Search Results

Search found 22446 results on 898 pages for 'oracle topics events'.

Page 565/898 | < Previous Page | 561 562 563 564 565 566 567 568 569 570 571 572  | Next Page >

• How to manage focus for a small set of simple widgets

  - by Christoph

  I'm developing a set of simple widgets for a small (128x128) display. For example I'd like to have a main screen with an overlay menu which I can use to toggle visibilty of main screen elements. Each option would be an icon with a box around it while it is selected. Button (left, up, right, down, enter) events should be given to the widget that has "focus". Focus is a simple thing to understand when using a GUI, but I'm having trouble implementing this. Can you suggest a simple concept for managing focus and input events? I have these simple ideas: Only one widget can have focus, so I need a single pointer to that widget. When this widget gets some kind of "cycle" input (as in "highlight the next item in this list"), the focus is given to a different widget. a widget must have a way of telling the application which widget the focus is given to next. if a widget cannot give a "next focus" hint, the application must be able to figure out where the focus should go. Widgets are currently structured like this: A widget can have a parent, which is passed to the constructor. Widgets are created statically, as I want to avoid dynamic memory allocation (I only have 16kB of RAM and I'd like to have control over that). widgets have siblings, implemented as an intrusive linked list (they have a next member). A parent has a pointer to the head of its list of children. Input events are arguments to the widgets buttonEvent methods which can accept or ignore that event. If it ignores the event, it can pass the event to its parent. My Questions: How can I manage focus for these widgets? Am I making this too complicated?

  Read the article

• sp_ssiscatalog v1.0.1.0 now available for download

  - by jamiet

  13 days ago I wrote a blog post entitled Introducing sp_ssiscatalog (v1.0.0.0) in which I first made mention of sp_ssiscatalog, an open source stored procedure intended to make it easy to query the SSIS Catalog. I have been working on some enhancements since then and hence v1.0.1.0 is now available for download from Codeplex. What’s new in this release This release includes the following enhancements: [execution_id] now gets returned in a call to EXEC [dbo].[sp_ssiscatalog] @operation_type='exec'; Filter events by specifying packages to ignore EXEC [dbo].[sp_ssiscatalog] @operation_type='exec',@exec_events_packagesexcluded='SomePackage.dtsx,AnotherPackage.dtsx'; [event_message_id] is now returned in a list of events List of executions can now be filtered via a minimum and maximum execution_id EXEC [dbo].[sp_ssiscatalog] @operation_type='execs',@execs_minimum_execution_id=198,@execs_maximum_execution_id=201 Events resultsets now have a field, [event_message_context_xml] that contains an XML document containing all [event_message_context] info (if any exists) Installation instructions Download the zip file at DB v1.0.1.0. It contains two files, SsisReportingPack.dacpac & SSISDB.dacpac Unzip to a folder of your choosing Open a command prompt and change to the directory into which you unzipped the files Execute: "%PROGRAMFILES(x86)%\Microsoft SQL Server\110\DAC\bin\sqlpackage.exe" /a:Publish /tdn:SsisReportingPack /sf:SSISReportingPack.dacpac /v:SSISDB=SSISDB /tsn:(local) (/tsn specifies the target server. Change as appropriate.) If everything works OK you’ll see something like the following: or depending on whether the target database already exists or not This will create a database called [SsisReportingPack] which contains [dbo].[sp_ssiscatalog] Feedback is welcomed! @Jamiet

  Read the article

• Building Queries Systematically

  - by Jeremy Smyth

  The SQL language is a bit like a toolkit for data. It consists of lots of little fiddly bits of syntax that, taken together, allow you to build complex edifices and return powerful results. For the uninitiated, the many tools can be quite confusing, and it's sometimes difficult to decide how to go about the process of building non-trivial queries, that is, queries that are more than a simple SELECT a, b FROM c; A System for Building Queries When you're building queries, you could use a system like the following:  Decide which fields contain the values you want to use in our output, and how you wish to alias those fields Values you want to see in your output Values you want to use in calculations . For example, to calculate margin on a product, you could calculate price - cost and give it the alias margin. Values you want to filter with. For example, you might only want to see products that weigh more than 2Kg or that are blue. The weight or colour columns could contain that information. Values you want to order by. For example you might want the most expensive products first, and the least last. You could use the price column in descending order to achieve that. Assuming the fields you've picked in point 1 are in multiple tables, find the connections between those tables Look for relationships between tables and identify the columns that implement those relationships. For example, The Orders table could have a CustomerID field referencing the same column in the Customers table. Sometimes the problem doesn't use relationships but rests on a different field; sometimes the query is looking for a coincidence of fact rather than a foreign key constraint. For example you might have sales representatives who live in the same state as a customer; this information is normally not used in relationships, but if your query is for organizing events where sales representatives meet customers, it's useful in that query. In such a case you would record the names of columns at either end of such a connection. Sometimes relationships require a bridge, a junction table that wasn't identified in point 1 above but is needed to connect tables you need; these are used in "many-to-many relationships". In these cases you need to record the columns in each table that connect to similar columns in other tables. Construct a join or series of joins using the fields and tables identified in point 2 above. This becomes your FROM clause. Filter using some of the fields in point 1 above. This becomes your WHERE clause. Construct an ORDER BY clause using values from point 1 above that are relevant to the desired order of the output rows. Project the result using the remainder of the fields in point 1 above. This becomes your SELECT clause. A Worked Example   Let's say you want to query the world database to find a list of countries (with their capitals) and the change in GNP, using the difference between the GNP and GNPOld columns, and that you only want to see results for countries with a population greater than 100,000,000. Using the system described above, we could do the following:  The Country.Name and City.Name columns contain the name of the country and city respectively.  The change in GNP comes from the calculation GNP - GNPOld. Both those columns are in the Country table. This calculation is also used to order the output, in descending order To see only countries with a population greater than 100,000,000, you need the Population field of the Country table. There is also a Population field in the City table, so you'll need to specify the table name to disambiguate. You can also represent a number like 100 million as 100e6 instead of 100000000 to make it easier to read. Because the fields come from the Country and City tables, you'll need to join them. There are two relationships between these tables: Each city is hosted within a country, and the city's CountryCode column identifies that country. Also, each country has a capital city, whose ID is contained within the country's Capital column. This latter relationship is the one to use, so the relevant columns and the condition that uses them is represented by the following FROM clause:  FROM Country JOIN City ON Country.Capital = City.ID The statement should only return countries with a population greater than 100,000,000. Country.Population is the relevant column, so the WHERE clause becomes:  WHERE Country.Population > 100e6  To sort the result set in reverse order of difference in GNP, you could use either the calculation, or the position in the output (it's the third column): ORDER BY GNP - GNPOld or ORDER BY 3 Finally, project the columns you wish to see by constructing the SELECT clause: SELECT Country.Name AS Country, City.Name AS Capital,        GNP - GNPOld AS `Difference in GNP`  The whole statement ends up looking like this:  mysql> SELECT Country.Name AS Country, City.Name AS Capital, -> GNP - GNPOld AS `Difference in GNP` -> FROM Country JOIN City ON Country.Capital = City.ID -> WHERE Country.Population > 100e6 -> ORDER BY 3 DESC; +--------------------+------------+-------------------+ | Country            | Capital    | Difference in GNP | +--------------------+------------+-------------------+ | United States | Washington | 399800.00 | | China | Peking | 64549.00 | | India | New Delhi | 16542.00 | | Nigeria | Abuja | 7084.00 | | Pakistan | Islamabad | 2740.00 | | Bangladesh | Dhaka | 886.00 | | Brazil | Brasília | -27369.00 | | Indonesia | Jakarta | -130020.00 | | Russian Federation | Moscow | -166381.00 | | Japan | Tokyo | -405596.00 | +--------------------+------------+-------------------+ 10 rows in set (0.00 sec) Queries with Aggregates and GROUP BY While this system might work well for many queries, it doesn't cater for situations where you have complex summaries and aggregation. For aggregation, you'd start with choosing which columns to view in the output, but this time you'd construct them as aggregate expressions. For example, you could look at the average population, or the count of distinct regions.You could also perform more complex aggregations, such as the average of GNP per head of population calculated as AVG(GNP/Population). Having chosen the values to appear in the output, you must choose how to aggregate those values. A useful way to think about this is that every aggregate query is of the form X, Y per Z. The SELECT clause contains the expressions for X and Y, as already described, and Z becomes your GROUP BY clause. Ordinarily you would also include Z in the query so you see how you are grouping, so the output becomes Z, X, Y per Z.  As an example, consider the following, which shows a count of  countries and the average population per continent:  mysql> SELECT Continent, COUNT(Name), AVG(Population)     -> FROM Country     -> GROUP BY Continent; +---------------+-------------+-----------------+ | Continent     | COUNT(Name) | AVG(Population) | +---------------+-------------+-----------------+ | Asia          |          51 |   72647562.7451 | | Europe        |          46 |   15871186.9565 | | North America |          37 |   13053864.8649 | | Africa        |          58 |   13525431.0345 | | Oceania       |          28 |    1085755.3571 | | Antarctica    |           5 |          0.0000 | | South America |          14 |   24698571.4286 | +---------------+-------------+-----------------+ 7 rows in set (0.00 sec) In this case, X is the number of countries, Y is the average population, and Z is the continent. Of course, you could have more fields in the SELECT clause, and  more fields in the GROUP BY clause as you require. You would also normally alias columns to make the output more suited to your requirements. More Complex Queries  Queries can get considerably more interesting than this. You could also add joins and other expressions to your aggregate query, as in the earlier part of this post. You could have more complex conditions in the WHERE clause. Similarly, you could use queries such as these in subqueries of yet more complex super-queries. Each technique becomes another tool in your toolbox, until before you know it you're writing queries across 15 tables that take two pages to write out. But that's for another day...

  Read the article

• Bejeweled-like game, managing different gem/powerup behaviors?

  - by Wissam

  I thought I'd ask a question and look forward to some insight from this very compelling community. In a Bejeweled-like (Match 3) game, the standard behavior once a valid swap of two adjacent tiles is made is that the resulting matching tiles are destroyed, any tiles now sitting over empty spaces fall to the position above the next present-tile, and any void created above is filled with new tiles. In richer Match-3 games like Bejeweled, 4 in a row (as opposed to just 3) modifies this behavior such that the tile that was swapped is retained, turned into a "flaming" gem, it falls, and then the empty space above is filled. The next time that "flaming gem" is played it explodes and destroys the 8 perimeter tiles, triggers a different animation sequence (neighbors of those 8 tiles being destroyed look like they've been hit by a shockwave then they fall to their respective positions). Scoring is different, the triggered sounds are different, etc. There are even more elaborate behaviors for Match5, Match-cross-pattern, and many powerups that can be purchased, each which produces a more elaborate sequence of events, sounds, animations, scoring, etc... What is the best approach to developing all these different behaviors that respond to players' "move" and her current "performance" and that deviate from the standard sequence of events, scoring, animation, sounds etc, in such a way that we can always flexibly introduce a new "powerup" ? What we are doing now is hard-coding the events of each one, but the task is long and arduous and seems like the wrong approach especially since the game-designers and testers often offer (later) valuable insight on what works better in-game, which means that the code itself may have to be re-written even for minor changes in behavior (say, destroy only 7 neighboring tiles, instead of all 8 in an explosion). ANY pointers for good practices here would be highly appreciated.

  Read the article

• Towards Ultra-Reusability for ADF - Adaptive Bindings

  - by Duncan Mills

  The task flow mechanism embodies one of the key value propositions of the ADF Framework, it's primary contribution being the componentization of your applications and implicitly the introduction of a re-use culture, particularly in large applications. However, what if we could do more? How could we make task flows even more re-usable than they are today? Well one great technique is to take advantage of a feature that is already present in the framework, a feature which I will call, for want of a better name, "adaptive bindings". What's an adaptive binding? well consider a simple use case.  I have several screens within my application which display tabular data which are all essentially identical, the only difference is that they happen to be based on different data collections (View Objects, Bean collections, whatever) , and have a different set of columns. Apart from that, however, they happen to be identical; same toolbar, same key functions and so on. So wouldn't it be nice if I could have a single parametrized task flow to represent that type of UI and reuse it? Hold on you say, great idea, however, to do that we'd run into problems. Each different collection that I want to display needs different entries in the pageDef file and: I want to continue to use the ADF Bindings mechanism rather than dropping back to passing the whole collection into the taskflow   If I do use bindings, there is no way I want to have to declare iterators and tree bindings for every possible collection that I might want the flow to handle  Ah, joy! I reply, no need to panic, you can just use adaptive bindings. Defining an Adaptive Binding  It's easiest to explain with a simple before and after use case.  Here's a basic pageDef definition for our familiar Departments table.  <executables> <iterator Binds="DepartmentsView1" DataControl="HRAppModuleDataControl" RangeSize="25"             id="DepartmentsView1Iterator"/> </executables> <bindings> <tree IterBinding="DepartmentsView1Iterator" id="DepartmentsView1">   <nodeDefinition DefName="oracle.demo.model.vo.DepartmentsView" Name="DepartmentsView10">     <AttrNames>       <Item Value="DepartmentId"/>         <Item Value="DepartmentName"/>         <Item Value="ManagerId"/>         <Item Value="LocationId"/>       </AttrNames>     </nodeDefinition> </tree> </bindings>  Here's the adaptive version: <executables> <iterator Binds="${pageFlowScope.voName}" DataControl="HRAppModuleDataControl" RangeSize="25"             id="TableSourceIterator"/> </executables> <bindings> <tree IterBinding="TableSourceIterator" id="GenericView"> <nodeDefinition Name="GenericViewNode"/> </tree> </bindings>  You'll notice three changes here.   Most importantly, you'll see that the hard-coded View Object name  that formally populated the iterator Binds attribute is gone and has been replaced by an expression (${pageFlowScope.voName}). This of course, is key, you can see that we can pass a parameter to the task flow, telling it exactly what VO to instantiate to populate this table! I've changed the IDs of the iterator and the tree binding, simply to reflect that they are now re-usable The tree binding itself has simplified and the node definition is now empty.  Now what this effectively means is that the #{node} map exposed through the tree binding will expose every attribute of the underlying iterator's collection - neat! (kudos to Eugene Fedorenko at this point who reminded me that this was even possible in his excellent "deep dive" session at OpenWorld  this year) Using the adaptive binding in the UI Now we have a parametrized  binding we have to make changes in the UI as well, first of all to reflect the new ID that we've assigned to the binding (of course) but also to change the column list from being a fixed known list to being a generic metadata driven set: <af:table value="#{bindings.GenericView.collectionModel}" rows="#{bindings.GenericView.rangeSize}"         fetchSize="#{bindings.GenericView.rangeSize}"           emptyText="#{bindings.GenericView.viewable ? 'No data to display.' : 'Access Denied.'}"           var="row" rowBandingInterval="0"           selectedRowKeys="#{bindings.GenericView.collectionModel.selectedRow}"           selectionListener="#{bindings.GenericView.collectionModel.makeCurrent}"           rowSelection="single" id="t1"> <af:forEach items="#{bindings.GenericView.attributeDefs}" var="def">   <af:column headerText="#{bindings.GenericView.labels[def.name]}" sortable="true"            sortProperty="#{def.name}" id="c1">     <af:outputText value="#{row[def.name]}" id="ot1"/>     </af:column>   </af:forEach> </af:table> Of course you are not constrained to a simple read only table here.  It's a normal tree binding and iterator that you are using behind the scenes so you can do all the usual things, but you can see the value of using ADFBC as the back end model as you have the rich pantheon of UI hints to use to derive things like labels (and validators and converters...)  One Final Twist  To finish on a high note I wanted to point out that you can take this even further and achieve the ultra-reusability I promised. Here's the new version of the pageDef iterator, see if you can notice the subtle change? <iterator Binds="{pageFlowScope.voName}"  DataControl="${pageFlowScope.dataControlName}" RangeSize="25"           id="TableSourceIterator"/>  Yes, as well as parametrizing the collection (VO) name, we can also parametrize the name of the data control. So your task flow can graduate from being re-usable within an application to being truly generic. So if you have some really common patterns within your app you can wrap them up and reuse then across multiple developments without having to dictate data control names, or connection names. This also demonstrates the importance of interacting with data only via the binding layer APIs. If you keep any code in the task flow generic in that way you can deal with data from multiple types of data controls, not just one flavour. Enjoy!

  Read the article

• Spreading incoming batched data into a real-time stream

  - by pr1001

  I would like to display some events in 'real-time'. However, I must fetch the data from another source. I can request the last X minutes, though the source is updated approximately every 5 minutes. This means that there will be a delay between the most recent data retrieved and the point in time that I make the request. Second, because I will be receiving a batch of data, I don't want to just fire out all the events down a socket once my fetcher has retrieved it: I would like to spread out the events so that they are both accurately spaced amongst each other and in sync with their original occurrences (e.g. an event is always displayed 6 minutes after it actually happened). My thought is to fetch the data every 5 minutes from the source, knowing that I won't get the very latest data. The original data would be then queued to be sent down the socket 7.5 minutes from its original timestamp – that is, at least ~2.5 minutes from when its batch was fetched and at most 7.5 minutes since then. My question is this: is this the best way to approach the problem? Does this problem have any standard approaches or associated literature related to implementation best-practices and edge cases? I am a bit worried that the frequency of my fetches and the frequency in which the source is updated will get out of sync, leading to points where no data will be retrieved from the source. However, since my socket delay is greater than my fetch frequency, the subsequent fetch should retrieve newer data before the socket queue is empty. Is that correct? Am I missing something? Thanks!

  Read the article

• Tracking form abandonment

  - by Alec Sanger

  I'm looking for a decent way to track form abandonment. Ideally, I would like to see how many people start filling out a form but do not complete it, as well as the last field that was filled out. The website is a fairly large Wordpress site with quite a few forms. Some of these forms are to register for events, some are for donations, some are for information requests. My first attempt at this was adding a generic jquery that bound functions to all forms on the site. When a form element was blurred, I would trigger a Google Analytics event with the name of the form, the name of the field, and whether or not it was filled. I expected to be able to go to the Event Flow section in Google Analytics and see the flow of these form events, however since there are so many forms and other events occurring on the website, Google wouldn't let me break them out very well. The other issue was the Quform doesn't name their fields anything relevant, and it doesn't look like we can name them ourselves. This results in a lot of ugly form names that don't mean anything without cross-referencing the actual form. Does anybody have any suggestions on how I can achieve more usable form abandonment metrics in a scenario like this?

  Read the article

• What are the memory-management capabilities of MySQL + JDBC (in light of autonomic computing)?

  - by Adel

  I'm interested in implementing some kind of autonomic-computing functionality using MySQL. By autonomic-computing I mean roughly some failsafe abilities, whereby the application appears to be at least slightly "intelligent" For reference, the main parts of autonomic computing we'd like are the "self-configuring" and "self-healing" features (the other two - "self-optimizing" and "self-protecting", are too abstract/futuristic for us, at this time). Sofor example, if we have a sample Java application that utilizes a MySQL database, we might want to automatically restart the MySQL database if we take up too much memory. Or maybe we want to have the ability to dynamiccally adjust the database memory as needed. So for example, when we start the application the database begins with a 56 Megabyte buffer; but then as we insert so many rows we want to have it automatically jump up to 512 MB, then to 1024, until a max of 4096 MB. Does all of the above suggest that MySQL is too "weak" for the task? Do you suggest using Oracle database? My professor believes that by using Java we can basically make up for any memory-management deficiencies that MySQL has in relation to Oracle DB. I'm new to MySQL , but have experience with Oracle. If all of the above sounds wishy-washy, it is because I'm still fleshing it out. thanks

  Read the article

• Java and .NET cost of use [on hold]

  - by 1110

  I work with .NET technology stack for about 4 years. I am learning and enjoy working with ASP MVC framework and I never did anything serious in other languages. This is not the question like what is better (I read all similar questions). What interest me is the cost of switching. For example: If you are about to start a start-up company today and you are in my situation not too much money, some good idea that you think others will use and have a knowledge of .NET. In my head I have a few questions that I can't answer and I know that somebody with experience can: 1) Java & .NET hosting. Suppose shared hosting is not good enough anymore, your site has grown and you need more resources. How much Java services is cheaper compared to .NET? 2) I didn't follow hype about ORACLE will kill java long time. Does oracle show interest in investing in java. I mean is is safe to bet on java as a technology when starting start-up (basically did oracle show some will to destroy java platform)? 3) I am not sure what I am asking here. When you use Java you can use JEEE stack or Java with third party stack (spring, hibernate, maven etc.). I saw a lot of project that work with second option if web application is not enterprise level but social networking site for example which stack is best pick? Summary of this question is is it safe to jump in to Java learn it and build product based on it. It's not too hard for me to learn it. But how much can I get from it.

  Read the article

• Did I Inadvertently Create a Mediator in my MVC?

  - by SoulBeaver

  I'm currently working on my first biggish project. It's a frontend facebook application that has, since last Tuesday, spanned some 6000-8000 LOC. I say this because I'm using the MVC, an architecture I have never rigidly enforced in any of my hobby projects. I read part of the PureMVC book, but I didn't quite grasp the concept of the Mediator. Since I didn't understand and didn't see the need for it, my project has yet to use a single mediator. Yesterday I went back to the design board because of some requirement changes and noticed that I could move all UI elements out of the View and into its own class. The View essentially only managed the lifetime of the UI and all events from the UI or Model. Technically, the View has now become a 'Mediator' between the Model and UI. Therefore, I realized today, I could just move all my UI stuff back into the View and create a mediator class that handles all events from the view and model. Is my understanding correct in thinking that I have devolved my View as it currently is (handling events from the Model and UI) into a Mediator and that the UI class is what should be the View?

  Read the article

• Working Qt controls in a 3d environment

  - by Jay

  I need some advice from a Qt expert. The background: I have a 3D engine (ogre3d) working in concert with Qt. The 3D Content is displayed in a widget (using a custom OS window in the client area). I'm able to overlay arbitrary Qt widgets onto the 3d world using the widget render() method and a shared bitmap. This makes a great "heads up display". I can use the standard Qt style sheets and animation using this technique. My goal I'd like to go a step further and allow the user to move these rendered widgets using the mouse. I'd like some advice on the best way to implement this. Possible solutions: The widgets in the HUD are not part of the inheritance chain. I render them manually. They don't get events though. I could add them to the inheritance chain so they get events in the usual way. Then I would need to change them to render to my shared bitmap instead of to the operating system. I looked at this once but couldn't find enough information to implement it. Capture mouse events in the 3D display widget and EMIT them to child controls. I basically create my own event handling chain. Any suggestions on how to implement this? I'm also considering switching to Qt5. I'm not sure how that might affect this decision.

  Read the article

• flash core engine by Dinesh [closed]

  - by hdinesh

  This post was a dump of the following code (without the highlights). No question, just a dump. Please update this q. with a real question to have it reopened. You (the asker) risk to be flagged as spammer (if not already) and a bad reputation. This is a q/a site, not a site to promote your own code libraries. package facers { import flash.display.*; import flash.events.*; import flash.geom.ColorTransform; import flash.utils.Dictionary; import org.papervision3d.cameras.*; import org.papervision3d.scenes.*; import org.papervision3d.objects.*; import org.papervision3d.objects.special.*; import org.papervision3d.objects.primitives.*; import org.papervision3d.materials.*; import org.papervision3d.events.FileLoadEvent; import org.papervision3d.materials.special.*; import org.papervision3d.materials.shaders.*; import org.papervision3d.materials.utils.*; import org.papervision3d.lights.*; import org.papervision3d.render.*; import org.papervision3d.view.*; import org.papervision3d.events.InteractiveScene3DEvent; import org.papervision3d.events.*; import org.papervision3d.core.utils.*; import org.papervision3d.core.geom.renderables.Vertex3D; import caurina.transitions.*; public class Main extends Sprite { public var viewport :BasicView; public var displayObject :DisplayObject3D; private var light :PointLight3D; private var shadowPlane :Plane; private var dataArray :Array; private var material :BitmapFileMaterial; private var planeByContainer :Dictionary = new Dictionary(); private var paperSize :Number = 0.5; private var cloudSize :Number = 1500; private var rotSize :Number = 360; private var maxAlbums :Number = 50; private var num :Number = 0; public function Main():void { trace("START APPLICATION"); viewport = new BasicView(1024, 690, true, true, CameraType.FREE); viewport.camera.zoom = 50; viewport.camera.extra = { goPosition: new DisplayObject3D(),goTarget: new DisplayObject3D() }; addChild(viewport); displayObject = new DisplayObject3D(); viewport.scene.addChild(displayObject); createAlbum(); addEventListener(Event.ENTER_FRAME, onRenderEvent); } private function createAlbum() { dataArray = new Array("images/thums/pic1.jpg", "images/thums/pic2.jpg", "images/thums/pic3.jpg", "images/thums/pic4.jpg", "images/thums/pic5.jpg", "images/thums/pic6.jpg", "images/thums/pic7.jpg", "images/thums/pic8.jpg", "images/thums/pic9.jpg", "images/thums/pic10.jpg", "images/thums/pic1.jpg", "images/thums/pic2.jpg", "images/thums/pic3.jpg", "images/thums/pic4.jpg", "images/thums/pic5.jpg", "images/thums/pic6.jpg", "images/thums/pic7.jpg", "images/thums/pic8.jpg", "images/thums/pic9.jpg", "images/thums/pic10.jpg"); for (var i:int = 0; i < dataArray.length; i++) { material = new BitmapFileMaterial(dataArray[i]); material.doubleSided = true; material.addEventListener(FileLoadEvent.LOAD_COMPLETE, loadMaterial); } } public function loadMaterial(event:Event) { var plane:Plane = new Plane(material, 300, 180); displayObject.addChild(plane); var _x:int = Math.random() * cloudSize - cloudSize/2; var _y:int = Math.random() * cloudSize - cloudSize/2; var _z:int = Math.random() * cloudSize - cloudSize/2; var _rotationX:int = Math.random() * rotSize; var _rotationY:int = Math.random() * rotSize; var _rotationZ:int = Math.random() * rotSize; Tweener.addTween(plane, { x:_x, y:_y, z:_z, rotationX:_rotationX, rotationY:_rotationY, rotationZ:_rotationZ, time:5, transition:"easeIn" } ); } protected function onRenderEvent(event:Event):void { var rotY: Number = (mouseY-(stage.stageHeight/2))/(900/2)*(1200); var rotX: Number = (mouseX-(stage.stageWidth/2))/(600/2)*(-1200); displayObject.rotationY = viewport.camera.x + (rotX - viewport.camera.x) / 50; displayObject.rotationX = viewport.camera.y + (rotY - viewport.camera.y) / 30; viewport.singleRender(); } } } package designLab.events { import flash.display.BlendMode; import flash.display.Sprite; import flash.events.Event; import flash.filters.BlurFilter; // Import designLab import designLab.layer.IntroLayer; import designLab.shadow.ShadowCaster; import designLab.utils.LayerConstant; // Import Papervision3D import org.papervision3d.cameras.*; import org.papervision3d.scenes.*; import org.papervision3d.objects.*; import org.papervision3d.objects.special.*; import org.papervision3d.objects.primitives.*; import org.papervision3d.materials.*; import org.papervision3d.materials.special.*; import org.papervision3d.materials.shaders.*; import org.papervision3d.materials.utils.*; import org.papervision3d.lights.*; import org.papervision3d.render.*; import org.papervision3d.view.*; import org.papervision3d.events.InteractiveScene3DEvent; import org.papervision3d.events.*; import org.papervision3d.core.utils.*; import org.papervision3d.core.geom.renderables.Vertex3D; public class CoreEnging extends Sprite { public var viewport :BasicView; // Create BasicView public var displayObject :DisplayObject3D; // Create DisplayObject public var shadowCaster :ShadowCaster; // Create ShadowCaster private var light :PointLight3D; // Create PointLight private var shadowPlane :Plane; // Create Plane private var layer :LayerConstant; // Create constant resource layer private static var instance :CoreEnging; // Create CoreEnging class static instance // CoreEnging class static instance mathod function public static function getinstance() { if (instance != null) return instance; else { instance = new CoreEnging(); return instance; } } // CoreEnging constrictor public function CoreEnging () { trace("INFO: Design Lab Application : Core Enging v0.1"); layer = new LayerConstant(); viewport = new BasicView(900, 600, true, true, CameraType.FREE); // pass the width, height, scaleToStage, interactive, cameraType to BasicView viewport.camera.zoom = 100; // Define the zoom level of camera addChild(viewport); createFloor(); // Create the floor displayObject = new DisplayObject3D(); // Create new instance of DisplayObject viewport.scene.addChild(displayObject); // Add the DisplayObject to the BasicView light = new PointLight3D(); // Create new instance of PointLight light.z = -50; // Position the Z of create instance light.x = 0; //Position the X of create instance light.rotationZ = 45; //Position the rotation angel of the Z of create instance light.y = 500; //Position the Y of create instance shadowCaster = new ShadowCaster("shadow", 0x000000, BlendMode.MULTIPLY, .1, [new BlurFilter(20, 20, 1)]); // pass shadowcaster name, color, blend mode, alpha and filters shadowCaster.setType(ShadowCaster.SPOTLIGHT); // Define the shadow type addEventListener(Event.ENTER_FRAME, onRenderEvent); // Add frame render event } // Start create floor public function createFloor() { var spr:Sprite = new Sprite(); // Create Sprite spr.graphics.beginFill(0xFFFFFF); // Define the fill color for sprite spr.graphics.drawRect(0, 0, 600, 600); // Define the X, Y, width, height of the sprite var sprMaterial:MovieMaterial = new MovieMaterial(spr, true, true, true); //Create a texture from an existing sprite instance shadowPlane = new Plane(sprMaterial, 2000, 2000, 1, 1); // create new instance of the Plane and pass the texture material, width, height, segmentsW and segmentsH shadowPlane.rotationX = 80; //Position the rotation angel of the X of Plane shadowPlane.y = -200; //Position the Y of Plane viewport.scene.addChild(shadowPlane); // Add the Plane to the BasicView } // switch method function of the page layer control public function addLayer(type:String) { switch (type) { case layer.INTRO: var intro:IntroLayer = new IntroLayer(); break; } } // Create get mathod function for DisplayObject public function getDisplayObject():DisplayObject3D { return displayObject; } // Create get mathod function for BasicView public function getViewport():BasicView { return viewport; } // Rendering function protected function onRenderEvent(event:Event):void { var rotY: Number = (mouseY-(stage.stageHeight/2))/(900/2)*(1200); var rotX: Number = (mouseX-(stage.stageWidth/2))/(600/2)*(-1200); displayObject.rotationY = viewport.camera.x + (rotX - viewport.camera.x) / 50; displayObject.rotationX = viewport.camera.y + (rotY - viewport.camera.y) / 30; // Remove the shadow shadowCaster.invalidate(); // create new shadow on DisplayObject move shadowCaster.castModel(displayObject, light, shadowPlane); viewport.singleRender(); } } } package designLab.layer { import flash.display.Sprite; import flash.events.Event; // Import designLab import designLab.materials.iBusinessCard; import designLab.events.CoreEnging; // Import Papervision3D import org.papervision3d.objects.primitives.Cube; import org.papervision3d.materials.ColorMaterial; import org.papervision3d.materials.MovieMaterial; public class IntroLayer { // IntroLayer constrictor public function IntroLayer() { trace("INFO: Load Intro layer"); var indexDP:DP_index = new DP_index(); //Create the library MovieClip var blackMaterial:MovieMaterial = new MovieMaterial(indexDP, true); //Create a texture from an existing library MovieClip instance blackMaterial.smooth = true; blackMaterial.doubleSided = false; var mycolor:ColorMaterial = new ColorMaterial(0x000000); //Create solid color material var mycard:iBusinessCard = new iBusinessCard(blackMaterial, blackMaterial, mycolor, 372, 10, 207); // Create custom 3D cube object to pass the Front, Back, All, CubeWidth, CubeDepth and CubeHeight CoreEnging.getinstance().getDisplayObject().addChild(mycard.create3DCube()); // Add the custom 3D cube to the DisplayObject } } } package designLab.materials { import flash.display.*; import flash.events.*; // Import Papervision3D import org.papervision3d.materials.*; import org.papervision3d.materials.utils.MaterialsList; import org.papervision3d.objects.primitives.Cube; public class iBusinessCard extends Sprite { private var materialsList :MaterialsList; private var cube :Cube; private var Front :MovieMaterial = new MovieMaterial(); private var Back :MovieMaterial = new MovieMaterial(); private var All :ColorMaterial = new ColorMaterial(); private var CubeWidth :Number; private var CubeDepth :Number; private var CubeHeight :Number; public function iBusinessCard(Front:MovieMaterial, Back:MovieMaterial, All:ColorMaterial, CubeWidth:Number, CubeDepth:Number, CubeHeight:Number) { setFront(Front); setBack(Back); setAll(All); setCubeWidth(CubeWidth); setCubeDepth(CubeDepth); setCubeHeight(CubeHeight); } public function create3DCube():Cube { materialsList = new MaterialsList(); materialsList.addMaterial(Front, "front"); materialsList.addMaterial(Back, "back"); materialsList.addMaterial(All, "left"); materialsList.addMaterial(All, "right"); materialsList.addMaterial(All, "top"); materialsList.addMaterial(All, "bottom"); cube = new Cube(materialsList, CubeWidth, CubeDepth, CubeHeight); cube.x = 0; cube.y = 0; cube.z = 0; cube.rotationY = 180; return cube; } public function setFront(Front:MovieMaterial) { this.Front = Front; } public function getFront():MovieMaterial { return Front; } public function setBack(Back:MovieMaterial) { this.Back = Back; } public function getBack():MovieMaterial { return Back; } public function setAll(All:ColorMaterial) { this.All = All; } public function getAll():ColorMaterial { return All; } public function setCubeWidth(CubeWidth:Number) { this.CubeWidth = CubeWidth; } public function getCubeWidth():Number { return CubeWidth; } public function setCubeDepth(CubeDepth:Number) { this.CubeDepth = CubeDepth; } public function getCubeDepth():Number { return CubeDepth; } public function setCubeHeight(CubeHeight:Number) { this.CubeHeight = CubeHeight; } public function getCubeHeight():Number { return CubeHeight; } } } package designLab.shadow { import flash.display.Sprite; import flash.filters.BlurFilter; import flash.geom.Point; import flash.geom.Rectangle; import flash.utils.Dictionary; import org.papervision3d.core.geom.TriangleMesh3D; import org.papervision3d.core.geom.renderables.Triangle3D; import org.papervision3d.core.geom.renderables.Vertex3D; import org.papervision3d.core.math.BoundingSphere; import org.papervision3d.core.math.Matrix3D; import org.papervision3d.core.math.Number3D; import org.papervision3d.core.math.Plane3D; import org.papervision3d.lights.PointLight3D; import org.papervision3d.materials.MovieMaterial; import org.papervision3d.objects.DisplayObject3D; import org.papervision3d.objects.primitives.Plane; public class ShadowCaster { private var vertexRefs:Dictionary; private var numberRefs:Dictionary; private var lightRay:Number3D = new Number3D() private var p3d:Plane3D = new Plane3D(); public var color:uint = 0; public var alpha:Number = 0; public var blend:String = ""; public var filters:Array; public var uid:String; private var _type:String = "point"; private var dir:Number3D; private var planeBounds:Dictionary; private var targetBounds:Dictionary; private var models:Dictionary; public static var DIRECTIONAL:String = "dir"; public static var SPOTLIGHT:String = "spot"; public function ShadowCaster(uid:String, color:uint = 0, blend:String = "multiply", alpha:Number = 1, filters:Array=null) { this.uid = uid; this.color = color; this.alpha = alpha; this.blend = blend; this.filters = filters ? filters : [new BlurFilter()]; numberRefs = new Dictionary(true); targetBounds = new Dictionary(true); planeBounds = new Dictionary(true); models = new Dictionary(true); } public function castModel(model:DisplayObject3D, light:PointLight3D, plane:Plane, faces:Boolean = true, cull:Boolean = false):void{ var ar:Array; if(models[model]) { ar = models[model]; }else{ ar = new Array(); getChildMesh(model, ar); models[model] = ar; } var reset:Boolean = true; for each(var t:TriangleMesh3D in ar){ if(faces) castFaces(light, t, plane, cull, reset); else castBoundingSphere(light, t, plane, 0.75, reset); reset = false; } } private function getChildMesh(do3d:DisplayObject3D, ar):void{ if(do3d is TriangleMesh3D) ar.push(do3d); for each(var d:DisplayObject3D in do3d.children) getChildMesh(d, ar); } public function setType(type:String="point"):void{ _type = type; } public function getType():String{ return _type; } public function castBoundingSphere(light:PointLight3D, target:TriangleMesh3D, plane:Plane, scaleRadius:Number=0.8, clear:Boolean = true):void{ var planeVertices:Array = plane.geometry.vertices; //convert to target space? var world:Matrix3D = plane.world; var inv:Matrix3D = Matrix3D.inverse(plane.transform); var lp:Number3D = new Number3D(light.x, light.y, light.z); Matrix3D.multiplyVector(inv, lp); p3d.setNormalAndPoint(plane.geometry.faces[0].faceNormal, new Number3D()); var b:BoundingSphere = target.geometry.boundingSphere; var bounds:Object = planeBounds[plane]; if(!bounds){ bounds = plane.boundingBox(); planeBounds[plane] = bounds; } var tbounds:Object = targetBounds[target]; if(!tbounds){ tbounds = target.boundingBox(); targetBounds[target] = tbounds; } var planeMovie:Sprite = Sprite(MovieMaterial(plane.material).movie); var movieSize:Point = new Point(planeMovie.width, planeMovie.height); var castClip:Sprite = getCastClip(plane); castClip.blendMode = this.blend; castClip.filters = this.filters; castClip.alpha = this.alpha; if(clear) castClip.graphics.clear(); vertexRefs = new Dictionary(true); var tlp:Number3D = new Number3D(light.x, light.y, light.z); Matrix3D.multiplyVector(Matrix3D.inverse(target.world), tlp); var center:Number3D = new Number3D(tbounds.min.x+tbounds.size.x*0.5, tbounds.min.y+tbounds.size.y*0.5, tbounds.min.z+tbounds.size.z*0.5); var dif:Number3D = Number3D.sub(lp, center); dif.normalize(); var other:Number3D = new Number3D(); other.x = -dif.y; other.y = dif.x; other.z = 0; other.normalize(); var cross:Number3D = Number3D.cross(new Number3D(plane.transform.n12, plane.transform.n22, plane.transform.n32), p3d.normal); cross.normalize(); //cross = new Number3D(-dif.y, dif.x, 0); //cross.normalize(); cross.multiplyEq(b.radius*scaleRadius); if(_type == DIRECTIONAL){ var oPos:Number3D = new Number3D(target.x, target.y, target.z); Matrix3D.multiplyVector(target.world, oPos); Matrix3D.multiplyVector(inv, oPos); dir = new Number3D(oPos.x-lp.x, oPos.y-lp.y, oPos.z-lp.z); } //numberRefs = new Dictionary(true); var pos:Number3D; var c2d:Point; var r2d:Point; //_type = SPOTLIGHT; pos = projectVertex(new Vertex3D(center.x, center.y, center.z), lp, inv, target.world); c2d = get2dPoint(pos, bounds.min, bounds.size, movieSize); pos = projectVertex(new Vertex3D(center.x+cross.x, center.y+cross.y, center.z+cross.z), lp, inv, target.world); r2d = get2dPoint(pos, bounds.min, bounds.size, movieSize); var dx:Number = r2d.x-c2d.x; var dy:Number = r2d.y-c2d.y; var rad:Number = Math.sqrt(dx*dx+dy*dy); castClip.graphics.beginFill(color); castClip.graphics.moveTo(c2d.x, c2d.y); castClip.graphics.drawCircle(c2d.x, c2d.y, rad); castClip.graphics.endFill(); } public function getCastClip(plane:Plane):Sprite{ var planeMovie:Sprite = Sprite(MovieMaterial(plane.material).movie); var movieSize:Point = new Point(planeMovie.width, planeMovie.height); var castClip:Sprite;// = new Sprite(); if(planeMovie.getChildByName("castClip"+uid)) return Sprite(planeMovie.getChildByName("castClip"+uid)); else{ castClip = new Sprite(); castClip.name = "castClip"+uid; castClip.scrollRect = new Rectangle(0, 0, movieSize.x, movieSize.y); //castClip.alpha = 0.4; planeMovie.addChild(castClip); return castClip; } } public function castFaces(light:PointLight3D, target:TriangleMesh3D, plane:Plane, cull:Boolean=false, clear:Boolean = true):void{ var planeVertices:Array = plane.geometry.vertices; //convert to target space? var world:Matrix3D = plane.world; var inv:Matrix3D = Matrix3D.inverse(plane.transform); var lp:Number3D = new Number3D(light.x, light.y, light.z); Matrix3D.multiplyVector(inv, lp); var tlp:Number3D; if(cull){ tlp = new Number3D(light.x, light.y, light.z); Matrix3D.multiplyVector(Matrix3D.inverse(target.world), tlp); } //Matrix3D.multiplyVector(Matrix3D.inverse(target.transform), tlp); //p3d.setThreePoints(planeVertices[0].getPosition(), planeVertices[1].getPosition(), planeVertices[2].getPosition()); p3d.setNormalAndPoint(plane.geometry.faces[0].faceNormal, new Number3D()); if(_type == DIRECTIONAL){ var oPos:Number3D = new Number3D(target.x, target.y, target.z); Matrix3D.multiplyVector(target.world, oPos); Matrix3D.multiplyVector(inv, oPos); dir = new Number3D(oPos.x-lp.x, oPos.y-lp.y, oPos.z-lp.z); } var bounds:Object = planeBounds[plane]; if(!bounds){ bounds = plane.boundingBox(); planeBounds[plane] = bounds; } var castClip:Sprite = getCastClip(plane); castClip.blendMode = this.blend; castClip.filters = this.filters; castClip.alpha = this.alpha; var planeMovie:Sprite = Sprite(MovieMaterial(plane.material).movie); var movieSize:Point = new Point(planeMovie.width, planeMovie.height); if(clear) castClip.graphics.clear(); vertexRefs = new Dictionary(true); //numberRefs = new Dictionary(true); var pos:Number3D; var p2d:Point; var s2d:Point; var hitVert:Number3D = new Number3D(); for each(var t:Triangle3D in target.geometry.faces){ if( cull){ hitVert.x = t.v0.x; hitVert.y = t.v0.y; hitVert.z = t.v0.z; if(Number3D.dot(t.faceNormal, Number3D.sub(tlp, hitVert)) <= 0) continue; } castClip.graphics.beginFill(color); pos = projectVertex(t.v0, lp, inv, target.world); s2d = get2dPoint(pos, bounds.min, bounds.size, movieSize); castClip.graphics.moveTo(s2d.x, s2d.y); pos = projectVertex(t.v1, lp, inv, target.world); p2d = get2dPoint(pos, bounds.min, bounds.size, movieSize); castClip.graphics.lineTo(p2d.x, p2d.y); pos = projectVertex(t.v2, lp, inv, target.world); p2d = get2dPoint(pos, bounds.min, bounds.size, movieSize); castClip.graphics.lineTo(p2d.x, p2d.y); castClip.graphics.lineTo(s2d.x, s2d.y); castClip.graphics.endFill(); } } public function invalidate():void{ invalidateModels(); invalidatePlanes(); } public function invalidatePlanes():void{ planeBounds = new Dictionary(true); } public function invalidateTargets():void{ numberRefs = new Dictionary(true); targetBounds = new Dictionary(true); } public function invalidateModels():void{ models = new Dictionary(true); invalidateTargets(); } private function get2dPoint(pos3D:Number3D, min3D:Number3D, size3D:Number3D, movieSize:Point):Point{ return new Point((pos3D.x-min3D.x)/size3D.x*movieSize.x, ((-pos3D.y-min3D.y)/size3D.y*movieSize.y)); } private function projectVertex(v:Vertex3D, light:Number3D, invMat:Matrix3D, world:Matrix3D):Number3D{ var pos:Number3D = vertexRefs[v]; if(pos) return pos; var n:Number3D = numberRefs[v]; if(!n){ n = new Number3D(v.x, v.y, v.z); Matrix3D.multiplyVector(world, n); Matrix3D.multiplyVector(invMat, n); numberRefs[v] = n; } if(_type == SPOTLIGHT){ lightRay.x = light.x; lightRay.y = light.y; lightRay.z = light.z; }else{ lightRay.x = n.x-dir.x; lightRay.y = n.y-dir.y; lightRay.z = n.z-dir.z; } pos = p3d.getIntersectionLineNumbers(lightRay, n); vertexRefs[v] = pos; return pos; } } } package designLab.utils { public class LayerConstant { public const INTRO:String = "INTRO"; // Intro layer string constant } }*emphasized text*

  Read the article

• SOA Suite 11g Native Format Builder Complex Format Example

  - by bob.webster

  This rather long posting details the steps required to process a grouping of fixed length records using Format Builder.   If it’s 10 pm and you’re feeling beat you might want to leave this until tomorrow.  But if it’s 10 pm and you need to get a Format Builder Complex template done, read on… The goal is to process individual orders from a file using the 11g File Adapter and Format Builder Sample Data =========== 001Square Widget            0245.98 102Triagular Widget         1120.00 403Circular Widget           0099.45 ORD8898302/01/2011 301Hexagon Widget         1150.98 ORD6735502/01/2011 The records are fixed length records representing a number of logical Order records. Each order record consists of a number of item records starting with a 3 digit number, followed by a single Summary Record which starts with the constant ORD. How can this file be processed so that the first poll returns the first order? 001Square Widget            0245.98 102Triagular Widget         1120.00 403Circular Widget           0099.45 ORD8898302/01/2011 And the second poll returns the second order? 301Hexagon Widget           1150.98 ORD6735502/01/2011 Note: if you need more than one order per poll, that’s also possible, see the “Multiple Messages” field in the “File Adapter Step 6 of 9” snapshot further down.   To follow along with this example you will need - Studio Edition Version 11.1.1.4.0    with the   - SOA Extension for JDeveloper 11.1.1.4.0 installed Both can be downloaded from here:  http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/middleware/soasuite/downloads/index.html You will not need a running WebLogic Server domain to complete the steps and Format Builder tests in this article.     Start with a SOA Composite containing a File Adapter The Format Builder is part of the File Adapter so start by creating a new SOA Project and Composite. Here is a quick summary for those not familiar with these steps - Start JDeveloper - From the Main Menu choose File->New - In the New Gallery window that opens Expand the “General” category and Select the Applications node.   Then choose SOA Application from the Items section on the right.  Finally press the OK button. - In Step 1 of the “Create SOA Application wizard” that appears enter an Application Name and an Directory of your     choice,   then press the Next button. - In Step 2 of the “Create SOA Application wizard”, press the Next button leaving all entries as defaulted. - In Step 3 of the “Create SOA Application wizard”, Enter a composite name of your choice and Press the Finish   Button These steps result in a new Application and SOA Project. The SOA Project contains a composite.xml file which is opened and shown below. For our example we have not defined a Mediator or a BPEL process to minimize the steps, but one or the other would eventually be needed to use the File Adapter we are about to create. Drag and drop the File Adapter icon from the Component Pallette onto either the LEFT side of the diagram under “Exposed Services” or the right side under “External References”.  (See the Green Circle in the image below).  Placing the adapter on the left side would indicate the file being processed is inbound to the composite, if the adapter is placed on the right side then the data is outbound to a file.     Note that the same Format Builder definition can be used in both directions.  For example we could use the format with a File Adapter on the left side of the composite to parse fixed data into XML, modify the data in our Composite or BPEL process and then use the same Format Builder definition with a File adapter on the right side of the composite to write the data back out in the same fixed data format When the File Adapter is dropped on the Composite the File Adapter Wizard Appears. Skip Past the first page, Step 1 of 9 by pressing the Next button. In Step 2 enter a service name of your choice as shown below, then press Next   When the Native Format Builder appears, skip the welcome page by pressing next. Also press the Next button to accept the settings on Step 3 of 9 On Step 4, select Read File and press the Next button as shown below.   On Step 5 enter a directory that will contain a file with the input data, then  Press the Next button as shown below. In step 6, enter *.txt or another file format to select input files from the input directory mentioned in step 5. ALSO check the “Files contain Multiple Messages” checkbox and set the “Publish Messages in Batches of” field to 1.  The value can be set higher to increase the number of logical order group records returned on each poll of the file adapter.  In other words, it determines the number of Orders that will be sent to each instance of a Mediator or Composite processing using the File Adapter.   Skip Step 7 by pressing the Next button In Step 8 press the Gear Icon on the right side to load the Native Format Builder.       Native Format Builder  appears Before diving into the format, here is an overview of the process. Approach - Bottom up Assuming an Order is a grouping of item records and a summary record…. - Define a separate  Complex Type for each Record Type found in the group.    (One for itemRecord and one for summaryRecord) - Define a Complex Type to contain the Group of Record types defined above   (LogicalOrderRecord) - Define a top level element to represent an order.  (order)   The order element will be of type LogicalOrderRecord   Defining the Format In Step 1 select   “Create new”  and  “Complex Type” and “Next”   In Step two browse to and select a file containing the test data shown at the start of this article. A link is provided at the end of this article to download a file containing the test data. Press the Next button     In Step 3 Complex types must be define for each type of input record. Select the Root-Element and Click on the Add Complex Type icon This creates a new empty complex type definition shown below. The fastest way to create the definition is to highlight the first line of the Sample File data and drag the line onto the  <new_complex_type> Format Builder introspects the data and provides a grid to define additional fields. Change the “Complex Type Name” to  “itemRecord” Then click on the ruler to indicate the position of fixed columns.  Drag the red triangle icons to the exact columns if necessary. Double click on an existing red triangle to remove an unwanted entry. In the case below fields are define in columns 0-3, 4-28, 29-eol When the field definitions are correct, press the “Generate Fields” button. Field entries named C1, C2 and C3 will be created as shown below. Click on the field names and rename them from C1->itemNum, C2->itemDesc and C3->itemCost  When all the fields are correctly defined press OK to save the complex type.        Next, the process is repeated to define a Complex Type for the SummaryRecord. Select the Root-Element in the schema tree and press the new complex type icon Then highlight and drag the Summary Record from the sample data onto the <new_complex_type>   Change the complex type name to “summaryRecord” Mark the fixed fields for Order Number and Order Date. Press the Generate Fields button and rename C1 and C2 to itemNum and orderDate respectively.   The last complex type to be defined is a type to hold the group of items and the summary record. Select the Root-Element in the schema tree and click the new complex type icon Select the “<new_complex_type>” entry and click the pencil icon   On the Complex Type Details page change the name and type of each input field. Change line 1 to be named item and set the Type  to “itemRecord” Change line 2 to be named summary and set the Type to “summaryRecord” We also need to indicate that itemRecords repeat in the input file. Click the pencil icon at the right side of the item line. On the Edit Details page change the “Max Occurs” entry from 1 to UNBOUNDED. We also need to indicate how to identify an itemRecord.  Since each item record has “.” in column 32 we can use this fact to differentiate an item record from a summary record. Change the “Look Ahead” field to value 32 and enter a period in the “Look For” field Press the OK button to save entry.     Finally, its time to create a top level element to represent an order. Select the “Root-Element” in the schema tree and press the New element icon Click on the <new_element> and press the pencil icon.   Set the Element Name to “order” and change the Data Type to “logicalOrderRecord” Press the OK button to save the element definition.   The final definition should match the screenshot below. Press the Next Button to view the definition source.     Press the Test Button to test the definition   Press the Green Triangle Icon to run the test.   And we are presented with an unwelcome error. The error states that the processor ran out of data while working through the definition. The processor was unable to differentiate between itemRecords and summaryRecords and therefore treated the entire file as a list of itemRecords.  At end of file, the “summary” portion of the logicalOrderRecord remained unprocessed but mandatory.   This root cause of this error is the loss of our “lookAhead” definition used to identify itemRecords. This appears to be a bug in the  Native Format Builder 11.1.1.4.0 Luckily, a simple workaround exists. Press the Cancel button and return to the “Step 4 of 4” Window. Manually add    nxsd:lookAhead="32" nxsd:lookFor="."   attributes after the maxOccurs attribute of the item element. as shown in the highlighted text below.   When the lookAhead and lookFor attributes have been added Press the Test button and on the Test page press the Green Triangle. The test is now successful, the first order in the file is returned by the File Adapter.     Below is a complete listing of the Result XML from the right column of the screen above   Try running it The downloaded input test file and completed schema file can be used for testing without following all the Native Format Builder steps in this example. Use the following link to download a file containing the sample data. Download Sample Input Data This is the best approach rather than cutting and pasting the input data at the top of the article.  Since the data is fixed length it’s very important to watch out for trailing spaces in the data and to ensure an eol character at the end of every line. The download file is correctly formatted. The final schema definition can be downloaded at the following link Download Completed Schema Definition   - Save the inputData.txt file to a known location like the xsd folder in your project. - Save the inputData_6.xsd file to the xsd folder in your project. - At step 1 in the Native Format Builder wizard  (as shown above) check the “Edit existing” radio button,    then browse and select the inputData_6.xsd file - At step 2 of the Format Builder configuration Wizard (as shown above) supply the path and filename for    the inputData.txt file. - You can then proceed to the test page and run a test. - Remember the wizard bug will drop the lookAhead and lookFor attributes,  you will need to manually add   nxsd:lookAhead="32" nxsd:lookFor="."    after the maxOccurs attribute of the item element in the   LogicalOrderRecord Complex Type.  (as shown above)   Good Luck with your Format Project

  Read the article

• Toorcon 15 (2013)

  - by danx

  The Toorcon gang (senior staff): h1kari (founder), nfiltr8, and Geo Introduction to Toorcon 15 (2013) A Tale of One Software Bypass of MS Windows 8 Secure Boot Breaching SSL, One Byte at a Time Running at 99%: Surviving an Application DoS Security Response in the Age of Mass Customized Attacks x86 Rewriting: Defeating RoP and other Shinanighans Clowntown Express: interesting bugs and running a bug bounty program Active Fingerprinting of Encrypted VPNs Making Attacks Go Backwards Mask Your Checksums—The Gorry Details Adventures with weird machines thirty years after "Reflections on Trusting Trust" Introduction to Toorcon 15 (2013) Toorcon 15 is the 15th annual security conference held in San Diego. I've attended about a third of them and blogged about previous conferences I attended here starting in 2003. As always, I've only summarized the talks I attended and interested me enough to write about them. Be aware that I may have misrepresented the speaker's remarks and that they are not my remarks or opinion, or those of my employer, so don't quote me or them. Those seeking further details may contact the speakers directly or use The Google. For some talks, I have a URL for further information. A Tale of One Software Bypass of MS Windows 8 Secure Boot Andrew Furtak and Oleksandr Bazhaniuk Yuri Bulygin, Oleksandr ("Alex") Bazhaniuk, and (not present) Andrew Furtak Yuri and Alex talked about UEFI and Bootkits and bypassing MS Windows 8 Secure Boot, with vendor recommendations. They previously gave this talk at the BlackHat 2013 conference. MS Windows 8 Secure Boot Overview UEFI (Unified Extensible Firmware Interface) is interface between hardware and OS. UEFI is processor and architecture independent. Malware can replace bootloader (bootx64.efi, bootmgfw.efi). Once replaced can modify kernel. Trivial to replace bootloader. Today many legacy bootkits—UEFI replaces them most of them. MS Windows 8 Secure Boot verifies everything you load, either through signatures or hashes. UEFI firmware relies on secure update (with signed update). You would think Secure Boot would rely on ROM (such as used for phones0, but you can't do that for PCs—PCs use writable memory with signatures DXE core verifies the UEFI boat loader(s) OS Loader (winload.efi, winresume.efi) verifies the OS kernel A chain of trust is established with a root key (Platform Key, PK), which is a cert belonging to the platform vendor. Key Exchange Keys (KEKs) verify an "authorized" database (db), and "forbidden" database (dbx). X.509 certs with SHA-1/SHA-256 hashes. Keys are stored in non-volatile (NV) flash-based NVRAM. Boot Services (BS) allow adding/deleting keys (can't be accessed once OS starts—which uses Run-Time (RT)). Root cert uses RSA-2048 public keys and PKCS#7 format signatures. SecureBoot — enable disable image signature checks SetupMode — update keys, self-signed keys, and secure boot variables CustomMode — allows updating keys Secure Boot policy settings are: always execute, never execute, allow execute on security violation, defer execute on security violation, deny execute on security violation, query user on security violation Attacking MS Windows 8 Secure Boot Secure Boot does NOT protect from physical access. Can disable from console. Each BIOS vendor implements Secure Boot differently. There are several platform and BIOS vendors. It becomes a "zoo" of implementations—which can be taken advantage of. Secure Boot is secure only when all vendors implement it correctly. Allow only UEFI firmware signed updates protect UEFI firmware from direct modification in flash memory protect FW update components program SPI controller securely protect secure boot policy settings in nvram protect runtime api disable compatibility support module which allows unsigned legacy Can corrupt the Platform Key (PK) EFI root certificate variable in SPI flash. If PK is not found, FW enters setup mode wich secure boot turned off. Can also exploit TPM in a similar manner. One is not supposed to be able to directly modify the PK in SPI flash from the OS though. But they found a bug that they can exploit from User Mode (undisclosed) and demoed the exploit. It loaded and ran their own bootkit. The exploit requires a reboot. Multiple vendors are vulnerable. They will disclose this exploit to vendors in the future. Recommendations: allow only signed updates protect UEFI fw in ROM protect EFI variable store in ROM Breaching SSL, One Byte at a Time Yoel Gluck and Angelo Prado Angelo Prado and Yoel Gluck, Salesforce.com CRIME is software that performs a "compression oracle attack." This is possible because the SSL protocol doesn't hide length, and because SSL compresses the header. CRIME requests with every possible character and measures the ciphertext length. Look for the plaintext which compresses the most and looks for the cookie one byte-at-a-time. SSL Compression uses LZ77 to reduce redundancy. Huffman coding replaces common byte sequences with shorter codes. US CERT thinks the SSL compression problem is fixed, but it isn't. They convinced CERT that it wasn't fixed and they issued a CVE. BREACH, breachattrack.com BREACH exploits the SSL response body (Accept-Encoding response, Content-Encoding). It takes advantage of the fact that the response is not compressed. BREACH uses gzip and needs fairly "stable" pages that are static for ~30 seconds. It needs attacker-supplied content (say from a web form or added to a URL parameter). BREACH listens to a session's requests and responses, then inserts extra requests and responses. Eventually, BREACH guesses a session's secret key. Can use compression to guess contents one byte at-a-time. For example, "Supersecret SupersecreX" (a wrong guess) compresses 10 bytes, and "Supersecret Supersecret" (a correct guess) compresses 11 bytes, so it can find each character by guessing every character. To start the guess, BREACH needs at least three known initial characters in the response sequence. Compression length then "leaks" information. Some roadblocks include no winners (all guesses wrong) or too many winners (multiple possibilities that compress the same). The solutions include: lookahead (guess 2 or 3 characters at-a-time instead of 1 character). Expensive rollback to last known conflict check compression ratio can brute-force first 3 "bootstrap" characters, if needed (expensive) block ciphers hide exact plain text length. Solution is to align response in advance to block size Mitigations length: use variable padding secrets: dynamic CSRF tokens per request secret: change over time separate secret to input-less servlets Future work eiter understand DEFLATE/GZIP HTTPS extensions Running at 99%: Surviving an Application DoS Ryan Huber Ryan Huber, Risk I/O Ryan first discussed various ways to do a denial of service (DoS) attack against web services. One usual method is to find a slow web page and do several wgets. Or download large files. Apache is not well suited at handling a large number of connections, but one can put something in front of it Can use Apache alternatives, such as nginx How to identify malicious hosts short, sudden web requests user-agent is obvious (curl, python) same url requested repeatedly no web page referer (not normal) hidden links. hide a link and see if a bot gets it restricted access if not your geo IP (unless the website is global) missing common headers in request regular timing first seen IP at beginning of attack count requests per hosts (usually a very large number) Use of captcha can mitigate attacks, but you'll lose a lot of genuine users. Bouncer, goo.gl/c2vyEc and www.github.com/rawdigits/Bouncer Bouncer is software written by Ryan in netflow. Bouncer has a small, unobtrusive footprint and detects DoS attempts. It closes blacklisted sockets immediately (not nice about it, no proper close connection). Aggregator collects requests and controls your web proxies. Need NTP on the front end web servers for clean data for use by bouncer. Bouncer is also useful for a popularity storm ("Slashdotting") and scraper storms. Future features: gzip collection data, documentation, consumer library, multitask, logging destroyed connections. Takeaways: DoS mitigation is easier with a complete picture Bouncer designed to make it easier to detect and defend DoS—not a complete cure Security Response in the Age of Mass Customized Attacks Peleus Uhley and Karthik Raman Peleus Uhley and Karthik Raman, Adobe ASSET, blogs.adobe.com/asset/ Peleus and Karthik talked about response to mass-customized exploits. Attackers behave much like a business. "Mass customization" refers to concept discussed in the book Future Perfect by Stan Davis of Harvard Business School. Mass customization is differentiating a product for an individual customer, but at a mass production price. For example, the same individual with a debit card receives basically the same customized ATM experience around the world. Or designing your own PC from commodity parts. Exploit kits are another example of mass customization. The kits support multiple browsers and plugins, allows new modules. Exploit kits are cheap and customizable. Organized gangs use exploit kits. A group at Berkeley looked at 77,000 malicious websites (Grier et al., "Manufacturing Compromise: The Emergence of Exploit-as-a-Service", 2012). They found 10,000 distinct binaries among them, but derived from only a dozen or so exploit kits. Characteristics of Mass Malware: potent, resilient, relatively low cost Technical characteristics: multiple OS, multipe payloads, multiple scenarios, multiple languages, obfuscation Response time for 0-day exploits has gone down from ~40 days 5 years ago to about ~10 days now. So the drive with malware is towards mass customized exploits, to avoid detection There's plenty of evicence that exploit development has Project Manager bureaucracy. They infer from the malware edicts to: support all versions of reader support all versions of windows support all versions of flash support all browsers write large complex, difficult to main code (8750 lines of JavaScript for example Exploits have "loose coupling" of multipe versions of software (adobe), OS, and browser. This allows specific attacks against specific versions of multiple pieces of software. Also allows exploits of more obscure software/OS/browsers and obscure versions. Gave examples of exploits that exploited 2, 3, 6, or 14 separate bugs. However, these complete exploits are more likely to be buggy or fragile in themselves and easier to defeat. Future research includes normalizing malware and Javascript. Conclusion: The coming trend is that mass-malware with mass zero-day attacks will result in mass customization of attacks. x86 Rewriting: Defeating RoP and other Shinanighans Richard Wartell Richard Wartell The attack vector we are addressing here is: First some malware causes a buffer overflow. The malware has no program access, but input access and buffer overflow code onto stack Later the stack became non-executable. The workaround malware used was to write a bogus return address to the stack jumping to malware Later came ASLR (Address Space Layout Randomization) to randomize memory layout and make addresses non-deterministic. The workaround malware used was to jump t existing code segments in the program that can be used in bad ways "RoP" is Return-oriented Programming attacks. RoP attacks use your own code and write return address on stack to (existing) expoitable code found in program ("gadgets"). Pinkie Pie was paid $60K last year for a RoP attack. One solution is using anti-RoP compilers that compile source code with NO return instructions. ASLR does not randomize address space, just "gadgets". IPR/ILR ("Instruction Location Randomization") randomizes each instruction with a virtual machine. Richard's goal was to randomize a binary with no source code access. He created "STIR" (Self-Transofrming Instruction Relocation). STIR disassembles binary and operates on "basic blocks" of code. The STIR disassembler is conservative in what to disassemble. Each basic block is moved to a random location in memory. Next, STIR writes new code sections with copies of "basic blocks" of code in randomized locations. The old code is copied and rewritten with jumps to new code. the original code sections in the file is marked non-executible. STIR has better entropy than ASLR in location of code. Makes brute force attacks much harder. STIR runs on MS Windows (PEM) and Linux (ELF). It eliminated 99.96% or more "gadgets" (i.e., moved the address). Overhead usually 5-10% on MS Windows, about 1.5-4% on Linux (but some code actually runs faster!). The unique thing about STIR is it requires no source access and the modified binary fully works! Current work is to rewrite code to enforce security policies. For example, don't create a *.{exe,msi,bat} file. Or don't connect to the network after reading from the disk. Clowntown Express: interesting bugs and running a bug bounty program Collin Greene Collin Greene, Facebook Collin talked about Facebook's bug bounty program. Background at FB: FB has good security frameworks, such as security teams, external audits, and cc'ing on diffs. But there's lots of "deep, dark, forgotten" parts of legacy FB code. Collin gave several examples of bountied bugs. Some bounty submissions were on software purchased from a third-party (but bounty claimers don't know and don't care). We use security questions, as does everyone else, but they are basically insecure (often easily discoverable). Collin didn't expect many bugs from the bounty program, but they ended getting 20+ good bugs in first 24 hours and good submissions continue to come in. Bug bounties bring people in with different perspectives, and are paid only for success. Bug bounty is a better use of a fixed amount of time and money versus just code review or static code analysis. The Bounty program started July 2011 and paid out $1.5 million to date. 14% of the submissions have been high priority problems that needed to be fixed immediately. The best bugs come from a small % of submitters (as with everything else)—the top paid submitters are paid 6 figures a year. Spammers like to backstab competitors. The youngest sumitter was 13. Some submitters have been hired. Bug bounties also allows to see bugs that were missed by tools or reviews, allowing improvement in the process. Bug bounties might not work for traditional software companies where the product has release cycle or is not on Internet. Active Fingerprinting of Encrypted VPNs Anna Shubina Anna Shubina, Dartmouth Institute for Security, Technology, and Society (I missed the start of her talk because another track went overtime. But I have the DVD of the talk, so I'll expand later) IPsec leaves fingerprints. Using netcat, one can easily visually distinguish various crypto chaining modes just from packet timing on a chart (example, DES-CBC versus AES-CBC) One can tell a lot about VPNs just from ping roundtrips (such as what router is used) Delayed packets are not informative about a network, especially if far away from the network More needed to explore about how TCP works in real life with respect to timing Making Attacks Go Backwards Fuzzynop FuzzyNop, Mandiant This talk is not about threat attribution (finding who), product solutions, politics, or sales pitches. But who are making these malware threats? It's not a single person or group—they have diverse skill levels. There's a lot of fat-fingered fumblers out there. Always look for low-hanging fruit first: "hiding" malware in the temp, recycle, or root directories creation of unnamed scheduled tasks obvious names of files and syscalls ("ClearEventLog") uncleared event logs. Clearing event log in itself, and time of clearing, is a red flag and good first clue to look for on a suspect system Reverse engineering is hard. Disassembler use takes practice and skill. A popular tool is IDA Pro, but it takes multiple interactive iterations to get a clean disassembly. Key loggers are used a lot in targeted attacks. They are typically custom code or built in a backdoor. A big tip-off is that non-printable characters need to be printed out (such as "[Ctrl]" "[RightShift]") or time stamp printf strings. Look for these in files. Presence is not proof they are used. Absence is not proof they are not used. Java exploits. Can parse jar file with idxparser.py and decomile Java file. Java typially used to target tech companies. Backdoors are the main persistence mechanism (provided externally) for malware. Also malware typically needs command and control. Application of Artificial Intelligence in Ad-Hoc Static Code Analysis John Ashaman John Ashaman, Security Innovation Initially John tried to analyze open source files with open source static analysis tools, but these showed thousands of false positives. Also tried using grep, but tis fails to find anything even mildly complex. So next John decided to write his own tool. His approach was to first generate a call graph then analyze the graph. However, the problem is that making a call graph is really hard. For example, one problem is "evil" coding techniques, such as passing function pointer. First the tool generated an Abstract Syntax Tree (AST) with the nodes created from method declarations and edges created from method use. Then the tool generated a control flow graph with the goal to find a path through the AST (a maze) from source to sink. The algorithm is to look at adjacent nodes to see if any are "scary" (a vulnerability), using heuristics for search order. The tool, called "Scat" (Static Code Analysis Tool), currently looks for C# vulnerabilities and some simple PHP. Later, he plans to add more PHP, then JSP and Java. For more information see his posts in Security Innovation blog and NRefactory on GitHub. Mask Your Checksums—The Gorry Details Eric (XlogicX) Davisson Eric (XlogicX) Davisson Sometimes in emailing or posting TCP/IP packets to analyze problems, you may want to mask the IP address. But to do this correctly, you need to mask the checksum too, or you'll leak information about the IP. Problem reports found in stackoverflow.com, sans.org, and pastebin.org are usually not masked, but a few companies do care. If only the IP is masked, the IP may be guessed from checksum (that is, it leaks data). Other parts of packet may leak more data about the IP. TCP and IP checksums both refer to the same data, so can get more bits of information out of using both checksums than just using one checksum. Also, one can usually determine the OS from the TTL field and ports in a packet header. If we get hundreds of possible results (16x each masked nibble that is unknown), one can do other things to narrow the results, such as look at packet contents for domain or geo information. With hundreds of results, can import as CSV format into a spreadsheet. Can corelate with geo data and see where each possibility is located. Eric then demoed a real email report with a masked IP packet attached. Was able to find the exact IP address, given the geo and university of the sender. Point is if you're going to mask a packet, do it right. Eric wouldn't usually bother, but do it correctly if at all, to not create a false impression of security. Adventures with weird machines thirty years after "Reflections on Trusting Trust" Sergey Bratus Sergey Bratus, Dartmouth College (and Julian Bangert and Rebecca Shapiro, not present) "Reflections on Trusting Trust" refers to Ken Thompson's classic 1984 paper. "You can't trust code that you did not totally create yourself." There's invisible links in the chain-of-trust, such as "well-installed microcode bugs" or in the compiler, and other planted bugs. Thompson showed how a compiler can introduce and propagate bugs in unmodified source. But suppose if there's no bugs and you trust the author, can you trust the code? Hell No! There's too many factors—it's Babylonian in nature. Why not? Well, Input is not well-defined/recognized (code's assumptions about "checked" input will be violated (bug/vunerabiliy). For example, HTML is recursive, but Regex checking is not recursive. Input well-formed but so complex there's no telling what it does For example, ELF file parsing is complex and has multiple ways of parsing. Input is seen differently by different pieces of program or toolchain Any Input is a program input executes on input handlers (drives state changes & transitions) only a well-defined execution model can be trusted (regex/DFA, PDA, CFG) Input handler either is a "recognizer" for the inputs as a well-defined language (see langsec.org) or it's a "virtual machine" for inputs to drive into pwn-age ELF ABI (UNIX/Linux executible file format) case study. Problems can arise from these steps (without planting bugs): compiler linker loader ld.so/rtld relocator DWARF (debugger info) exceptions The problem is you can't really automatically analyze code (it's the "halting problem" and undecidable). Only solution is to freeze code and sign it. But you can't freeze everything! Can't freeze ASLR or loading—must have tables and metadata. Any sufficiently complex input data is the same as VM byte code Example, ELF relocation entries + dynamic symbols == a Turing Complete Machine (TM). @bxsays created a Turing machine in Linux from relocation data (not code) in an ELF file. For more information, see Rebecca "bx" Shapiro's presentation from last year's Toorcon, "Programming Weird Machines with ELF Metadata" @bxsays did same thing with Mach-O bytecode Or a DWARF exception handling data .eh_frame + glibc == Turning Machine X86 MMU (IDT, GDT, TSS): used address translation to create a Turning Machine. Page handler reads and writes (on page fault) memory. Uses a page table, which can be used as Turning Machine byte code. Example on Github using this TM that will fly a glider across the screen Next Sergey talked about "Parser Differentials". That having one input format, but two parsers, will create confusion and opportunity for exploitation. For example, CSRs are parsed during creation by cert requestor and again by another parser at the CA. Another example is ELF—several parsers in OS tool chain, which are all different. Can have two different Program Headers (PHDRs) because ld.so parses multiple PHDRs. The second PHDR can completely transform the executable. This is described in paper in the first issue of International Journal of PoC. Conclusions trusting computers not only about bugs! Bugs are part of a problem, but no by far all of it complex data formats means bugs no "chain of trust" in Babylon! (that is, with parser differentials) we need to squeeze complexity out of data until data stops being "code equivalent" Further information See and langsec.org. USENIX WOOT 2013 (Workshop on Offensive Technologies) for "weird machines" papers and videos.

  Read the article

• Exalogic 2.0.1 Tea Break Snippets - Scripting Asset Creation

  - by The Old Toxophilist

  So far in this series we have looked at creating asset within the EMOC BUI but the Exalogic 2.0.1 installation also provide the Iaas cli as an alternative to most of the common functionality available within EMOC. The IaaS cli interface provides access to the functions that are available to a user logged into the BUI with the CloudUser Role. As such not all functionality is available from the command line interface however having said that the IaaS cli provides all the functionality required to create the Assets within a specific Account (Tenure). Because these action are common and repeatable I decided to wrap the functionality within a simple script that takes a simple input file and creates the Asset. Following the Script through will show us the required steps needed to create the various Assets within an Account and hence I will work through the various functions within the script below describing the steps. You will note from the various steps within the script that it is designed to pause between actions allowing the proceeding action to complete. The reason for this is because we could swamp EMOC with a series of actions and may end up with a situation where we are trying to action a Volume attached before the creation of the vServer and Volume have completed. processAssets() This function simply reads through the passed input file identifying what assets need to be created. An example of the input file can be found below. It can be seen that the input file can be used to create Assets in multiple Accounts during a single run. The order of the entries define the functions that need to be actioned as follows: Input Command Iaas Actions Parameters Production:Connect akm-describe-accounts akm-create-access-key iaas-create-key-pair iaas-describe-vnets iaas-describe-vserver-types iaas-describe-server-templates Username Password Production:Create|vServer iaas-run-vserver vServer Name vServer Type Name Template Name Comma separated list of network names which the vServer will connect to. Comma separated list of IPs for the specified networks. Production:Create|Volume iaas-create-volume Volume Name Volume Size Production:Attach|Volume iaas-attach-volumes-to-vserver vServer Name Comma separated list of volume names Production:Disconnect iaas-delete-key-pair akm-delete-access-key None connectToAccount() It can be seen from the connectToAccount function that before we can execute any Asset creation we must first connect to the appropriate account. To do this we will need the ID associated with the Account. This can be found by executing the akm-describe-accounts cli command which will return a list of all Accounts and there IDs. Once we have the Account ID we generate and Access key using the akm-create-access-key command and then a keypair with the iaas-create-key-pair command. At this point we now have all the information we need to access the specific named account. createVServer() This function simply retrieved the information from the input line and then will create the vServer using the iaas-run-vserver cli command. Reading the function you will notice that it takes the various input names for vServer Type, Template and Networks and converts them into the appropriate IDs. The IaaS cli will not work directly with component names and hence all IDs need to be found. createVolume() Function that simply takes the Volume name and Size then executes the iaas-create-volume command to create the volume. attachVolume() Takes the name of the Volume, which we may have just created, and a Volume then identifies the appropriate IDs before assigning the Volume to the vServer with the iaas-attach-volumes-to-vserver. disconnectFromAccount() Once we have finished connecting to the Account we simply remove the key pair with iaas-delete-key-pair and the access key with akm-delete-access-key although it may be useful to keep this if ssh is required and you do not subsequently modify the sshd information to allow unsecured access. By default the key is required for ssh access when a vServer is created from the command-line. CreateAssets.sh 1 export OCCLI=/opt/sun/occli/bin 2 export IAAS_HOME=/opt/oracle/iaas/cli 3 export JAVA_HOME=/usr/java/latest 4 export IAAS_BASE_URL=https://127.0.0.1 5 export IAAS_ACCESS_KEY_FILE=iaas_access.key 6 export KEY_FILE=iaas_access.pub 7 #CloudUser used to create vServers & Volumes 8 export IAAS_USER=exaprod 9 export IAAS_PASSWORD_FILE=root.pwd 10 export KEY_NAME=cli.recreate 11 export INPUT_FILE=CreateAssets.in 12 13 export ACCOUNTS_FILE=accounts.out 14 export VOLUMES_FILE=volumes.out 15 export DISTGRPS_FILE=distgrp.out 16 export VNETS_FILE=vnets.out 17 export VSERVER_TYPES_FILE=vstype.out 18 export VSERVER_FILE=vserver.out 19 export VSERVER_TEMPLATES=template.out 20 export KEY_PAIRS=keypairs.out 21 22 PROCESSING_ACCOUNT="" 23 24 function cleanTempFiles() { 25 rm -f $ACCOUNTS_FILE $VOLUMES_FILE $DISTGRPS_FILE $VNETS_FILE $VSERVER_TYPES_FILE $VSERVER_FILE $VSERVER_TEMPLATES $KEY_PAIRS $IAAS_PASSWORD_FILE $KEY_FILE $IAAS_ACCESS_KEY_FILE 26 } 27 28 function connectToAccount() { 29 if [[ "$ACCOUNT" != "$PROCESSING_ACCOUNT" ]] 30 then 31 if [[ "" != "$PROCESSING_ACCOUNT" ]] 32 then 33 $IAAS_HOME/bin/iaas-delete-key-pair --key-name $KEY_NAME --access-key-file $IAAS_ACCESS_KEY_FILE 34 $IAAS_HOME/bin/akm-delete-access-key $AK 35 fi 36 PROCESSING_ACCOUNT=$ACCOUNT 37 IAAS_USER=$ACCOUNT_USER 38 echo "$ACCOUNT_PASSWORD" > $IAAS_PASSWORD_FILE 39 $IAAS_HOME/bin/akm-describe-accounts --sep "|" > $ACCOUNTS_FILE 40 while read line 41 do 42 ACCOUNT_ID=${line%%|*} 43 line=${line#*|} 44 ACCOUNT_NAME=${line%%|*} 45 # echo "Id = $ACCOUNT_ID" 46 # echo "Name = $ACCOUNT_NAME" 47 if [[ "$ACCOUNT_NAME" == "$ACCOUNT" ]] 48 then 49 echo "Found Production Account $line" 50 AK=`$IAAS_HOME/bin/akm-create-access-key --account $ACCOUNT_ID --access-key-file $IAAS_ACCESS_KEY_FILE` 51 KEYPAIR=`$IAAS_HOME/bin/iaas-create-key-pair --key-name $KEY_NAME --key-file $KEY_FILE` 52 echo "Connected to $ACCOUNT_NAME" 53 break 54 fi 55 done < $ACCOUNTS_FILE 56 fi 57 } 58 59 function disconnectFromAccount() { 60 $IAAS_HOME/bin/iaas-delete-key-pair --key-name $KEY_NAME --access-key-file $IAAS_ACCESS_KEY_FILE 61 $IAAS_HOME/bin/akm-delete-access-key $AK 62 PROCESSING_ACCOUNT="" 63 } 64 65 function getNetworks() { 66 $IAAS_HOME/bin/iaas-describe-vnets --sep "|" > $VNETS_FILE 67 } 68 69 function getVSTypes() { 70 $IAAS_HOME/bin/iaas-describe-vserver-types --sep "|" > $VSERVER_TYPES_FILE 71 } 72 73 function getTemplates() { 74 $IAAS_HOME/bin/iaas-describe-server-templates --sep "|" > $VSERVER_TEMPLATES 75 } 76 77 function getVolumes() { 78 $IAAS_HOME/bin/iaas-describe-volumes --sep "|" > $VOLUMES_FILE 79 } 80 81 function getVServers() { 82 $IAAS_HOME/bin/iaas-describe-vservers --sep "|" > $VSERVER_FILE 83 } 84 85 function getNetworkId() { 86 while read line 87 do 88 NETWORK_ID=${line%%|*} 89 line=${line#*|} 90 NAME=${line%%|*} 91 if [[ "$NAME" == "$NETWORK_NAME" ]] 92 then 93 break 94 fi 95 done < $VNETS_FILE 96 } 97 98 function getVSTypeId() { 99 while read line 100 do 101 VSTYPE_ID=${line%%|*} 102 line=${line#*|} 103 NAME=${line%%|*} 104 if [[ "$VSTYPE_NAME" == "$NAME" ]] 105 then 106 break 107 fi 108 done < $VSERVER_TYPES_FILE 109 } 110 111 function getTemplateId() { 112 while read line 113 do 114 TEMPLATE_ID=${line%%|*} 115 line=${line#*|} 116 NAME=${line%%|*} 117 if [[ "$TEMPLATE_NAME" == "$NAME" ]] 118 then 119 break 120 fi 121 done < $VSERVER_TEMPLATES 122 } 123 124 function getVolumeId() { 125 while read line 126 do 127 export VOLUME_ID=${line%%|*} 128 line=${line#*|} 129 NAME=${line%%|*} 130 if [[ "$NAME" == "$VOLUME_NAME" ]] 131 then 132 break; 133 fi 134 done < $VOLUMES_FILE 135 } 136 137 function getVServerId() { 138 while read line 139 do 140 VSERVER_ID=${line%%|*} 141 line=${line#*|} 142 NAME=${line%%|*} 143 if [[ "$VSERVER_NAME" == "$NAME" ]] 144 then 145 break; 146 fi 147 done < $VSERVER_FILE 148 } 149 150 function getVServerState() { 151 getVServers 152 while read line 153 do 154 VSERVER_ID=${line%%|*} 155 line=${line#*|} 156 NAME=${line%%|*} 157 line=${line#*|} 158 line=${line#*|} 159 VSERVER_STATE=${line%%|*} 160 if [[ "$VSERVER_NAME" == "$NAME" ]] 161 then 162 break; 163 fi 164 done < $VSERVER_FILE 165 } 166 167 function pauseUntilVServerRunning() { 168 # Wait until the Server is running before creating the next 169 getVServerState 170 while [[ "$VSERVER_STATE" != "RUNNING" ]] 171 do 172 getVServerState 173 echo "$NAME $VSERVER_STATE" 174 if [[ "$VSERVER_STATE" != "RUNNING" ]] 175 then 176 echo "Sleeping......." 177 sleep 60 178 fi 179 if [[ "$VSERVER_STATE" == "FAILED" ]] 180 then 181 echo "Will Delete $NAME in 5 Minutes....." 182 sleep 300 183 deleteVServer 184 echo "Deleted $NAME waiting 5 Minutes....." 185 sleep 300 186 break 187 fi 188 done 189 # Lets pause for a minute or two 190 echo "Just Chilling......" 191 sleep 60 192 echo "Ahhhhh we're getting there......." 193 sleep 60 194 echo "I'm almost at one with the universe......." 195 sleep 60 196 echo "Bong Reality Check !" 197 } 198 199 function deleteVServer() { 200 $IAAS_HOME/bin/iaas-terminate-vservers --force --vserver-ids $VSERVER_ID 201 } 202 203 function createVServer() { 204 VSERVER_NAME=${ASSET_DETAILS%%|*} 205 ASSET_DETAILS=${ASSET_DETAILS#*|} 206 VSTYPE_NAME=${ASSET_DETAILS%%|*} 207 ASSET_DETAILS=${ASSET_DETAILS#*|} 208 TEMPLATE_NAME=${ASSET_DETAILS%%|*} 209 ASSET_DETAILS=${ASSET_DETAILS#*|} 210 NETWORK_NAMES=${ASSET_DETAILS%%|*} 211 ASSET_DETAILS=${ASSET_DETAILS#*|} 212 IP_ADDRESSES=${ASSET_DETAILS%%|*} 213 # Get Ids associated with names 214 getVSTypeId 215 getTemplateId 216 # Convert Network Names to Ids 217 NETWORK_IDS="" 218 while true 219 do 220 NETWORK_NAME=${NETWORK_NAMES%%,*} 221 NETWORK_NAMES=${NETWORK_NAMES#*,} 222 getNetworkId 223 if [[ "$NETWORK_IDS" != "" ]] 224 then 225 NETWORK_IDS="$NETWORK_IDS,$NETWORK_ID" 226 else 227 NETWORK_IDS=$NETWORK_ID 228 fi 229 if [[ "$NETWORK_NAME" == "$NETWORK_NAMES" ]] 230 then 231 break 232 fi 233 done 234 # Create vServer 235 echo "About to execute : $IAAS_HOME/bin/iaas-run-vserver --name $VSERVER_NAME --key-name $KEY_NAME --vserver-type $VSTYPE_ID --server-template-id $TEMPLATE_ID --vnets $NETWORK_IDS --ip-addresses $IP_ADDRESSES" 236 $IAAS_HOME/bin/iaas-run-vserver --name $VSERVER_NAME --key-name $KEY_NAME --vserver-type $VSTYPE_ID --server-template-id $TEMPLATE_ID --vnets $NETWORK_IDS --ip-addresses $IP_ADDRESSES 237 pauseUntilVServerRunning 238 } 239 240 function createVolume() { 241 VOLUME_NAME=${ASSET_DETAILS%%|*} 242 ASSET_DETAILS=${ASSET_DETAILS#*|} 243 VOLUME_SIZE=${ASSET_DETAILS%%|*} 244 # Create Volume 245 echo "About to execute : $IAAS_HOME/bin/iaas-create-volume --name $VOLUME_NAME --size $VOLUME_SIZE" 246 $IAAS_HOME/bin/iaas-create-volume --name $VOLUME_NAME --size $VOLUME_SIZE 247 # Lets pause 248 echo "Just Waiting 30 Seconds......" 249 sleep 30 250 } 251 252 function attachVolume() { 253 VSERVER_NAME=${ASSET_DETAILS%%|*} 254 ASSET_DETAILS=${ASSET_DETAILS#*|} 255 VOLUME_NAMES=${ASSET_DETAILS%%|*} 256 # Get vServer Id 257 getVServerId 258 # Convert Volume Names to Ids 259 VOLUME_IDS="" 260 while true 261 do 262 VOLUME_NAME=${VOLUME_NAMES%%,*} 263 VOLUME_NAMES=${VOLUME_NAMES#*,} 264 getVolumeId 265 if [[ "$VOLUME_IDS" != "" ]] 266 then 267 VOLUME_IDS="$VOLUME_IDS,$VOLUME_ID" 268 else 269 VOLUME_IDS=$VOLUME_ID 270 fi 271 if [[ "$VOLUME_NAME" == "$VOLUME_NAMES" ]] 272 then 273 break 274 fi 275 done 276 # Attach Volumes 277 echo "About to execute : $IAAS_HOME/bin/iaas-attach-volumes-to-vserver --vserver-id $VSERVER_ID --volume-ids $VOLUME_IDS" 278 $IAAS_HOME/bin/iaas-attach-volumes-to-vserver --vserver-id $VSERVER_ID --volume-ids $VOLUME_IDS 279 # Lets pause 280 echo "Just Waiting 30 Seconds......" 281 sleep 30 282 } 283 284 function processAssets() { 285 while read line 286 do 287 ACCOUNT=${line%%:*} 288 line=${line#*:} 289 ACTION=${line%%|*} 290 line=${line#*|} 291 if [[ "$ACTION" == "Connect" ]] 292 then 293 ACCOUNT_USER=${line%%|*} 294 line=${line#*|} 295 ACCOUNT_PASSWORD=${line%%|*} 296 connectToAccount 297 298 ## Account Info 299 getNetworks 300 getVSTypes 301 getTemplates 302 303 continue 304 fi 305 if [[ "$ACTION" == "Create" ]] 306 then 307 ASSET=${line%%|*} 308 line=${line#*|} 309 ASSET_DETAILS=$line 310 if [[ "$ASSET" == "vServer" ]] 311 then 312 createVServer 313 314 continue 315 fi 316 if [[ "$ASSET" == "Volume" ]] 317 then 318 createVolume 319 320 continue 321 fi 322 fi 323 if [[ "$ACTION" == "Attach" ]] 324 then 325 ASSET=${line%%|*} 326 line=${line#*|} 327 ASSET_DETAILS=$line 328 if [[ "$ASSET" == "Volume" ]] 329 then 330 getVolumes 331 getVServers 332 attachVolume 333 334 continue 335 fi 336 fi 337 if [[ "$ACTION" == "Connect" ]] 338 then 339 disconnectFromAccount 340 341 continue 342 fi 343 done < $INPUT_FILE 344 } 345 346 # Should Parameterise this 347 348 while [ $# -gt 0 ] 349 do 350 case "$1" in 351 -a) INPUT_FILE="$2"; shift;; 352 *) echo ""; echo >&2 \ 353 "usage: $0 [-a <Asset Definition File>] (Default is CreateAssets.in)" 354 echo""; exit 1;; 355 *) break;; 356 esac 357 shift 358 done 359 360 361 362 363 processAssets 364 365 echo "**************************************" 366 echo "***** Finished Creating Assets *****" 367 echo "**************************************" 368 CreateAssetsProd.in Production:Connect|exaprod|welcome1 Production:Create|vServer|VS006|VSTProduction|BaseOEL56ServerTemplate|EoIB-otd-prod,vn-prod-web,IPoIB-default,IPoIB-vserver-shared-storage|10.51.223.13,192.168.0.13,10.117.81.67,172.17.0.14 Production:Create|vServer|VS007|VSTProduction|BaseOEL56ServerTemplate|EoIB-otd-prod,vn-prod-web,IPoIB-default,IPoIB-vserver-shared-storage|10.51.223.14,192.168.0.14,10.117.81.68,172.17.0.15 Production:Create|vServer|VS008|VSTProduction|BaseOEL56ServerTemplate|EoIB-wls-prod,vn-prod-web,IPoIB-default,IPoIB-vserver-shared-storage|10.51.225.61,192.168.0.61,10.117.81.61,172.17.0.16 Production:Create|vServer|VS009|VSTProduction|BaseOEL56ServerTemplate|EoIB-wls-prod,vn-prod-web,IPoIB-default,IPoIB-vserver-shared-storage|10.51.225.62,192.168.0.62,10.117.81.62,172.17.0.17 Production:Create|vServer|VS000|VSTProduction|BaseOEL56ServerTemplate|EoIB-wls-prod,vn-prod-web,IPoIB-default,IPoIB-vserver-shared-storage|10.51.225.63,192.168.0.63,10.117.81.63,172.17.0.18 Production:Create|vServer|VS001|VSTProduction|BaseOEL56ServerTemplate|EoIB-wls-prod,vn-prod-web,IPoIB-default,IPoIB-vserver-shared-storage|10.51.225.64,192.168.0.64,10.117.81.64,172.17.0.19 Production:Create|vServer|VS002|VSTProduction|BaseOEL56ServerTemplate|EoIB-wls-prod,vn-prod-web,IPoIB-default,IPoIB-vserver-shared-storage|10.51.225.65,192.168.0.65,10.117.81.65,172.17.0.20 Production:Create|vServer|VS003|VSTProduction|BaseOEL56ServerTemplate|EoIB-wls-prod,vn-prod-web,IPoIB-default,IPoIB-vserver-shared-storage|10.51.225.66,192.168.0.66,10.117.81.66,172.17.0.21 Production:Create|Volume|VS006|50 Production:Create|Volume|VS007|50 Production:Create|Volume|VS008|50 Production:Create|Volume|VS009|50 Production:Create|Volume|VS000|50 Production:Create|Volume|VS001|50 Production:Create|Volume|VS002|50 Production:Create|Volume|VS003|50 Production:Attach|Volume|VS006|VS006 Production:Attach|Volume|VS007|VS007 Production:Attach|Volume|VS008|VS008 Production:Attach|Volume|VS009|VS009 Production:Attach|Volume|VS000|VS000 Production:Attach|Volume|VS001|VS001 Production:Attach|Volume|VS002|VS002 Production:Attach|Volume|VS003|VS003 Production:Disconnect Development:Connect|exadev|welcome1 Development:Create|vServer|VS014|VSTDevelopment|BaseOEL56ServerTemplate|EoIB-development,IPoIB-default,IPoIB-vserver-shared-storage|10.51.224.24,10.117.81.71,172.17.0.24 Development:Create|vServer|VS015|VSTDevelopment|BaseOEL56ServerTemplate|EoIB-development,IPoIB-default,IPoIB-vserver-shared-storage|10.51.224.25,10.117.81.72,172.17.0.25 Development:Create|vServer|VS016|VSTDevelopment|BaseOEL56ServerTemplate|EoIB-development,IPoIB-default,IPoIB-vserver-shared-storage|10.51.224.26,10.117.81.73,172.17.0.26 Development:Create|vServer|VS017|VSTDevelopment|BaseOEL56ServerTemplate|EoIB-development,IPoIB-default,IPoIB-vserver-shared-storage|10.51.224.27,10.117.81.74,172.17.0.27 Development:Create|vServer|VS018|VSTDevelopment|BaseOEL56ServerTemplate|EoIB-development,IPoIB-default,IPoIB-vserver-shared-storage|10.51.224.28,10.117.81.75,172.17.0.28 Development:Create|vServer|VS019|VSTDevelopment|BaseOEL56ServerTemplate|EoIB-development,IPoIB-default,IPoIB-vserver-shared-storage|10.51.224.29,10.117.81.76,172.17.0.29 Development:Create|vServer|VS020|VSTDevelopment|BaseOEL56ServerTemplate|EoIB-development,IPoIB-default,IPoIB-vserver-shared-storage|10.51.224.30,10.117.81.77,172.17.0.30 Development:Create|vServer|VS021|VSTDevelopment|BaseOEL56ServerTemplate|EoIB-development,IPoIB-default,IPoIB-vserver-shared-storage|10.51.224.31,10.117.81.78,172.17.0.31 Development:Create|vServer|VS022|VSTDevelopment|BaseOEL56ServerTemplate|EoIB-development,IPoIB-default,IPoIB-vserver-shared-storage|10.51.224.32,10.117.81.79,172.17.0.32 Development:Create|vServer|VS023|VSTDevelopment|BaseOEL56ServerTemplate|EoIB-development,IPoIB-default,IPoIB-vserver-shared-storage|10.51.224.33,10.117.81.80,172.17.0.33 Development:Create|vServer|VS024|VSTDevelopment|BaseOEL56ServerTemplate|EoIB-development,IPoIB-default,IPoIB-vserver-shared-storage|10.51.224.34,10.117.81.81,172.17.0.34 Development:Create|vServer|VS025|VSTDevelopment|BaseOEL56ServerTemplate|EoIB-development,IPoIB-default,IPoIB-vserver-shared-storage|10.51.224.35,10.117.81.82,172.17.0.35 Development:Create|vServer|VS026|VSTDevelopment|BaseOEL56ServerTemplate|EoIB-development,IPoIB-default,IPoIB-vserver-shared-storage|10.51.224.36,10.117.81.83,172.17.0.36 Development:Create|vServer|VS027|VSTDevelopment|BaseOEL56ServerTemplate|EoIB-development,IPoIB-default,IPoIB-vserver-shared-storage|10.51.224.37,10.117.81.84,172.17.0.37 Development:Create|Volume|VS014|50 Development:Create|Volume|VS015|50 Development:Create|Volume|VS016|50 Development:Create|Volume|VS017|50 Development:Create|Volume|VS018|50 Development:Create|Volume|VS019|50 Development:Create|Volume|VS020|50 Development:Create|Volume|VS021|50 Development:Create|Volume|VS022|50 Development:Create|Volume|VS023|50 Development:Create|Volume|VS024|50 Development:Create|Volume|VS025|50 Development:Create|Volume|VS026|50 Development:Create|Volume|VS027|50 Development:Attach|Volume|VS014|VS014 Development:Attach|Volume|VS015|VS015 Development:Attach|Volume|VS016|VS016 Development:Attach|Volume|VS017|VS017 Development:Attach|Volume|VS018|VS018 Development:Attach|Volume|VS019|VS019 Development:Attach|Volume|VS020|VS020 Development:Attach|Volume|VS021|VS021 Development:Attach|Volume|VS022|VS022 Development:Attach|Volume|VS023|VS023 Development:Attach|Volume|VS024|VS024 Development:Attach|Volume|VS025|VS025 Development:Attach|Volume|VS026|VS026 Development:Attach|Volume|VS027|VS027 Development:Disconnect This entry was originally posted on the The Old Toxophilist Site.

  Read the article

• Developing Spring Portlet for use inside Weblogic Portal / Webcenter Portal

  - by Murali Veligeti

  We need to understand the main difference between portlet workflow and servlet workflow.The main difference between portlet workflow and servlet workflow is that, the request to the portlet can have two distinct phases: 1) Action phase 2) Render phase. The Action phase is executed only once and is where any 'backend' changes or actions occur, such as making changes in a database. The Render phase then produces what is displayed to the user each time the display is refreshed. The critical point here is that for a single overall request, the action phase is executed only once, but the render phase may be executed multiple times. This provides a clean separation between the activities that modify the persistent state of your system and the activities that generate what is displayed to the user.The dual phases of portlet requests are one of the real strengths of the JSR-168 specification. For example, dynamic search results can be updated routinely on the display without the user explicitly re-running the search. Most other portlet MVC frameworks attempt to completely hide the two phases from the developer and make it look as much like traditional servlet development as possible - we think this approach removes one of the main benefits of using portlets. So, the separation of the two phases is preserved throughout the Spring Portlet MVC framework. The primary manifestation of this approach is that where the servlet version of the MVC classes will have one method that deals with the request, the portlet version of the MVC classes will have two methods that deal with the request: one for the action phase and one for the render phase. For example, where the servlet version of AbstractController has the handleRequestInternal(..) method, the portlet version of AbstractController has handleActionRequestInternal(..) and handleRenderRequestInternal(..) methods.The Spring Portlet Framework is designed around a DispatcherPortlet that dispatches requests to handlers, with configurable handler mappings and view resolution, just as the DispatcherServlet in the Spring Web Framework does.  Developing portlet.xml Let's start the sample development by creating the portlet.xml file in the /WebContent/WEB-INF/ folder as shown below: <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?> <portlet-app version="2.0" xmlns="http://java.sun.com/xml/ns/portlet/portlet-app_2_0.xsd" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"> <portlet> <portlet-name>SpringPortletName</portlet-name> <portlet-class>org.springframework.web.portlet.DispatcherPortlet</portlet-class> <supports> <mime-type>text/html</mime-type> <portlet-mode>view</portlet-mode> </supports> <portlet-info> <title>SpringPortlet</title> </portlet-info> </portlet> </portlet-app> DispatcherPortlet is responsible for handling every client request. When it receives a request, it finds out which Controller class should be used for handling this request, and then it calls its handleActionRequest() or handleRenderRequest() method based on the request processing phase. The Controller class executes business logic and returns a View name that should be used for rendering markup to the user. The DispatcherPortlet then forwards control to that View for actual markup generation. As you can see, DispatcherPortlet is the central dispatcher for use within Spring Portlet MVC Framework. Note that your portlet application can define more than one DispatcherPortlet. If it does so, then each of these portlets operates its own namespace, loading its application context and handler mapping. The DispatcherPortlet is also responsible for loading application context (Spring configuration file) for this portlet. First, it tries to check the value of the configLocation portlet initialization parameter. If that parameter is not specified, it takes the portlet name (that is, the value of the <portlet-name> element), appends "-portlet.xml" to it, and tries to load that file from the /WEB-INF folder. In the portlet.xml file, we did not specify the configLocation initialization parameter, so let's create SpringPortletName-portlet.xml file in the next section. Developing SpringPortletName-portlet.xml Create the SpringPortletName-portlet.xml file in the /WebContent/WEB-INF folder of your application as shown below: <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?> <beans xmlns="http://www.springframework.org/schema/beans" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" xsi:schemaLocation="http://www.springframework.org/schema/beans http://www.springframework.org/schema/beans/spring-beans-2.0.xsd"> <bean id="viewResolver" class="org.springframework.web.servlet.view.InternalResourceViewResolver"> <property name="viewClass" value="org.springframework.web.servlet.view.JstlView"/> <property name="prefix" value="/jsp/"/> <property name="suffix" value=".jsp"/> </bean> <bean id="pointManager" class="com.wlp.spring.bo.internal.PointManagerImpl"> <property name="users"> <list> <ref bean="point1"/> <ref bean="point2"/> <ref bean="point3"/> <ref bean="point4"/> </list> </property> </bean> <bean id="point1" class="com.wlp.spring.bean.User"> <property name="name" value="Murali"/> <property name="points" value="6"/> </bean> <bean id="point2" class="com.wlp.spring.bean.User"> <property name="name" value="Sai"/> <property name="points" value="13"/> </bean> <bean id="point3" class="com.wlp.spring.bean.User"> <property name="name" value="Rama"/> <property name="points" value="43"/> </bean> <bean id="point4" class="com.wlp.spring.bean.User"> <property name="name" value="Krishna"/> <property name="points" value="23"/> </bean> <bean id="messageSource" class="org.springframework.context.support.ResourceBundleMessageSource"> <property name="basename" value="messages"/> </bean> <bean name="/users.htm" id="userController" class="com.wlp.spring.controller.UserController"> <property name="pointManager" ref="pointManager"/> </bean> <bean name="/pointincrease.htm" id="pointIncreaseController" class="com.wlp.spring.controller.IncreasePointsFormController"> <property name="sessionForm" value="true"/> <property name="pointManager" ref="pointManager"/> <property name="commandName" value="pointIncrease"/> <property name="commandClass" value="com.wlp.spring.bean.PointIncrease"/> <property name="formView" value="pointincrease"/> <property name="successView" value="users"/> </bean> <bean id="parameterMappingInterceptor" class="org.springframework.web.portlet.handler.ParameterMappingInterceptor" /> <bean id="portletModeParameterHandlerMapping" class="org.springframework.web.portlet.handler.PortletModeParameterHandlerMapping"> <property name="order" value="1" /> <property name="interceptors"> <list> <ref bean="parameterMappingInterceptor" /> </list> </property> <property name="portletModeParameterMap"> <map> <entry key="view"> <map> <entry key="pointincrease"> <ref bean="pointIncreaseController" /> </entry> <entry key="users"> <ref bean="userController" /> </entry> </map> </entry> </map> </property> </bean> <bean id="portletModeHandlerMapping" class="org.springframework.web.portlet.handler.PortletModeHandlerMapping"> <property name="order" value="2" /> <property name="portletModeMap"> <map> <entry key="view"> <ref bean="userController" /> </entry> </map> </property> </bean> </beans> The SpringPortletName-portlet.xml file is an application context file for your MVC portlet. It has a couple of bean definitions: viewController. At this point, remember that the viewController bean definition points to the com.ibm.developerworks.springmvc.ViewController.java class. portletModeHandlerMapping. As we discussed in the last section, whenever DispatcherPortlet gets a client request, it tries to find a suitable Controller class for handling that request. That is where PortletModeHandlerMapping comes into the picture. The PortletModeHandlerMapping class is a simple implementation of the HandlerMapping interface and is used by DispatcherPortlet to find a suitable Controller for every request. The PortletModeHandlerMapping class uses Portlet mode for the current request to find a suitable Controller class to use for handling the request. The portletModeMap property of portletModeHandlerMapping bean is the place where we map the Portlet mode name against the Controller class. In the sample code, we show that viewController is responsible for handling View mode requests. Developing UserController.java In the preceding section, you learned that the viewController bean is responsible for handling all the View mode requests. Your next step is to create the UserController.java class as shown below: public class UserController extends AbstractController { private PointManager pointManager; public void handleActionRequest(ActionRequest request, ActionResponse response) throws Exception { } public ModelAndView handleRenderRequest(RenderRequest request, RenderResponse response) throws ServletException, IOException { String now = (new java.util.Date()).toString(); Map<String, Object> myModel = new HashMap<String, Object>(); myModel.put("now", now); myModel.put("users", this.pointManager.getUsers()); return new ModelAndView("users", "model", myModel); } public void setPointManager(PointManager pointManager) { this.pointManager = pointManager; } } Every controller class in Spring Portlet MVC Framework must implement the org.springframework.web. portlet.mvc.Controller interface directly or indirectly. To make things easier, Spring Framework provides AbstractController class, which is the default implementation of the Controller interface. As a developer, you should always extend your controller from either AbstractController or one of its more specific subclasses. Any implementation of the Controller class should be reusable, thread-safe, and capable of handling multiple requests throughout the lifecycle of the portlet. In the sample code, we create the ViewController class by extending it from AbstractController. Because we don't want to do any action processing in the HelloSpringPortletMVC portlet, we override only the handleRenderRequest() method of AbstractController. Now, the only thing that HelloWorldPortletMVC should do is render the markup of View.jsp to the user when it receives a user request to do so. To do that, return the object of ModelAndView with a value of view equal to View. Developing web.xml According to Portlet Specification 1.0, every portlet application is also a Servlet Specification 2.3-compliant Web application, and it needs a Web application deployment descriptor (that is, web.xml). Let’s create the web.xml file in the /WEB-INF/ folder as shown in listing 4. Follow these steps: Open the existing web.xml file located at /WebContent/WEB-INF/web.xml. Replace the contents of this file with the code as shown below: <servlet> <servlet-name>ViewRendererServlet</servlet-name> <servlet-class>org.springframework.web.servlet.ViewRendererServlet</servlet-class> </servlet> <servlet-mapping> <servlet-name>ViewRendererServlet</servlet-name> <url-pattern>/WEB-INF/servlet/view</url-pattern> </servlet-mapping> <context-param> <param-name>contextConfigLocation</param-name> <param-value>/WEB-INF/applicationContext.xml</param-value> </context-param> <listener> <listener-class>org.springframework.web.context.ContextLoaderListener</listener-class> </listener> The web.xml file for the sample portlet declares two things: ViewRendererServlet. The ViewRendererServlet is the bridge servlet for portlet support. During the render phase, DispatcherPortlet wraps PortletRequest into ServletRequest and forwards control to ViewRendererServlet for actual rendering. This process allows Spring Portlet MVC Framework to use the same View infrastructure as that of its servlet version, that is, Spring Web MVC Framework. ContextLoaderListener. The ContextLoaderListener class takes care of loading Web application context at the time of the Web application startup. The Web application context is shared by all the portlets in the portlet application. In case of duplicate bean definition, the bean definition in the portlet application context takes precedence over the Web application context. The ContextLoader class tries to read the value of the contextConfigLocation Web context parameter to find out the location of the context file. If the contextConfigLocation parameter is not set, then it uses the default value, which is /WEB-INF/applicationContext.xml, to load the context file. The Portlet Controller interface requires two methods that handle the two phases of a portlet request: the action request and the render request. The action phase should be capable of handling an action request and the render phase should be capable of handling a render request and returning an appropriate model and view. While the Controller interface is quite abstract, Spring Portlet MVC offers a lot of controllers that already contain a lot of the functionality you might need – most of these are very similar to controllers from Spring Web MVC. The Controller interface just defines the most common functionality required of every controller - handling an action request, handling a render request, and returning a model and a view. How rendering works As you know, when the user tries to access a page with PointSystemPortletMVC portlet on it or when the user performs some action on any other portlet on that page or tries to refresh that page, a render request is sent to the PointSystemPortletMVC portlet. In the sample code, because DispatcherPortlet is the main portlet class, Weblogic Portal / Webcenter Portal calls its render() method and then the following sequence of events occurs: The render() method of DispatcherPortlet calls the doDispatch() method, which in turn calls the doRender() method. After the doRenderService() method gets control, first it tries to find out the locale of the request by calling the PortletRequest.getLocale() method. This locale is used while making all the locale-related decisions for choices such as which resource bundle should be loaded or which JSP should be displayed to the user based on the locale. After that, the doRenderService() method starts iterating through all the HandlerMapping classes configured for this portlet, calling their getHandler() method to identify the appropriate Controller for handling this request. In the sample code, we have configured only PortletModeHandlerMapping as a HandlerMapping class. The PortletModeHandlerMapping class reads the value of the current portlet mode, and based on that, it finds out, the Controller class that should be used to handle this request. In the sample code, ViewController is configured to handle the View mode request so that the PortletModeHandlerMapping class returns the object of ViewController. After the object of ViewController is returned, the doRenderService() method calls its handleRenderRequestInternal() method. Implementation of the handleRenderRequestInternal() method in ViewController.java is very simple. It logs a message saying that it got control, and then it creates an instance of ModelAndView with a value equal to View and returns it to DispatcherPortlet. After control returns to doRenderService(), the next task is to figure out how to render View. For that, DispatcherPortlet starts iterating through all the ViewResolvers configured in your portlet application, calling their resolveViewName() method. In the sample code we have configured only one ViewResolver, InternalResourceViewResolver. When its resolveViewName() method is called with viewName, it tries to add /WEB-INF/jsp as a prefix to the view name and to add JSP as a suffix. And it checks if /WEB-INF/jsp/View.jsp exists. If it does exist, it returns the object of JstlView wrapping View.jsp. After control is returned to the doRenderService() method, it creates the object PortletRequestDispatcher, which points to /WEB-INF/servlet/view – that is, ViewRendererServlet. Then it sets the object of JstlView in the request and dispatches the request to ViewRendererServlet. After ViewRendererServlet gets control, it reads the JstlView object from the request attribute and creates another RequestDispatcher pointing to the /WEB-INF/jsp/View.jsp URL and passes control to it for actual markup generation. The markup generated by View.jsp is returned to user. At this point, you may question the need for ViewRendererServlet. Why can't DispatcherPortlet directly forward control to View.jsp? Adding ViewRendererServlet in between allows Spring Portlet MVC Framework to reuse the existing View infrastructure. You may appreciate this more when we discuss how easy it is to integrate Apache Tiles Framework with your Spring Portlet MVC Framework. The attached project SpringPortlet.zip should be used to import the project in to your OEPE Workspace. SpringPortlet_Jars.zip contains jar files required for the application. Project is written on Spring 2.5.  The same JSR 168 portlet should work on Webcenter Portal as well.  Downloads: Download WeblogicPotal Project which consists of Spring Portlet. Download Spring Jars In-addition to above you need to download Spring.jar (Spring2.5)

  Read the article

• From Bluehost to WP Engine, My WordPress Story

  - by thatjeffsmith

  This is probably the longest blog post I’ve written in a LONG time. And if you’re used to coming here for the Oracle stuff, this post is not about that. It’s about my blog, and the stuff under the hood that makes it run, AKA WordPress. If you want to skip to the juicy stuff, then use these shortcuts: My Site Slowed Down How I Moved to WP Engine How WP Engine ‘Hooked’ Me Why WP Engine? I started thatJeffSmith.com on May 28th, 2010. I had been already been blogging for several years, but a couple of really smart people I respected (Andy, Brent – thanks again!) suggested that I take ownership of my content and begin building my personal brand. I thought that was a good idea, and so I signed up for service with bluehost. Bluehost makes setting up a WordPress site very, very easy. And, they continued to be easy to work with for the past 2 years. I would even recommend them to anyone looking to host their own WordPress install/site. For $83.40, I purchased a year’s worth of service and my domain name registration – a very good value. And then last year I paid $107.40 for another year’s services. And when that year expired I paid another $190.80 for an additional two year’s service in advance. I had been up to that point, getting my money’s worth. And then, just a few weeks ago… My Site Slowed to a Crawl That spike was from an April Fool's Day Post, I think Why? Well, when I first started blogging, I had the same problem that most beginner bloggers have – not many readers. In my first year of blogging, I think the highest number of readers on a single day was about 125. I remember that day as I was very excited to break 100! Bluehost was very reliable, serving up my content with maybe a total of 3-4 outages in the past 2 years. Support was usually very prompt with answers and solutions, and I love their ‘Chat now’ technology – much nicer than message boards only or pay-to-talk phone support. In the past 6 months however, I noticed a couple of things: daily traffic was increasing – woohoo! my service was experiencing severe CPU throttling – doh! To be honest, I wasn’t aware the throttling was occuring, but I did know that the response time of my blog was starting to lag. Average load times were approaching 20-30 seconds. Not good when good sites are loading in 5 seconds or less. And just this past week, in getting ready to launch a new website for work that sucked in an RSS feed from my blog, the new page was left waiting for more than a minute. Not good! In fact my boss asked, why aren’t you blogging on Blogger? Ugh. I tried a few things to fix the problem: I paid for a premium WordPress theme – Themify’s Grido (thanks to @SQLRockstar for the heads-up) I installed a couple of WP caching plugins I read every WP optimization blog post I could get my greedy little eyes on However, at the same time I was also getting addicted to WordPress bloggers talking about all the cool things you could do with your blog. As a result I had at one point about 30 different plugins installed. WordPress runs on MySQL, and certain queries running via these plugins were starving for CPU. Plugins that would be called every page load meant that as more people clicked on my site, the more CPU I needed. I’m not stupid, so I eventually figured out that maybe less plugins was better, and was able to go down to just 20. But still, the site was running like a dog. CPU Throttling, makes MySQL wait to run a query Bluehost runs shared servers. Your site runs on the same box that several hundred (or thousand?) other services are running on. If you take more CPU than they think you should have, they will limit your service by making you stand in line for CPU, AKA ‘throttling.’ This is not bad. This business model allows them to serve many, many users for a very fair price. It works great until, well, until it doesn’t. I noticed in the last week that for every minute of service, I was being throttled between 60 and 300 seconds. If there were 5 MySQL processes running, then every single one of them were being held in check. The blog visitor notice this as their page requests would take a minute or more to be answered. Bluehost unfortunately doesn’t offer dedicated server hosting, so there was no real upgrade path for me follow and remain one of their customers. So what was I to do? Uninstall every plugin and hope the site sped up? Ask for people to take turns on my blog? I decided to spend my way out of the problem. I signed up for service with WP Engine and moved ThatJeffSmith.com The first 2 months are free, and after that it’s about $29/month to run my site on their system. My math tells me that’s a good bit more expensive than what Bluehost was charging me – to the tune of about 300% more a month. Oh, and I should just say that my blog is a personal blog even though I talk about work stuff here. I don’t get paid for blogging, I don’t sell ads, and I don’t expense the service fees – this is my personal passion. So is it worth it? In the first 4 days, it seems to be totally worth it. Load times have gone from 20-30 seconds to less than 5 seconds. A few folks have told me via Twitter that they notice faster page loads. I anticipate this will indirectly lead to more traffic as Google penalizes you in search results if your site is too slow, and of course some folks won’t even bother waiting more than 5-10 seconds. I noticed right away that writing posts, uploading pictures, and just using the WordPress dashboard in general was much more responsive. So writing is less of a chore now, which means I won’t have a good reason not to write How I Moved to WP Engine I signed up for the service and registered my domain. I then took a full export of my ‘old’ site by doing a FTP GET of all my files, then did a MySQL database backup, exported my WordPress Theme settings to a .zip file, and then finally used the WordPress ‘Export’ feature. I then used the WordPress ‘Import’ on the new site to load up my posts. Then I uploaded the theme .zip package from Themify. Then I FTP’d the ‘wp-content’ directory up to my new server using SFTP (WP Engine only supports secure FTP – good on them!) Using a temporary URL to see my new site, I was able to confirm that everything looked mostly OK – I’ll detail the challenges and issues of fixing the content next – but then it was time to ‘flip the switch.’ I updated the IP address that the DNS lookup tables use to route traffic to my new server. In a matter of minutes the DNS servers around the world were updated and it was time to see the new site! But It Was ‘Broken’ I had never moved a website before, and in my rush to update the DNS, I had changed the records without really finding out what I was supposed to do first. After re-reading the directions provided by WP Engine and following the guidance of their support engineer, I realized I had needed to set the CNAME (Alias) ‘www’ record to point to a different URL than the ‘www.thatjeffsmith.com’ entry I had set. Once corrected the site was up and running in less than a minute. Then It Was Only Mostly Broken Many of my plugins weren’t working. Apparently just ftp’ing the wp-content directory up wasn’t the proper way to re-install the plugin. I suspect file permissions or file ownership wasn’t proper. Some plug-ins were working, many had their settings wiped to the defaults, and a few just didn’t work again. I had to delete the directory of the plug-in manually via SFTP, and then use the WP Dashboard to install it from scratch. And here was my first ‘lesson’ – don’t switch the DNS records until you’ve completely tested your new site. I wasn’t able to navigate the old WP console to review my plug-in settings. Thankfully I was able to use the Wayback Machine to reverse engineer some things, and of course most plug-ins aren’t that complicated to setup to begin with. An example of one that I had to redo from scratch is the ‘Twitter @Anywhere Plus’ plugin that I use to create the form that allows folks to tweet a post they enjoyed at the end of each story. How WP Engine ‘Hooked’ Me I actually signed up with another provider first. They ranked highly in Google searches and a few Tweeps recommended them to me. But hours after signing up and I still didn’t have sever reyady, I was ready to give up on them. They offered no chat or phone support – only mail and message boards. And the message boards were rife with posts about how the service had gone downhill in the past 6 months. To their credit, they did make it easy to cancel, although I did have to do so via email as their website ‘cancel’ button was non-existent. Within minutes of activating my WP Engine account I had received my welcome message and directions on how to get started. I was able to see my staged website right away. They also did something very cool before I even got started – they looked at my existing site and told me by how much they could improve its performance. The proof is in the web pudding. I like this for a few reasons, but primarily I liked their business model. It told me they knew what they were doing, and that they were willing to put their money where their mouth was. This was further evident by their 60-day money back guarantee. And if I understand it correctly, they don’t even take your money until after that 60 day period is over. After a day, I was welcomed by the WP Engine social media team, and was given the opportunity to subscribe to their newsletter and follow their account on Twitter. I noticed their Twitter team is sure to post regular WordPress tips several times a day. It’s not just an account that’s setup for the sake of having a Twitter presence. These little things add up and give me confidence in my decision to choose them as my hosting partner. ‘Partner’ – that’s a lot nicer word than just ‘service provider,’ isn’t it? Oh, and they offered me a t-shirt. Don’t ever doubt the power of a ‘free’ t-shirt! How awesome is this e-mail, from a customer perspective? I wasn’t really expecting any of this. Exceeding expectations before I have even handed over a single dollar seems like a pretty good business plan. This is how you treat customers. Love them to death, and they reward you with loyalty. But Jeff, You Skipped a Piece Here, Why WP Engine? I found them on one of those ‘Top 10′ list posts, and pulled up their webpage. I noticed they offered a specialized service – they host WordPress installs, and that’s it. Their servers are tuned specifically for running WordPress. They had in bolded text, things like ‘INSANELY FAST. INFINITELY SCALABLE.’ and ‘LIGHTNING SPEED.’ And then they offered insurance against hackers and they took care of automatic backups and restores. The only drawbacks I have noticed so far relate to plugins I used that have been ‘blacklisted.’ In order to guarantee that ‘lightning’ speed, they have banned the use of the CPU-suckiest plugins. One of those is the ‘Related Posts’ plugin. So if you are a subscriber and are reading this in your email, you’ll notice there’s no links back to my blog to continue reading other related stories. Since that referral traffic is very small single-digit for my site, I decided that I’m OK with that. I’d rather have the warp-speed page loads. Again, I think that will lead to higher traffic down the road. In 50+ days I will need to decide if WP Engine is a permanent solution. I’ll be sure to update this post when that time comes and let y’all know how it turns out.

  Read the article

• Adding attachments to HumanTasks *beforehand*

  - by ccasares

  For an demo I'm preparing along with a partner, we need to add some attachments to a HumanTask beforehand, that is, the attachment must be associated already to the Task by the time the user opens its Form. How to achieve this?, indeed it's quite simple and just a matter of some mappings to the Task's input execData structure. Oracle BPM supports "default" attachments (which use BPM tables) or UCM-based ones. The way to insert attachments for both methods is pretty similar. With default attachments When using default attachments, first we need to have the attachment payload as part of the BPM process, that is, must be contained in a variable. Normally the attachment content is binary, so we'll need first to convert it to a base64-string (not covered on this blog entry). What we need to do is just to map the following execData parameters as part of the input of the HumanTask: execData.attachment[n].content            <-- the base64 payload data execData.attachment[n].mimeType           <-- depends on your attachment                                               (e.g.: "application/pdf") execData.attachment[n].name               <-- attachment name (just the name you want to                                               use. No need to be the original filename) execData.attachment[n].attachmentScope    <-- BPM or TASK (depending on your needs) execData.attachment[n].storageType        <-- TASK execData.attachment[n].doesBelongToParent <-- false (not sure if this one is really                                               needed, but it definitely doesn't hurt) execData.attachment[n].updatedBy          <-- username who is attaching it execData.attachment[n].updatedDate        <-- dateTime of when this attachment is                                               attached  Bear in mind that the attachment structure is a repetitive one. So if you need to add more than one attachment, you'll need to use XSLT mapping. If not, the Assign mapper automatically adds [1] for the iteration.  With UCM-based attachments With UCM-based attachments, the procedure is basically the same. We'll need to map some extra fields and not to map others. The tricky part with UCM-based attachments is what we need to know beforehand about the attachment itself. Of course, we don't need to have the payload, but a couple of information from the attachment that must be checked in already in UCM. First, let's see the mappings: execData.attachment[n].mimeType           <-- Document's dFormat attribute (1) execData.attachment[n].name               <-- attachment name (just the name you want to                                               use. No need to be the original filename) execData.attachment[n].attachmentScope    <-- BPM or TASK (depending on your needs) execData.attachment[n].storageType        <-- UCM execData.attachment[n].doesBelongToParent <-- false (not sure if this one is really                                               needed, but it definitely doesn't hurt) execData.attachment[n].updatedBy          <-- username who is attaching it execData.attachment[n].updatedDate        <-- dateTime of when this attachment is                                               attached  execData.attachment[n].uri                <-- "ecm://<dID>" where dID is document's dID                                      attribute (2) execData.attachment[n].ucmDocType         <-- Document's dDocType attribute (3) execData.attachment[n].securityGroup      <-- Document's dSecurityGroup attribute (4) execData.attachment[n].revision           <-- Document's dRevisionID attribute (5) execData.attachment[n].ucmMetadataItem[1].name  <-- "DocUrl" execData.attachment[n].ucmMetadataItem[1].type  <-- STRING execData.attachment[n].ucmMetadataItem[1].value <-- Document's url attribute (6)  Where to get those (n) fields? In my case I get those from a Search call to UCM (not covered on this blog entry) As I mentioned above, we must know which UCM document we're going to attach. We may know its ID, its name... whatever we need to uniquely identify it calling the IDC Search method. This method returns ALL the info we need to attach the different fields labeled with a number above.  The only tricky one is (6). UCM Search service returns the url attribute as a context-root without hostname:port. E.g.: /cs/groups/public/documents/document/dgvs/mdaw/~edisp/ccasareswcptel000239.pdf However we do need to include the full qualified URL when mapping (6). Where to get the http://<hostname>:<port> value? Honestly, I have no clue. What I use to do is to use a BPM property that can always be modified at runtime if needed. There are some other fields that might be needed in the execData.attachment structure, like account (if UCM's is using Accounts). But for demos I've never needed to use them, so I'm not sure whether it's necessary or not. Feel free to add some comments to this entry if you know it ;-)  That's all folks. Should you need help with the UCM Search service, let me know and I can write a quick entry on that topic.

  Read the article

• Announcing: Improvements to the Windows Azure Portal

  - by ScottGu

  Earlier today we released a number of enhancements to the new Windows Azure Management Portal.  These new capabilities include: Service Bus Management and Monitoring Support for Managing Co-administrators Import/Export support for SQL Databases Virtual Machine Experience Enhancements Improved Cloud Service Status Notifications Media Services Monitoring Support Storage Container Creation and Access Control Support All of these improvements are now live in production and available to start using immediately.  Below are more details on them: Service Bus Management and Monitoring The new Windows Azure Management Portal now supports Service Bus management and monitoring. Service Bus provides rich messaging infrastructure that can sit between applications (or between cloud and on-premise environments) and allow them to communicate in a loosely coupled way for improved scale and resiliency. With the new Service Bus experience, you can now create and manage Service Bus Namespaces, Queues, Topics, Relays and Subscriptions. You can also get rich monitoring for Service Bus Queues, Topics and Subscriptions. To create a Service Bus namespace, you can now select the “Service Bus” tab in the Windows Azure portal and then simply select the CREATE command: Doing so will bring up a new “Create a Namespace” dialog that allows you to name and create a new Service Bus Namespace: Once created, you can obtain security credentials associated with the Namespace via the ACCESS KEY command. This gives you the ability to obtain the connection string associated with the service namespace. You can copy and paste these values into any application that requires these credentials: It is also now easy to create Service Bus Queues and Topics via the NEW experience in the portal drawer.  Simply click the NEW command and navigate to the “App Services” category to create a new Service Bus entity: Once you provision a new Queue or Topic it can be managed in the portal.  Clicking on a namespace will display all queues and topics within it: Clicking on an item in the list will allow you to drill down into a dashboard view that allows you to monitor the activity and traffic within it, as well as perform operations on it. For example, below is a view of an “orders” queue – note how we now surface both the incoming and outgoing message flow rate, as well as the total queue length and queue size: To monitor pub/sub subscriptions you can use the ADD METRICS command within a topic and select a specific subscription to monitor. Support for Managing Co-Administrators You can now add co-administrators for your Windows Azure subscription using the new Windows Azure Portal. This allows you to share management of your Windows Azure services with other users. Subscription co-administrators share the same administrative rights and permissions that service administrator have - except a co-administrator cannot change or view billing details about the account, nor remove the service administrator from a subscription. In the SETTINGS section, click on the ADMINISTRATORS tab, and select the ADD button to add a co-administrator to your subscription: To add a co-administrator, you specify the email address for a Microsoft account (formerly Windows Live ID) or an organizational account, and choose the subscription you want to add them to: You can later update the subscriptions that the co-administrator has access to by clicking on the EDIT button, and then select or deselect the subscriptions to which they belong. Import/Export Support for SQL Databases The Windows Azure administration portal now supports importing and exporting SQL Databases to/from Blob Storage.  Databases can be imported/exported to blob storage using the same BACPAC file format that is supported with SQL Server 2012.  Among other benefits, this makes it easy to copy and migrate databases between on-premise and cloud environments. SQL Databases now have an EXPORT command in the bottom drawer that when pressed will prompt you to save your database to a Windows Azure storage container: The UI allows you to choose an existing storage account or create a new one, as well as the name of the BACPAC file to persist in blob storage: You can also now import and create a new SQL Database by using the NEW command.  This will prompt you to select the storage container and file to import the database from: The Windows Azure Portal enables you to monitor the progress of import and export operations. If you choose to log out of the portal, you can come back later and check on the status of all of the operations in the new history tab of the SQL Database server – this shows your entire import and export history and the status (success/fail) of each: Enhancements to the Virtual Machine Experience One of the common pain-points we have heard from customers using the preview of our new Virtual Machine support has been the inability to delete the associated VHDs when a VM instance (or VM drive) gets deleted. Prior to today’s release the VHDs would continue to be in your storage account and accumulate storage charges. You can now navigate to the Disks tab within the Virtual Machine extension, select a VM disk to delete, and click the DELETE DISK command: When you click the DELETE DISK button you have the option to delete the disk + associated .VHD file (completely clearing it from storage).  Alternatively you can delete the disk but still retain a .VHD copy of it in storage. Improved Cloud Service Status Notifications The Windows Azure portal now exposes more information of the health status of role instances.  If any of the instances are in a non-running state, the status at the top of the dashboard will summarize the status (and update automatically as the role health changes): Clicking the instance hyperlink within this status summary view will navigate you to a detailed role instance view, and allow you to get more detailed health status of each of the instances.  The portal has been updated to provide more specific status information within this detailed view – giving you better visibility into the health of your app: Monitoring Support for Media Services Windows Azure Media Services allows you to create media processing jobs (for example: encoding media files) in your Windows Azure Media Services account. In the Windows Azure Portal, you can now monitor the number of encoding jobs that are queued up for processing as well as active, failed and queued tasks for encoding jobs. On your media services account dashboard, you can visualize the monitoring data for last 6 hours, 24 hours or 7 days. Storage Container Creation and Access Control Support You can now create Windows Azure Storage storage containers from within the Windows Azure Portal.  After selecting a storage account, you can navigate to the CONTAINERS tab and click the ADD CONTAINER command: This will display a dialog that lets you name the new container and control access to it: You can also update the access setting as well as container metadata of existing containers by selecting one and then using the new EDIT CONTAINER command: This will then bring up the edit container dialog that allows you to change and save its settings: In addition to creating and editing containers, you can click on them within the portal to drill-in and view blobs within them.  Summary The above features are all now live in production and available to use immediately.  If you don’t already have a Windows Azure account, you can sign-up for a free trial and start using them today.  Visit the Windows Azure Developer Center to learn more about how to build apps with it. We’ll have even more new features and enhancements coming later this month – including support for the recent Windows Server 2012 and .NET 4.5 releases (we will enable new web and worker role images with Windows Server 2012 and .NET 4.5, and support .NET 4.5 with Websites).  Keep an eye out on my blog for details as these new features become available. Hope this helps, Scott P.S. In addition to blogging, I am also now using Twitter for quick updates and to share links. Follow me at: twitter.com/scottgu

  Read the article

• WCF Duplex Interaction with Web Server

  - by Mark Struzinski

  Here is my scenario, and it is causing us a considerable amount of grief at the moment: We have a vendor web service which provides base level telephony functionality. This service has a SOAP api, which we are leveraging to build up a custom UI that is integrated into our in house web apps. The api functions on 2 levels. You make standard client calls into the service to initiate actions, such as Login, Place Call, Hang Up, etc. On a different thread, the service sends events back to the client to alert the user of things that are occurring on the system (agent successfully logged in, call was disconnected, etc). I implemented a WCF service to sit between the web server and the vendor service. This WCF service operates in duplex mode, establishing a 2 way connection with the web server. The web server makes outbound calls to the WCF service, which routes them to the vendor's web service. Events are received back to the WCF service, which passes them onto the web server via a callback channel on the WCF client. As events are received on the web server, they are placed into a hash table with the user's name as the key, and a .NET queue as the value to hold the event. Each event is enqueued to the agent who owns it. On a 2 second interval, the web page polls the web server via an ajax request to get new events for the logged in user. It hits the hash table for the user key, dequeues any events that are present, and serializes them back up to the web page. From there, they are processed in order and appropriate messages are displayed to the user. This implementation performs well in a single user scenario. The second I put more than 1 user on the system, I start getting frequent timeouts with the following CommunicationException: A connection attempt failed because the connected party did not properly respond after a period of time, or established connection failed because connected host has failed to respond We are running Windows Server 2008 R2 both servers. Both the web app and WCF service are running on .NET 3.5. The WCF service is running under the net.tcp protocol in duplex mode. The web app is ASP.NET MVC 2. Has anyone dealt with anything like this scenario? Is there a more efficient way (or a widely accepted pattern) to implement this?

  Read the article

• Strange error inserting new relationship data in core-data

  - by michael

  My app will allow users to create a personalised list of events from a large list of events. I have a table view which simply displays these events, tapping on one of them takes the user to the event details view, which has a button "add to my events". In this detailed view I own the original event object, retrieved via an NSFetchedResultsController and passed to the detailed view (via a table cell, the same as the core data recipes sample). I have no trouble retrieving/displaying information from this "event". I am then trying to add it to the list of MyEvents represented by a one to many (inverse) relationship: This code: NSManagedObjectContext *context = [event managedObjectContext]; MyEvents *myEvents = (MyEvents *)[NSEntityDescription insertNewObjectForEntityForName:@"MyEvents" inManagedObjectContext:context]; [myEvents addEventObject:event];//ERROR And this code (suggested below): //would this add to or overwrite the "list" i am attempting to maintain NSManagedObjectContext *context = [event managedObjectContext]; MyEvents *myEvents = (MyEvents *)[NSEntityDescription insertNewObjectForEntityForName:@"MyEvents" inManagedObjectContext:context]; NSMutableSet *myEvent = [myEvents mutableSetValueForKey:@"event"]; [myEvent addObject:event]; //ERROR Bot produce (at the line indicated by //ERROR): *** -[NSComparisonPredicate evaluateWithObject:]: message sent to deallocated instance Seems I may have missed something fundamental. I cant glean any more information through the use of debugging tools, with my knowledge of them. 1) Is this a valid way to compile and store an editable list like this? 2) Is there a better way? 3) What could possibly be the deallocated instance in error? -- I have now modified the Event entity to have a to-many relationship called "myEvents" which referrers to itself. I can add Events to this fine, and logging the object shows the correct memory addresses appearing for the relationship after a [event addMyEventObject:event];. The same failure happens right after this however. I am still at a loss to understand what is going wrong. This is the backtrace #0 0x01f753a7 in ___forwarding___ () #1 0x01f516c2 in __forwarding_prep_0___ () #2 0x01c5aa8f in -[NSFetchedResultsController(PrivateMethods) _preprocessUpdatedObjects:insertsInfo:deletesInfo:updatesInfo:sectionsWithDeletes:newSectionNames:treatAsRefreshes:] () #3 0x01c5d63b in -[NSFetchedResultsController(PrivateMethods) _managedObjectContextDidChange:] () #4 0x0002e63a in _nsnote_callback () #5 0x01f40005 in _CFXNotificationPostNotification () #6 0x0002bef0 in -[NSNotificationCenter postNotificationName:object:userInfo:] () #7 0x01bbe17d in -[NSManagedObjectContext(_NSInternalNotificationHandling) _postObjectsDidChangeNotificationWithUserInfo:] () #8 0x01c1d763 in -[NSManagedObjectContext(_NSInternalChangeProcessing) _createAndPostChangeNotification:withDeletions:withUpdates:withRefreshes:] () #9 0x01ba25ea in -[NSManagedObjectContext(_NSInternalChangeProcessing) _processRecentChanges:] () #10 0x01bdfb3a in -[NSManagedObjectContext processPendingChanges] () #11 0x01bd0957 in _performRunLoopAction () #12 0x01f4d252 in __CFRunLoopDoObservers () #13 0x01f4c65f in CFRunLoopRunSpecific () #14 0x01f4bc48 in CFRunLoopRunInMode () #15 0x0273878d in GSEventRunModal () #16 0x02738852 in GSEventRun () #17 0x002ba003 in UIApplicationMain () Cheers.

  Read the article

• Sorting and Filtering By Model-Based LOV Display Value

  - by Steven Davelaar

  If you use a model-based LOV and you use display type "choice", then ADF nicely displays the display value, even if the table is read-only. In the screen shot below, you see the RegionName attribute displayed instead of the RegionId. This is accomplished by the model-based LOV, I did not modify the Countries view object to include a join with Regions.  Also note the sort icon, the table is sorted by RegionId. This sorting typically results in a bug reported by your test team. Europe really shouldn't come before America when sorting ascending, right? To fix this, we could of course change the Countries view object query and add a join with the Regions table to include the RegionName attribute. If the table is updateable, we still need the choice list, so we need to move the model-based LOV from the RegionId attribute to the RegionName attribute and hide the RegionId attribute in the table. But that is a lot of work for such a simple requirement, in particular if we have lots of model-based choice lists in our view object. Fortunately, there is an easier way to do this, with some generic code in your view object base class that fixes this at once for all model-based choice lists that we have defined in our application. The trick is to override the method getSortCriteria() in the base view object class. By default, this method returns null because the sorting is done in the database through a SQL Order By clause. However, if the getSortCriteria method does return a sort criteria the framework will perform in memory sorting which is what we need to achieve sorting by region name. So, inside this method we need to evaluate the Order By clause, and if the order by column matches an attribute that has a model-based LOV choicelist defined with a display attribute that is different from the value attribute, we need to return a sort criterria. Here is the complete code of this method: public SortCriteria[] getSortCriteria() {   String orderBy = getOrderByClause();          if (orderBy!=null )   {     boolean descending = false;     if (orderBy.endsWith(" DESC"))      {       descending = true;       orderBy = orderBy.substring(0,orderBy.length()-5);     }     // extract column name, is part after the dot     int dotpos = orderBy.lastIndexOf(".");     String columnName = orderBy.substring(dotpos+1);     // loop over attributes and find matching attribute     AttributeDef orderByAttrDef = null;     for (AttributeDef attrDef : getAttributeDefs())     {       if (columnName.equals(attrDef.getColumnName()))       {         orderByAttrDef = attrDef;         break;       }     }     if (orderByAttrDef!=null && "choice".equals(orderByAttrDef.getProperty("CONTROLTYPE"))          && orderByAttrDef.getListBindingDef()!=null)     {       String orderbyAttr = orderByAttrDef.getName();       String[] displayAttrs = orderByAttrDef.getListBindingDef().getListDisplayAttrNames();       String[] listAttrs = orderByAttrDef.getListBindingDef().getListAttrNames();       // if first list display attributes is not the same as first list attribute, than the value       // displayed is different from the value copied back to the order by attribute, in which case we need to       // use our custom comparator       if (displayAttrs!=null && listAttrs!=null && displayAttrs.length>0 && !displayAttrs[0].equals(listAttrs[0]))       {                  SortCriteriaImpl sc1 = new SortCriteriaImpl(orderbyAttr, descending);         SortCriteria[] sc = new SortCriteriaImpl[]{sc1};         return sc;                           }     }     }   return super.getSortCriteria(); } If this method returns a sort criteria, then the framework will call the sort method on the view object. The sort method uses a Comparator object to determine the sequence in which the rows should be returned. This comparator is retrieved by calling the getRowComparator method on the view object. So, to ensure sorting by our display value, we need to override this method to return our custom comparator: public Comparator getRowComparator() {   return new LovDisplayAttributeRowComparator(getSortCriteria()); } The custom comparator class extends the default RowComparator class and overrides the method compareRows and looks up the choice display value to compare the two rows. The complete code of this class is included in the sample application.  With this code in place, clicking on the Region sort icon nicely sorts the countries by RegionName, as you can see below. When using the Query-By-Example table filter at the top of the table, you typically want to use the same choice list to filter the rows. One way to do that is documented in ADF code corner sample 16 - How To Customize the ADF Faces Table Filter.The solution in this sample is perfectly fine to use. This sample requires you to define a separate iterator binding and associated tree binding to populate the choice list in the table filter area using the af:iterator tag. You might be able to reuse the same LOV view object instance in this iterator binding that is used as view accessor for the model-bassed LOV. However, I have seen quite a few customers who have a generic LOV view object (mapped to one "refcodes" table) with the bind variable values set in the LOV view accessor. In such a scenario, some duplicate work is needed to get a dedicated view object instance with the correct bind variables that can be used in the iterator binding. Looking for ways to maximize reuse, wouldn't it be nice if we could just reuse our model-based LOV to populate this filter choice list? Well we can. Here are the basic steps: 1. Create an attribute list binding in the page definition that we can use to retrieve the list of SelectItems needed to populate the choice list <list StaticList="false" Uses="LOV_RegionId"               IterBinding="CountriesView1Iterator" id="RegionId"/>  We need this "current row" list binding because the implicit list binding used by the item in the table is not accessible outside a table row, we cannot use the expression #{row.bindings.RegionId} in the table filter facet. 2. Create a Map-style managed bean with the get method retrieving the list binding as key, and returning the list of SelectItems. To return this list, we take the list of selectItems contained by the list binding and replace the index number that is normally used as key value with the actual attribute value that is set by the choice list. Here is the code of the get method:  public Object get(Object key) {   if (key instanceof FacesCtrlListBinding)   {     // we need to cast to internal class FacesCtrlListBinding rather than JUCtrlListBinding to     // be able to call getItems method. To prevent this import, we could evaluate an EL expression     // to get the list of items     FacesCtrlListBinding lb = (FacesCtrlListBinding) key;     if (cachedFilterLists.containsKey(lb.getName()))     {       return cachedFilterLists.get(lb.getName());     }     List<SelectItem> items = (List<SelectItem>)lb.getItems();     if (items==null || items.size()==0)     {       return items;     }     List<SelectItem> newItems = new ArrayList<SelectItem>();     JUCtrlValueDef def = ((JUCtrlValueDef)lb.getDef());     String valueAttr = def.getFirstAttrName();     // the items list has an index number as value, we need to replace this with the actual     // value of the attribute that is copied back by the choice list     for (int i = 0; i < items.size(); i++)     {       SelectItem si = (SelectItem) items.get(i);       Object value = lb.getValueFromList(i);       if (value instanceof Row)       {         Row row = (Row) value;         si.setValue(row.getAttribute(valueAttr));                 }       else       {         // this is the "empty" row, set value to empty string so all rows will be returned         // as user no longer wants to filter on this attribute         si.setValue("");       }       newItems.add(si);     }     cachedFilterLists.put(lb.getName(), newItems);     return newItems;   }   return null; } Note that we added caching to speed up performance, and to handle the situation where table filters or search criteria are set such that no rows are retrieved in the table. When there are no rows, there is no current row and the getItems method on the list binding will return no items.  An alternative approach to create the list of SelectItems would be to retrieve the iterator binding from the list binding and loop over the rows in the iterator binding rowset. Then we wouldn't need the import of the ADF internal oracle.adfinternal.view.faces.model.binding.FacesCtrlListBinding class, but then we need to figure out the display attributes from the list binding definition, and possible separate them with a dash if multiple display attributes are defined in the LOV. Doable but less reuse and more work. 3. Inside the filter facet for the column create an af:selectOneChoice with the value property of the f:selectItems tag referencing the get method of the managed bean:  <f:facet name="filter">   <af:selectOneChoice id="soc0" autoSubmit="true"                       value="#{vs.filterCriteria.RegionId}">     <!-- attention: the RegionId list binding must be created manually in the page definition! -->                       <f:selectItems id="si0"                    value="#{viewScope.TableFilterChoiceList[bindings.RegionId]}"/>   </af:selectOneChoice> </f:facet> Note that the managed bean is defined in viewScope for the caching to take effect. Here is a screen shot of the tabe filter in action: You can download the sample application here. 

  Read the article

• Cutom event dispatchment location

  - by Martino Wullems

  Hello, I've been looking into custom event (listeners) for quite some time, but never succeeded in making one. There are so many different mehods, extending the Event class, but also Extending the EventDispatcher class, very confusing! I want to settle with this once and for all and learn the appriopate technique. package{ import flash.events.Event; public class CustomEvent extends Event{ public static const TEST:String = 'test'; //what exac is the purpose of the value in the string? public var data:Object; public function CustomEvent(type:String, bubbles:Boolean = false, cancelable:Boolean = false, data:Object = null):void { this.data = data; super(); } } } As far as I know a custom class where you set the requirements for the event to be dispatched has to be made: package { import flash.display.MovieClip; public class TestClass extends MovieClip { public function TestClass():void { if (ConditionForHoldToComplete == true) { dispatchEvent(new Event(CustomEvent.TEST)); } } } } I'm not sure if this is correct, but it should be something along the lines of this. Now What I want is something like a mouseevent, which can be applied to a target and does not require a specific class. It would have to work something like this: package com.op_pad._events{ import flash.events.MouseEvent; import flash.utils.Timer; import flash.events.TimerEvent; import flash.events.EventDispatcher; import flash.events.Event; public class HoldEvent extends Event { public static const HOLD_COMPLETE:String = "hold completed"; var timer:Timer; public function SpriteEvent(type:String, bubbles:Boolean=true, cancelable:Boolean=false) { super( type, bubbles, cancelable ); timer = new Timer(1000, 1); //somehow find the target where is event is placed upon -> target.addEventlistener target.addEventListener(MouseEvent.MOUSE_DOWN, startTimer); target.addEventListener(MouseEvent.MOUSE_UP, stopTimer); } public override function clone():Event { return new SpriteEvent(type, bubbles, cancelable); } public override function toString():String { return formatToString("MovieEvent", "type", "bubbles", "cancelable", "eventPhase"); } ////////////////////////////////// ///// c o n d i t i o n s ///// ////////////////////////////////// private function startTimer(e:MouseEvent):void { timer.start(); timer.addEventListener(TimerEvent.TIMER_COMPLETE, complete); } private function stopTimer(e:MouseEvent):void { timer.stop() } public function complete(e:TimerEvent):void { dispatchEvent(new HoldEvent(HoldEvent.HOLD_COMPLETE)); } } } This obviously won't work, but should give you an idea of what I want to achieve. This should be possible because mouseevent can be applied to about everything.The main problem is that I don't know where I should set the requirements for the event to be executed to be able to apply it to movieclips and sprites. Thanks in advance

  Read the article

• Connecting SceneBuilder edited FXML to Java code

  - by daniel

  Recently I had to answer several questions regarding how to connect an UI built with the JavaFX SceneBuilder 1.0 Developer Preview to Java Code. So I figured out that a short overview might be helpful. But first, let me state the obvious. What is FXML? To make it short, FXML is an XML based declaration format for JavaFX. JavaFX provides an FXML loader which will parse FXML files and from that construct a graph of Java object. It may sound complex when stated like that but it is actually quite simple. Here is an example of FXML file, which instantiate a StackPane and puts a Button inside it: -- <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?> <?import java.lang.*?> <?import java.util.*?> <?import javafx.scene.control.*?> <?import javafx.scene.layout.*?> <?import javafx.scene.paint.*?> <StackPane prefHeight="150.0" prefWidth="200.0" xmlns:fx="http://javafx.com/fxml"> <children> <Button mnemonicParsing="false" text="Button" /> </children> </StackPane> ... and here is the code I would have had to write if I had chosen to do the same thing programatically: import javafx.scene.control.*; import javafx.scene.layout.*; ... final Button button = new Button("Button"); button.setMnemonicParsing(false); final StackPane stackPane = new StackPane(); stackPane.setPrefWidth(200.0); stackPane.setPrefHeight(150.0); stacPane.getChildren().add(button); As you can see - FXML is rather simple to understand - as it is quite close to the JavaFX API. So OK FXML is simple, but why would I use it?Well, there are several answers to that - but my own favorite is: because you can make it with SceneBuilder. What is SceneBuilder? In short SceneBuilder is a layout tool that will let you graphically build JavaFX user interfaces by dragging and dropping JavaFX components from a library, and save it as an FXML file. SceneBuilder can also be used to load and modify JavaFX scenegraphs declared in FXML. Here is how I made the small FXML file above: Start the JavaFX SceneBuilder 1.0 Developer Preview In the Library on the left hand side, click on 'StackPane' and drag it on the content view (the white rectangle) In the Library, select a Button and drag it onto the StackPane on the content view. In the Hierarchy Panel on the left hand side - select the StackPane component, then invoke 'Edit > Trim To Selected' from the menubar That's it - you can now save, and you will obtain the small FXML file shown above. Of course this is only a trivial sample, made for the sake of the example - and SceneBuilder will let you create much more complex UIs. So, I have now an FXML file. But what do I do with it? How do I include it in my program? How do I write my main class? Loading an FXML file with JavaFX Well, that's the easy part - because the piece of code you need to write never changes. You can download and look at the SceneBuilder samples if you need to get convinced, but here is the short version: Create a Java class (let's call it 'Main.java') which extends javafx.application.Application In the same directory copy/save the FXML file you just created using SceneBuilder. Let's name it "simple.fxml" Now here is the Java code for the Main class, which simply loads the FXML file and puts it as root in a stage's scene. /* * Copyright (c) 2012, Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. */ package simple; import java.util.logging.Level; import java.util.logging.Logger; import javafx.application.Application; import javafx.fxml.FXMLLoader; import javafx.scene.Scene; import javafx.scene.layout.StackPane; import javafx.stage.Stage; public class Main extends Application { /** * @param args the command line arguments */ public static void main(String[] args) { Application.launch(Main.class, (java.lang.String[])null); } @Override public void start(Stage primaryStage) { try { StackPane page = (StackPane) FXMLLoader.load(Main.class.getResource("simple.fxml")); Scene scene = new Scene(page); primaryStage.setScene(scene); primaryStage.setTitle("FXML is Simple"); primaryStage.show(); } catch (Exception ex) { Logger.getLogger(Main.class.getName()).log(Level.SEVERE, null, ex); } } } Great! Now I only have to use my favorite IDE to compile the class and run it. But... wait... what does it do? Well nothing. It just displays a button in the middle of a window. There's no logic attached to it. So how do we do that? How can I connect this button to my application logic? Here is how: Connection to code First let's define our application logic. Since this post is only intended to give a very brief overview - let's keep things simple. Let's say that the only thing I want to do is print a message on System.out when the user clicks on my button. To do that, I'll need to register an action handler with my button. And to do that, I'll need to somehow get a handle on my button. I'll need some kind of controller logic that will get my button and add my action handler to it. So how do I get a handle to my button and pass it to my controller? Once again - this is easy: I just need to write a controller class for my FXML. With each FXML file, it is possible to associate a controller class defined for that FXML. That controller class will make the link between the UI (the objects defined in the FXML) and the application logic. To each object defined in FXML we can associate an fx:id. The value of the id must be unique within the scope of the FXML, and is the name of an instance variable inside the controller class, in which the object will be injected. Since I want to have access to my button, I will need to add an fx:id to my button in FXML, and declare an @FXML variable in my controller class with the same name. In other words - I will need to add fx:id="myButton" to my button in FXML: -- <Button fx:id="myButton" mnemonicParsing="false" text="Button" /> and declare @FXML private Button myButton in my controller class @FXML private Button myButton; // value will be injected by the FXMLLoader Let's see how to do this. Add an fx:id to the Button object Load "simple.fxml" in SceneBuilder - if not already done In the hierarchy panel (bottom left), or directly on the content view, select the Button object. Open the Properties sections of the inspector (right panel) for the button object At the top of the section, you will see a text field labelled fx:id. Enter myButton in that field and validate. Associate a controller class with the FXML file Still in SceneBuilder, select the top root object (in our case, that's the StackPane), and open the Code section of the inspector (right hand side) At the top of the section you should see a text field labelled Controller Class. In the field, type simple.SimpleController. This is the name of the class we're going to create manually. If you save at this point, the FXML will look like this: -- <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?> <?import java.lang.*?> <?import java.util.*?> <?import javafx.scene.control.*?> <?import javafx.scene.layout.*?> <?import javafx.scene.paint.*?> <StackPane prefHeight="150.0" prefWidth="200.0" xmlns:fx="http://javafx.com/fxml" fx:controller="simple.SimpleController"> <children> <Button fx:id="myButton" mnemonicParsing="false" text="Button" /> </children> </StackPane> As you can see, the name of the controller class has been added to the root object: fx:controller="simple.SimpleController" Coding the controller class In your favorite IDE, create an empty SimpleController.java class. Now what does a controller class looks like? What should we put inside? Well - SceneBuilder will help you there: it will show you an example of controller skeleton tailored for your FXML. In the menu bar, invoke View > Show Sample Controller Skeleton. A popup appears, displaying a suggestion for the controller skeleton: copy the code displayed there, and paste it into your SimpleController.java: /** * Sample Skeleton for "simple.fxml" Controller Class * Use copy/paste to copy paste this code into your favorite IDE **/ package simple; import java.net.URL; import java.util.ResourceBundle; import javafx.fxml.FXML; import javafx.fxml.Initializable; import javafx.scene.control.Button; public class SimpleController implements Initializable { @FXML // fx:id="myButton" private Button myButton; // Value injected by FXMLLoader @Override // This method is called by the FXMLLoader when initialization is complete public void initialize(URL fxmlFileLocation, ResourceBundle resources) { assert myButton != null : "fx:id=\"myButton\" was not injected: check your FXML file 'simple.fxml'."; // initialize your logic here: all @FXML variables will have been injected } } Note that the code displayed by SceneBuilder is there only for educational purpose: SceneBuilder does not create and does not modify Java files. This is simply a hint of what you can use, given the fx:id present in your FXML file. You are free to copy all or part of the displayed code and paste it into your own Java class. Now at this point, there only remains to add our logic to the controller class. Quite easy: in the initialize method, I will register an action handler with my button: () { @Override public void handle(ActionEvent event) { System.out.println("That was easy, wasn't it?"); } }); ... -- ... // initialize your logic here: all @FXML variables will have been injected myButton.setOnAction(new EventHandler<ActionEvent>() { @Override public void handle(ActionEvent event) { System.out.println("That was easy, wasn't it?"); } }); ... That's it - if you now compile everything in your IDE, and run your application, clicking on the button should print a message on the console! Summary What happens is that in Main.java, the FXMLLoader will load simple.fxml from the jar/classpath, as specified by 'FXMLLoader.load(Main.class.getResource("simple.fxml"))'. When loading simple.fxml, the loader will find the name of the controller class, as specified by 'fx:controller="simple.SimpleController"' in the FXML. Upon finding the name of the controller class, the loader will create an instance of that class, in which it will try to inject all the objects that have an fx:id in the FXML. Thus, after having created '<Button fx:id="myButton" ... />', the FXMLLoader will inject the button instance into the '@FXML private Button myButton;' instance variable found on the controller instance. This is because The instance variable has an @FXML annotation, The name of the variable exactly matches the value of the fx:id Finally, when the whole FXML has been loaded, the FXMLLoader will call the controller's initialize method, and our code that registers an action handler with the button will be executed. For a complete example, take a look at the HelloWorld SceneBuilder sample. Also make sure to follow the SceneBuilder Get Started guide, which will guide you through a much more complete example. Of course, there are more elegant ways to set up an Event Handler using FXML and SceneBuilder. There are also many different ways to work with the FXMLLoader. But since it's starting to be very late here, I think it will have to wait for another post. I hope you have enjoyed the tour! --daniel

  Read the article

• Is there a Telecommunications Reference Architecture?

  - by raul.goycoolea

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

  Read the article

< Previous Page | 561 562 563 564 565 566 567 568 569 570 571 572  | Next Page >