrustFebruary2005WSSecureConversationFebruary2005WSSecurityPolicy11BasicSecurityProfile10" which explicitly specifies the protocol version. There are several variants of this specification but none of them seem to support the nonce unfortunately. This protocol does allow for optional omission of the Nonce and created timestamp provided (which effectively makes those keys optional). With some services I tried that requested a Nonce just using this protocol actually worked where the default basicHttpBinding failed to connect, so this is a possible solution for access to some services. Unfortunately for my target service that was not an option. The nonce has to be there. Creating Custom ClientCredentials As it turns out WCF doesn't have support for the Digest Nonce as part of WS-Security, and so as far as I can tell there's no way to do it just with configuration settings. I did a bunch of research on this trying to find workarounds for this, and I did find a couple of entries on StackOverflow as well as on the MSDN forums. However, none of these are particularily clear and I ended up using bits and pieces of several of them to arrive at a working solution in the end. http://stackoverflow.com/questions/896901/wcf-adding-nonce-to-usernametoken http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/wcf/thread/4df3354f-0627-42d9-b5fb-6e880b60f8ee The latter forum message is the more useful of the two (the last message on the thread in particular) and it has most of the information required to make this work. But it took some experimentation for me to get this right so I'll recount the process here maybe a bit more comprehensively. In order for this to work a number of classes have to be overridden: ClientCredentials ClientCredentialsSecurityTokenManager WSSecurityTokenizer The idea is that we need to create a custom ClientCredential class to hold the custom properties so they can be set from the UI or via configuration settings. The TokenManager and Tokenizer are mainly required to allow the custom credentials class to flow through the WCF pipeline and eventually provide custom serialization. Here are the three classes required and their full implementations:public class CustomCredentials : ClientCredentials { public CustomCredentials() { } protected CustomCredentials(CustomCredentials cc) : base(cc) { } public override System.IdentityModel.Selectors.SecurityTokenManager CreateSecurityTokenManager() { return new CustomSecurityTokenManager(this); } protected override ClientCredentials CloneCore() { return new CustomCredentials(this); } } public class CustomSecurityTokenManager : ClientCredentialsSecurityTokenManager { public CustomSecurityTokenManager(CustomCredentials cred) : base(cred) { } public override System.IdentityModel.Selectors.SecurityTokenSerializer CreateSecurityTokenSerializer(System.IdentityModel.Selectors.SecurityTokenVersion version) { return new CustomTokenSerializer(System.ServiceModel.Security.SecurityVersion.WSSecurity11); } } public class CustomTokenSerializer : WSSecurityTokenSerializer { public CustomTokenSerializer(SecurityVersion sv) : base(sv) { } protected override void WriteTokenCore(System.Xml.XmlWriter writer, System.IdentityModel.Tokens.SecurityToken token) { UserNameSecurityToken userToken = token as UserNameSecurityToken; string tokennamespace = "o"; DateTime created = DateTime.Now; string createdStr = created.ToString("yyyy-MM-ddThh:mm:ss.fffZ"); // unique Nonce value - encode with SHA-1 for 'randomness' // in theory the nonce could just be the GUID by itself string phrase = Guid.NewGuid().ToString(); var nonce = GetSHA1String(phrase); // in this case password is plain text // for digest mode password needs to be encoded as: // PasswordAsDigest = Base64(SHA-1(Nonce + Created + Password)) // and profile needs to change to //string password = GetSHA1String(nonce + createdStr + userToken.Password); string password = userToken.Password; writer.WriteRaw(string.Format( "<{0}:UsernameToken u:Id=\"" + token.Id + "\" xmlns:u=\"http://docs.oasis-open.org/wss/2004/01/oasis-200401-wss-wssecurity-utility-1.0.xsd\">" + "<{0}:Username>" + userToken.UserName + "</{0}:Username>" + "<{0}:Password Type=\"http://docs.oasis-open.org/wss/2004/01/oasis-200401-wss-username-token-profile-1.0#PasswordText\">" + password + "</{0}:Password>" + "<{0}:Nonce EncodingType=\"http://docs.oasis-open.org/wss/2004/01/oasis-200401-wss-soap-message-security-1.0#Base64Binary\">" + nonce + "</{0}:Nonce>" + "<u:Created>" + createdStr + "</u:Created></{0}:UsernameToken>", tokennamespace)); } protected string GetSHA1String(string phrase) { SHA1CryptoServiceProvider sha1Hasher = new SHA1CryptoServiceProvider(); byte[] hashedDataBytes = sha1Hasher.ComputeHash(Encoding.UTF8.GetBytes(phrase)); return Convert.ToBase64String(hashedDataBytes); } } Realistically only the CustomTokenSerializer has any significant code in. The code there deals with actually serializing the custom credentials using low level XML semantics by writing output into an XML writer. I can't take credit for this code - most of the code comes from the MSDN forum post mentioned earlier - I made a few adjustments to simplify the nonce generation and also added some notes to allow for PasswordDigest generation. Per spec the nonce is nothing more than a unique value that's supposed to be 'random'. I'm thinking that this value can be any string that's unique and a GUID on its own probably would have sufficed. Comments on other posts that GUIDs can be potentially guessed are highly exaggerated to say the least IMHO. To satisfy even that aspect though I added the SHA1 encryption and binary decoding to give a more random value that would be impossible to 'guess'. The original example from the forum post used another level of encoding and decoding to string in between - but that really didn't accomplish anything but extra overhead. The header output generated from this looks like this:<s:Header> <o:Security s:mustUnderstand="1" xmlns:o="http://docs.oasis-open.org/wss/2004/01/oasis-200401-wss-wssecurity-secext-1.0.xsd"> <o:UsernameToken u:Id="uuid-f43d8b0d-0ebb-482e-998d-f544401a3c91-1" xmlns:u="http://docs.oasis-open.org/wss/2004/01/oasis-200401-wss-wssecurity-utility-1.0.xsd"> <o:Username>TheUsername</o:Username> <o:Password Type="http://docs.oasis-open.org/wss/2004/01/oasis-200401-wss-username-token-profile-1.0#PasswordText">ThePassword</o:Password> <o:Nonce EncodingType="http://docs.oasis-open.org/wss/2004/01/oasis-200401-wss-soap-message-security-1.0#Base64Binary" >PjVE24TC6HtdAnsf3U9c5WMsECY=</o:Nonce> <u:Created>2012-11-23T07:10:04.670Z</u:Created> </o:UsernameToken> </o:Security> </s:Header> which is exactly as it should be. Password Digest? In my case the password is passed in plain text over an SSL connection, so there's no digest required so I was done with the code above. Since I don't have a service handy that requires a password digest,  I had no way of testing the code for the digest implementation, but here is how this is likely to work. If you need to pass a digest encoded password things are a little bit trickier. The password type namespace needs to change to: http://docs.oasis-open.org/wss/2004/01/oasis-200401-wss-username-token-profile-1.0#Digest and then the password value needs to be encoded. The format for password digest encoding is this: Base64(SHA-1(Nonce + Created + Password)) and it can be handled in the code above with this code (that's commented in the snippet above): string password = GetSHA1String(nonce + createdStr + userToken.Password); The entire WriteTokenCore method for digest code looks like this:protected override void WriteTokenCore(System.Xml.XmlWriter writer, System.IdentityModel.Tokens.SecurityToken token) { UserNameSecurityToken userToken = token as UserNameSecurityToken; string tokennamespace = "o"; DateTime created = DateTime.Now; string createdStr = created.ToString("yyyy-MM-ddThh:mm:ss.fffZ"); // unique Nonce value - encode with SHA-1 for 'randomness' // in theory the nonce could just be the GUID by itself string phrase = Guid.NewGuid().ToString(); var nonce = GetSHA1String(phrase); string password = GetSHA1String(nonce + createdStr + userToken.Password); writer.WriteRaw(string.Format( "<{0}:UsernameToken u:Id=\"" + token.Id + "\" xmlns:u=\"http://docs.oasis-open.org/wss/2004/01/oasis-200401-wss-wssecurity-utility-1.0.xsd\">" + "<{0}:Username>" + userToken.UserName + "</{0}:Username>" + "<{0}:Password Type=\"http://docs.oasis-open.org/wss/2004/01/oasis-200401-wss-username-token-profile-1.0#Digest\">" + password + "</{0}:Password>" + "<{0}:Nonce EncodingType=\"http://docs.oasis-open.org/wss/2004/01/oasis-200401-wss-soap-message-security-1.0#Base64Binary\">" + nonce + "</{0}:Nonce>" + "<u:Created>" + createdStr + "</u:Created></{0}:UsernameToken>", tokennamespace)); } I had no service to connect to to try out Digest auth - if you end up needing it and get it to work please drop a comment… How to use the custom Credentials The easiest way to use the custom credentials is to create the client in code. Here's a factory method I use to create an instance of my service client:  public static RealTimeOnlineClient CreateRealTimeOnlineProxy(string url, string username, string password) { if (string.IsNullOrEmpty(url)) url = "https://notrealurl.com:443/cows/services/RealTimeOnline"; CustomBinding binding = new CustomBinding(); var security = TransportSecurityBindingElement.CreateUserNameOverTransportBindingElement(); security.IncludeTimestamp = false; security.DefaultAlgorithmSuite = SecurityAlgorithmSuite.Basic256; security.MessageSecurityVersion = MessageSecurityVersion.WSSecurity10WSTrustFebruary2005WSSecureConversationFebruary2005WSSecurityPolicy11BasicSecurityProfile10; var encoding = new TextMessageEncodingBindingElement(); encoding.MessageVersion = MessageVersion.Soap11; var transport = new HttpsTransportBindingElement(); transport.MaxReceivedMessageSize = 20000000; // 20 megs binding.Elements.Add(security); binding.Elements.Add(encoding); binding.Elements.Add(transport); RealTimeOnlineClient client = new RealTimeOnlineClient(binding, new EndpointAddress(url)); // to use full client credential with Nonce uncomment this code: // it looks like this might not be required - the service seems to work without it client.ChannelFactory.Endpoint.Behaviors.Remove<System.ServiceModel.Description.ClientCredentials>(); client.ChannelFactory.Endpoint.Behaviors.Add(new CustomCredentials()); client.ClientCredentials.UserName.UserName = username; client.ClientCredentials.UserName.Password = password; return client; } This returns a service client that's ready to call other service methods. The key item in this code is the ChannelFactory endpoint behavior modification that that first removes the original ClientCredentials and then adds the new one. The ClientCredentials property on the client is read only and this is the way it has to be added.   Summary It's a bummer that WCF doesn't suport WSE Security authentication with nonce values out of the box. From reading the comments in posts/articles while I was trying to find a solution, I found that this feature was omitted by design as this protocol is considered unsecure. While I agree that plain text passwords are rarely a good idea even if they go over secured SSL connection as WSE Security does, there are unfortunately quite a few services (mosly Java services I suspect) that use this protocol. I've run into this twice now and trying to find a solution online I can see that this is not an isolated problem - many others seem to have struggled with this. It seems there are about a dozen questions about this on StackOverflow all with varying incomplete answers. Hopefully this post provides a little more coherent content in one place. Again I marvel at WCF and its breadth of support for protocol features it has in a single tool. And even when it can't handle something there are ways to get it working via extensibility. But at the same time I marvel at how freaking difficult it is to arrive at these solutions. I mean there's no way I could have ever figured this out on my own. It takes somebody working on the WCF team or at least being very, very intricately involved in the innards of WCF to figure out the interconnection of the various objects to do this from scratch. Luckily this is an older problem that has been discussed extensively online and I was able to cobble together a solution from the online content. I'm glad it worked out that way, but it feels dirty and incomplete in that there's a whole learning path that was omitted to get here… Man am I glad I'm not dealing with SOAP services much anymore. REST service security - even when using some sort of federation is a piece of cake by comparison :-) I'm sure once standards bodies gets involved we'll be right back in security standard hell…© Rick Strahl, West Wind Technologies, 2005-2012Posted in WCF  Web Services   Tweet !function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];if(!d.getElementById(id)){js=d.createElement(s);js.id=id;js.src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js";fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js,fjs);}}(document,"script","twitter-wjs"); (function() { var po = document.createElement('script'); po.type = 'text/javascript'; po.async = true; po.src = 'https://apis.google.com/js/plusone.js'; var s = document.getElementsByTagName('script')[0]; s.parentNode.insertBefore(po, s); })();

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• Listen to Over 100,000 Radio Stations in Windows Media Center

  - by Mysticgeek

  A cool feature in Windows 7 Media Center is the ability to listen to local FM radio. But what if you don’t have a tuner card that supports a connected radio antenna? The RadioTime plugin solves the problem by allowing access to thousands of online radio stations. With the RadioTime plugin for Windows Media Center, you’ll have access to over 100,000 online radio stations from around the world. Their guide is broken down into different categories such as Talk Radio, Music Radio, Sports Radio and more. It’s completely free, but does require registration to save preset stations. RadioTime It works with Media Center in XP, Vista, and Windows 7 (which we’re demonstrating here). When installing it for Windows 7, make sure to click the Installer link below the “Get It Now – Free” button as the installer works best for the new OS. Installation is extremely quick and easy… Now when you open Windows 7 Media Center you’ll find it located in the Extras category from the main menu. After you launch it, you’re presented with the RadioTime guide where you can browse through the different categories of stations. Your shown various station suggestions each time you start it up. The main categories are broken down further so you can find the right genre of the music your looking for.   World Radio offers you stations from all over the world categorized into different regions. RadioTime does support local stations via an FM tuner, but if you don’t have one, you can still access local stations provided they broadcast online. One thing about listening to your local stations online is the audio quality may not be as good as if you had a tuner connected. It provides information on most of the online stations. For example here we look at Minnesota Public Radio info and you get a schedule of when certain programs are on. Then get even more information about the topics on the shows. To use the Presets option you’ll need to log into your RadioTime account, or if you don’t have one just click on the link to create a free one.   Creating a free account is simple and basic on their site. You aren’t required to have an account to use the RadioTime plugin, it’s only if you want the additional benefits. Conclusion For this article we only tried it with Windows 7 Media Center, and sometimes the interface felt clunky when moving quickly through menus. Also, there isn’t a search feature from within Media Center, however, you can search stations from their site and add them to your presets. Despite a few shortcomings, this is a very cool way to get access to thousands of online radio stations through Windows Media Center. If you’re looking for a way to access thousands of radio stations through WMC, you might want to give RadioTime a try. Download RadioTime for Windows Media Center Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Listen To XM Radio with Windows Media Center in Windows 7Listen and Record Over 12,000 Online Radio Stations with RadioSureUsing Netflix Watchnow in Windows Vista Media Center (Gmedia)Learning Windows 7: Manage Your Music with Windows Media PlayerSchedule Updates for Windows Media Center 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 Windows Media Player 12: Tweak Video & Sound with Playback Enhancements Own a cell phone, or does a cell phone own you? Make your Joomla & Drupal Sites Mobile with OSMOBI Integrate Twitter and Delicious and Make Life Easier Design Your Web Pages Using the Golden Ratio Worldwide Growth of the Internet

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• Inspire Geek Love with These Hilarious Geek Valentines

  - by Eric Z Goodnight

  Want to send some Geek Love to that special someone? Why not do it with these elementary school throwback valentines, and win their heart this upcoming Valentine’s day—the geek way! Read on to see the simple method to make your own custom Valentines, as well as download a set of eleven ready-made ones any geek guy or gal should be delighted get. It’s amore! How to Make Custom Valentines A size we’ve used for all of our Valentines is a 3” x 4” at 150 dpi. This is fairly low resolution for print, but makes a great graphic to email. With your new image open, Navigate to Edit > Fill and fill your background layer with a rich, red color (or whatever appeals to you.) By setting “Use” to “Foreground color as shown above, you’ll paint whatever foreground color you have in your color picker. Press to select the text tool. Set a few text objects, using whatever fonts appeal to you. Pixel fonts, like this one, are freely downloadable, and we’ve already shared a great list of Valentines fonts. Copy an image from the internet if you’re confident your sweetie won’t mind a bit of fair use of copyrighted imagery. If they do mind, find yourself some great Creative Commons images. to do a free transform on your image, sizing it to whatever dimensions work best for your design. Right click your newly added image layer in your panel and Choose “Blending Effects” to pick a Layer Style. “Stroke” with this setting adds a black line around your image. Also turning on “Outer Glow” with this setting puts a dark black shadow around the top and bottom (and sides, although they are hidden). Add some more text. Double entendre is recommended. Click and hold down on the “Rectangle Tool” to get the “Custom Shape Tool.” The custom shape tool has useful vector shapes built into it. Find the “Shape” dropdown in the menu to find the heart image. Click and drag to create a vector heart shape in your image. Your layers panel is where you can change the color, if it happens to use the wrong one at first. Click the color swatch in your panel, highlighted in blue above. will transform your vector heart. You can also use it to rotate, if you like. Add some details, like this Power or Standby symbol, which can be found in symbol fonts, taken from images online, or drawn by hand. Your Valentine is now ready to be saved as a JPG or PNG and sent to the object of your affection! Keep reading to see a list of 11 downloadable How-To Geek Valentines, including this one and the three from the header image. Download The HTG Set of Valentines Download the HTG Geek Valentines (ZIP) Download the HTG Geek Valentines (ZIP) When he’s not wooing ladies with Valentines cards, you can email the author at [email protected] with your Photoshop and Graphics questions. Your questions may be featured in a future How-To Geek article! Latest Features How-To Geek ETC Inspire Geek Love with These Hilarious Geek Valentines How to Integrate Dropbox with Pages, Keynote, and Numbers on iPad RGB? CMYK? Alpha? What Are Image Channels and What Do They Mean? How to Recover that Photo, Picture or File You Deleted Accidentally How To Colorize Black and White Vintage Photographs in Photoshop How To Get SSH Command-Line Access to Windows 7 Using Cygwin How to Kid Proof Your Computer’s Power and Reset Buttons Microsoft’s Windows Media Player Extension Adds H.264 Support Back to Google Chrome Android Notifier Pushes Android Notices to Your Desktop Dead Space 2 Theme for Chrome and Iron Carl Sagan and Halo Reach Mashup – We Humans are Capable of Greatness [Video] Battle the Necromorphs Once Again on Your Desktop with the Dead Space 2 Theme for Windows 7

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• SQL SERVER – Video – Beginning Performance Tuning with SQL Server Execution Plan

  - by pinaldave

  Traveling can be most interesting or most exhausting experience. However, traveling is always the most enlightening experience one can have. While going to long journey one has to prepare a lot of things. Pack necessary travel gears, clothes and medicines. However, the most essential part of travel is the journey to the destination. There are many variations one prefer but the ultimate goal is to have a delightful experience during the journey. Here is the video available which explains how to begin with SQL Server Execution plans. Performance Tuning is a Journey Performance tuning is just like a long journey. The goal of performance tuning is efficient and least resources consuming query execution with accurate results. Just as maps are the most essential aspect of performance tuning the same way, execution plans are essentially maps for SQL Server to reach to the resultset. The goal of the execution plan is to find the most efficient path which translates the least usage of the resources (CPU, memory, IO etc). Execution Plans are like Maps When online maps were invented (e.g. Bing, Google, Mapquests etc) initially it was not possible to customize them. They were given a single route to reach to the destination. As time evolved now it is possible to give various hints to the maps, for example ‘via public transport’, ‘walking’, ‘fastest route’, ‘shortest route’, ‘avoid highway’. There are places where we manually drag the route and make it appropriate to our needs. The same situation is with SQL Server Execution Plans, if we want to tune the queries, we need to understand the execution plans and execution plans internals. We need to understand the smallest details which relate to execution plan when we our destination is optimal queries. Understanding Execution Plans The biggest challenge with maps are figuring out the optimal path. The same way the  most common challenge with execution plans is where to start from and which precise route to take. Here is a quick list of the frequently asked questions related to execution plans: Should I read the execution plans from bottoms up or top down? Is execution plans are left to right or right to left? What is the relational between actual execution plan and estimated execution plan? When I mouse over operator I see CPU and IO but not memory, why? Sometime I ran the query multiple times and I get different execution plan, why? How to cache the query execution plan and data? I created an optimal index but the query is not using it. What should I change – query, index or provide hints? What are the tools available which helps quickly to debug performance problems? Etc… Honestly the list is quite a big and humanly impossible to write everything in the words. SQL Server Performance:  Introduction to Query Tuning My friend Vinod Kumar and I have created for the same a video learning course for beginning performance tuning. We have covered plethora of the subject in the course. Here is the quick list of the same: Execution Plan Basics Essential Indexing Techniques Query Design for Performance Performance Tuning Tools Tips and Tricks Checklist: Performance Tuning We believe we have covered a lot in this four hour course and we encourage you to go over the video course if you are interested in Beginning SQL Server Performance Tuning and Query Tuning. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.SQLAuthority.com) Filed under: PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Optimization, SQL Performance, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL, Technology, Video Tagged: Execution Plan

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• Sneak peek at next generation Three MiFi unit – Huawei E585

  - by Liam Westley

  Last Wednesday I was fortunate to be invited to a sneak preview of the next generation Three MiFi unit, the Huawei E585. Many thanks to all those who posted questions both via this blog or via @westleyl on Twitter. I think I made sure I asked every question posed to the MiFi product manager from Three UK, and so here's the answers you were after. What is a MiFi? For those who are wondering, a MiFi unit is a 3G broadband modem combined with a WiFi access point, providing 3G broadband data access to up to five devices simultaneously via standard WiFi connections. What is different? It appears the prime task of enhancing the MiFi was to improve the user experience and user interface, both in terms of the device hardware and within the management software to configure the device.  I think this was a very sensible decision as these areas had substantial room for improvement. Single button operation to switch on, enable WiFi and connect to 3G Improved OELD display (see below), replacing the multi coloured LEDs; including signal strength, SMS notifications, the number of connected clients and data usage Management is via a web based dashboard accessible from any web browser. This is a big win for those running Linux, Mac OS/X, iPad users and, for me, as I can now configure the device from Windows 7 64-bit Charging is via micro USB, the new standard for small USB devices; you cannot use your old charger for the new MiFi unit Automatic reconnection when regaining a signal Improved charging time, which should allow recharging of the device when in use Although subjective, the black and silver design does look more classy than the silver and white plastic of the original MiFi What is the same? Virtually the same size and weight The battery is the same unit as the original MiFi so you’ll have a handy spare if you upgrade Data plans remain the same as the current MiFi, so cheapest price for upgraders will be £49 pay as you go Still only works on 3G networks, with no fallback to GPRS or EDGE There is no specific upgrade path for existing three customers, either from dongle or from the original MiFi My opinion I think three have concentrated on the correct areas of usability and user experience rather than trying to add new whizz bang technology features which aren’t of interest to mainstream users. The one button operation and the improved device display will make it much easier to use when out and about. If the automatic reconnection proves reliable that will remove a major bugbear that I experienced the previous evening when travelling on the First Great Western line from Paddington to Didcot Parkway.  The signal was repeatedly lost as we sped through tunnels and cuttings, and without automatic reconnection is was a real pain to keep pressing the data button on the MiFi to re-establish my data connection. And finally, the web based dashboard will mean I no longer need to resort to my XP based netbook to configure the SSID and password. My everyday laptop runs Windows 7 64-bit which appears to confuse the older 3 WiFi manager which cannot locate the MiFi when connected. Links to other sites, and other images of the device Good first impressions from Ben Smith, http://thereallymobileproject.com/2010/06/3uk-announce-a-new-mifi-with-a-screen/ Also, a round up of other sneak preview posts, http://www.3mobilebuzz.com/2010/06/11/mifi-round-two-your-view/ Pictures Here is a comparison of the old MiFi device next to the new device, complete with OLED display and the Huawei logo now being a prominent feature on the front of the device. One of my fellow bloggers had a Linux based netbook, showing off the web based dashboard complete with Text messages panel to manage SMS. And finally, I never thought that my blog sub title would ever end up printed onto a cup cake, ... and here's some of the other cup cakes ...

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• NDepend tool – Why every developer working with Visual Studio.NET must try it!

  - by hajan

  In the past two months, I have had a chance to test the capabilities and features of the amazing NDepend tool designed to help you make your .NET code better, more beautiful and achieve high code quality. In other words, this tool will definitely help you harmonize your code. I mean, you’ve probably heard about Chaos Theory. Experienced developers and architects are already advocates of the programming chaos that happens when working with complex project architecture, the matrix of relationships between objects which simply even if you are the one who have written all that code, you know how hard is to visualize everything what does the code do. When the application get more and more complex, you will start missing a lot of details in your code… NDepend will help you visualize all the details on a clever way that will help you make smart moves to make your code better. The NDepend tool supports many features, such as: Code Query Language – which will help you write custom rules and query your own code! Imagine, you want to find all your methods which have more than 100 lines of code :)! That’s something simple! However, I will dig much deeper in one of my next blogs which I’m going to dedicate to the NDepend’s CQL (Code Query Language) Architecture Visualization – You are an architect and want to visualize your application’s architecture? I’m thinking how many architects will be really surprised from their architectures since NDepend shows your whole architecture showing each piece of it. NDepend will show you how your code is structured. It shows the architecture in graphs, but if you have very complex architecture, you can see it in Dependency Matrix which is more suited to display large architecture Code Metrics – Using NDepend’s panel, you can see the code base according to Code Metrics. You can do some additional filtering, like selecting the top code elements ordered by their current code metric value. You can use the CQL language for this purpose too. Smart Search – NDepend has great searching ability, which is again based on the CQL (Code Query Language). However, you have some options to search using dropdown lists and text boxes and it will generate the appropriate CQL code on fly. Moreover, you can modify the CQL code if you want it to fit some more advanced searching tasks. Compare Builds and Code Difference – NDepend will also help you compare previous versions of your code with the current one at one of the most clever ways I’ve seen till now. Create Custom Rules – using CQL you can create custom rules and let NDepend warn you on each build if you break a rule Reporting – NDepend can automatically generate reports with detailed stats, graph representation, dependency matrixes and some additional advanced reporting features that will simply explain you everything related to your application’s code, architecture and what you’ve done. And that’s not all. As I’ve seen, there are many other features that NDepend supports. I will dig more in the upcoming days and will blog more about it. The team who built the NDepend have also created good documentation, which you can find on the NDepend website. On their website, you can also find some good videos that will help you get started quite fast. It’s easy to install and what is very important it is fully integrated with Visual Studio. To get you started, you can watch the following Getting Started Online Demo and Tutorial with explanations and screenshots. If you are interested to know more about how to use the features of this tool, either visit their website or wait for my next blogs where I will show some real examples of using the tool and how it helps make your code better. And the last thing for this blog, I would like to copy one sentence from the NDepend’s home page which says: ‘Hence the software design becomes concrete, code reviews are effective, large refactoring are easy and evolution is mastered.’ Website: www.ndepend.com Getting Started: http://www.ndepend.com/GettingStarted.aspx Features: http://www.ndepend.com/Features.aspx Download: http://www.ndepend.com/NDependDownload.aspx Hope you like it! Please do let me know your feedback by providing comments to my blog post. Kind Regards, Hajan

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