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• Non-standard installation (installing Linux from Linux)

  - by Evan Plaice

  So, here's my setup. I have one partition with the newest version installed, a second partition with an older version installed (as a backup just in case), a swap partition that both share, and a boot partition so the bootloader doesn't need to be setup after each upgrade. Partitions: sda1 ext3 /boot sda2 ext4 / (current version) sda3 ext4 / (old version) sda4 swap /swap sda5 ntfs (contains folders symbolically linked to /home on /) So far it has been a very good setup. I can create new boot loaders without screwing it up and adding my personal files into a new install is as simple as creating some symbolic links (the partition is NTFS in case I need to load windows on the system again). Here's the issue. I'd like to be able to drop the install into /distro on the current version and install a new version on / on the old version effectively replacing/upgrading it. The goal is to be able to just swap out new versions as they are released while maintaining redundancy in case I don't like th update. So far I have: downloaded the install.iso created a folder in /distro copied the install.iso into /distro extracted vmlinuz and initrd.lz into /distro Then I modified /boot/grub/menu.lst with the following entry: title Install Linux root (hd0,1) kernel /distro/vmlinuz initrd /distro/initrd.lz vmlinuz loads perfectly but it says it can't find initrd.lz on boot. I have also tried to uncompress the image with: unlzma < initrd.lz > initrd.img And, updating the menu.lst file to match; but that doesn't work either. I'm assuming that vmlinuz (linux kernel) loads, fires up the virtual filesystem by creating a ramdisk (initrd), mounts the iso, and launches the installer. Am I missing something here? Update: First, I wanted to say that the accepted answer would have been the best option if I was doing a normal Ubuntu install. Unfortunately, I was installing Linux Mint (which lacks the script needed to make debootstrap work. So the problem I with the above approach was, I was missing the command that vmlinuz (linux kernel) needed to execute to start boot into LiveCD mode. By looking in the /boot/grub/grub.cfg file I found what I was missing. Although this method will work, it requires that the installation files reside on their own partition. I took the easy route and used unetbootin to drop the LiveCD on a usb drive and booted from that. Like I said before. Debootstrap would have been the ideal solution here. Even though I couldn't use it I wrote down the steps it would've taken to use it. Step One: Format sda3 (the partition with the old copy of linux that's being overwritten) I used gparted to format it as ext4 from within the current linux install. How this is done varies based on what tools you prefer to use. Step Two: Mount the newly formatted partition (we'll call the mount ubuntu for simplicity) sudo mkdir /mnt/ubuntu sudo mount -o -loop /dev/sda3 /mnt/ubuntu Step Three: Get debootstrap sudo apt-get install debootstrap Step Four: Mount the install disk (replace ubuntu.iso with the name if your install disk) sudo mkdir /media/cdrom sudo mount -o loop ~/ubuntu.iso /media/cdrom Step Five: Install the OS using debootstrap (replace fiesty with the version you're installing and amd64 with your processor's architecture) sudo debootstrap --arch amd64 fiesty /mnt/ubuntu file:/media/cdrom The settings here varies. While I loaded debootstrap using an install iso, you can also have debootstrap automatically download and install if with a repository link (While most of these repositories contain debian versions I'm still not clear as to whether Ubuntu has similar repositories). Here a list of the debian package repositories and their mirrors. This is how you'd deploy debootstrap if you were doing it directly from a repository: sudo debootstrap --arch amd64 squeeze /mnt/debian http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian Here's the link that I primarily used to figure this out.

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• Asp.net Session State Revisited

  - by karan@dotnet

  Every now and then I see doubts and queries which I believe is the most discussed topic in the .net environment - Asp.net Sessions. So what really are they, why are they needed and what does browser and .net do with it. These and some of the other questions I hope to answer with this post. Because of the stateless nature of the HTTP protocol there is always a need of state management in a web application. There are many other ways to store data but I feel Session state is amongst the most powerful one. The ASP.NET session state is a technology that lets you store server-side, user-specific data. Our web applications can then use data to process request from the user for which the session state was instantiated. So when does a session is first created? When we start a asp.net application a non-expiring cookie is created and its called as ASP.NET_SessionId. Basically there are two methods for this depending upon how you configure this setting in your config file. The session ID can be a part of cookie as discussed above(called as ASP.NET_SessionId) or it is embedded in the browser’s URL. For the latter part we have to set cookie-less session in our web.config file. These Session ID’s are 120-bit random number that is represented by 20-character string. The cookie will be alive until you close your browser. If you browse from one app to another within the same domain, then both the apps will use the same session ID to track the session state. Why reuse? so that you don’t have to create a new session ID for each request. One can abandon one particular Session by calling Session.Abandon() which will stop the page processing and clear out the session data. A subsequent page request causes a brand new session object to be instantiated. So what happened to my cookie? Well the session cookie is still there even when one Session.Abandon() is called and another session object is created. The Session.Abandon() lets you clear out your session state without waiting for session timeout. By default, this time-out is a 20-minute sliding expiration. This expiration is refreshed every time that the user makes a request to the Web site and presents the session ID cookie. The Abandon method sets a flag in the session state object that indicates that the session state should be abandoned. If your app does not have global.asax then your session cookie will be killed at the end of each page request. So you need to have a global.asax file and Session_Start() handler to make sure that the session cookie will remain intact once its issued after the first page hit. The runtime invokes global.asax’s Session_OnEnd() when you call Session.Abandon() or the session times out. The session manager stores session data in HttpCache with sliding expiration where this timeout can be configured in the <sessionState> of web.config file. When the timeout is up the HttpCache will remove the session state object. Sometimes we want particular pages not to time out as compared to other pages in our applications. We can handle this in two ways. First, we can set a timer or may be a JavaScript function that refreshes the page after fixed intervals of time. The only thing being the page being cached locally and then the request is not made to the server so to prevent that you can add this to your page: <%@ OutputCache Location="None" VaryByParam="None" %> Second approach is to move your page into its own folder and then add a web.config to that folder to control the timeout. Also not all pages in your application will need access to session state. For those pages that do not, you can indicate that session state is not needed and prevent session data from being fetched from the store in requests to these pages. You can disable the session state at page level like this:<%@ Page EnableSessionState="False" %>tbc…

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• Using the RSSBus Salesforce Excel Add-In From Excel Macros (VBA)

  - by dataintegration

  The RSSBus Salesforce Excel Add-In makes it easy to retrieve and update data from Salesforce from within Microsoft Excel. In addition to the built-in wizards that make data manipulation possible without code, the full functionality of the RSSBus Excel Add-Ins is available programmatically with Excel Macros (VBA) and Excel Functions. This article shows how to write an Excel macro that can be used to perform bulk inserts into Salesforce. Although this article uses the Salesforce Excel Add-In as an example, the same process can be applied to any of the Excel Add-Ins available on our website. Step 1: Download and install the RSSBus Excel Add-In available on our website. Step 2: Open Excel and create place holder cells for the connection details that are needed from the macro. In this article, a spreadsheet will be created for batch inserts, and these cells will store the connection details, and will be used to report the job Id, the batch Id, and the batch status. Step 3: Switch to the Developer tab in Excel. Add a new button on the spreadsheet, and create a new macro associated with it. This macro will contain the code needed to insert a batch of rows into Salesforce. Step 4: Add a reference to the Excel Add-In by selecting Tools --> References --> RSSBus Excel Add-In. The macro functions of the Excel Add-In will be available once the reference has been added. The following code shows how to call a Stored Procedure. In this example, a job is created to insert Leads by calling the CreateJob stored procedure. CreateJob returns a jobId that can be used to upload a large number of Leads in one transaction. Note the use of cells B1, B2, B3, and B4 that were created in Step 2 to read the connection settings from the Excel SpreadSheet and to write out the status of the procedure. methodName = "CreateJob" module.SetProviderName ("Salesforce") nameArray = Array("ObjectName", "Action", "ConcurrencyMode") valueArray = Array("Lead", "insert", "Serial") user = Range("B1").value pass = Range("B2").value atoken = Range("B3").value If (Not user = "" And Not pass = "" And Not atoken = "") Then module.SetConnectionString ("User=" + user + ";Password=" + pass + ";Access Token=" + atoken + ";") If module.CallSP(methodName, nameArray, valueArray) Then Dim ColumnCount As Integer ColumnCount = module.GetColumnCount Dim idIndex As Integer For Count = 0 To ColumnCount - 1 Dim colName As String colName = module.GetColumnName(Count) If module.GetColumnName(Count) = "id" Then idIndex = Count End If Next While (Not module.EOF) Range("B4").value = module.GetValue(idIndex) module.MoveNext Wend Else MsgBox "The CreateJob query failed." End If Exit Sub Else MsgBox "Please specify the connection details." Exit Sub End If Error: MsgBox "ERROR: " & Err.Description Step 5: Add the code to your macro. If you use the code above, you can check the results at Salesforce.com. They can be seen at Administration Setup -> Monitoring -> Bulk Data Load Jobs. Download the attached sample file for a more complete demo. Distributing an Excel File With Macros An Excel file with macros is saved using the .xlms extension. The code for the macro remains in the Excel file, and you can distribute your Excel file to any machine where the RSSBus Salesforce Excel Add-In is already installed. Macro Sample File Please download the fully functional sample excel file that includes the code referenced here. You will also need the RSSBus Excel Add-In to make the connection. You can download a free trial here. Note: You may get an error message stating: "Can't find project or library." in Excel 2007, since this example is made using Excel 2010. To resolve this, navigate to Tools -> References and uncheck the "MISSING: RSSBus Excel Add-In", then scroll down and check the "RSSBus Excel Add-In" listed below it.

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• Installing CUDA on Ubuntu 12.04 with nvidia driver 295.59

  - by johnmcd

  I have been trying to get cuda to run on a nvidia gt 650m based laptop. I am running Ubuntu 12.04 with the nvidia 295.59 driver. Also, my laptop uses Optimus so I have install the driver via bumblebee. Bumblebee is not working correctly yet -- however I believe it is possible to install CUDA independently. To install CUDA I have followed the instructions detailed here: How can I get nVidia CUDA or OpenCL working on a laptop with nVidia discrete card/Intel Integrated Graphics? However I am still running into problem building the sdk. I made the changes specified at the above link in common.mk, but I got the following (snippet) from the build process: make[2]: Entering directory `/home/john/NVIDIA_GPU_Computing_SDK/C/src/fluidsGL' /usr/bin/ld: warning: libnvidia-tls.so.302.17, needed by /usr/lib/nvidia-current/libGL.so, not found (try using -rpath or -rpath-link) /usr/bin/ld: warning: libnvidia-glcore.so.302.17, needed by /usr/lib/nvidia-current/libGL.so, not found (try using -rpath or -rpath-link) /usr/lib/nvidia-current/libGL.so: undefined reference to `_nv018tls' /usr/lib/nvidia-current/libGL.so: undefined reference to `_nv012glcore' /usr/lib/nvidia-current/libGL.so: undefined reference to `_nv017glcore' /usr/lib/nvidia-current/libGL.so: undefined reference to `_nv012tls' /usr/lib/nvidia-current/libGL.so: undefined reference to `_nv015tls' /usr/lib/nvidia-current/libGL.so: undefined reference to `_nv019tls' /usr/lib/nvidia-current/libGL.so: undefined reference to `_nv000glcore' /usr/lib/nvidia-current/libGL.so: undefined reference to `_nv017tls' /usr/lib/nvidia-current/libGL.so: undefined reference to `_nv013tls' /usr/lib/nvidia-current/libGL.so: undefined reference to `_nv013glcore' /usr/lib/nvidia-current/libGL.so: undefined reference to `_nv018glcore' /usr/lib/nvidia-current/libGL.so: undefined reference to `_nv022tls' /usr/lib/nvidia-current/libGL.so: undefined reference to `_nv007tls' /usr/lib/nvidia-current/libGL.so: undefined reference to `_nv009tls' /usr/lib/nvidia-current/libGL.so: undefined reference to `_nv020tls' /usr/lib/nvidia-current/libGL.so: undefined reference to `_nv014glcore' /usr/lib/nvidia-current/libGL.so: undefined reference to `_nv015glcore' /usr/lib/nvidia-current/libGL.so: undefined reference to `_nv016tls' /usr/lib/nvidia-current/libGL.so: undefined reference to `_nv001glcore' /usr/lib/nvidia-current/libGL.so: undefined reference to `_nv006tls' /usr/lib/nvidia-current/libGL.so: undefined reference to `_nv021tls' /usr/lib/nvidia-current/libGL.so: undefined reference to `_nv011tls' /usr/lib/nvidia-current/libGL.so: undefined reference to `_nv020glcore' /usr/lib/nvidia-current/libGL.so: undefined reference to `_nv019glcore' /usr/lib/nvidia-current/libGL.so: undefined reference to `_nv002glcore' /usr/lib/nvidia-current/libGL.so: undefined reference to `_nv021glcore' /usr/lib/nvidia-current/libGL.so: undefined reference to `_nv014tls' collect2: ld returned 1 exit status make[2]: *** [../../bin/linux/release/fluidsGL] Error 1 make[2]: Leaving directory `/home/john/NVIDIA_GPU_Computing_SDK/C/src/fluidsGL' make[1]: *** [src/fluidsGL/Makefile.ph_build] Error 2 make[1]: Leaving directory `/home/john/NVIDIA_GPU_Computing_SDK/C' make: *** [all] Error 2 The libraries that ld warns about are on my system and are installed on the system: $ locate libnvidia-tls.so.302.17 libnvidia-glcore.so.302.17 /usr/lib/nvidia-current/libnvidia-glcore.so.302.17 /usr/lib/nvidia-current/libnvidia-tls.so.302.17 /usr/lib/nvidia-current/tls/libnvidia-tls.so.302.17 /usr/lib32/nvidia-current/libnvidia-glcore.so.302.17 /usr/lib32/nvidia-current/libnvidia-tls.so.302.17 /usr/lib32/nvidia-current/tls/libnvidia-tls.so.302.17 however /usr/lib/nvidia-current and /usr/lib32/nvidia-current are not being picked up by ldconfig. I have tried adding them by adding a file to /etc/ld.so.conf.d/ which gets past this error, however now I am getting the following error: make[2]: Entering directory `/home/john/NVIDIA_GPU_Computing_SDK/C/src/deviceQueryDrv' cc1plus: warning: command line option ‘-Wimplicit’ is valid for C/ObjC but not for C++ [enabled by default] obj/x86_64/release/deviceQueryDrv.cpp.o: In function `main': deviceQueryDrv.cpp:(.text.startup+0x5f): undefined reference to `cuInit' deviceQueryDrv.cpp:(.text.startup+0x99): undefined reference to `cuDeviceGetCount' deviceQueryDrv.cpp:(.text.startup+0x10b): undefined reference to `cuDeviceComputeCapability' deviceQueryDrv.cpp:(.text.startup+0x127): undefined reference to `cuDeviceGetName' deviceQueryDrv.cpp:(.text.startup+0x16a): undefined reference to `cuDriverGetVersion' deviceQueryDrv.cpp:(.text.startup+0x1f0): undefined reference to `cuDeviceTotalMem_v2' deviceQueryDrv.cpp:(.text.startup+0x262): undefined reference to `cuDeviceGetAttribute' deviceQueryDrv.cpp:(.text.startup+0x457): undefined reference to `cuDeviceGetAttribute' deviceQueryDrv.cpp:(.text.startup+0x4bc): undefined reference to `cuDeviceGetAttribute' deviceQueryDrv.cpp:(.text.startup+0x502): undefined reference to `cuDeviceGetAttribute' deviceQueryDrv.cpp:(.text.startup+0x533): undefined reference to `cuDeviceGetAttribute' obj/x86_64/release/deviceQueryDrv.cpp.o:deviceQueryDrv.cpp:(.text.startup+0x55e): more undefined references to `cuDeviceGetAttribute' follow collect2: ld returned 1 exit status make[2]: *** [../../bin/linux/release/deviceQueryDrv] Error 1 make[2]: Leaving directory `/home/john/NVIDIA_GPU_Computing_SDK/C/src/deviceQueryDrv' make[1]: *** [src/deviceQueryDrv/Makefile.ph_build] Error 2 make[1]: Leaving directory `/home/john/NVIDIA_GPU_Computing_SDK/C' make: *** [all] Error 2 I would appreciate any help that anyone can provide me with. If I can provide any further information please let me know. Thanks.

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• Problem with script substitution when running script

  - by tucaz

  Hi! I'm new to Linux so this probably should be an easy fix, but I cannot see it. I have a script downloaded from official sources that is used to install additional tools for fsharp but it gives me a syntax error when running it. I tried to replace ( and ) by { and } but eventually it lead me to another error so I think this is not the problem since the script works for everybody. I read some articles that say that my bash version maybe is not the right one. I'm using Ubuntu 10.10 and here is the error: install-bonus.sh: 28: Syntax error: "(" unexpected (expecting "}") And this is line 27, 28 and 29: { declare -a DIRS=("${!3}") FILE=$2 And the full script: #! /bin/sh -e PREFIX=/usr BIN=$PREFIX/bin MAN=$PREFIX/share/man/man1/ die() { echo "$1" &2 echo "Installation aborted." &2 exit 1 } echo "This script will install additional material for F# including" echo "man pages, fsharpc and fsharpi scripts and Gtk# support for F#" echo "Interactive (root access needed)" echo "" # ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ # Utility function that searches specified directories for a specified file # and if the file is not found, it asks user to provide a directory RESULT="" searchpaths() { declare -a DIRS=("${!3}") FILE=$2 DIR=${DIRS[0]} for TRYDIR in ${DIRS[@]} do if [ -f $TRYDIR/$FILE ] then DIR=$TRYDIR fi done while [ ! -f $DIR/$FILE ] do echo "File '$FILE' was not found in any of ${DIRS[@]}. Please enter $1 installation directory:" read DIR done RESULT=$DIR } # ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ # Locate F# installation directory - this is needed, because we want to # add environment variable with it, generate 'fsharpc' and 'fsharpi' and also # copy load-gtk.fsx to that directory # ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ PATHS=( $1 /usr/lib/fsharp /usr/lib/shared/fsharp ) searchpaths "F# installation" FSharp.Core.dll PATHS[@] FSHARPDIR=$RESULT echo "Successfully found F# installation directory." # ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ # Check that we have everything we need # ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ [ $(id -u) -eq 0 ] || die "Please run the script as root." which mono /dev/null || die "mono not found in PATH." # ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ # Make sure that all additional assemblies are in GAC # ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ echo "Installing additional F# assemblies to the GAC" gacutil -i $FSHARPDIR/FSharp.Build.dll gacutil -i $FSHARPDIR/FSharp.Compiler.dll gacutil -i $FSHARPDIR/FSharp.Compiler.Interactive.Settings.dll gacutil -i $FSHARPDIR/FSharp.Compiler.Server.Shared.dll # ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ # Install additional files # ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ # Install man pages echo "Installing additional F# commands, scripts and man pages" mkdir -p $MAN cp *.1 $MAN # Export the FSHARP_COMPILER_BIN environment variable if [[ ! "$OSTYPE" =~ "darwin" ]]; then echo "export FSHARP_COMPILER_BIN=$FSHARPDIR" fsharp.sh mv fsharp.sh /etc/profile.d/ fi # Generate 'load-gtk.fsx' script for F# Interactive (ask user if we cannot find binaries) PATHS=( /usr/lib/mono/gtk-sharp-2.0 /usr/lib/cli/gtk-sharp-2.0 /Library/Frameworks/Mono.framework/Versions/2.8/lib/mono/gtk-sharp-2.0 ) searchpaths "Gtk#" gtk-sharp.dll PATHS[@] GTKDIR=$RESULT echo "Successfully found Gtk# root directory." PATHS=( /usr/lib/mono/gtk-sharp-2.0 /usr/lib/cli/glib-sharp-2.0 /Library/Frameworks/Mono.framework/Versions/2.8/lib/mono/gtk-sharp-2.0 ) searchpaths "Glib" glib-sharp.dll PATHS[@] GLIBDIR=$RESULT echo "Successfully found Glib# root directory." PATHS=( /usr/lib/mono/gtk-sharp-2.0 /usr/lib/cli/atk-sharp-2.0 /Library/Frameworks/Mono.framework/Versions/2.8/lib/mono/gtk-sharp-2.0 ) searchpaths "Atk#" atk-sharp.dll PATHS[@] ATKDIR=$RESULT echo "Successfully found Atk# root directory." PATHS=( /usr/lib/mono/gtk-sharp-2.0 /usr/lib/cli/gdk-sharp-2.0 /Library/Frameworks/Mono.framework/Versions/2.8/lib/mono/gtk-sharp-2.0 ) searchpaths "Gdk#" gdk-sharp.dll PATHS[@] GDKDIR=$RESULT echo "Successfully found Gdk# root directory." cp bonus/load-gtk.fsx load-gtk1.fsx sed "s,INSERTGTKPATH,$GTKDIR,g" load-gtk1.fsx load-gtk2.fsx sed "s,INSERTGDKPATH,$GDKDIR,g" load-gtk2.fsx load-gtk3.fsx sed "s,INSERTATKPATH,$ATKDIR,g" load-gtk3.fsx load-gtk4.fsx sed "s,INSERTGLIBPATH,$GLIBDIR,g" load-gtk4.fsx load-gtk.fsx rm load-gtk1.fsx rm load-gtk2.fsx rm load-gtk3.fsx rm load-gtk4.fsx mv load-gtk.fsx $FSHARPDIR/load-gtk.fsx # Generate 'fsharpc' and 'fsharpi' scripts (using the F# path) # 'fsharpi' automatically searches F# root directory (e.g. load-gtk) echo "#!/bin/sh" fsharpc echo "exec mono $FSHARPDIR/fsc.exe --resident \"\$@\"" fsharpc chmod 755 fsharpc echo "#!/bin/sh" fsharpi echo "exec mono $FSHARPDIR/fsi.exe -I:\"$FSHARPDIR\" \"\$@\"" fsharpi chmod 755 fsharpi mv fsharpc $BIN/fsharpc mv fsharpi $BIN/fsharpi Thanks a lot!

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• #altnetseattle &ndash; REST Services

  - by GeekAgilistMercenary

  Below are the notes I made in the REST Architecture Session I helped kick off with Andrew. RSS, ATOM, and such needed for better discovery.  i.e. there still is a need for some type of discovery. Difficult is modeling behaviors in a RESTful way.  ??  Invoking some type of state against an object.  For instance in the case of a POST vs. a GET.  The GET is easy, comes back as is, but what about a POST, which often changes some state or something. Challenge is doing multiple workflows with stateful workflows.  How does batch work.  Maybe model the batch as a resource. Frameworks aren’t particularly part of REST, REST is REST.  But point argued that REST is modeled, or part of modeling a state machine of some sort… ? Nothing is 100% reliable w/ REST – comparisons drawn with TCP/IP.  Sufficient probability is made however for the communications, but the idea of a possible failure has to be built into the usage model of REST. Ruby on Rails / RESTfully, and others used.  What were their issues, what do they do.  ATOM feeds, object serialized, using LINQ to XML w/ this.  No state machine libraries. Idempotent areas around REST and single change POST changes are inherent in the architecture. REST – one of the constrained languages is for the interaction w/ the system.  Limiting what can be done on the resources.  - disagreement, there is no agreed upon REST verbs. Sam Ruby – RESTful services.  Expanded the verbs within REST/HTTP pushes you off the web.  Of the existing verbs POST leaves the most up for debate. Robert Reem used Factory to deal with the POST to handle the new state.  The POST identifying what it just did by the return. Different states are put into POST, so that new prospective verbs, without creating verbs for REST/HTTP can be used to advantage without breaking universal clients. Biggest issue with REST services is their lack of state, yet it is also one of their biggest strengths.  What happens is that the client takes up the often onerous task of handling all state, state machines, and other extraneous resource management.  All the GETs, POSTs, DELETEs, INSERTs get all pushed into abstraction.  My 2 cents is that this in a way ends up pushing a huge proprietary burden onto the REST services often removing the point of REST to be simple and to the point. WADL does provide discovery and some state control (sort of?) Statement made, "WADL" isn't needed.  The JSON, XML, or other client side returned data handles this. I then applied the law of 2 feet rule for myself and headed to finish up these notes, post to the Wiki, and figure out what I was going to do next.  For the original Wiki entry check it out here. I will be adding more to this post with a subsequent post.  Please do feel free to post your thoughts and ideas about this, as I am sure everyone in the session will have more for elaboration.

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• Copy New Files Only in .NET

  - by psheriff

  Recently I had a client that had a need to copy files from one folder to another. However, there was a process that was running that would dump new files into the original folder every minute or so. So, we needed to be able to copy over all the files one time, then also be able to go back a little later and grab just the new files. After looking into the System.IO namespace, none of the classes within here met my needs exactly. Of course I could build it out of the various File and Directory classes, but then I remembered back to my old DOS days (yes, I am that old!). The XCopy command in DOS (or the command prompt for you pure Windows people) is very powerful. One of the options you can pass to this command is to grab only newer files when copying from one folder to another. So instead of writing a ton of code I decided to simply call the XCopy command using the Process class in .NET. The command I needed to run at the command prompt looked like this: XCopy C:\Original\*.* D:\Backup\*.* /q /d /y What this command does is to copy all files from the Original folder on the C drive to the Backup folder on the D drive. The /q option says to do it quitely without repeating all the file names as it copies them. The /d option says to get any newer files it finds in the Original folder that are not in the Backup folder, or any files that have a newer date/time stamp. The /y option will automatically overwrite any existing files without prompting the user to press the "Y" key to overwrite the file. To translate this into code that we can call from our .NET programs, you can write the CopyFiles method presented below. C# using System.Diagnostics public void CopyFiles(string source, string destination){  ProcessStartInfo si = new ProcessStartInfo();  string args = @"{0}\*.* {1}\*.* /q /d /y";   args = string.Format(args, source, destination);   si.FileName = "xcopy";  si.Arguments = args;  Process.Start(si);} VB.NET Imports System.Diagnostics Public Sub CopyFiles(source As String, destination As String)  Dim si As New ProcessStartInfo()  Dim args As String = "{0}\*.* {1}\*.* /q /d /y"   args = String.Format(args, source, destination)   si.FileName = "xcopy"  si.Arguments = args  Process.Start(si)End Sub The CopyFiles method first creates a ProcessStartInfo object. This object is where you fill in name of the command you wish to run and also the arguments that you wish to pass to the command. I created a string with the arguments then filled in the source and destination folders using the string.Format() method. Finally you call the Start method of the Process class passing in the ProcessStartInfo object. That's all there is to calling any command in the operating system. Very simple, and much less code than it would have taken had I coded it using the various File and Directory classes. Good Luck with your Coding,Paul Sheriff ** SPECIAL OFFER FOR MY BLOG READERS **Visit http://www.pdsa.com/Event/Blog for a free video on Silverlight entitled Silverlight XAML for the Complete Novice - Part 1.  

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• SPARC T5-4 LDoms for RAC and WebLogic Clusters

  - by Jeff Taylor-Oracle

  I wanted to use two Oracle SPARC T5-4 servers to simultaneously host both Oracle RAC and a WebLogic Server Cluster. I chose to use Oracle VM Server for SPARC to create a cluster like this: There are plenty of trade offs and decisions that need to be made, for example: Rather than configuring the system by hand, you might want to use an Oracle SuperCluster T5-8 My configuration is similar to jsavit's: Availability Best Practices - Example configuring a T5-8 but I chose to ignore some of the advice. Maybe I should have included an  alternate service domain, but I decided that I already had enough redundancy Both Oracle SPARC T5-4 servers were to be configured like this: Cntl 0.25  4  64GB                     App LDom                    2.75 CPU's                                        44 cores                                          704 GB              DB LDom      One CPU         16 cores         256 GB   The systems started with everything in the primary domain: # ldm list NAME             STATE      FLAGS   CONS    VCPU  MEMORY   UTIL  NORM  UPTIME primary          active     -n-c--  UART    512   1023G    0.0%  0.0%  11m # ldm list-spconfig factory-default [current] primary # ldm list -o core,memory,physio NAME              primary           CORE     CID    CPUSET     0      (0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7)     1      (8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15)     2      (16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23) -- SNIP     62     (496, 497, 498, 499, 500, 501, 502, 503)     63     (504, 505, 506, 507, 508, 509, 510, 511) MEMORY     RA               PA               SIZE                 0x30000000       0x30000000       255G     0x80000000000    0x80000000000    256G     0x100000000000   0x100000000000   256G     0x180000000000   0x180000000000   256G # Give this memory block to the DB LDom IO     DEVICE                           PSEUDONYM        OPTIONS     pci@300                          pci_0                pci@340                          pci_1                pci@380                          pci_2                pci@3c0                          pci_3                pci@400                          pci_4                pci@440                          pci_5                pci@480                          pci_6                pci@4c0                          pci_7                pci@300/pci@1/pci@0/pci@6        /SYS/RCSA/PCIE1     pci@300/pci@1/pci@0/pci@c        /SYS/RCSA/PCIE2     pci@300/pci@1/pci@0/pci@4/pci@0/pci@c /SYS/MB/SASHBA0     pci@300/pci@1/pci@0/pci@4/pci@0/pci@8 /SYS/RIO/NET0        pci@340/pci@1/pci@0/pci@6        /SYS/RCSA/PCIE3     pci@340/pci@1/pci@0/pci@c        /SYS/RCSA/PCIE4     pci@380/pci@1/pci@0/pci@a        /SYS/RCSA/PCIE9     pci@380/pci@1/pci@0/pci@4        /SYS/RCSA/PCIE10     pci@3c0/pci@1/pci@0/pci@e        /SYS/RCSA/PCIE11     pci@3c0/pci@1/pci@0/pci@8        /SYS/RCSA/PCIE12     pci@400/pci@1/pci@0/pci@e        /SYS/RCSA/PCIE5     pci@400/pci@1/pci@0/pci@8        /SYS/RCSA/PCIE6     pci@440/pci@1/pci@0/pci@e        /SYS/RCSA/PCIE7     pci@440/pci@1/pci@0/pci@8        /SYS/RCSA/PCIE8     pci@480/pci@1/pci@0/pci@a        /SYS/RCSA/PCIE13     pci@480/pci@1/pci@0/pci@4        /SYS/RCSA/PCIE14     pci@4c0/pci@1/pci@0/pci@8        /SYS/RCSA/PCIE15     pci@4c0/pci@1/pci@0/pci@4        /SYS/RCSA/PCIE16     pci@4c0/pci@1/pci@0/pci@c/pci@0/pci@c /SYS/MB/SASHBA1     pci@4c0/pci@1/pci@0/pci@c/pci@0/pci@4 /SYS/RIO/NET2    Added an additional service processor configuration: # ldm add-spconfig split # ldm list-spconfig factory-default primary split [current] And removed many of the resources from the primary domain: # ldm start-reconf primary # ldm set-core 4 primary # ldm set-memory 32G primary # ldm rm-io pci@340 primary # ldm rm-io pci@380 primary # ldm rm-io pci@3c0 primary # ldm rm-io pci@400 primary # ldm rm-io pci@440 primary # ldm rm-io pci@480 primary # ldm rm-io pci@4c0 primary # init 6 Needed to add resources to the guest domains: # ldm add-domain db # ldm set-core cid=`seq -s"," 48 63` db # ldm add-memory mblock=0x180000000000:256G db # ldm add-io pci@480 db # ldm add-io pci@4c0 db # ldm add-domain app # ldm set-core 44 app # ldm set-memory 704G  app # ldm add-io pci@340 app # ldm add-io pci@380 app # ldm add-io pci@3c0 app # ldm add-io pci@400 app # ldm add-io pci@440 app Needed to set up services: # ldm add-vds primary-vds0 primary # ldm add-vcc port-range=5000-5100 primary-vcc0 primary Needed to add a virtual network port for the WebLogic application domain: # ipadm NAME              CLASS/TYPE STATE        UNDER      ADDR lo0               loopback   ok           --         --    lo0/v4         static     ok           --         ...    lo0/v6         static     ok           --         ... net0              ip         ok           --         ...    net0/v4        static     ok           --         xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx/24    net0/v6        addrconf   ok           --         ....    net0/v6        addrconf   ok           --         ... net8              ip         ok           --         --    net8/v4        static     ok           --         ... # dladm show-phys LINK              MEDIA                STATE      SPEED  DUPLEX    DEVICE net1              Ethernet             unknown    0      unknown   ixgbe1 net0              Ethernet             up         1000   full      ixgbe0 net8              Ethernet             up         10     full      usbecm2 # ldm add-vsw net-dev=net0 primary-vsw0 primary # ldm add-vnet vnet1 primary-vsw0 app Needed to add a virtual disk to the WebLogic application domain: # format Searching for disks...done AVAILABLE DISK SELECTIONS:        0. c0t5000CCA02505F874d0 <HITACHI-H106060SDSUN600G-A2B0-558.91GB>           /scsi_vhci/disk@g5000cca02505f874           /dev/chassis/SPARC_T5-4.AK00084038/SYS/SASBP0/HDD0/disk        1. c0t5000CCA02506C468d0 <HITACHI-H106060SDSUN600G-A2B0-558.91GB>           /scsi_vhci/disk@g5000cca02506c468           /dev/chassis/SPARC_T5-4.AK00084038/SYS/SASBP0/HDD1/disk        2. c0t5000CCA025067E5Cd0 <HITACHI-H106060SDSUN600G-A2B0-558.91GB>           /scsi_vhci/disk@g5000cca025067e5c           /dev/chassis/SPARC_T5-4.AK00084038/SYS/SASBP0/HDD2/disk        3. c0t5000CCA02506C258d0 <HITACHI-H106060SDSUN600G-A2B0-558.91GB>           /scsi_vhci/disk@g5000cca02506c258           /dev/chassis/SPARC_T5-4.AK00084038/SYS/SASBP0/HDD3/disk Specify disk (enter its number): ^C # ldm add-vdsdev /dev/dsk/c0t5000CCA02506C468d0s2 HDD1@primary-vds0 # ldm add-vdisk HDD1 HDD1@primary-vds0 app Add some additional spice to the pot: # ldm set-variable auto-boot\\?=false db # ldm set-variable auto-boot\\?=false app # ldm set-var boot-device=HDD1 app Bind the logical domains: # ldm bind db # ldm bind app At the end of the process, the system is set up like this: # ldm list -o core,memory,physio NAME             primary          CORE     CID    CPUSET     0      (0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7)     1      (8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15)     2      (16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23)     3      (24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31) MEMORY     RA               PA               SIZE                0x30000000       0x30000000       32G IO     DEVICE                           PSEUDONYM        OPTIONS     pci@300                          pci_0               pci@300/pci@1/pci@0/pci@6        /SYS/RCSA/PCIE1     pci@300/pci@1/pci@0/pci@c        /SYS/RCSA/PCIE2     pci@300/pci@1/pci@0/pci@4/pci@0/pci@c /SYS/MB/SASHBA0     pci@300/pci@1/pci@0/pci@4/pci@0/pci@8 /SYS/RIO/NET0   ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ NAME             app              CORE     CID    CPUSET     4      (32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39)     5      (40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47)     6      (48, 49, 50, 51, 52, 53, 54, 55)     7      (56, 57, 58, 59, 60, 61, 62, 63)     8      (64, 65, 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71)     9      (72, 73, 74, 75, 76, 77, 78, 79)     10     (80, 81, 82, 83, 84, 85, 86, 87)     11     (88, 89, 90, 91, 92, 93, 94, 95)     12     (96, 97, 98, 99, 100, 101, 102, 103)     13     (104, 105, 106, 107, 108, 109, 110, 111)     14     (112, 113, 114, 115, 116, 117, 118, 119)     15     (120, 121, 122, 123, 124, 125, 126, 127)     16     (128, 129, 130, 131, 132, 133, 134, 135)     17     (136, 137, 138, 139, 140, 141, 142, 143)     18     (144, 145, 146, 147, 148, 149, 150, 151)     19     (152, 153, 154, 155, 156, 157, 158, 159)     20     (160, 161, 162, 163, 164, 165, 166, 167)     21     (168, 169, 170, 171, 172, 173, 174, 175)     22     (176, 177, 178, 179, 180, 181, 182, 183)     23     (184, 185, 186, 187, 188, 189, 190, 191)     24     (192, 193, 194, 195, 196, 197, 198, 199)     25     (200, 201, 202, 203, 204, 205, 206, 207)     26     (208, 209, 210, 211, 212, 213, 214, 215)     27     (216, 217, 218, 219, 220, 221, 222, 223)     28     (224, 225, 226, 227, 228, 229, 230, 231)     29     (232, 233, 234, 235, 236, 237, 238, 239)     30     (240, 241, 242, 243, 244, 245, 246, 247)     31     (248, 249, 250, 251, 252, 253, 254, 255)     32     (256, 257, 258, 259, 260, 261, 262, 263)     33     (264, 265, 266, 267, 268, 269, 270, 271)     34     (272, 273, 274, 275, 276, 277, 278, 279)     35     (280, 281, 282, 283, 284, 285, 286, 287)     36     (288, 289, 290, 291, 292, 293, 294, 295)     37     (296, 297, 298, 299, 300, 301, 302, 303)     38     (304, 305, 306, 307, 308, 309, 310, 311)     39     (312, 313, 314, 315, 316, 317, 318, 319)     40     (320, 321, 322, 323, 324, 325, 326, 327)     41     (328, 329, 330, 331, 332, 333, 334, 335)     42     (336, 337, 338, 339, 340, 341, 342, 343)     43     (344, 345, 346, 347, 348, 349, 350, 351)     44     (352, 353, 354, 355, 356, 357, 358, 359)     45     (360, 361, 362, 363, 364, 365, 366, 367)     46     (368, 369, 370, 371, 372, 373, 374, 375)     47     (376, 377, 378, 379, 380, 381, 382, 383) MEMORY     RA               PA               SIZE                0x30000000       0x830000000      192G     0x4000000000     0x80000000000    256G     0x8080000000     0x100000000000   256G IO     DEVICE                           PSEUDONYM        OPTIONS     pci@340                          pci_1               pci@380                          pci_2               pci@3c0                          pci_3               pci@400                          pci_4               pci@440                          pci_5               pci@340/pci@1/pci@0/pci@6        /SYS/RCSA/PCIE3     pci@340/pci@1/pci@0/pci@c        /SYS/RCSA/PCIE4     pci@380/pci@1/pci@0/pci@a        /SYS/RCSA/PCIE9     pci@380/pci@1/pci@0/pci@4        /SYS/RCSA/PCIE10     pci@3c0/pci@1/pci@0/pci@e        /SYS/RCSA/PCIE11     pci@3c0/pci@1/pci@0/pci@8        /SYS/RCSA/PCIE12     pci@400/pci@1/pci@0/pci@e        /SYS/RCSA/PCIE5     pci@400/pci@1/pci@0/pci@8        /SYS/RCSA/PCIE6     pci@440/pci@1/pci@0/pci@e        /SYS/RCSA/PCIE7     pci@440/pci@1/pci@0/pci@8        /SYS/RCSA/PCIE8 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ NAME             db               CORE     CID    CPUSET     48     (384, 385, 386, 387, 388, 389, 390, 391)     49     (392, 393, 394, 395, 396, 397, 398, 399)     50     (400, 401, 402, 403, 404, 405, 406, 407)     51     (408, 409, 410, 411, 412, 413, 414, 415)     52     (416, 417, 418, 419, 420, 421, 422, 423)     53     (424, 425, 426, 427, 428, 429, 430, 431)     54     (432, 433, 434, 435, 436, 437, 438, 439)     55     (440, 441, 442, 443, 444, 445, 446, 447)     56     (448, 449, 450, 451, 452, 453, 454, 455)     57     (456, 457, 458, 459, 460, 461, 462, 463)     58     (464, 465, 466, 467, 468, 469, 470, 471)     59     (472, 473, 474, 475, 476, 477, 478, 479)     60     (480, 481, 482, 483, 484, 485, 486, 487)     61     (488, 489, 490, 491, 492, 493, 494, 495)     62     (496, 497, 498, 499, 500, 501, 502, 503)     63     (504, 505, 506, 507, 508, 509, 510, 511) MEMORY     RA               PA               SIZE                0x80000000       0x180000000000   256G IO     DEVICE                           PSEUDONYM        OPTIONS     pci@480                          pci_6               pci@4c0                          pci_7               pci@480/pci@1/pci@0/pci@a        /SYS/RCSA/PCIE13     pci@480/pci@1/pci@0/pci@4        /SYS/RCSA/PCIE14     pci@4c0/pci@1/pci@0/pci@8        /SYS/RCSA/PCIE15     pci@4c0/pci@1/pci@0/pci@4        /SYS/RCSA/PCIE16     pci@4c0/pci@1/pci@0/pci@c/pci@0/pci@c /SYS/MB/SASHBA1     pci@4c0/pci@1/pci@0/pci@c/pci@0/pci@4 /SYS/RIO/NET2   Start the domains: # ldm start app LDom app started # ldm start db LDom db started Make sure to start the vntsd service that was created, above. # svcs -a | grep ldo disabled        8:38:38 svc:/ldoms/vntsd:default online          8:38:58 svc:/ldoms/agents:default online          8:39:25 svc:/ldoms/ldmd:default # svcadm enable vntsd Now use the MAC address to configure the Solaris 11 Automated Installation. Database Logical Domain # telnet localhost 5000 {0} ok devalias screen                   /pci@4c0/pci@1/pci@0/pci@c/pci@0/pci@7/display@0 disk7                    /pci@4c0/pci@1/pci@0/pci@c/pci@0/pci@c/scsi@0/disk@p3 disk6                    /pci@4c0/pci@1/pci@0/pci@c/pci@0/pci@c/scsi@0/disk@p2 disk5                    /pci@4c0/pci@1/pci@0/pci@c/pci@0/pci@c/scsi@0/disk@p1 disk4                    /pci@4c0/pci@1/pci@0/pci@c/pci@0/pci@c/scsi@0/disk@p0 scsi1                    /pci@4c0/pci@1/pci@0/pci@c/pci@0/pci@c/scsi@0 net3                     /pci@4c0/pci@1/pci@0/pci@c/pci@0/pci@4/network@0,1 net2                     /pci@4c0/pci@1/pci@0/pci@c/pci@0/pci@4/network@0 virtual-console          /virtual-devices/console@1 name                     aliases {0} ok boot net2 Boot device: /pci@4c0/pci@1/pci@0/pci@c/pci@0/pci@4/network@0  File and args: 1000 Mbps full duplex Link up Requesting Internet Address for xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx Requesting Internet Address for xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx WLS Logical Domain # telnet localhost 5001 {0} ok devalias hdd1                     /virtual-devices@100/channel-devices@200/disk@0 vnet1                    /virtual-devices@100/channel-devices@200/network@0 net                      /virtual-devices@100/channel-devices@200/network@0 disk                     /virtual-devices@100/channel-devices@200/disk@0 virtual-console          /virtual-devices/console@1 name                     aliases {0} ok boot net Boot device: /virtual-devices@100/channel-devices@200/network@0  File and args: Requesting Internet Address for xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx Requesting Internet Address for xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx Repeat the process for the second SPARC T5-4, install Solaris, RAC and WebLogic Cluster, and you are ready to go. Maybe buying a SuperCluster would have been easier.

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• [EF + Oracle] Entities

  - by JTorrecilla

  Prologue Following with the Serie I started yesterday about Entity Framework with Oracle, Today I am going to start talking about Entities. What is an Entity? A Entity is an object of the EF model corresponding to a record in a DB table. For example, let’s see, in Image 1 we can see one Entity from our model, and in the second one we can see the mapping done with the DB. (Image 1) (Image 2) More in depth a Entity is a Class inherited from the abstract class “EntityObject”, contained by the “System.Data.Objects.DataClasses” namespace. At the same time, this class inherits from the following Class and interfaces: StructuralObject: It is an Abstract class that inherits from INotifyPropertyChanging and INotifyPropertyChanged interfaces, and it exposes the events that manage the Changes of the class, and the functions related to check the data types of the Properties from our Entity.  IEntityWithKey: Interface which exposes the Key of the entity. IEntityWithChangeTracker: Interface which lets indicate the state of the entity (Detached, Modified, Added…) IEntityWithRelationships: Interface which indicates the relations about the entity. Which is the Content of a Entity? A Entity is composed by: Properties, Navigation Properties and Methods. What is a Property? A Entity Property is an object that represents a column from the mapped table from DB. It has a data type equivalent in .Net Framework to the DB Type. When we create the EF model, VS, internally, create the code for each Entity selected in the Tables step, such all methods that we will see in next steps. For each property, VS creates a structure similar to: · Private variable with the mapped Data type. · Function with a name like On{Property_Name}Changing({dataType} value): It manages the event which happens when we try to change the value. · Function with a name like On{Property_Name}Change: It manages the event raised when the property has changed successfully. · Property with Get and Set methods: The Set Method manages the private variable and do the following steps: Raise Changing event. Report the Entity is Changing. Set the prívate variable. For it, Use the SetValidValue function of the StructuralObject. There is a function for each datatype, and the functions takes 2 params: the value, and if the prop allow nulls. Invoke that the entity has been successfully changed. Invoke the Changed event of the Prop. ReportPropertyChanging and ReportPropertyChanged events, let, respectively, indicate that there is pending changes in the Entity, and the changes have success correctly. While the ReportPropertyChanged is raised, the Track State of the Entity will be changed. What is a Navigation Property? Navigation Properties are a kind of property of the type: EntityCollection<TEntity>, where TEntity is an Entity type from the model related with the current one, it is said, is a set of record from a related table in the DB. The EntityCollection class inherits from: · RelatedEnd: There is an abstract class that give the functions needed to obtein the related objects. · ICollection<TEntity> · IEnumerable<TEntity> · IEnumerable · IListSource For the previous interfaces, I wish recommend the following post from Jose Miguel Torres. Navigation properties allow us, to get and query easily objects related with the Entity. Methods? There is only one method in the Entity object. “Create{Entity}”, that allow us to create an object of the Entity by sending the parameters needed to create it. Finally After this chapter, we know what is an Entity, how is related to the DB and the relation to other Entities. In following chapters, we will se CRUD operations(Create, Read, Update, Delete).

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• SSIS - Connect to Oracle on a 64-bit machine (Updated for SSIS 2008 R2)

  - by jorg

  We recently had a few customers where a connection to Oracle on a 64 bit machine was necessary. A quick search on the internet showed that this could be a big problem. I found all kind of blog and forum posts of developers complaining about this. A lot of developers will recognize the following error message: Test connection failed because of an error in initializing provider. Oracle client and networking components were not found. These components are supplied by Oracle Corporation and are part of the Oracle Version 7.3.3 or later client software installation. Provider is unable to function until these components are installed. After a lot of searching, trying and debugging I think I found the right way to do it! Problems Because BIDS is a 32 bit application, as well on 32 as on 64 bit machines, it cannot see the 64 bit driver for Oracle. Because of this, connecting to Oracle from BIDS on a 64 bit machine will never work when you install the 64 bit Oracle client. Another problem is the "Microsoft Provider for Oracle", this driver only exists in a 32 bit version and Microsoft has no plans to create a 64 bit one in the near future. The last problem I know of is in the Oracle client itself, it seems that a connection will never work with the instant client, so always use the full client. There are also a lot of problems with the 10G client, one of it is the fact that this driver can't handle the "(x86)" in the path of SQL Server. So using the 10G client is no option! Solution Download the Oracle 11G full client. Install the 32 AND the 64 bit version of the 11G full client (Installation Type: Administrator) and reboot the server afterwards. The 32 bit version is needed for development from BIDS with is 32 bit, the 64 bit version is needed for production with the SQLAgent, which is 64 bit. Configure the Oracle clients (both 32 and 64 bits) by editing  the files tnsnames.ora and sqlnet.ora. Try to do this with an Oracle DBA or, even better, let him/her do this. Use the "Oracle provider for OLE DB" from SSIS, don't use the "Microsoft Provider for Oracle" because a 64 bit version of it does not exist. Schedule your packages with the SQLAgent. Background information Visual Studio (BI Dev Studio)is a 32bit application. SQL Server Management Studio is a 32bit application. dtexecui.exe is a 32bit application. dtexec.exe has both 32bit and 64bit versions. There are x64 and x86 versions of the Oracle provider available. SQLAgent is a 64bit process. My advice to BI consultants is to get an Oracle DBA or professional for the installation and configuration of the 2 full clients (32 and 64 bit). Tell the DBA to download the biggest client available, this way you are sure that they pick the right one ;-) Testing if the clients have been installed and configured in the right way can be done with Windows ODBC Data Source Administrator: Start... Programs... Administrative tools... Data Sources (ODBC) ADITIONAL STEPS FOR SSIS 2008 R2 It seems that, unfortunately, some additional steps are necessary for SQL Server 2008 R2 installations: 1. Open REGEDIT (Start… Run… REGEDIT) on the server and search for the following entry (for the 32 bits driver): HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\MSDTC\MTxOCI Make sure the following values are entered: 2. Next, search for (for the 64 bits driver): HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\MSDTC\MTxOCI Make sure the same values as above are entered. 3. Reboot your server.

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• Windows 8 Camp&ndash;Ways to Prepare

  - by Lori Lalonde

  When Windows 8 was announced at the BUILD conference back in September, it created quite a buzz among the developer community. By the spring of 2012,  Windows 8 Developer Camps started popping up everywhere imaginable. I received a lot of questions from CTTDNUG members about whether or not we would be hosting one locally. If you recall my post about the Windows Phone/Azure Developer Workshop that CTTDNUG hosted back in March, you’ll remember that the biggest hurdle to overcome when planning this type of event was finding the right venue. It took some time, but I finally found a venue that was available and provided the prerequisites needed to ensure this camp is a success. I am very excited that CTTDNUG will be hosting a Windows 8 Camp this summer in the Kitchener/Waterloo area. In fact, it’s coming up in less than 2 weeks. Clearly other developers are excited as well, because our registration numbers show that the event is already 70% full! On top of that, I was fortunate enough to also book two well-known evangelists to present and teach at this full day developer camp: Andrei Marukovich and Atley Hunter. This was the icing on the cake. With the content provided by Microsoft, and two local experts that live and breathe Windows 8 development, I know that I, along with other developers that attend this event, will have the opportunity to maximize our learning potential and hit the ground running. If you plan on attending a Windows 8 Developer Camp soon, and want to ensure you get the most “bang for your buck” (figuratively speaking, since these camps are free), there are some things you can do to prepare before the big day: 1) Install the prerequisites on your own device before the big day I can’t stress this enough. Otherwise, you will be spending valuable time during the hands-on period downloading and installing what is needed, rather than digging into the development and using that time to ask the experts on-hand about programming challenges, issues, questions you may have with respect to your development. Prerequisites: Windows 8 Release Preview Visual Studio 2012 RC Download the Windows 8 SDK Samples 2) Purchase, download, and read Charles Petzold’s newest book:  Programming Windows 6th Edition This is a great introduction to the type of content you will be learning about during the camp. Doing some light reading beforehand might raise some questions about the concepts discussed in the book, which will give you the opportunity to write them down and bring them with you to the camp. The experts on hand will be able to answer them for you. 3) Make use of the freebies that are available Telerik has recently released a preview of their RadControls for Metro. You can sign up to receive a license code to give you access to install the preview for free and start playing around with it. Syncfusion also offers a free download of their Metro Studio package, which is a collection of metro style icons that you can customize and use in your own applications. Last but not least, once you’ve installed the Windows 8 Release Preview on your own device, go to the Windows 8 Store and download a handful of the free apps that are available. Testing out other Metro apps may give you ideas of what you can do in your own apps and analyze what features you like: application flow, type of animations used, concepts that were leveraged, how live tiles were used, etc. I hope you found these tips to be useful as you embark on a new development journey! Although this post focused on how to prepare for a Windows 8 camp, the same ideas are there whichever developer camp/workshop/event you attend. Learning does not begin and end on the day of the event. Attending a developer camp is just one step of many to master whatever technology you are interested in. It is a continuous process, which is fully maximized when you do your homework beforehand, actively participate during,  and follow up by putting what you learned to practice afterwards. Happy coding!

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• SQL Azure: Notes on Building a Shard Technology

  - by Herve Roggero

  In Chapter 10 of the book on SQL Azure (http://www.apress.com/book/view/9781430229612) I am co-authoring, I am digging deeper in what it takes to write a Shard. It's actually a pretty cool exercise, and I wanted to share some thoughts on how I am designing the technology. A Shard is a technology that spreads the load of database requests over multiple databases, as transparently as possible. The type of shard I am building is called a Vertical Partition Shard  (VPS). A VPS is a mechanism by which the data is stored in one or more databases behind the scenes, but your code has no idea at design time which data is in which database. It's like having a mini cloud for records instead of services. Imagine you have three SQL Azure databases that have the same schema (DB1, DB2 and DB3), you would like to issue a SELECT * FROM Users on all three databases, concatenate the results into a single resultset, and order by last name. Imagine you want to ensure your code doesn't need to change if you add a new database to the shard (DB4). Now imagine that you want to make sure all three databases are queried at the same time, in a multi-threaded manner so your code doesn't have to wait for three database calls sequentially. Then, imagine you would like to obtain a breadcrumb (in the form of a new, virtual column) that gives you a hint as to which database a record came from, so that you could update it if needed. Now imagine all that is done through the standard SqlClient library... and you have the Shard I am currently building. Here are some lessons learned and techniques I am using with this shard: Parellel Processing: Querying databases in parallel is not too hard using the Task Parallel Library; all you need is to lock your resources when needed Deleting/Updating Data: That's not too bad either as long as you have a breadcrumb. However it becomes more difficult if you need to update a single record and you don't know in which database it is. Inserting Data: I am using a round-robin approach in which each new insert request is directed to the next database in the shard. Not sure how to deal with Bulk Loads just yet... Shard Databases:  I use a static collection of SqlConnection objects which needs to be loaded once; from there on all the Shard commands use this collection Extension Methods: In order to make it look like the Shard commands are part of the SqlClient class I use extension methods. For example I added ExecuteShardQuery and ExecuteShardNonQuery methods to SqlClient. Exceptions: Capturing exceptions in a multi-threaded code is interesting... but I kept it simple for now. I am using the ConcurrentQueue to store my exceptions. Database GUID: Every database in the shard is given a GUID, which is calculated based on the connection string's values. DataTable. The Shard methods return a DataTable object which can be bound to objects.  I will be sharing the code soon as an open-source project in CodePlex. Please stay tuned on twitter to know when it will be available (@hroggero). Or check www.bluesyntax.net for updates on the shard. Thanks!

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• Attachments in Oracle BPM 11g – Create a BPM Process Instance by passing an Attachment

  - by Venugopal Mangipudi

  Problem Statement: On a recent engagement I had  a requirement where we needed to create BPM instances using a message start event. The challenge was that the instance needed to be created after polling a file location and attaching the picked up file (pdf) as an attachment to the instance. Proposed Solution: I was contemplating using process API to accomplish this,but came up with a solution which involves a BPEL process to pickup the file and send a notification to the BPM process by passing the attachment as a payload. The following are some of the brief steps that were used to build the solution: BPM Process to receive an attachment as part of the payload: The BPM Process is a very simple process which has a Message Start event that accepts the attachment as an argument and a Simple User Task that the user can use to view the attachment (as part of the OOTB attachment panel). The Input payload is based on AttachmentPayload.xsd.  The 3 key elements of the the payload are: <xsd:element name="filename" type="xsd:string"/> <xsd:element name="mimetype" type="xsd:string"/> <xsd:element name="content" type="xsd:base64Binary"/> A screenshot of the Human task data assignment that need to performed to attach the file is provided here. Once the process and the UI project (default generated UI) are deployed to the SOA server, copy the wsdl location of the process service (from EM). This WSDL would be used in the BPEL project to create the Instances in the BPM process after a file is polled. BPEL Process to Poll for File and create instances in the BPM process: For the BPEL process a File adapter was configured as a Read service (File Streaming option and keeping the Schema as Opaque). Once a location and the file pattern to poll are provided the Readservice Partner Link was wired to Invoke the BPEL Process. Also, using the BPM Process WSDL, we can create the Webservice reference and can invoke the start operation. Before we do the assignment for the Invoke operation, a global variable should be created to hold the value of the fileName of the file. The mapping to the global variable can be done on the Receive activity properties (jca.file.FileName).  So for the assign operation before we invoke the BPM process service, we can get the content of the file from the receive input variable and the fileName from the jca.file.FileName property. The mimetype needs to be hard coded to the mime-type of the file: application/pdf (I am still researching ways to derive the mime type as it is not available as part of the jca.file properties).  The screenshot of the BPEL process can be found here and the Assign activity can be found here. The project source can be found at the following location. A sample pdf file to test the project and a screenshot of the BPM Human task screen after the successful creation of the instance can be found here. References: [1] https://blogs.oracle.com/fmwinaction/entry/oracle_bpm_adding_an_attachment

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• Getting Started with NASM

  - by MarkPearl

  Today I got to play with NASM. This is an assembler and disassembler that can be used to write 16-bit, 32-bit & 64-bit programs. Let me say upfront that the last time I looked at assembly code at any depth was when I was studying Computer Science in Pietermaritzburg – ten years ago – and we never ever got to touch any real assembly code so a lot of what I am looking at today is very new to me. The first thing I did was download NASM compiler. This turned out to be a bit more complicated than I thought. Originally I went to http://www.nasm.us/ and downloaded the nasm-2.09.04.zip file which I thought had all I needed. No luck! It seemed to just have the uncompiled code, and from what I could tell I would need to recompile and build it – possibly in c++? Well, I wasn’t going to waste my time with that, so a bit more searching and I found the Win32 (http://www.nasm.us/pub/nasm/releasebuilds/2.09.04/win32/) folder Nasm.exe which I downloaded. Choosing an IDE So, I have NASM compiler but to compile anything you need to pass a string of special characters in the command prompt. That’s fine if I was going to just do one program once every couple of years, but since I am aiming to do quite a bit more exploration of NASM I began searching for an IDE. There were a few options, even apparently Visual Studio with a bit of tweeking could do the job, but from past experience I wanted to avoid the VS route as it can sometimes get confusing. I eventually settled on TextPad which I had used a few years ago for a similar project and it had been simple enough yet powerful enough to do the job. A bit of searching and I found a syntax file for NASM and everything seemed hunky dory. Configuring TextPad to run the NASM Compiler Next was to get TextPad to run the NASM compiler. TextPad has this external tools option that allows one to configure special commands. To simplify the process I first created a bat file in the NASM directory that allowed me to simply compile asm files. The bat file was called as.bat and had just one line of code… nasm -f bin %1.asm -o %1.com -l %1.lst Once I had created as.bat I just needed to go into TextPad and create a tool. I have made a quick video of that just showing you where the various settings are which is viewable below. The 64Bit Problem So I now have an ‘IDE’ linked to my NASM compiler so everything should be fine right? No! Whenever I tried to compile an asm program it compiles fine, but when I try and run it I get an error – “This version of the file is not compatible with the version Windows you’re running. Check your computer’s system information to see whether you need an x86 (32-bit) or x64 (64-bit) version of the program, and then contact the software publisher." Well.. it turns out there are a few complications with having a 64 bit OS! So after searching google and coming to any real solution that I could find other than perhaps attempting to build the code for nasm, I eventually resorted to running a VM with Windows XP on it and putting NASM there… My first hello world program So I attempt my first hello world program as per an example I found… the code was quite simple and is shown below… bits16 org 0x100 jmp main message: db 'Hello World',0ah,0dh,'$' main: mov dx,message mov ah,09 int 21h int 20h Running the build tool from TextPad and everything compiles fine and I now have a console app with helllo world shown. Conclusion It’s very early days with NASM. I have been spoilt with Visual Studio and high order languages so I assume it will be a painful ride getting into the basics of assembly programming but I am hoping that at the end of it, I will at least have a bit more exposure to a language closer to the metal.

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• Script to UPDATE STATISTICS with time window

  - by Bill Graziano

  I recently spent some time troubleshooting odd query plans and came to the conclusion that we needed better statistics.  We’ve been running sp_updatestats but apparently it wasn’t sampling enough of the table to get us what we needed.  I have a pretty limited window at night where I can hammer the disks while this runs.  The script below just calls UPDATE STATITICS on all tables that “need” updating.  It defines need as any table whose statistics are older than the number of days you specify (30 by default).  It also has a throttle so it breaks out of the loop after a set amount of time (60 minutes).  That means it won’t start processing a new table after this time but it might take longer than this to finish what it’s doing.  It always processes the oldest statistics first so it will eventually get to all of them.  It defaults to sample 25% of the table.  I’m not sure that’s a good default but it works for now.  I’ve tested this in SQL Server 2005 and SQL Server 2008.  I liked the way Michelle parameterized her re-index script and I took the same approach. CREATE PROCEDURE dbo.UpdateStatistics ( @timeLimit smallint = 60 ,@debug bit = 0 ,@executeSQL bit = 1 ,@samplePercent tinyint = 25 ,@printSQL bit = 1 ,@minDays tinyint = 30 )AS/******************************************************************* Copyright Bill Graziano 2010*******************************************************************/SET NOCOUNT ON;PRINT '[ ' + CAST(GETDATE() AS VARCHAR(100)) + ' ] ' + 'Launching...'IF OBJECT_ID('tempdb..#status') IS NOT NULL DROP TABLE #status;CREATE TABLE #status( databaseID INT , databaseName NVARCHAR(128) , objectID INT , page_count INT , schemaName NVARCHAR(128) Null , objectName NVARCHAR(128) Null , lastUpdateDate DATETIME , scanDate DATETIME CONSTRAINT PK_status_tmp PRIMARY KEY CLUSTERED(databaseID, objectID));DECLARE @SQL NVARCHAR(MAX);DECLARE @dbName nvarchar(128);DECLARE @databaseID INT;DECLARE @objectID INT;DECLARE @schemaName NVARCHAR(128);DECLARE @objectName NVARCHAR(128);DECLARE @lastUpdateDate DATETIME;DECLARE @startTime DATETIME;SELECT @startTime = GETDATE();DECLARE cDB CURSORREAD_ONLYFOR select [name] from master.sys.databases where database_id > 4OPEN cDBFETCH NEXT FROM cDB INTO @dbNameWHILE (@@fetch_status <> -1)BEGIN IF (@@fetch_status <> -2) BEGIN SELECT @SQL = ' use ' + QUOTENAME(@dbName) + ' select DB_ID() as databaseID , DB_NAME() as databaseName ,t.object_id ,sum(used_page_count) as page_count ,s.[name] as schemaName ,t.[name] AS objectName , COALESCE(d.stats_date, ''1900-01-01'') , GETDATE() as scanDate from sys.dm_db_partition_stats ps join sys.tables t on t.object_id = ps.object_id join sys.schemas s on s.schema_id = t.schema_id join ( SELECT object_id, MIN(stats_date) as stats_date FROM ( select object_id, stats_date(object_id, stats_id) as stats_date from sys.stats) as d GROUP BY object_id ) as d ON d.object_id = t.object_id where ps.row_count > 0 group by s.[name], t.[name], t.object_id, COALESCE(d.stats_date, ''1900-01-01'') ' SET ANSI_WARNINGS OFF; Insert #status EXEC ( @SQL); SET ANSI_WARNINGS ON; END FETCH NEXT FROM cDB INTO @dbNameENDCLOSE cDBDEALLOCATE cDBDECLARE cStats CURSORREAD_ONLYFOR SELECT databaseID , databaseName , objectID , schemaName , objectName , lastUpdateDate FROM #status WHERE DATEDIFF(dd, lastUpdateDate, GETDATE()) >= @minDays ORDER BY lastUpdateDate ASC, page_count desc, [objectName] ASC OPEN cStatsFETCH NEXT FROM cStats INTO @databaseID, @dbName, @objectID, @schemaName, @objectName, @lastUpdateDateWHILE (@@fetch_status <> -1)BEGIN IF (@@fetch_status <> -2) BEGIN IF DATEDIFF(mi, @startTime, GETDATE()) > @timeLimit BEGIN PRINT '[ ' + CAST(GETDATE() AS VARCHAR(100)) + ' ] ' + '*** Time Limit Reached ***'; GOTO __DONE; END SELECT @SQL = 'UPDATE STATISTICS ' + QUOTENAME(@dBName) + '.' + QUOTENAME(@schemaName) + '.' + QUOTENAME(@ObjectName) + ' WITH SAMPLE ' + CAST(@samplePercent AS NVARCHAR(100)) + ' PERCENT;'; IF @printSQL = 1 PRINT '[ ' + CAST(GETDATE() AS VARCHAR(100)) + ' ] ' + @SQL + ' (Last Updated: ' + CAST(@lastUpdateDate AS VARCHAR(100)) + ')' IF @executeSQL = 1 BEGIN EXEC (@SQL); END END FETCH NEXT FROM cStats INTO @databaseID, @dbName, @objectID, @schemaName, @objectName, @lastUpdateDateEND__DONE:CLOSE cStatsDEALLOCATE cStatsPRINT '[ ' + CAST(GETDATE() AS VARCHAR(100)) + ' ] ' + 'Completed.'GO

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• Oracle MDM Maturity Model

  - by David Butler

  A few weeks ago, I discussed the results of a survey conducted by Oracle’s Insight team. The survey was based on the data management maturity model that the Oracle Insight team has developed over the years as they analyzed customer IT organizations to help them get more out of everything they already have. I thought you might like to learn more about the maturity model itself. It can help you figure out where you stand when it comes to getting your organizations data management act together. The model covers maturity levels around five key areas: Profiling data sources; Defining a data strategy; Defining a data consolidation plan; Data maintenance; and Data utilization. Profile data sources: Profiling data sources involves taking an inventory of all data sources from across your IT landscape. Then evaluate the quality of the data in each source system. This enables the scoping of what data to collect into an MDM hub and what rules are needed to insure data harmonization across systems. Define data strategy: A data strategy requires an understanding of the data usage. Given data usage, various data governance requirements need to be developed. This includes data controls and security rules as well as data structure and usage policies. Define data consolidation strategy: Consolidation requires defining your operational data model. How integration is to be accomplished. Cross referencing common data attributes from multiple systems is needed. Synchronization policies also need to be developed. Data maintenance: The desired standardization needs to be defined, including what constitutes a ‘match’ once the data has been standardized. Cleansing rules are a part of this methodology. Data quality monitoring requirements also need to be defined. Utilize the data: What data gets published, and who consumes the data must be determined. How to get the right data to the right place in the right format given its intended use must be understood. Validating the data and insuring security rules are in place and enforced are crucial aspects for full no-risk data utilization. For each of the above data management areas, a maturity level needs to be assessed. Where your organization wants to be should also be identified using the same maturity levels. This results in a sound gap analysis your organization can use to create action plans to achieve the ultimate goals. Marginal is the lowest level. It is characterized by manually maintaining trusted sources; lacking or inconsistent, silo’d structures with limited integration, and gaps in automation. Stable is the next leg up the MDM maturity staircase. It is characterized by tactical MDM implementations that are limited in scope and target a specific division.  It includes limited data stewardship capabilities as well. Best Practice is a serious MDM maturity level characterized by process automation improvements. The scope is enterprise wide. It is a business solution that provides a single version of the truth, with closed-loop data quality capabilities. It is typically driven by an enterprise architecture group with both business and IT representation.   Transformational is the highest MDM maturity level. At this level, MDM is quantitatively managed. It is integrated with Business Intelligence, SOA, and BPM. MDM is leveraged in business process orchestration. Take an inventory using this MDM Maturity Model and see where you are in your journey to full MDM maturity with all the business benefits that accrue to organizations who have mastered their data for the benefit of all operational applications, business processes, and analytical systems. To learn more, Trevor Naidoo and I have written the Oracle MDM Maturity Model whitepaper. It’s free, so go ahead and download it and use it as you see fit.

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• WebCenter Customer Spotlight: Textron Inc.

  - by me

  Author: Peter Reiser - Social Business Evangelist, Oracle WebCenter  Solution SummaryTextron Inc. is one of the world's best known multi-industry companies and is a pioneer of the diversified business model. Founded in 1923, it has grown into a network of businesses—including Bell Helicopter, E-Z-GO, Cessna, and Jacobsen—with facilities and a presence in 25 countries, serving a diverse and global customer base. Textron is ranked 236th on the Fortune 500 list of the largest US companies. Textron needed a Web experience management solution to centralize control, minimize costs, and enable more efficient operations. Specifically, the company wanted to take IT out of the picture as much as possible, enabling sales and marketing leads for subsidiaries to make Website updates as they deem appropriate for their business.   Textron worked with Oracle partner Element Solutions to consolidate its Website management systems onto Oracle WebCenter Sites. The implementation enables Textron’s subsidiaries to adjust more quickly to customer demands,  reduced Website management cost & time to update content on a Website while allowing to integrate its Website updates more closely with social media and mobile platforms. Company OverviewTextron Inc. is one of the world's best known multi-industry companies and is a pioneer of the diversified business model. Founded in 1923, it has grown into a network of businesses—including Bell Helicopter, E-Z-GO, Cessna, and Jacobsen—with facilities and a presence in 25 countries, serving a diverse and global customer base. Textron is ranked 236th on the Fortune 500 list of the largest US companies. Business ChallengesWith numerous subsidiaries and more than 50 public Websites, Textron needed a Web experience management solution to centralize control, minimize costs, and enable more efficient operations. Specifically, the company wanted to take IT out of the picture as much as possible, enabling sales and marketing leads for subsidiaries to make Website updates as they deem appropriate for their business.   Solution DeployedTextron worked with Oracle partner Element Solutions to consolidate its Website management systems onto Oracle WebCenter Sites. Specifically, Textron: Used Oracle WebCenter Sites to integrate Web experience management capabilities for all Textron brands, including Bell Helicopter, E-Z-GO, Cessna, and Jacobsen Developed Website templates to enable marketing and communications professionals to easily make updates to their Websites, without having to work with IT Reduced Website management costs, as it costs more for IT to coordinate Website updates as opposed to marketing and communications Enabled IT to concentrate on other activities to enhance overall operations for Textron, such as project workflows Acquired a platform that enables marketing teams to integrate their Websites with social media and mobile platforms, allowing subsidiaries to make updates and contact customers anytime and everywhere—including through tablets and smartphones Reduced the time it takes to update content on a Website, including press releases, by enabling communications professionals to make updates directly Developed more appealing visual designs for Websites to help enhance customer purchase Business ResultsThe implementation enabled Textron’s subsidiaries to adjust more quickly to customer demands and Textron’s IT staff to concentrate on other processes, such as writing code and developing new workflows, enabling them to enhance company processes. In addition, Textron can use Oracle WebCenter Sites to integrate its Website updates more closely with social media and mobile platforms, enabling marketing and communications teams to make updates anytime and everywhere. The initiative has enabled Textron to save money by freeing IT up to work on more important tasks, instituting new e-commerce and mobile initiatives to better engage customers, and by ensuring efficient Website management processes to quickly adjust to customer demands.  “We considered a number of products, but chose Oracle WebCenter Sites because it provides the best user interface. We reviewed customer references and analyst reports, and Oracle WebCenter Sites was consistently at the top of the list,” Brad Hof, Manager, Advanced Business Solutions and Web Communications, Textron Inc. Additional Information Tectron Inc. Customer Snapshot Oracle WebCenter Sites

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• database design help for game / user levels / progress

  - by sprugman

  Sorry this got long and all prose-y. I'm creating my first truly gamified web app and could use some help thinking about how to structure the data. The Set-up Users need to accomplish tasks in each of several categories before they can move up a level. I've got my Users, Tasks, and Categories tables, and a UserTasks table which joins the three. ("User 3 has added Task 42 in Category 8. Now they've completed it.") That's all fine and working wonderfully. The Challenge I'm not sure of the best way to track the progress in the individual categories toward each level. The "business" rules are: You have to achieve a certain number of points in each category to move up. If you get the number of points needed in Cat 8, but still have other work to do to complete the level, any new Cat 8 points count toward your overall score, but don't "roll over" into the next level. The number of Categories is small (five currently) and unlikely to change often, but by no means absolutely fixed. The number of points needed to level-up will vary per level, probably by a formula, or perhaps a lookup table. So the challenge is to track each user's progress toward the next level in each category. I've thought of a few potential approaches: Possible Solutions Add a column to the users table for each category and reset them all to zero each time a user levels-up. Have a separate UserProgress table with a row for each category for each user and the number of points they have. (Basically a Many-to-Many version of #1.) Add a userLevel column to the UserTasks table and use that to derive their progress with some kind of SUM statement. Their current level will be a simple int in the User table. Pros & Cons (1) seems like by far the most straightforward, but it's also the least flexible. Perhaps I could use a naming convention based on the category ids to help overcome some of that. (With code like "select cats; for each cat, get the value from Users.progress_{cat.id}.") It's also the one where I lose the most data -- I won't know which points counted toward leveling up. I don't have a need in mind for that, so maybe I don't care about that. (2) seems complicated: every time I add or subtract a user or a category, I have to maintain the other table. I foresee synchronization challenges. (3) Is somewhere in between -- cleaner than #2, but less intuitive than #1. In order to find out where a user is, I'd have mildly complex SQL like: SELECT categoryId, SUM(points) from UserTasks WHERE userId={user.id} & countsTowardLevel={user.level} groupBy categoryId Hmm... that doesn't seem so bad. I think I'm talking myself into #3 here, but would love any input, advice or other ideas. P.S. Sorry for the cross-post. I wrote this up on SO and then remembered that there was a game dev-focused one. Curious to see if I get different answers one place than the other....

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• Notes from a short presentation on NodeJs

  - by Aligned

  Originally posted on: http://geekswithblogs.net/Aligned/archive/2014/05/30/notes-from-a-short-presentation-on-nodejs.aspxI volunteered myself to give a short 30 minute presentation at a work lunch and learn on NodeJs. With my limited experience I see using Node as a great tool for build process improvement, scaffolding with yeoman, and running tests with Karma. I haven’t looked into using as a full server or development stack. I guess I’m too stuck on IIS and Visual Studio :-). Here are my notes, that aren’t very well formatted, but I wanted to share it anyways. What is it? "Node.js is a platform built on Chrome's JavaScript runtime for easily building fast, scalable network applications. Node.js uses an event-driven, non-blocking I/O model that makes it lightweight and efficient, perfect for data-intensive real-time applications that run across distributed devices." Why should you be interested? another popular tool that can help you get the job done you can use the command prompt! can be run at build or release time to automate tasks What are some uses? https://www.npmjs.org/ - NuGet for Node packages http://bower.io/ - NuGet for UI JavaScript libraries (jQuery, Bootstrap, Angular, etc) http://yeoman.io/ "Our workflow is comprised of three tools for improving your productivity and satisfaction when building a web app: yo (the scaffolding tool), grunt (the build tool) and bower (for package management)." -> yeoman asks which components you want alternative - http://joakimbeng.eu01.aws.af.cm/slush-replacing-yeoman-with-gulp/ https://www.npmjs.org/package/generator-cg-angular - phantom js, less, // git is needed for bower http://git-scm.com/ run installer in Windows before you can use bower // select Run Git from the Windows Command Prompt in the installer // requires a reboot http://stackoverflow.com/questions/20069297/bower-git-not-in-the-path-error npm install -g git npm install -g yo npm install -g generator-cg-angular mkdir myapp cd myapp yo cg-angular npm install -g bower npm install -g grunt-cli yo bower grunt serve grunt test grunt build // there are many generators (generator-angular) is another one // I like the Nuget HotTowel-Angular from John Papa myself // needed IIS Node for Express -> prompt from WebMatrix Karma bat to startup Karma - see below image compression - https://www.npmjs.org/search?q=optimize+images, https://github.com/heldr/node-smushit - do it from the command line LESS compiling js and css combine and minification at build with Gulp for requireJS apps quick lightweight HTTP server - "Express" Build pipeline with Grunt or Gulp http://www.johnpapa.net/gulp-and-grunt-at-anglebrackets/ Gulp is the newer and improved over Grunt. Supposed to be easier to use, but Grunt is more established. https://github.com/johnpapa/ng-demos/tree/master/grunt-gulp https://github.com/assetgraph/assetgraph-builder Does a lot of the minimizing, combining, image optimization etc using Node. Looks interesting.... http://nodejs.org http://nodeschool.io/ http://sub.watchmecode.net/getting-started-with-nodejs-installing-and-writing-your-first-code/ https://stormpath.com/blog/build-a-killer-node-dot-js-client-for-your-rest-plus-json-api/ https://codio.com/ http://www.hanselman.com/blog/ItsJustASoftwareIssueEdgejsBringsNodeAndNETTogetherOnThreePlatforms.aspx run unit tests - Karma in msBuild karma-start.bat @echo off cd %~dp0\.. REM 604800 is to make sure we only update once every 7 days call npm install --cache-min 604800 -g grunt-cli call npm install --cache-min 604800 call npm install --cache-min 604800 -g karma-cli karma start UnitTests\karma.conf.js REM karma start UnitTests\karma.conf.js --single-run REM see karma-start.bat and karam.config.js REM jsHint comes from Nuget

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• Are Chief Digital Officers the Result of CMO/CIO Refusal to Change?

  - by Mike Stiles

  Apparently CDO no longer just stands for “Collateralized Debt Obligations.”  It stands for Chief Digital Officer. And they’re the ones who are supposed to answer the bat signal CEO’s are throwing into the sky, swoop in and POW! drive the transition of the enterprise to integrated digital systems. So imagine being a CMO or a CIO at such an enterprise and realizing it’s been determined that you are not the answer that’s needed. In fact, IntelligentHQ author Ashley Friedlein points out the very rise of the CDO is an admission of C-Suite failure to become savvy enough, quickly enough in modern technology. Is that fair? Despite the repeated drumbeat that CMO’s and CIO’s must enter a new era of cooperation and collaboration to enact the social-enabled enterprise, the verdict seems to be that if it’s happening at all, it’s not happening fast enough. Therefore, someone else is needed with the authority to make things happen. So who is this relatively new beast? Gartner VP David Willis says, “The Chief Digital Officer plays in the place where the enterprise meets the customer, where the revenue is generated, and the mission accomplished.” In other words, where the rubber meets the road. They aren’t just another “C” heading up a unit. They’re the CEO’s personal SWAT team, able to call the shots necessary across all units to affect what has become job one…customer experience. And what are the CMO’s and CIO’s doing while this is going on? Playing corporate games. Accenture reports 38% of CMOs say IT deliberately keeps them out of the loop, with 35% saying marketing’s needs aren’t a very high priority. 31% of CIOs say marketers don’t understand tech and regularly go around them for solutions. Fun! Meanwhile the CEO feels the need to bring in a parental figure to pull it all together. Gartner thinks 25% of all orgs will have a CDO by 2015 as CMO’s and particularly CIO’s (Peter Hinssen points out many CDO’s are coming “from anywhere but IT”) let the opportunity to be the agent of change their company needs slip away. Perhaps most interestingly, these CDO’s seem to be entering the picture already on the fast track. One consultancy counted 7 instances of a CDO moving into the CEO role, which, as this Wired article points out, is pretty astounding since nobody ever heard of the job a few years ago. And vendors are quickly figuring out that this is the person they need to be talking to inside the brand. The position isn’t without its critics. Forrester’s Martin Gill says the reaction from executives at some traditional companies to someone being brought in to be in charge of digital might be to wash their own hands of responsibility for all things digital – a risky maneuver given the pervasiveness of digital in business. They might not even be called Chief Digital Officers. They might be the Chief Customer Officer, Chief Experience Officer, etc. You can call them Twinkletoes if you want to, but essentially anyone who has the mandate direct from the CEO to enact modern technology changes not currently being championed by the CMO or CIO can be regarded as “boss.” @mikestiles @oraclesocialPhoto: freedigitalphotos.net

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• Process Is The New App by Leon Smiers

  - by JuergenKress

  Process-on-the-Fly #2 - Process is the New App The next generation of business process management and business rules management tools is so powerful that it actually can be seen as the successor to custom-built applications. Being able to define detailed process, flows, decision trees and business helps on both the business and IT side to create powerful, differentiating solutions that would have required extensive custom coding in the past. Now much of the definition can be done ‘on the fly,’ using visual models and (semi) natural language in the nearest proximity to the business. Over the years, ERP systems have been customized to enter organization-specific functionality into the ERP application. This leads to better support for the business, but at the same time involves higher costs for maintenance, high dependency on the personnel involved in this customization, long timelines to deliver change to the system and increased risk involved in upgrading the ERP system. However, the best of both worlds can be created by bringing back the functionality to out-of-the-box usage of the ERP system and at the same time introducing change and flexibility by means of externalized 'Process Apps' in direct connection with the ERP system. The ERP system (or legacy bespoke system, for that matter) is used as originally intended and designed, resulting in more predictable behavior of the system related to usage and performance, and clearly can be maintained in a more standardized and cost-effective way. The Prrocess App externalizes the needed functionality into a highly customizable application outside the ERP for which it is supported by rules engines, task inboxes and can be delivered to different channels. The reasons for needing Process Apps may include the following: The ERP system just doesn't deliver this functionality in a specific industry; the volatility of changing certain functionality is high; or an umbrella type of functionality across (ERP) silos is needed. An example of bringing all this together is around the hiring process for a new employee at a university. Oracle PeopleSoft HCM could be used as the HR system to store all employee details. In the hiring process, an authorization scheme is involved for getting the approval to create a contract for the employee-to-be. In the university world, this authorization scheme is complex and involves faculties/colleges (with different organizational structures) and cross-faculty organizational structures. Including such an authorization scheme into PeopleSoft would require a lot of customization. By adding a handle inside PeopleSoft towards an externalized authorization Process App, the execution of the authorization of the employee is done outside the ERP: in a tool that is aimed to deliver approval schemes via a worklist-type of application. The Process App here works as an add-on to the PeopleSoft system, but can also be extended to support the full lifecycle of the end-to-end hiring process with the possibility to involve multiple applications. The actual core functionality is kept in the supporting ERP systems, while at the same time the Process App acts as an umbrella function to control the end-to-end flow and give insight into the efficiency of the end-to-end process. How to get there? Read the complete article here. SOA & BPM Partner Community For regular information on Oracle SOA Suite become a member in the SOA & BPM Partner Community for registration please visit www.oracle.com/goto/emea/soa (OPN account required) If you need support with your account please contact the Oracle Partner Business Center. Blog Twitter LinkedIn Facebook Wiki Technorati Tags: Capgemini,Leon Smiers,SOA Community,Oracle SOA,Oracle BPM,Community,OPN,Jürgen Kress

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• Oracle Fusion Supply Chain Management (SCM) Designs May Improve End User Productivity

  - by Applications User Experience

  By Applications User Experience on March 10, 2011 Michele Molnar, Senior Usability Engineer, Applications User Experience The Challenge: The SCM User Experience team, in close collaboration with product management and strategy, completely redesigned the user experience for Oracle Fusion applications. One of the goals of this redesign was to increase end user productivity by applying design patterns and guidelines and incorporating findings from extensive usability research. But a question remained: How do we know that the Oracle Fusion designs will actually increase end user productivity? The Test: To answer this question, the SCM Usability Engineers compared Oracle Fusion designs to their corresponding existing Oracle applications using the workflow time analysis method. The workflow time analysis method breaks tasks into a sequence of operators. By applying standard time estimates for all of the operators in the task, an estimate of the overall task time can be calculated. The workflow time analysis method has been recently adopted by the Applications User Experience group for use in predicting end user productivity. Using this method, a design can be tested and refined as needed to improve productivity even before the design is coded. For the study, we selected some of our recent designs for Oracle Fusion Product Information Management (PIM). The designs encompassed tasks performed by Product Managers to create, manage, and define products for their organization. (See Figure 1 for an example.) In applying this method, the SCM Usability Engineers collaborated with Product Management to compare the new Oracle Fusion Applications designs against Oracle’s existing applications. Together, we performed the following activities: Identified the five most frequently performed tasks Created detailed task scenarios that provided the context for each task Conducted task walkthroughs Analyzed and documented the steps and flow required to complete each task Applied standard time estimates to the operators in each task to estimate the overall task completion time Figure 1. The interactions on each Oracle Fusion Product Information Management screen were documented, as indicated by the red highlighting. The task scenario and script provided the context for each task.  The Results: The workflow time analysis method predicted that the Oracle Fusion Applications designs would result in productivity gains in each task, ranging from 8% to 62%, with an overall productivity gain of 43%. All other factors being equal, the new designs should enable these tasks to be completed in about half the time it takes with existing Oracle Applications. Further analysis revealed that these performance gains would be achieved by reducing the number of clicks and screens needed to complete the tasks. Conclusions: Using the workflow time analysis method, we can expect the Oracle Fusion Applications redesign to succeed in improving end user productivity. The workflow time analysis method appears to be an effective and efficient tool for testing, refining, and retesting designs to optimize productivity. The workflow time analysis method does not replace usability testing with end users, but it can be used as an early predictor of design productivity even before designs are coded. We are planning to conduct usability tests later in the development cycle to compare actual end user data with the workflow time analysis results. Such results can potentially be used to validate the productivity improvement predictions. Used together, the workflow time analysis method and usability testing will enable us to continue creating, evaluating, and delivering Oracle Fusion designs that exceed the expectations of our end users, both in the quality of the user experience and in productivity. (For more information about studying productivity, refer to the Measuring User Productivity blog.)

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• Why is there no service-oriented language?

  - by Wolfgang

  Edit: To avoid further confusion: I am not talking about web services and such. I am talking about structuring applications internally, it's not about how computers communicate. It's about programming languages, compilers and how the imperative programming paradigm is extended. Original: In the imperative programming field, we saw two paradigms in the past 20 years (or more): object-oriented (OO), and service-oriented (SO) aka. component-based (CB). Both paradigms extend the imperative programming paradigm by introducing their own notion of modules. OO calls them objects (and classes) and lets them encapsulates both data (fields) and procedures (methods) together. SO, in contrast, separates data (records, beans, ...) from code (components, services). However, only OO has programming languages which natively support its paradigm: Smalltalk, C++, Java and all other JVM-compatibles, C# and all other .NET-compatibles, Python etc. SO has no such native language. It only comes into existence on top of procedural languages or OO languages: COM/DCOM (binary, C, C++), CORBA, EJB, Spring, Guice (all Java), ... These SO frameworks clearly suffer from the missing native language support of their concepts. They start using OO classes to represent services and records. This leads to designs where there is a clear distinction between classes that have methods only (services) and those that have fields only (records). Inheritance between services or records is then simulated by inheritance of classes. Technically, its not kept so strictly but in general programmers are adviced to make classes to play only one of the two roles. They use additional, external languages to represent the missing parts: IDL's, XML configurations, Annotations in Java code, or even embedded DSL like in Guice. This is especially needed, but not limited to, since the composition of services is not part of the service code itself. In OO, objects create other objects so there is no need for such facilities but for SO there is because services don't instantiate or configure other services. They establish an inner-platform effect on top of OO (early EJB, CORBA) where the programmer has to write all the code that is needed to "drive" SO. Classes represent only a part of the nature of a service and lots of classes have to be written to form a service together. All that boiler plate is necessary because there is no SO compiler which would do it for the programmer. This is just like some people did it in C for OO when there was no C++. You just pass the record which holds the data of the object as a first parameter to the procedure which is the method. In a OO language this parameter is implicit and the compiler produces all the code that we need for virtual functions etc. For SO, this is clearly missing. Especially the newer frameworks extensively use AOP or introspection to add the missing parts to a OO language. This doesn't bring the necessary language expressiveness but avoids the boiler platform code described in the previous point. Some frameworks use code generation to produce the boiler plate code. Configuration files in XML or annotations in OO code is the source of information for this. Not all of the phenomena that I mentioned above can be attributed to SO but I hope it clearly shows that there is a need for a SO language. Since this paradigm is so popular: why isn't there one? Or maybe there are some academic ones but at least the industry doesn't use one.

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• What is the difference between Workcenters, Dashboards, and the Interaction Hub?

  - by Matthew Haavisto

  Oracle Open World has just concluded.  Over the course of the conference, we presented several sessions covering different aspects of the PeopleSoft user experience, including Workcenters, Dashboards, and the PeopleSoft Interaction Hub (formerly known as the PeopleSoft Applications Portal).  Although we've produced collateral on these features and covered them in sessions, it became apparent at the conference that customers still have many questions about the these products, including how they are licensed, how they are installed, what their various purposes are, and how they can be used together synergistically. Let's Start with Licensing and Installation As you may know, we've extended the restricted use license (RUL) for the Interaction Hub.  This grants customers with PeopleTools 8.52 licenses the right to install the Interaction Hub for free for use as specified in the Tools license notes.  Note that this means customers receive a restricted use license for the Interaction Hub that doesn't cost them an additional license fee, but it is a separate product, not part of PeopleTools or PeopleSoft applications, and is a separate installation.  This means customers must provide the infrastructure to install and run the Hub, just like any other application.  The benefits of using the Hub to unify your PeopleSoft user experience can be great.  PeopleSoft applications have not yet delivered instances of the Hub with their products, though they may in the future. Workcenters and Dashboards, on the other hand, are frameworks provided by PeopleTools.  No other license is required, and no additional installation of a separate product is needed (apart from PeopleTools and PeopleSoft applications).  PeopleSoft applications are delivering instances of the workcenters and dashboards with their products.  Some are available now, and more are coming in future releases.  These delivered workcenter and dashboard instances require no additional licenses, and no additional installations beyond Tools and the applications that provide them.  In addition, the workcenter and dashboard frameworks provided by PeopleTools can be used by customers to build their own workcenters and dashboards, and it's quite easy and simple to do so. What are Their Differences?  What Purposes do they Serve? Workcenters, Dashboards and the Interaction Hub appear somewhat similar.  They all contain pagelets, and have some visual characteristics in common.  However, their strengths and purposes are very different, and they were designed to provide different benefits to your PeopleSoft ecosystem. Workcenters and Dashboards have the following characteristics: Designed for specific roles Focus on the daily tasks of those roles Help to streamline the work performed most often Personal view of my work world Makes navigation and search easier and quicker, particularly for transactions and decision support Reports and data needed for day-to-day work Personalizable, but minimal Delivered by PS Apps, but can be altered by customer for their requirements Customers can create their own Workcenters can be used for guided processes  The Interaction Hub is designed to aggregate content from multiple applications, and is is used to unify the user experience of those applications.  It offers a rich, web site-based user experience, and is often used to provide access to infrequently performed activities like benefits enrollment, payroll inquiries, life event changes, onboarding, and so on. Full-featured and robust Centrally administered Pushed to large audience Broad info like Company News Infrequent activities like benefits, not day-to-day tasks Self-service, access to employer info Central launch point for other activities and can navigate to workcenters and dashboards Deployed by customers or consultants, instances not delivered by PeopleSoft (at this time) Content management Unified PS application navigation Although these products are quite different and serve different purposes in your PeopleSoft environment, they can be used together to provide a richer, more efficient and engaging user experience for your all your user communities.

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• Customers Discuss: Real-World Operational Reporting with Oracle GoldenGate

  - by Irem Radzik

  Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin-top:0in; mso-para-margin-right:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:10.0pt; mso-para-margin-left:0in; line-height:115%; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;} As businesses leverage business intelligence and analytics for day-to-day decision making, operational reporting solutions become more and more common. While some companies can use their production OLTP system for running operational reports, for many it is too much overhead and performance impact for transaction processing systems.  Oracle GoldenGate’s real-time data integration capabilities enable companies to create a real-time replica of their OLTP systems, dedicated for operational reporting. This instance can be optimized for the reports needed as well such as containing only the tables needed from the source. Oracle GoldenGate has certified solutions for many Oracle applications such as EBusiness Suite, Peoplesoft, JD Edwards, to offload operational reporting to another reporting server that has real-time data feeding from the production system. At Oracle OpenWorld we will be hearing from a panel of Oracle GoldenGate customers how they deployed GoldenGate for operational reporting. Comcast, Turk Telekom, and Raymond James will be sharing their experiences and the benefits achieved when implementing GoldenGate’s solution. If you have performance degradation in your production systems due to reporting or ad-hoc queries, and you will be at OpenWorld, don’t miss this informative session: Real-World Operational Reporting with Oracle GoldenGate: Customer Panel-- Tuesday Oct 2nd 11:45am Mascone West 3005. For other data integration sessions at OpenWorld, please check our Focus-On document.  Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin-top:0in; mso-para-margin-right:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:10.0pt; mso-para-margin-left:0in; line-height:115%; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;} If you cannot attend OpenWorld, please check out related white paper “Using Oracle GoldenGate to Achieve Operational Reporting for Oracle Applications” to learn more.

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