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• Storing same type but still getting an ArrayStoreException

  - by Firefoxx Pwnass

  I have strange problem. I have three classes. Book ( abstract ), and two subclasses ( Fiction, Nonfiction). I have created array of Book references. That array can hold both subclasse's objects. I'have following code for Fiction class. public class Fiction extends Book{ public Fiction(String title) { super(title); setPrice(); } public void setPrice() { super.price = 24.99; } } And the "same" code for Nonfiction class public class Nonfiction extends Book{ public Nonfiction(String title) { super(title); setPrice(); } public void setPrice() { super.price = 37.99; } } And this is Main program. import javax.swing.JOptionPane; public class Main { public static void main(String[] args) { Book[] book = new Fiction[6]; for(int i = 0; i<book.length; i++) { if(i<4) { String title = JOptionPane.showInputDialog("Enter fiction book, no "+i); book[i] = new Fiction(title); } else { String title = JOptionPane.showInputDialog("Enter non fiction book, no "+i); book[i] = new Nonfiction(title); } } for(int x = 0; x<book.length; x++) { System.out.println("Book named "+book[x].getTitle()+" costs "+book[x].getPrice()); } } } For any reason i'm getting ArrayStoreException on this line.. book[i] = new Nonfiction(title); But same code works for Fiction class. I checked java documentation and it says that this exception is thrown when i'm trying to store different objects in array ( like String and Int ), but in this case they are all the same objects. Both classes are children of superclass, that means, they are of the same type. I'm confsued. A little help here please?

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• Embedded Development Board

  - by ALF3130

  I'm new to the embedded development world and am looking to get my very first board. After some research, I realize that there aren't many choices with FPUs. This is important in my project as I'm going to be doing quite a bit of floating point computations. I found the Mini2440 which seems to run on the ARM920T core. This particular unit is perfect for my needs (decent price, all the right I/O ports, and a touch screen to boot) but it seems that it doesn't have an FPU. I don't know how big of a penalty I'd be paying for FP emulation, so I'm unsure of whether to pull the trigger on this one. That said: Can someone please confirm whether this product (Mini2440) has an FPU or not? My project will do image capture and analysis. Does anyone have any experience with running things like OpenMP on such platforms? Please suggest any other similar boards in the = $200 price range that have an FPU. This world is new to me. Any other advice or things I should be aware of is much appreciated.

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• Using VLOOKUP in Excel

  - by Mark Virtue

  VLOOKUP is one of Excel’s most useful functions, and it’s also one of the least understood.  In this article, we demystify VLOOKUP by way of a real-life example.  We’ll create a usable Invoice Template for a fictitious company. So what is VLOOKUP?  Well, of course it’s an Excel function.  This article will assume that the reader already has a passing understanding of Excel functions, and can use basic functions such as SUM, AVERAGE, and TODAY.  In its most common usage, VLOOKUP is a database function, meaning that it works with database tables – or more simply, lists of things in an Excel worksheet.  What sort of things?   Well, any sort of thing.  You may have a worksheet that contains a list of employees, or products, or customers, or CDs in your CD collection, or stars in the night sky.  It doesn’t really matter. Here’s an example of a list, or database.  In this case it’s a list of products that our fictitious company sells: Usually lists like this have some sort of unique identifier for each item in the list.  In this case, the unique identifier is in the “Item Code” column.  Note:  For the VLOOKUP function to work with a database/list, that list must have a column containing the unique identifier (or “key”, or “ID”), and that column must be the first column in the table.  Our sample database above satisfies this criterion. The hardest part of using VLOOKUP is understanding exactly what it’s for.  So let’s see if we can get that clear first: VLOOKUP retrieves information from a database/list based on a supplied instance of the unique identifier. Put another way, if you put the VLOOKUP function into a cell and pass it one of the unique identifiers from your database, it will return you one of the pieces of information associated with that unique identifier.  In the example above, you would pass VLOOKUP an item code, and it would return to you either the corresponding item’s description, its price, or its availability (its “In stock” quantity).  Which of these pieces of information will it pass you back?  Well, you get to decide this when you’re creating the formula. If all you need is one piece of information from the database, it would be a lot of trouble to go to to construct a formula with a VLOOKUP function in it.  Typically you would use this sort of functionality in a reusable spreadsheet, such as a template.  Each time someone enters a valid item code, the system would retrieve all the necessary information about the corresponding item. Let’s create an example of this:  An Invoice Template that we can reuse over and over in our fictitious company. First we start Excel… …and we create ourselves a blank invoice: This is how it’s going to work:  The person using the invoice template will fill in a series of item codes in column “A”, and the system will retrieve each item’s description and price, which will be used to calculate the line total for each item (assuming we enter a valid quantity). For the purposes of keeping this example simple, we will locate the product database on a separate sheet in the same workbook: In reality, it’s more likely that the product database would be located in a separate workbook.  It makes little difference to the VLOOKUP function, which doesn’t really care if the database is located on the same sheet, a different sheet, or a completely different workbook. In order to test the VLOOKUP formula we’re about to write, we first enter a valid item code into cell A11: Next, we move the active cell to the cell in which we want information retrieved from the database by VLOOKUP to be stored.  Interestingly, this is the step that most people get wrong.  To explain further:  We are about to create a VLOOKUP formula that will retrieve the description that corresponds to the item code in cell A11.  Where do we want this description put when we get it?  In cell B11, of course.  So that’s where we write the VLOOKUP formula – in cell B11. Select cell B11: We need to locate the list of all available functions that Excel has to offer, so that we can choose VLOOKUP and get some assistance in completing the formula.  This is found by first clicking the Formulas tab, and then clicking Insert Function:   A box appears that allows us to select any of the functions available in Excel.  To find the one we’re looking for, we could type a search term like “lookup” (because the function we’re interested in is a lookup function).  The system would return us a list of all lookup-related functions in Excel.  VLOOKUP is the second one in the list.  Select it an click OK… The Function Arguments box appears, prompting us for all the arguments (or parameters) needed in order to complete the VLOOKUP function.  You can think of this box as the function is asking us the following questions: What unique identifier are you looking up in the database? Where is the database? Which piece of information from the database, associated with the unique identifier, do you wish to have retrieved for you? The first three arguments are shown in bold, indicating that they are mandatory arguments (the VLOOKUP function is incomplete without them and will not return a valid value).  The fourth argument is not bold, meaning that it’s optional:   We will complete the arguments in order, top to bottom. The first argument we need to complete is the Lookup_value argument.  The function needs us to tell it where to find the unique identifier (the item code in this case) that it should be retuning the description of.  We must select the item code we entered earlier (in A11). Click on the selector icon to the right of the first argument: Then click once on the cell containing the item code (A11), and press Enter: The value of “A11” is inserted into the first argument. Now we need to enter a value for the Table_array argument.  In other words, we need to tell VLOOKUP where to find the database/list.  Click on the selector icon next to the second argument: Now locate the database/list and select the entire list – not including the header line.  The database is located on a separate worksheet, so we first click on that worksheet tab: Next we select the entire database, not including the header line: …and press Enter.  The range of cells that represents the database (in this case “’Product Database’!A2:D7”) is entered automatically for us into the second argument. Now we need to enter the third argument, Col_index_num.  We use this argument to specify to VLOOKUP which piece of information from the database, associate with our item code in A11, we wish to have returned to us.  In this particular example, we wish to have the item’s description returned to us.  If you look on the database worksheet, you’ll notice that the “Description” column is the second column in the database.  This means that we must enter a value of “2” into the Col_index_num box: It is important to note that that we are not entering a “2” here because the “Description” column is in the B column on that worksheet.  If the database happened to start in column K of the worksheet, we would still enter a “2” in this field. Finally, we need to decide whether to enter a value into the final VLOOKUP argument, Range_lookup.  This argument requires either a true or false value, or it should be left blank.  When using VLOOKUP with databases (as is true 90% of the time), then the way to decide what to put in this argument can be thought of as follows: If the first column of the database (the column that contains the unique identifiers) is sorted alphabetically/numerically in ascending order, then it’s possible to enter a value of true into this argument, or leave it blank. If the first column of the database is not sorted, or it’s sorted in descending order, then you must enter a value of false into this argument As the first column of our database is not sorted, we enter false into this argument: That’s it!  We’ve entered all the information required for VLOOKUP to return the value we need.  Click the OK button and notice that the description corresponding to item code “R99245” has been correctly entered into cell B11: The formula that was created for us looks like this: If we enter a different item code into cell A11, we will begin to see the power of the VLOOKUP function:  The description cell changes to match the new item code: We can perform a similar set of steps to get the item’s price returned into cell E11.  Note that the new formula must be created in cell E11.  The result will look like this: …and the formula will look like this: Note that the only difference between the two formulae is the third argument (Col_index_num) has changed from a “2” to a “3” (because we want data retrieved from the 3rd column in the database). If we decided to buy 2 of these items, we would enter a “2” into cell D11.  We would then enter a simple formula into cell F11 to get the line total: =D11*E11 …which looks like this… Completing the Invoice Template We’ve learned a lot about VLOOKUP so far.  In fact, we’ve learned all we’re going to learn in this article.  It’s important to note that VLOOKUP can be used in other circumstances besides databases.  This is less common, and may be covered in future How-To Geek articles. Our invoice template is not yet complete.  In order to complete it, we would do the following: We would remove the sample item code from cell A11 and the “2” from cell D11.  This will cause our newly created VLOOKUP formulae to display error messages: We can remedy this by judicious use of Excel’s IF() and ISBLANK() functions.  We change our formula from this…       =VLOOKUP(A11,’Product Database’!A2:D7,2,FALSE) …to this…       =IF(ISBLANK(A11),”",VLOOKUP(A11,’Product Database’!A2:D7,2,FALSE)) We would copy the formulas in cells B11, E11 and F11 down to the remainder of the item rows of the invoice.  Note that if we do this, the resulting formulas will no longer correctly refer to the database table.  We could fix this by changing the cell references for the database to absolute cell references.  Alternatively – and even better – we could create a range name for the entire product database (such as “Products”), and use this range name instead of the cell references.  The formula would change from this…       =IF(ISBLANK(A11),”",VLOOKUP(A11,’Product Database’!A2:D7,2,FALSE)) …to this…       =IF(ISBLANK(A11),”",VLOOKUP(A11,Products,2,FALSE)) …and then copy the formulas down to the rest of the invoice item rows. We would probably “lock” the cells that contain our formulae (or rather unlock the other cells), and then protect the worksheet, in order to ensure that our carefully constructed formulae are not accidentally overwritten when someone comes to fill in the invoice. We would save the file as a template, so that it could be reused by everyone in our company If we were feeling really clever, we would create a database of all our customers in another worksheet, and then use the customer ID entered in cell F5 to automatically fill in the customer’s name and address in cells B6, B7 and B8. If you would like to practice with VLOOKUP, or simply see our resulting Invoice Template, it can be downloaded from here. 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• ASP.NET and HTML5 Local Storage

  - by Stephen Walther

  My favorite feature of HTML5, hands-down, is HTML5 local storage (aka DOM storage). By taking advantage of HTML5 local storage, you can dramatically improve the performance of your data-driven ASP.NET applications by caching data in the browser persistently. Think of HTML5 local storage like browser cookies, but much better. Like cookies, local storage is persistent. When you add something to browser local storage, it remains there when the user returns to the website (possibly days or months later). Importantly, unlike the cookie storage limitation of 4KB, you can store up to 10 megabytes in HTML5 local storage. Because HTML5 local storage works with the latest versions of all modern browsers (IE, Firefox, Chrome, Safari), you can start taking advantage of this HTML5 feature in your applications right now. Why use HTML5 Local Storage? I use HTML5 Local Storage in the JavaScript Reference application: http://Superexpert.com/JavaScriptReference The JavaScript Reference application is an HTML5 app that provides an interactive reference for all of the syntax elements of JavaScript (You can read more about the application and download the source code for the application here). When you open the application for the first time, all of the entries are transferred from the server to the browser (all 300+ entries). All of the entries are stored in local storage. When you open the application in the future, only changes are transferred from the server to the browser. The benefit of this approach is that the application performs extremely fast. When you click the details link to view details on a particular entry, the entry details appear instantly because all of the entries are stored on the client machine. When you perform key-up searches, by typing in the filter textbox, matching entries are displayed very quickly because the entries are being filtered on the local machine. This approach can have a dramatic effect on the performance of any interactive data-driven web application. Interacting with data on the client is almost always faster than interacting with the same data on the server. Retrieving Data from the Server In the JavaScript Reference application, I use Microsoft WCF Data Services to expose data to the browser. WCF Data Services generates a REST interface for your data automatically. Here are the steps: Create your database tables in Microsoft SQL Server. For example, I created a database named ReferenceDB and a database table named Entities. Use the Entity Framework to generate your data model. For example, I used the Entity Framework to generate a class named ReferenceDBEntities and a class named Entities. Expose your data through WCF Data Services. I added a WCF Data Service to my project and modified the data service class to look like this:   using System.Data.Services; using System.Data.Services.Common; using System.Web; using JavaScriptReference.Models; namespace JavaScriptReference.Services { [System.ServiceModel.ServiceBehavior(IncludeExceptionDetailInFaults = true)] public class EntryService : DataService<ReferenceDBEntities> { // This method is called only once to initialize service-wide policies. public static void InitializeService(DataServiceConfiguration config) { config.UseVerboseErrors = true; config.SetEntitySetAccessRule("*", EntitySetRights.All); config.DataServiceBehavior.MaxProtocolVersion = DataServiceProtocolVersion.V2; } // Define a change interceptor for the Products entity set. [ChangeInterceptor("Entries")] public void OnChangeEntries(Entry entry, UpdateOperations operations) { if (!HttpContext.Current.Request.IsAuthenticated) { throw new DataServiceException("Cannot update reference unless authenticated."); } } } }     The WCF data service is named EntryService. Notice that it derives from DataService<ReferenceEntitites>. Because it derives from DataService<ReferenceEntities>, the data service exposes the contents of the ReferenceEntitiesDB database. In the code above, I defined a ChangeInterceptor to prevent un-authenticated users from making changes to the database. Anyone can retrieve data through the service, but only authenticated users are allowed to make changes. After you expose data through a WCF Data Service, you can use jQuery to retrieve the data by performing an Ajax call. For example, I am using an Ajax call that looks something like this to retrieve the JavaScript entries from the EntryService.svc data service: $.ajax({ dataType: "json", url: “/Services/EntryService.svc/Entries”, success: function (result) { var data = callback(result["d"]); } });     Notice that you must unwrap the data using result[“d”]. After you unwrap the data, you have a JavaScript array of the entries. I’m transferring all 300+ entries from the server to the client when the application is opened for the first time. In other words, I transfer the entire database from the server to the client, once and only once, when the application is opened for the first time. The data is transferred using JSON. Here is a fragment: { "d" : [ { "__metadata": { "uri": "http://superexpert.com/javascriptreference/Services/EntryService.svc/Entries(1)", "type": "ReferenceDBModel.Entry" }, "Id": 1, "Name": "Global", "Browsers": "ff3_6,ie8,ie9,c8,sf5,es3,es5", "Syntax": "object", "ShortDescription": "Contains global variables and functions", "FullDescription": "<p>\nThe Global object is determined by the host environment. In web browsers, the Global object is the same as the windows object.\n</p>\n<p>\nYou can use the keyword <code>this</code> to refer to the Global object when in the global context (outside of any function).\n</p>\n<p>\nThe Global object holds all global variables and functions. For example, the following code demonstrates that the global <code>movieTitle</code> variable refers to the same thing as <code>window.movieTitle</code> and <code>this.movieTitle</code>.\n</p>\n<pre>\nvar movieTitle = \"Star Wars\";\nconsole.log(movieTitle === this.movieTitle); // true\nconsole.log(movieTitle === window.movieTitle); // true\n</pre>\n", "LastUpdated": "634298578273756641", "IsDeleted": false, "OwnerId": null }, { "__metadata": { "uri": "http://superexpert.com/javascriptreference/Services/EntryService.svc/Entries(2)", "type": "ReferenceDBModel.Entry" }, "Id": 2, "Name": "eval(string)", "Browsers": "ff3_6,ie8,ie9,c8,sf5,es3,es5", "Syntax": "function", "ShortDescription": "Evaluates and executes JavaScript code dynamically", "FullDescription": "<p>\nThe following code evaluates and executes the string \"3+5\" at runtime.\n</p>\n<pre>\nvar result = eval(\"3+5\");\nconsole.log(result); // returns 8\n</pre>\n<p>\nYou can rewrite the code above like this:\n</p>\n<pre>\nvar result;\neval(\"result = 3+5\");\nconsole.log(result);\n</pre>", "LastUpdated": "634298580913817644", "IsDeleted": false, "OwnerId": 1 } … ]} I worried about the amount of time that it would take to transfer the records. According to Google Chome, it takes about 5 seconds to retrieve all 300+ records on a broadband connection over the Internet. 5 seconds is a small price to pay to avoid performing any server fetches of the data in the future. And here are the estimated times using different types of connections using Fiddler: Notice that using a modem, it takes 33 seconds to download the database. 33 seconds is a significant chunk of time. So, I would not use the approach of transferring the entire database up front if you expect a significant portion of your website audience to connect to your website with a modem. Adding Data to HTML5 Local Storage After the JavaScript entries are retrieved from the server, the entries are stored in HTML5 local storage. Here’s the reference documentation for HTML5 storage for Internet Explorer: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc197062(VS.85).aspx You access local storage by accessing the windows.localStorage object in JavaScript. This object contains key/value pairs. For example, you can use the following JavaScript code to add a new item to local storage: <script type="text/javascript"> window.localStorage.setItem("message", "Hello World!"); </script>   You can use the Google Chrome Storage tab in the Developer Tools (hit CTRL-SHIFT I in Chrome) to view items added to local storage: After you add an item to local storage, you can read it at any time in the future by using the window.localStorage.getItem() method: <script type="text/javascript"> window.localStorage.setItem("message", "Hello World!"); </script>   You only can add strings to local storage and not JavaScript objects such as arrays. Therefore, before adding a JavaScript object to local storage, you need to convert it into a JSON string. In the JavaScript Reference application, I use a wrapper around local storage that looks something like this: function Storage() { this.get = function (name) { return JSON.parse(window.localStorage.getItem(name)); }; this.set = function (name, value) { window.localStorage.setItem(name, JSON.stringify(value)); }; this.clear = function () { window.localStorage.clear(); }; }   If you use the wrapper above, then you can add arbitrary JavaScript objects to local storage like this: var store = new Storage(); // Add array to storage var products = [ {name:"Fish", price:2.33}, {name:"Bacon", price:1.33} ]; store.set("products", products); // Retrieve items from storage var products = store.get("products");   Modern browsers support the JSON object natively. If you need the script above to work with older browsers then you should download the JSON2.js library from: https://github.com/douglascrockford/JSON-js The JSON2 library will use the native JSON object if a browser already supports JSON. Merging Server Changes with Browser Local Storage When you first open the JavaScript Reference application, the entire database of JavaScript entries is transferred from the server to the browser. Two items are added to local storage: entries and entriesLastUpdated. The first item contains the entire entries database (a big JSON string of entries). The second item, a timestamp, represents the version of the entries. Whenever you open the JavaScript Reference in the future, the entriesLastUpdated timestamp is passed to the server. Only records that have been deleted, updated, or added since entriesLastUpdated are transferred to the browser. The OData query to get the latest updates looks like this: http://superexpert.com/javascriptreference/Services/EntryService.svc/Entries?$filter=(LastUpdated%20gt%20634301199890494792L) If you remove URL encoding, the query looks like this: http://superexpert.com/javascriptreference/Services/EntryService.svc/Entries?$filter=(LastUpdated gt 634301199890494792L) This query returns only those entries where the value of LastUpdated > 634301199890494792 (the version timestamp). The changes – new JavaScript entries, deleted entries, and updated entries – are merged with the existing entries in local storage. The JavaScript code for performing the merge is contained in the EntriesHelper.js file. The merge() method looks like this:   merge: function (oldEntries, newEntries) { // concat (this performs the add) oldEntries = oldEntries || []; var mergedEntries = oldEntries.concat(newEntries); // sort this.sortByIdThenLastUpdated(mergedEntries); // prune duplicates (this performs the update) mergedEntries = this.pruneDuplicates(mergedEntries); // delete mergedEntries = this.removeIsDeleted(mergedEntries); // Sort this.sortByName(mergedEntries); return mergedEntries; },   The contents of local storage are then updated with the merged entries. I spent several hours writing the merge() method (much longer than I expected). I found two resources to be extremely useful. First, I wrote extensive unit tests for the merge() method. I wrote the unit tests using server-side JavaScript. I describe this approach to writing unit tests in this blog entry. The unit tests are included in the JavaScript Reference source code. Second, I found the following blog entry to be super useful (thanks Nick!): http://nicksnettravels.builttoroam.com/post/2010/08/03/OData-Synchronization-with-WCF-Data-Services.aspx One big challenge that I encountered involved timestamps. I originally tried to store an actual UTC time as the value of the entriesLastUpdated item. I quickly discovered that trying to work with dates in JSON turned out to be a big can of worms that I did not want to open. Next, I tried to use a SQL timestamp column. However, I learned that OData cannot handle the timestamp data type when doing a filter query. Therefore, I ended up using a bigint column in SQL and manually creating the value when a record is updated. I overrode the SaveChanges() method to look something like this: public override int SaveChanges(SaveOptions options) { var changes = this.ObjectStateManager.GetObjectStateEntries( EntityState.Modified | EntityState.Added | EntityState.Deleted); foreach (var change in changes) { var entity = change.Entity as IEntityTracking; if (entity != null) { entity.LastUpdated = DateTime.Now.Ticks; } } return base.SaveChanges(options); }   Notice that I assign Date.Now.Ticks to the entity.LastUpdated property whenever an entry is modified, added, or deleted. Summary After building the JavaScript Reference application, I am convinced that HTML5 local storage can have a dramatic impact on the performance of any data-driven web application. If you are building a web application that involves extensive interaction with data then I recommend that you take advantage of this new feature included in the HTML5 standard.

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• UPK Customer Success Story: The City and County of San Francisco

  - by karen.rihs(at)oracle.com

  The value of UPK during an upgrade is a hot topic and was a primary focus during our latest customer roundtable featuring The City and County of San Francisco: Leveraging UPK to Accelerate Your PeopleSoft Upgrade. As the Change Management Analyst for their PeopleSoft 9.0 HCM project (Project eMerge), Jan Crosbie-Taylor provided a unique perspective on how they're utilizing UPK and UPK pre-built content early on to successfully manage change for thousands of city and county employees and retirees as they move to this new release. With the first phase of the project going live next September, it's important to the City and County of San Francisco to 1) ensure that the various constituents are brought along with the project team, and 2) focus on the end user aspects of the implementation, including training. Here are some highlights on how UPK and UPK pre-built content are helping them accomplish this: As a former documentation manager, Jan really appreciates the power of UPK as a single source content creation tool. It saves them time by streamlining the documentation creation process, enabling them to record content once, then repurpose it multiple times. With regard to change management, UPK has enabled them to educate the project team and gain critical buy in and support by familiarizing users with the application early on through User Experience Workshops and by promoting UPK at meetings whenever possible. UPK has helped create awareness for the project, making the project real to users. They are taking advantage of UPK pre-built content to: Educate the project team and subject matter experts on how PeopleSoft 9.0 works as delivered Create a guide/storyboard for their own recording Save time/effort and create consistency by enhancing their recorded content with text and conceptual information from the pre-built content Create PeopleSoft Help for their development databases by publishing and integrating the UPK pre-built content into the application help menu Look ahead to the next release of PeopleTools, comparing the differences to help the team evaluate which version to use with their implemtentation When it comes time for training, they will be utilizing UPK in the classroom, eliminating the time and cost of maintaining training databases. Instructors will be able to carry all training content on a thumb drive, allowing them to easily provide consistent training at their many locations, regardless of the environment. Post go-live, they will deploy the same UPK content to provide just-in-time, in-application support for the entire system via the PeopleSoft Help menu and their PeopleSoft Enterprise Portal. Users will already be comfortable with UPK as a source of help, having been exposed to it during classroom training. They are also using UPK for a non-Oracle application called JobAps, an online job application solution used by many government organizations. Jan found UPK's object recognition to be excellent, yet it's been incredibly easy for her to change text or a field name if needed. Please take time to listen to this recording. The City and County of San Francisco's UPK story is very exciting, and Jan shared so many great examples of how they're taking advantage of UPK and UPK pre-built content early on in their project. We hope others will be able to incorporate these into their projects. Many thanks to Jan for taking the time to share her experiences and creative uses of UPK with us! - Karen Rihs, Oracle UPK Outbound Product Management

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• The Windows Store... why did I sign up with this mess again?

  - by FransBouma

  Yesterday, Microsoft revealed that the Windows Store is now open to all developers in a wide range of countries and locations. For the people who think "wtf is the 'Windows Store'?", it's the central place where Windows 8 users will be able to find, download and purchase applications (or as we now have to say to not look like a computer illiterate: <accent style="Kentucky">aaaaappss</accent>) for Windows 8. As this is the store which is integrated into Windows 8, it's an interesting place for ISVs, as potential customers might very well look there first. This of course isn't true for all kinds of software, and developer tools in general aren't the kind of applications most users will download from the Windows store, but a presence there can't hurt. Now, this Windows Store hosts two kinds of applications: 'Metro-style' applications and 'Desktop' applications. The 'Metro-style' applications are applications created for the new 'Metro' UI which is present on Windows 8 desktop and Windows RT (the single color/big font fingerpaint-oriented UI). 'Desktop' applications are the applications we all run and use on Windows today. Our software are desktop applications. The Windows Store hosts all Metro-style applications locally in the store and handles the payment for these applications. This means you upload your application (sorry, 'app') to the store, jump through a lot of hoops, Microsoft verifies that your application is not violating a tremendous long list of rules and after everything is OK, it's published and hopefully you get customers and thus earn money. Money which Microsoft will pay you on a regular basis after customers buy your application. Desktop applications are not following this path however. Desktop applications aren't hosted by the Windows Store. Instead, the Windows Store more or less hosts a page with the application's information and where to get the goods. I.o.w.: it's nothing more than a product's Facebook page. Microsoft will simply redirect a visitor of the Windows Store to your website and the visitor will then use your site's system to purchase and download the application. This last bit of information is very important. So, this morning I started with fresh energy to register our company 'Solutions Design bv' at the Windows Store and our two applications, LLBLGen Pro and ORM Profiler. First I went to the Windows Store dashboard page. If you don't have an account, you have to log in or sign up if you don't have a live account. I signed in with my live account. After that, it greeted me with a page where I had to fill in a code which was mailed to me. My local mail server polls every several minutes for email so I had to kick it to get it immediately. I grabbed the code from the email and I was presented with a multi-step process to register myself as a company or as an individual. In red I was warned that this choice was permanent and not changeable. I chuckled: Microsoft apparently stores its data on paper, not in digital form. I chose 'company' and was presented with a lengthy form to fill out. On the form there were two strange remarks: Per company there can just be 1 (one, uno, not zero, not two or more) registered developer, and only that developer is able to upload stuff to the store. I have no idea how this works with large companies, oh the overhead nightmares... "Sorry, but John, our registered developer with the Windows Store is on holiday for 3 months, backpacking through Australia, no, he's not reachable at this point. M'yeah, sorry bud. Hey, did you fill in those TPS reports yesterday?" A separate Approver has to be specified, which has to be a different person than the registered developer. Apparently to Microsoft a company with just 1 person is not a company. Luckily we're with two people! *pfew*, dodged that one, otherwise I would be stuck forever: the choice I already made was not reversible! After I had filled out the form and it was all well and good and accepted by the Microsoft lackey who had to write it all down in some paper notebook ("Hey, be warned! It's a permanent choice! Written down in ink, can't be changed!"), I was presented with the question how I wanted to pay for all this. "Pay for what?" I wondered. Must be the paper they were scribbling the information on, I concluded. After all, there's a financial crisis going on! How could I forget! Silly me. "Ok fair enough". The price was 75 Euros, not the end of the world. I could only pay by credit card, so it was accepted quickly. Or so I thought. You see, Microsoft has a different idea about CC payments. In the normal world, you type in your CC number, some date, a name and a security code and that's it. But Microsoft wants to verify this even more. They want to make a verification purchase of a very small amount and are doing that with a special code in the description. You then have to type in that code in a special form in the Windows Store dashboard and after that you're verified. Of course they'll refund the small amount they pull from your card. Sounds simple, right? Well... no. The problem starts with the fact that I can't see the CC activity on some website: I have a bank issued CC card. I get the CC activity once a month on a piece of paper sent to me. The bank's online website doesn't show them. So it's possible I have to wait for this code till October 12th. One month. "So what, I'm not going to use it anyway, Desktop applications don't use the payment system", I thought. "Haha, you're so naive, dear developer!" Microsoft won't allow you to publish any applications till this verification is done. So no application publishing for a month. Wouldn't it be nice if things were, you know, digital, so things got done instantly? But of course, that lackey who scribbled everything in the Big Windows Store Registration Book isn't that quick. Can't blame him though. He's just doing his job. Now, after the payment was done, I was presented with a page which tells me Microsoft is going to use a third party company called 'Symantec', which will verify my identity again. The page explains to me that this could be done through email or phone and that they'll contact the Approver to verify my identity. "Phone?", I thought... that's a little drastic for a developer account to publish a single page of information about an external hosted software product, isn't it? On Facebook I just added a page, done. And paying you, Microsoft, took less information: you were happy to take my money before my identity was even 'verified' by this 3rd party's minions! "Double standards!", I roared. No-one cared. But it's the thought of getting it off your chest, you know. Luckily for me, everyone at Symantec was asleep when I was registering so they went for the fallback option in case phone calls were not possible: my Approver received an email. Imagine you have to explain the idiot web of security theater I was caught in to someone else who then has to reply a random person over the internet that I indeed was who I said I was. As she's a true sweetheart, she gave me the benefit of the doubt and assured that for now, I was who I said I was. Remember, this is for a desktop application, which is only a link to a website, some pictures and a piece of text. No file hosting, no payment processing, nothing, just a single page. Yeah, I also thought I was crazy. But we're not at the end of this quest yet. I clicked around in the confusing menus of the Windows Store dashboard and found the 'Desktop' section. I get a helpful screen with a warning in red that it can't find any certified 'apps'. True, I'm just getting started, buddy. I see a link: "Check the Windows apps you submitted for certification". Well, I haven't submitted anything, but let's see where it brings me. Oh the thrill of adventure! I click the link and I end up on this site: the hardware/desktop dashboard account registration. "Erm... but I just registered...", I mumbled to no-one in particular. Apparently for desktop registration / verification I have to register again, it tells me. But not only that, the desktop application has to be signed with a certificate. And not just some random el-cheapo certificate you can get at any mall's discount store. No, this certificate is special. It's precious. This certificate, the 'Microsoft Authenticode' Digital Certificate, is the only certificate that's acceptable, and jolly, it can be purchased from VeriSign for the price of only ... $99.-, but be quick, because this is a limited time offer! After that it's, I kid you not, $499.-. 500 dollars for a certificate to sign an executable. But, I do feel special, I got a special price. Only for me! I'm glowing. Not for long though. Here I started to wonder, what the benefit of it all was. I now again had to pay money for a shiny certificate which will add 'Solutions Design bv' to our installer as the publisher instead of 'unknown', while our customers download the file from our website. Not only that, but this was all about a Desktop application, which wasn't hosted by Microsoft. They only link to it. And make no mistake. These prices aren't single payments. Every year these have to be renewed. Like a membership of an exclusive club: you're special and privileged, but only if you cough up the dough. To give you an example how silly this all is: I added LLBLGen Pro and ORM Profiler to the Visual Studio Gallery some time ago. It's the same thing: it's a central place where one can find software which adds to / extends / works with Visual Studio. I could simply create the pages, add the information and they show up inside Visual Studio. No files are hosted at Microsoft, they're downloaded from our website. Exactly the same system. As I have to wait for the CC transcripts to arrive anyway, I can't proceed with publishing in this new shiny store. After the verification is complete I have to wait for verification of my software by Microsoft. Even Desktop applications need to be verified using a long list of rules which are mainly focused on Metro-style applications. Even while they're not hosted by Microsoft. I wonder what they'll find. "Your application wasn't approved. It violates rule 14 X sub D: it provides more value than our own competing framework". While I was writing this post, I tried to check something in the Windows Store Dashboard, to see whether I remembered it correctly. I was presented again with the question, after logging in with my live account, to enter the code that was just mailed to me. Not the previous code, a brand new one. Again I had to kick my mail server to pull the email to proceed. This was it. This 'experience' is so beyond miserable, I'm afraid I have to say goodbye for now to the 'Windows Store'. It's simply not worth my time. Now, about live accounts. You might know this: live accounts are tied to everything you do with Microsoft. So if you have an MSDN subscription, e.g. the one which costs over $5000.-, it's tied to this same live account. But the fun thing is, you can login with your live account to the MSDN subscriptions with just the account id and password. No additional code is mailed to you. While it gives you access to all Microsoft software available, including your licenses. Why the draconian security theater with this Windows Store, while all I want is to publish some desktop applications while on other Microsoft sites it's OK to simply sign in with your live account: no codes needed, no verification and no certificates? Microsoft, one thing you need with this store and that's: apps. Apps, apps, apps, apps, aaaaaaaaapps. Sorry, my bad, got carried away. I just can't stand the word 'app'. This store's shelves have to be filled to the brim with goods. But instead of being welcomed into the store with open arms, I have to fight an uphill battle with an endless list of rules and bullshit to earn the privilege to publish in this shiny store. As if I have to be thrilled to be one of the exclusive club called 'Windows Store Publishers'. As if Microsoft doesn't want it to succeed. Craig Stuntz sent me a link to an old blog post of his regarding code signing and uploading to Microsoft's old mobile store from back in the WinMo5 days: http://blogs.teamb.com/craigstuntz/2006/10/11/28357/. Good read and good background info about how little things changed over the years. I hope this helps Microsoft make things more clearer and smoother and also helps ISVs with their decision whether to go with the Windows Store scheme or ignore it. For now, I don't see the advantage of publishing there, especially not with the nonsense rules Microsoft cooked up. Perhaps it changes in the future, who knows.

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• Computer Visionaries 2014 Kinect Hackathon

  - by T

  Originally posted on: http://geekswithblogs.net/tburger/archive/2014/08/08/computer-visionaries-2014-kinect-hackathon.aspxA big thank you to Computer Vision Dallas and Microsoft for putting together the Computer Visionaries 2014 Kinect Hackathon that took place July 18th and 19th 2014.  Our team had a great time and learned a lot from the Kinect MVP's and Microsoft team.  The Dallas Entrepreneur Center was a fantastic venue. In total, 114 people showed up to form 15 teams. Burger ITS & Friends team members with Ben Lower:  Shawn Weisfeld, Teresa Burger, Robert Burger, Harold Pulcher, Taylor Woolley, Cori Drew (not pictured), and Katlyn Drew (not pictured) We arrived Friday after a long day of work/driving.  Originally, our idea was to make a learning game for kids.  It was intended to be multi-simultaneous players dragging and dropping tiles into a canvas area for kids around 5 years old. We quickly learned that we were limited to two simultaneous players. After working on the game for the rest of the evening and into the next morning we decided that a fast multi-player game with hand gestures was not going to happen without going beyond what was provided with the API. If we were going to have something to show, it was time to switch gears. The next idea on the table was the Photo Anywhere Kiosk. The user can use voice and hand gestures to pick a place they would like to be.  After the user says a place (or anything they want) and then the word "search", the app uses Bing to display a bunch of images for him/her to choose from. With the use of hand gesture (grab and slide to move back and forth and push/pull to select an image) the user can get the perfect image to pose with. I couldn't get a snippet with the hand but when a the app is in use, a hand shows up to cue the user to use their hand to control it's movement. Once they chose an image, we use the Kinect background removal feature to super impose the user on that image. When they are in the perfect position, they say "save" to save the image. Currently, the image is saved in the images folder on the users account but there are many possibilities such as emailing it, posting to social media, etc.. The competition was great and we were honored to be recognized for third place. Other related posts: http://jasongfox.com/computer-visionaries-2014-incredible-success/ A couple of us are continuing to work on the kid's game and are going to make it a Windows 8 multi-player game without Kinect functionality. Stay tuned for more updates.

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• Giving a Zone "More Power"

  - by Brian Leonard

  In addition to the traditional virtualization benefits that Solaris zones offer, applications running in zones are also running in a more secure environment. One way to quantify this is compare the privileges available to the global zone with those of a local zone. For example, there a 82 distinct privileges available to the global zone: bleonard@solaris:~$ ppriv -l | wc -l 82 You can view the descriptions for each of those privileges as follows: bleonard@solaris:~$ ppriv -lv contract_event Allows a process to request critical events without limitation. Allows a process to request reliable delivery of all events on any event queue. contract_identity Allows a process to set the service FMRI value of a process contract template. ... Or for just one or more privileges: bleonard@solaris:~$ ppriv -lv file_dac_read file_dac_write file_dac_read Allows a process to read a file or directory whose permission bits or ACL do not allow the process read permission. file_dac_write Allows a process to write a file or directory whose permission bits or ACL do not allow the process write permission. In order to write files owned by uid 0 in the absence of an effective uid of 0 ALL privileges are required. However, in a non-global zone, only 43 of the 83 privileges are available by default: root@myzone:~# ppriv -l zone | wc -l 43 The missing privileges are: cpc_cpu dtrace_kernel dtrace_proc dtrace_user file_downgrade_sl file_flag_set file_upgrade_sl graphics_access graphics_map net_mac_implicit proc_clock_highres proc_priocntl proc_zone sys_config sys_devices sys_ipc_config sys_linkdir sys_dl_config sys_net_config sys_res_bind sys_res_config sys_smb sys_suser_compat sys_time sys_trans_label virt_manage win_colormap win_config win_dac_read win_dac_write win_devices win_dga win_downgrade_sl win_fontpath win_mac_read win_mac_write win_selection win_upgrade_sl xvm_control However, just like Tim Taylor, it is possible to give your zones more power. For example, a zone by default doesn't have the privileges to support DTrace: root@myzone:~# dtrace -l ID PROVIDER MODULE FUNCTION NAME The DTrace privileges can be added, however, as follows: bleonard@solaris:~$ sudo zonecfg -z myzone Password: zonecfg:myzone> set limitpriv="default,dtrace_proc,dtrace_user" zonecfg:myzone> verify zonecfg:myzone> exit bleonard@solaris:~$ sudo zoneadm -z myzone reboot Now I can run DTrace from within the zone: root@myzone:~# dtrace -l | more ID PROVIDER MODULE FUNCTION NAME 1 dtrace BEGIN 2 dtrace END 3 dtrace ERROR 7115 syscall nosys entry 7116 syscall nosys return ... Note, certain privileges are never allowed to be assigned to a zone. You'll be notified on boot if you attempt to assign a prohibited privilege to a zone: bleonard@solaris:~$ sudo zoneadm -z myzone reboot privilege "dtrace_kernel" is not permitted within the zone's privilege set zoneadm: zone myzone failed to verify Here's a nice listing of all the privileges and their zone status (default, optional, prohibited): Privileges in a Non-Global Zone.

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• Securing an ADF Application using OES11g: Part 2

  - by user12587121

  To validate the integration with OES we need a sample ADF Application that is rich enough to allow us to test securing the various ADF elements.  To achieve this we can add some items including bounded task flows to the application developed in this tutorial. A sample JDeveloper 11.1.1.6 project is available here. It depends on the Fusion Order Demo (FOD) database schema which is easily created using the FOD build scripts.In the deployment we have chosen to enable only ADF Authentication as we will delegate Authorization, mostly, to OES.The welcome page of the application with all the links exposed looks as follows: The Welcome, Browse Products, Browse Stock and System Administration links go to pages while the Supplier Registration and Update Stock are bounded task flows.  The Login link goes to a basic login page and once logged in a link is presented that goes to a logout page.  Only the Browse Products and Browse Stock pages are really connected to the database--the other pages and task flows do not really perform any operations on the database. Required Security Policies We make use of a set of test users and roles as decscribed on the welcome page of the application.  In order to exercise the different authorization possibilities we would like to enforce the following sample policies: Anonymous users can see the Login, Welcome and Supplier Registration links. They can also see the Welcome page, the Login page and follow the Supplier Registration task flow.  They can see the icon adjacent to the Login link indicating whether they have logged in or not. Authenticated users can see the Browse Product page. Only staff granted the right can see the Browse Product page cost price value returned from the database and then only if the value is below a configurable limit. Suppliers and staff can see the Browse Stock links and pages.  Customers cannot. Suppliers can see the Update Stock link but only those with the update permission are allowed to follow the task flow that it launches.  We could hide the link but leave it exposed here so we can easily demonstrate the method call activity protecting the task flow. Only staff granted the right can see the System Administration link and the System Administration page it accesses. Implementing the required policies In order to secure the application we will make use of the following techniques: EL Expressions and Java backing beans: JSF has the notion of EL expressions to reference data from backing Java classes.  We use these to control the presentation of links on the navigation page which respect the security contraints.  So a user will not see links that he is not allowed to click on into. These Java backing beans can call on to OES for an authorization decision.  Important Note: naturally we would configure the WLS domain where our ADF application is running as an OES WLS SM, which would allow us to efficiently query OES over the PEP API.  However versioning conflicts between OES 11.1.1.5 and ADF 11.1.1.6 mean that this is not possible.  Nevertheless, we can make use of the OES RESTful gateway technique from this posting in order to call into OES. You can easily create and manage backing beans in Jdeveloper as follows: Custom ADF Phase Listener: ADF extends the JSF page lifecycle flow and allows one to hook into the flow to intercept page rendering.  We use this to put a check prior to rendering any protected pages, again calling on to OES via the backing bean.  Phase listeners are configured in the adf-settings.xml file.  See the MyPageListener.java class in the project.  Here, for example,  is the code we use in the listener to check for allowed access to the sysadmin page, navigating back to the welcome page if authorization is not granted:                         if (page != null && (page.equals("/system.jspx") || page.equals("/system"))){                             System.out.println("MyPageListener: Checking Authorization for /system");                             if (getValue("#{oesBackingBean.UIAccessSysAdmin}").toString().equals("false") ){                                   System.out.println("MyPageListener: Forcing navigation away from system" +                                       "to welcome");                                 NavigationHandler nh = fc.getApplication().getNavigationHandler();                                   nh.handleNavigation(fc, null, "welcome");                               } else {                                 System.out.println("MyPageListener: access allowed");                              }                         } Method call activity: our app makes use of bounded task flows to implement the sequence of pages that update the stock or allow suppliers to self register.  ADF takes care of ensuring that a bounded task flow can be entered by only one page.  So a way to protect all those pages is to make a call to OES in the first activity and then either exit the task flow or continue depending on the authorization decision.  The method call returns a String which contains the name of the transition to effect. This is where we configure the method call activity in JDeveloper: We implement each of the policies using the above techniques as follows: Policies 1 and 2: as these policies concern the coarse grained notions of controlling access to anonymous and authenticated users we can make use of the container’s security constraints which can be defined in the web.xml file.  The allPages constraint is added automatically when we configure Authentication for the ADF application.  We have added the “anonymousss” constraint to allow access to the the required pages, task flows and icons: <security-constraint>    <web-resource-collection>      <web-resource-name>anonymousss</web-resource-name>      <url-pattern>/faces/welcome</url-pattern>      <url-pattern>/afr/*</url-pattern>      <url-pattern>/adf/*</url-pattern>      <url-pattern>/key.png</url-pattern>      <url-pattern>/faces/supplier-reg-btf/*</url-pattern>      <url-pattern>/faces/supplier_register_complete</url-pattern>    </web-resource-collection>  </security-constraint> Policy 3: we can place an EL expression on the element representing the cost price on the products.jspx page: #{oesBackingBean.dataAccessCostPrice}. This EL Expression references a method in a Java backing bean that will call on to OES for an authorization decision.  In OES we model the authorization requirement by requiring the view permission on the resource /MyADFApp/data/costprice and granting it only to the staff application role.  We recover any obligations to determine the limit.  Policy 4: is implemented by putting an EL expression on the Browse Stock link #{oesBackingBean.UIAccessBrowseStock} which checks for the view permission on the /MyADFApp/ui/stock resource. The stock.jspx page is protected by checking for the same permission in a custom phase listener—if the required permission is not satisfied then we force navigation back to the welcome page. Policy 5: the Update Stock link is protected with the same EL expression as the Browse Link: #{oesBackingBean.UIAccessBrowseStock}.  However the Update Stock link launches a bounded task flow and to protect it the first activity in the flow is a method call activity which will execute an EL expression #{oesBackingBean.isUIAccessSupplierUpdateTransition}  to check for the update permission on the /MyADFApp/ui/stock resource and either transition to the next step in the flow or terminate the flow with an authorization error. Policy 6: the System Administration link is protected with an EL Expression #{oesBackingBean.UIAccessSysAdmin} that checks for view access on the /MyADF/ui/sysadmin resource.  The system page is protected in the same way at the stock page—the custom phase listener checks for the same permission that protects the link and if not satisfied we navigate back to the welcome page. Testing the Application To test the application: deploy the OES11g Admin to a WLS domain deploy the OES gateway in a another domain configured to be a WLS SM. You must ensure that the jps-config.xml file therein is configured to allow access to the identity store, otherwise the gateway will not b eable to resolve the principals for the requested users.  To do this ensure that the following elements appear in the jps-config.xml file: <serviceProvider type="IDENTITY_STORE" name="idstore.ldap.provider" class="oracle.security.jps.internal.idstore.ldap.LdapIdentityStoreProvider">             <description>LDAP-based IdentityStore Provider</description>  </serviceProvider> <serviceInstance name="idstore.ldap" provider="idstore.ldap.provider">             <property name="idstore.config.provider" value="oracle.security.jps.wls.internal.idstore.WlsLdapIdStoreConfigProvider"/>             <property name="CONNECTION_POOL_CLASS" value="oracle.security.idm.providers.stdldap.JNDIPool"/></serviceInstance> <serviceInstanceRef ref="idstore.ldap"/> download the sample application and change the URL to the gateway in the MyADFApp OESBackingBean code to point to the OES Gateway and deploy the application to an 11.1.1.6 WLS domain that has been extended with the ADF JRF files. You will need to configure the FOD database connection to point your database which contains the FOD schema. populate the OES Admin and OES Gateway WLS LDAP stores with the sample set of users and groups.  If  you have configured the WLS domains to point to the same LDAP then it would only have to be done once.  To help with this there is a directory called ldap_scripts in the sample project with ldif files for the test users and groups. start the OES Admin console and configure the required OES authorization policies for the MyADFApp application and push them to the WLS SM containing the OES Gateway. Login to the MyADFApp as each of the users described on the login page to test that the security policy is correct. You will see informative logging from the OES Gateway and the ADF application to their respective WLS consoles. Congratulations, you may now login to the OES Admin console and change policies that will control the behaviour of your ADF application--change the limit value in the obligation for the cost price for example, or define Role Mapping policies to determine staff access to the system administration page based on user profile attributes. ADF Development Notes Some notes on ADF development which are probably typical gotchas: May need this on WLS startup in order to allow us to overwrite credentials for the database, the signal here is that there is an error trying to access the data base: -Djps.app.credential.overwrite.allowed=true Best to call Bounded Task flows via a CommandLink (as opposed to a go link) as you cannot seem to start them again from a go link, even having completed the task flow correctly with a return activity. Once a bounded task flow (BTF) is initated it must complete correctly  via a return activity—attempting to click on any other link whilst in the context of a  BTF has no effect.  See here for example: When using the ADF Authentication only security approach it seems to be awkward to allow anonymous access to the welcome and registration pages.  We can achieve anonymous access using the web.xml security constraint shown above (where no auth-constraint is specified) however it is not clear what needs to be listed in there….for example the /afr/* and /adf/* are in there by trial and error as sometimes the welcome page will not render if we omit those items.  I was not able to use the default allPages constraint with for example the anonymous-role or the everyone WLS group in order to be able to allow anonymous access to pages. The ADF security best practice advises placing all pages under the public_html/WEB-INF folder as then ADF will not allow any direct access to the .jspx pages but will only allow acces via a link of the form /faces/welcome rather than /faces/welcome.jspx.  This seems like a very good practice to follow as having multiple entry points to data is a source of confusion in a web application (particulary from a security point of view). In Authentication+Authorization mode only pages with a Page definition file are protected.  In order to add an emty one right click on the page and choose Go to Page Definition.  This will create an empty page definition and now the page will require explicit permission to be seen. It is advisable to give a unique context root via the weblogic.xml for the application, as otherwise the application will clash with any other application with the same context root and it will not deploy

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• Three Global Telecoms Soar With Siebel

  - by michael.seback

  Deutsche Telekom Group Selects Oracle's Siebel CRM to Underpin Next-Generation CRM Strategy The Deutsche Telekom Group (DTAG), one of the world's leading telecommunications companies, and a customer of Oracle since 2001, has invested in Oracle's Siebel CRM as the standard platform for its Next Generation CRM strategy; a move to lower the cost of managing its 120 million customers across its European businesses. Oracle's Siebel CRM is planned to be deployed in Germany and all of the company's European business within five years. "...Our Next-Generation strategy is a significant move to lower our operating costs and enhance customer service for all our European customers. Not only is Oracle underpinning this strategy, but is also shaping the way our company operates and sells to customers. We look forward to working with Oracle over the coming years as the technology is extended across Europe," said Dr. Steffen Roehn, CIO Deutsche Telekom AG... "The telecommunications industry is currently undergoing some major changes. As a result, companies like Deutsche Telekom are needing to be more intelligent about the way they use technology, particularly when it comes to customer service. Deutsche Telekom is a great example of how organisations can use CRM to not just improve services, but also drive more commercial opportunities through the ability to offer highly tailored offers, while the customer is engaged online or on the phone," said Steve Fearon, vice president CRM, EMEA Read more. Telecom Argentina S.A. Accelerates Time-to-Market for New Communications Products and Services Telecom Argentina S.A. offers basic telephone, urban landline, and national and international long-distance services...."With Oracle's Siebel CRM and Oracle Communication Billing and Revenue Management, we started a technological transformation that allows us to satisfy our critical business needs, such as improving customer service and quickly launching new phone and internet products and services." - Saba Gooley, Chief Information Officer, Wire Line and Internet Services, Telecom Argentina S.A.Read more. Türk Telekom Develops Benefits-Driven CRM Roadmap Türk Telekom Group provides integrated telecommunication services from public switched telephone network (PSTN) and global systems for mobile communications technology (GSM). to broadband internet...."Oracle Insight provided us with a structured deployment approach that makes sense for our business. It quantified the benefits of the CRM solution allowing us to engage with the relevant business owners; essential for a successful transformation program." - Paul Taylor, VP Commercial Transformation, Türk Telekom Read more.

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• cisco 2911 router vs 2811 router

  - by NickToyota

  Just wondering if anyone has experience with the cisco 2911 or 2900 series routers. I understand it is newer and similar to the 2811 but more robust. The price difference is not that much more. I am trying to determine if I should go with the 29xx or 28xx series for a small-medium sized company. ISP bandwidth load balancing and fail over is required. T1 and ADSL lines already in place.

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• amazon cloud vs rackspace cloud

  - by machaa

  Hi, I'm looking to take a dedicated server - in the process I read about Amazon Cloud computing & Rackspace Cloud Servers. Now I'm not sure which one to opt? Could somebody suggest - Performance & Price wise. Regards

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• video card performance monitoring?

  - by Dru

  Is there a 'top' like command for monitoring the GPU and memory usage of a video card? I am most interested in Linux commands, but and OS would be interesting. I strongly suspect that for a group of my systems the video cards are being under-utilized (but I have no idea by how much) and would like to re-allocate funds to other bottle-necks. We are using higher end cards, so the price difference between cards is significant. Thank you.

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• Problem in In-App purchase-consumable model

  - by kunal-dutta

  I have created a nonconsumable in app purchase item and now I want to create a consumable in-app purchase by which a user to buy it every time he uses it,and also I want to create a subscription model In-App purchase. Everything works as expected except when I buy the item more than one time, iPhone pop ups a message saying "You've already purchased the item. Do You want to buy it again?". Is It possible to disable this dialog and proceed to the actual purchase?And what will have to change in following code with different model:- in InApp purchase manager.m: @implementation InAppPurchaseManager //@synthesize purchasableObjects; //@synthesize storeObserver; @synthesize proUpgradeProduct; @synthesize productsRequest; //BOOL featureAPurchased; //BOOL featureBPurchased; //static InAppPurchaseManager* _sharedStoreManager; // self (void)dealloc { //[_sharedStoreManager release]; //[storeObserver release]; [super dealloc]; } (void)requestProUpgradeProductData { NSSet *productIdentifiers = [NSSet setWithObject:@"com.vigyaapan.iWorkOut1" ]; productsRequest = [[SKProductsRequest alloc] initWithProductIdentifiers:productIdentifiers]; productsRequest.delegate = self; [productsRequest start]; // we will release the request object in the delegate callback } pragma mark - pragma mark SKProductsRequestDelegate methods (void)productsRequest:(SKProductsRequest *)request didReceiveResponse:(SKProductsResponse *)response { //NSArray *products = response.products; //proUpgradeProduct = [products count] == 1 ? [[products firstObject] retain]: nil; if (proUpgradeProduct) { NSLog(@"Product title: %@", proUpgradeProduct.localizedTitle); NSLog(@"Product description: %@", proUpgradeProduct.localizedDescription); NSLog(@"Product price: %@", proUpgradeProduct.price); NSLog(@"Product id:%@", proUpgradeProduct.productIdentifier); } /*for (NSString invalidProductId in response.invalidProductIdentifiers) { NSLog(@"Invalid product id: %@" , invalidProductId); }/ //finally release the reqest we alloc/init’ed in requestProUpgradeProductData [productsRequest release]; [[NSNotificationCenter defaultCenter] postNotificationName:kInAppPurchaseManagerProductsFetchedNotification object:self userInfo:nil]; } pragma - pragma Public methods /* call this method once on startup*/ (void)loadStore { /* restarts any purchases if they were interrupted last time the app was open*/ [[SKPaymentQueue defaultQueue] addTransactionObserver:self]; /* get the product description (defined in early sections)*/ [self requestProUpgradeProductData]; } /* call this before making a purchase*/ (BOOL)canMakePurchases { return [SKPaymentQueue canMakePayments]; } /* kick off the upgrade transaction*/ (void)purchaseProUpgrade { SKPayment *payment = [SKPayment paymentWithProductIdentifier:@"9820091347"]; [[SKPaymentQueue defaultQueue] addPayment:payment]; } pragma - pragma Purchase helpers /* saves a record of the transaction by storing the receipt to disk*/ (void)recordTransaction:(SKPaymentTransaction )transaction { if ([transaction.payment.productIdentifier isEqualToString:kInAppPurchaseProUpgradeProductId]) { / save the transaction receipt to disk*/ [[NSUserDefaults standardUserDefaults] setValue:transaction.transactionReceipt forKey:@"proUpgradeTransactionReceipt" ]; [[NSUserDefaults standardUserDefaults] synchronize]; } } /* enable pro features*/ (void)provideContent:(NSString )productId { if ([productId isEqualToString:kInAppPurchaseProUpgradeProductId]) { / enable the pro features*/ [[NSUserDefaults standardUserDefaults] setBool:YES forKey:@"isProUpgradePurchased" ]; [[NSUserDefaults standardUserDefaults] synchronize]; } } (void)finishTransaction:(SKPaymentTransaction )transaction wasSuccessful:(BOOL)wasSuccessful { // / remove the transaction from the payment queue.*/ [[SKPaymentQueue defaultQueue] finishTransaction:transaction]; NSDictionary *userInfo = [NSDictionary dictionaryWithObjectsAndKeys:transaction, @"transaction" , nil]; if (wasSuccessful) { /* send out a notification that we’ve finished the transaction*/ [[NSNotificationCenter defaultCenter]postNotificationName:kInAppPurchaseManagerTransactionSucceededNotification object:self userInfo:userInfo]; } else { /* send out a notification for the failed transaction*/ [[NSNotificationCenter defaultCenter] postNotificationName:kInAppPurchaseManagerTransactionFailedNotification object:self userInfo:userInfo]; } } (void)completeTransaction:(SKPaymentTransaction *)transaction { [self recordTransaction:transaction]; [self provideContent:transaction.payment.productIdentifier]; [self finishTransaction:transaction wasSuccessful:YES]; } (void)restoreTransaction:(SKPaymentTransaction *)transaction { [self recordTransaction:transaction.originalTransaction]; [self provideContent:transaction.originalTransaction.payment.productIdentifier]; [self finishTransaction:transaction wasSuccessful:YES]; } (void)failedTransaction:(SKPaymentTransaction )transaction { if (transaction.error.code != SKErrorPaymentCancelled) { / error!/ [self finishTransaction:transaction wasSuccessful:NO]; } else { / this is fine, the user just cancelled, so don’t notify*/ [[SKPaymentQueue defaultQueue] finishTransaction:transaction]; } } (void)paymentQueue:(SKPaymentQueue *)queue updatedTransactions:(NSArray *)transactions { for (SKPaymentTransaction *transaction in transactions) { switch (transaction.transactionState) { case SKPaymentTransactionStatePurchased: [self completeTransaction:transaction]; break; case SKPaymentTransactionStateFailed: [self failedTransaction:transaction]; break; case SKPaymentTransactionStateRestored: [self restoreTransaction:transaction]; break; default: break; } } } @end in SKProduct.m:- @implementation SKProduct (LocalizedPrice) - (NSString *)localizedPrice { NSNumberFormatter *numberFormatter = [[NSNumberFormatter alloc] init]; [numberFormatter setFormatterBehavior:NSNumberFormatterBehavior10_4]; [numberFormatter setNumberStyle:NSNumberFormatterCurrencyStyle]; [numberFormatter setLocale:self.priceLocale]; NSString *formattedString = [numberFormatter stringFromNumber:self.price]; [numberFormatter release]; return formattedString; }

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• how to find a good wireless PowerPoint controller device?

  - by Reid

  I'm looking for a wireless gadget to advance PowerPoint slides, and would also work with Keynote or whatever on a Mac. Sub-questions: (a) What are these things called, so I can search for them. (b) What is a reasonable price point - the cheap ones seem to be under $20, and name brand seem to be $40 or $50. Do the cheap no-name devices work? (c) Specific device recommendations. Many thanks, Reid

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• Is it better to have more small ram chips or fewer large ones?

  - by Alex Andronov

  I am currently building a new server. I have options between say 32GB Memory for 2 CPUs, DDR3, 1066MHz (8x4GB Dual Ranked RDIMMs) and 36GB Memory for 2 CPUs, DDR3, 1066MHz (18x2GB Dual Ranked RDIMMs) Both at the same price. Should I go for the higher ram amount or the fewer chips? This will be for a Dell PowerEdge R710 with two Intel® Xeon® E5530, 2.4Ghz, 8MB Cache, 5.86 GT/s QPI, Turbo, HT Thanks

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• How to set 2 conditions / criterias for VLOOKUP / LOOKUP / etc in OpenOffice Calc (or Excel)

  - by MestreLion

  I have this spreadsheet that started as a silly aid for a game (Mafia Wars 2), but grew into a tricky spreadsheet question. In the game your character have 9 "slots" for weapons and armors, 1 for each "type": Light Weapon, Heavy Weapon, Body Armor, Head Armor, etc. So I made a list of all weapons and armors available in the game, 1 item per row. Example: SHOP ITEM TYPE ITEM NAME ATK DEF PRICE EQUIPPED? Marketplace Weapon Light Konrad Knife 16 5 5.500 Marketplace Weapon Light Ice Queen 19 6 8.200 Marketplace Armor Body Up Layered Polym 0 31 8.600 Marketplace Armor Body Up Full Shield 7 42 17.650 Marketplace Weapon Heavy Konrad Bullpup 53 25 24.500 Marketplace Weapon Heavy Full Moon Blow 73 12 24.500 x Marketplace Armor Body Low Knee Pads 17 26 14.200 x Marketplace Armor Body Low Army Boots 15 55 24.500 Bone Yard Weapon Light Bone Launcher 41 2 9.400 x Neon Strip Vehicle Ground Supercharged 41 34 24.500 Dead End Weapon Heavy Sharp Sickle 21 5 24.500 Dead End Armor Body Low Unholy Boots 5 36 15.000 Dead End Armor Head Hockey Mask 5 18 15.900 x Last columns is an indication of the items i have already bought and equipped (marked with "x"). What I need is a formula that, for each "slot" (item type), returns info related to the item of that kind that I am using. That would be: ITEM TYPE SHOP NAME ITEM NAME ATK DEF PRICE Weapon Light Bone Yard Bone Launcher 41 2 9.400 Weapon Heavy Marketplace Full Moon Blow 73 12 24.500 Weapon Special -- -- -- -- -- Armor Body Up -- -- -- -- -- Armor Body Low Marketplace Knee Pads 17 26 14.200 Armor Head Dead End Hockey Mask 5 18 15.900 Vehicle Ground -- -- -- -- -- Vehicle Water -- -- -- -- -- Vehicle Air -- -- -- -- -- The item types are fixed, so they can be hard coded. Each row for an item type. So, for 1st result line, it would return data from the row where both 2nd column is "Weapon Light" and last column is "x". Basically I need a LOOKUP (or VLOOKUP, or anything else) that uses 2 criteria to find a given row, the item type and the X marker. Question is: HOW? I am using OpenOffice Calc 3.2.1, but since it shares so many functions with MS Excel, answers for Excel are also fine (as long as it only uses regular formulas, no VBScript or Macros or VBA etc) Last but not least, suggestions / solutions for rearranging the data so it makes this problem easier to solve are also welcome. Thanks!

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• Eyefinity with lower power graphic card?

  - by terrani

  Hi, I am looking for a graphic that supports Eyefinity, but with lower power. What I mean by "lower power" is lower performance and lower power literally. I don't need performance and heat of ATI 5 Series, but I love their multi-monitor supports and price range. What options do I have?

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• Windows Hosting

  - by Sid Momin

  What's a good hosting service for the following? I need to set up a Windows development server, IIS and SQL server. We will be developing with Visual Studio. We also need to control our project with SVN. We're probably looking for a VPS, but we definitely need administrator access and the ability to install programs such as (whatever Windows uses for) SVN. Price does matter, because we're a 4 man operation. Thanks

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• Any large USB sticks with integrated card readers?

  - by Al

  I have one of Kingston's DataTraveller Micro Reader USB sticks, a fantastic memory stick with an integrated micro SD and M2 card reader. However, I've gradually filled it to the brim and am looking for a larger stick. Unfortunately, Kingston don't make them any bigger than the 4GB one that I currently have and I was hoping to go to 16GB now that they've come down in price. Does anyone know if any manufacturers make something similar: a 16GB stick with a micro SD card reader integrated (I'm not bothered about the M2 reader).

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• Best reseller for a domain name

  - by Josh K

  Looking to purchase a domain name separately from the package (using SliceHost and want a domain name) and I was wondering what is the best reseller to purchase from. All the pricing for a yearly renewal is under $10, so price isn't an issue. I'm also not sure what else to be concerned about when purchasing a domain name, such as domain registration, etc.

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• Third monitor on onboard VGA ?

  - by e-turhan

  Hello guys, I'am using dual monitor setup with a radeon 5770 vga card, also I have an onboard vga card on ASUS M4A785TD EVO mainboard. Now I want to add one more monitor to my system. Can I use the onboard vga for third monitor or I need to buy a new vga card? If I need to buy new vga card which one would you suggest for least price? I am using windows 7.

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• Tomcat - Spring Framework - MySQL, Load balancing design

  - by Mat Banik

  Lets say I have Spring Framework App that is running on Tomcat and uses MySQL database: What would be the best solution in this instance that would allow for sociability (price/performance/integration time)? More precisely: What would be on the Web Load balancer box, and who should be the tomcat web server clustered? What would be on the Database Load balancer box and how should be the database servers clustered? And if at all possible specific technical integration links would be of great help.

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• Recommended apps for new desktop machine install?

  - by Eddie Parker

  I'm hoping to harness the collective tips of superuser to gather recommended apps/configurations to keep a new desktop clean, virus free, and hopefully lower software rot. I ask because I've recently come across tools like dropbox, deepfreeze, returnil, etc, and I'm curious what other ones are out there to protect a new box. I personally am interested in Windows, but feel free to comment on whatever OS you'd like, freeware or otherwise. Ideally specify the price/OS in your answer(s).

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• Rails multiple select box issue for search

  - by Reido

  First off here is my model, controller, view: My model, this is where I have my search code:--------------------------- def self.find_by_lcc(params) where = [] where << "category = 'Land'" unless params[:mls].blank? where << "mls = :mls" end unless params[:county].blank? where << "county = :county" end unless params[:acreage_range].blank? where << "acreage_range = :acreage_range" end unless params[:landtype].blank? where << "landtype = :landtype" end unless params[:price_range].blank? where << "price_range = :price_range" end if where.empty? [] else find(:all, :conditions => [where.join(" AND "), params], :order => "county, price desc") end end My controller:---------------- def land @counties = ['Adams', 'Alcorn', 'Amite', 'Attala'] @title = "Browse" return if params[:commit].nil? @properties = Property.find_by_lcc(params) else 'No properties were found' render :action = 'land_table' end My View: ---------------------- <table width="900"> <tr> <td> <% form_tag({ :action => "land" }, :method => "get") do %> <fieldset> <legend>Search our Land Properties</legend> <div class="form_row"><p>&nbsp;</p></div> <div class="form_row"> <label for="mls">MLS Number:</label>&nbsp; <%= text_field_tag 'mls', params[:mls] %> </div> <div class="form_row"> <label for "county"><font color="#ff0000">*County:</font></label>&nbsp; <%= select_tag "county", options_for_select(@counties), :multiple => true, :size => 6 %> </div> <div class="form_row"> <label for "acreage_range">Acreage:</label>&nbsp; <%= select_tag "acreage_range", options_for_select([['All',''],['1-10','1-10'],['11-25','11-25'],['26-50','26-50'],['51-100','51-100']]) %> </div> <div class="form_row"> <label for "landtype">Type:</label>&nbsp; <%= select_tag "landtype", options_for_select([['All',''],['Waterfront','Waterfront'],['Wooded','Wooded'],['Pasture','Pasture'],['Woods/Pasture','Woods/Pasture'],['Lot','Lot']]) %> </div> <div class="form_row"> <label for="price_range"><font color="#ff0000">*Price:</font></label>&nbsp; <%= select_tag "price_range", options_for_select([['All',''],['0-1,000','0-1,000'],['1,001-10,000','1,001-10,000'],['10,001-50,000','10,001-50,000'],['50,001-100,000','50,001-100,000'],['100,001-150,000']])%> </div> <input type="text" style="display: none;" disabled="disabled" size="1" /> <%= submit_tag "Search", :class => "submit" %> </fieldset> <% end%> </td> </tr> </table> The search works fine until I add ", :multiple = true, :size = 6" to make the county field multiple select. Then I get the error: Processing PublicController#land (for 65.0.81.83 at 2010-04-01 13:11:30) [GET] Parameters: {"acreage_range"=>"", "commit"=>"Search", "county"=>["Adams", "Amite"], "landtype"=>"", "price_range"=>"", "mls"=>""} ActiveRecord::StatementInvalid (Mysql::Error: Operand should contain 1 column(s): SELECT * FROM `properties` WHERE (category = 'Land' AND county = 'Adams','Amite') ORDER BY county, price desc): app/models/property.rb:93:in `find_by_lcc' app/controllers/public_controller.rb:84:in `land' /usr/lib/ruby/1.8/thread.rb:135:in `synchronize' fcgi (0.8.7) lib/fcgi.rb:117:in `session' fcgi (0.8.7) lib/fcgi.rb:104:in `each_request' fcgi (0.8.7) lib/fcgi.rb:36:in `each' dispatch.fcgi:24 I've tried to make the county, acreage_range, and price_range fields into multiple select boxes numerous ways, but can not get any method to work correctly. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks,

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