Search Results

Search found 8471 results on 339 pages for 'bad boy'.

Page 67/339 | < Previous Page | 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74  | Next Page >

• Visually and audibly unambiguous subset of the Latin alphabet?

  - by elliot42

  Imagine you give someone a card with the code "5SBDO0" on it. In some fonts, the letter "S" is difficult to visually distinguish from the number five, (as with number zero and letter "O"). Reading the code out loud, it might be difficult to distinguish "B" from "D", necessitating saying "B as in boy," "D as in dog," or using a "phonetic alphabet" instead. What's the biggest subset of letters and numbers that will, in most cases, both look unambiguous visually and sound unambiguous when read aloud? Background: We want to generate a short string that can encode as many values as possible while still being easy to communicate. Imagine you have a 6-character string, "123456". In base 10 this can encode 10^6 values. In hex "1B23DF" you can encode 16^6 values in the same number of characters, but this can sound ambiguous when read aloud. ("B" vs. "D") Likewise for any string of N characters, you get (size of alphabet)^N values. The string is limited to a length of about six characters, due to wanting to fit easily within the capacity of human working memory capacity. Thus to find the max number of values we can encode, we need to find that largest unambiguous set of letters/numbers. There's no reason we can't consider the letters G-Z, and some common punctuation, but I don't want to have to go manually pairwise compare "does G sound like A?", "does G sound like B?", "does G sound like C" myself. As we know this would be O(n^2) linguistic work to do =)...

  Read the article

• People != Resources

  - by eddraper

  Ken Tabor’s blog post “They Are not Resources – We Are People” struck a chord with me.  I distinctly remember hearing the term “resources” within the context of “people” for the first time back in the late 90’s.  I was in a meeting at Compaq and a manager had been faced with some new scope for an IT project he was managing.  His response was that he needed more “resources” in order to get the job done.  As I knew the timeline for the project was fixed and the process for acquiring additional funding would almost certainly extend beyond his expected delivery date, I wondered what he meant.  After the meeting, I asked him what he meant… his response was that he needed some more “bodies” to get the job done.  For a minute, my mind whirred… why is it so difficult to simply say “people?”  This particular manager was neither a bad person nor a bad manager… quite the contrary.  I respected him quite a bit and still do.  Over time, I began to notice that he was what could be termed an “early adopter” of many “Business speak” terms – such as “sooner rather than later,” “thrown a curve,” “boil the ocean” etcetera.  Over time, I’ve discovered that much of this lexicon can actually be useful, though cliché and overused.  For example, “Boil the ocean” does serve a useful purpose in distilling a lot of verbiage and meaning into three simple words that paint a clear mental picture.  The term “resources” would serve a similar purpose if it were applied to the concept of time, funding, or people.  The problem is that this never happened.  “Resources”, “bodies”, “ICs” (individual contributors)… this is what “people” have become in the IT business world.  Why?  We’re talking about simple word choices here.  Why have human beings been deliberately dehumanized and abstracted in this manner? What useful purpose does it serve other than to demean and denigrate?

  Read the article

• Which things instantly ring alarm bells when looking at code? [closed]

  - by FinnNk

  I attended a software craftsmanship event a couple of weeks ago and one of the comments made was "I'm sure we all recognize bad code when we see it" and everyone nodded sagely without further discussion. This sort of thing always worries me as there's that truism that everyone thinks they're an above average driver. Although I think I can recognize bad code I'd love to learn more about what other people consider to be code smells as it's rarely discussed in detail on people's blogs and only in a handful of books. In particular I think it'd be interesting to hear about anything that's a code smell in one language but not another. I'll start off with an easy one: Code in source control that has a high proportion of commented out code - why is it there? was it meant to be deleted? is it a half finished piece of work? maybe it shouldn't have been commented out and was only done when someone was testing something out? Personally I find this sort of thing really annoying even if it's just the odd line here and there, but when you see large blocks interspersed with the rest of the code it's totally unacceptable. It's also usually an indication that the rest of the code is likely to be of dubious quality as well.

  Read the article

• What's wrong with circular references?

  - by dash-tom-bang

  I was involved in a programming discussion today where I made some statements that basically assumed axiomatically that circular references (between modules, classes, whatever) are generally bad. Once I got through with my pitch, my coworker asked, "what's wrong with circular references?" I've got strong feelings on this, but it's hard for me to verbalize concisely and concretely. Any explanation that I may come up with tends to rely on other items that I too consider axioms ("can't use in isolation, so can't test", "unknown/undefined behavior as state mutates in the participating objects", etc.), but I'd love to hear a concise reason for why circular references are bad that don't take the kinds of leaps of faith that my own brain does, having spent many hours over the years untangling them to understand, fix, and extend various bits of code. Edit: I am not asking about homogenous circular references, like those in a doubly-linked list or pointer-to-parent. This question is really asking about "larger scope" circular references, like libA calling libB which calls back to libA. Substitute 'module' for 'lib' if you like. Thanks for all of the answers so far!

  Read the article

• In MVC, why can't a model create a view?

  - by MUY Belgium

  I have a web application written in Perl with a controller, some "views" and some "Models". Each "Model" is corresponding to one "View". The controller (one file) creates an Model object corresponding to each view (view is a CGI argument) then retrieve the view from the module it has just created. Indeed, this should be bad thing but can you argue a bit more about it. My first idea was that since the object "Model" depends upon the "view", then the "model" is actually a view. But also the fact that ALL the cgi parameters are passed to the Model causes the "Model" to become not truelly a view but to loose all interest, since it is only related to the current implementation of the web apps. On other words, that the "Model" keep model but loose its "comprehensiveness" ("Model" is not easily understandable). I'm am quite new in project analysis, so please do not be too harsh. Why is this bad? I have made a prototype with the main structures I have understood of this web application, made as short as possible. #Model.pm package Model; import { # this requires an attribute called "view" # and this require an argument which is the cgi params } ... #View1.pm package View1; ... #Model1.pm package ModelView1 ; base Model; use View1; sub new { my $class = shift; my $arg = shift; Model::DoSomething($arg); $self->view = new View1($arg); ... } #controller.cgi my $model = 0; ... $model = new Model1( cgi_param => params() ); #there is severall models here ... print $model->get_view()->get_html();

  Read the article

• Graphics hardware warning when updating to 14.04

  - by pacomet

  As I use Ubuntu at work I just update only LTS versions but now I'm not sure if I can/should. As my computer is now ten years old I would change if was mine but as it is owned by my employer I have to work with it. It's not a bad one, it runs fine (this was not true when still had Windows on it ;-). When updating to 14.04, it warns about possible bad/slow performance with Unity 3D so I stop updating as I am at work, not my own computer. As I understand from http://askubuntu.com/a/438958/25305 Nvidia Geforce FX 5500 graphics card is still supported in 14.04. Now, in 12.04, I have driver version 173 and unity 2d runs fine for me. output of /usr/lib/nux/unity_support_test -p OpenGL vendor string: NVIDIA Corporation OpenGL renderer string: GeForce FX 5500/AGP/SSE2 OpenGL version string: 2.1.2 NVIDIA 173.14.39 Not software rendered: yes Not blacklisted: no GLX fbconfig: yes GLX texture from pixmap: yes GL npot or rect textures: yes GL vertex program: yes GL fragment program: yes GL vertex buffer object: yes GL framebuffer object: yes GL version is 1.4+: yes Unity 3D supported: no Should I update? Is it better to stay with 12.04? Thanks

  Read the article

• Is version history really sacred or is it better to rebase?

  - by dukeofgaming

  I've always agreed with Mercurial's mantra, however, now that Mercurial comes bundled with the rebase extension and it is a popular practice in git, I'm wondering if it could really be regarded as a "bad practice", or at least bad enough to avoid using. In any case, I'm aware of rebasing being dangerous after pushing. OTOH, I see the point of trying to package 5 commits in a single one to make it look niftier (specially at in a production branch), however, personally I think would be better to be able to see partial commits to a feature where some experimentation is done, even if it is not as nifty, but seeing something like "Tried to do it way X but it is not as optimal as Y after all, doing it Z taking Y as base" would IMHO have good value to those studying the codebase and follow the developers train of thought. My very opinionated (as in dumb, visceral, biased) point of view is that programmers like rebase to hide mistakes... and I don't think this is good for the project at all. So my question is: have you really found valuable to have such "organic commits" (i.e. untampered history) in practice?, or conversely, do you prefer to run into nifty well-packed commits and disregard the programmers' experimentation process?; whichever one you chose, why does that work for you? (having other team members to keep history, or alternatively, rebasing it).

  Read the article

• how to fully unit test functions and their internal validation

  - by Patrick

  I am just now getting into formal unit testing and have come across an issue in testing separate internal parts of functions. I have created a base class of data manipulation (i.e.- moving files, chmodding file, etc) and in moveFile() I have multiple levels of validation to pinpoint when a moveFile() fails (i.e.- source file not readable, destination not writeable). I can't seem to figure out how to force a couple particular validations to fail while not tripping the previous validations. Example: I want the copying of a file to fail, but by the time I've gotten to the actual copying, I've checked for everything that can go wrong before copying. Code Snippit: (Bad code on the fifth line...) // if the change permissions is set, change the file permissions if($chmod !== null) { $mod_result = chmod($destination_directory.DIRECTORY_SEPARATOR.$new_filename, $chmod); if($mod_result === false || $source_directory.DIRECTORY_SEPARATOR.$source_filename == '/home/k...../file_chmod_failed.qif') { DataMan::logRawMessage('File permissions update failed on moveFile [ERR0009] - ['.$destination_directory.DIRECTORY_SEPARATOR.$new_filename.' - '.$chmod.']', sfLogger::ALERT); return array('success' => false, 'type' => 'Internal Server Error [ERR0009]'); } } So how do I simulate the copy failing. My stop-gap measure was to perform a validation on the filename being copied and if it's absolute path matched my testing file, force the failure. I know this is very bad to put testing code into the actual code that will be used to run on the production server but I'm not sure how else to do it. Note: I am on PHP 5.2, symfony, using lime_test(). EDIT I am testing the chmodding and ensuring that the array('success' = false, 'type' = ..) is returned

  Read the article

• Ternary and Artificial Intelligence

  - by user2957844

  Not much of a programmer myself, however I have been thinking about the future of AI. If a fully functional AI is programmed in a binary environment as is used in current computing, would that create a bit of a black and white personality? As in just yes/no, on/off, 1/0? I will use the Skynet computer from the Terminator series as a bad analogy; it is brought online and comes to the conclusion that humanity should just be destroyed so the problem is resolved, basically its only options were; fire the missiles or not. (The films do not really go into what its moves would be after doing such a thing, but that goes into the realms of AI evolution so does not really fit with this question.) It may also have been badly programmed. Now, the human mind has been akin to a ternary system which allows our "out of the box" thinking along with all the other wonderful things our minds can do. So, would it not be more prudent to create a functional ternary system and program an AI using it so the resulting personality would be able to benefit from the third "maybe" (so to speak) option? I understand that in binary there are ways to get around the whole yes/no etc. way of things, however the basic operations are still just 1's and 0's. Again with using the above bad Skynet analogy; if it could have had that third "maybe" option as part of its core system, it may have decided to not launch due to being able to make sense of the intricacies of human nature and the politics of such a move etc. In effect, my question is; Would an AI benefit more from ternary computing as opposed to binary due to the inclusion of -1, or 2, dependent on the system ("maybe," as I call it)?

  Read the article

• What is a good way to refactor a large, terribly written code base by myself? [closed]

  - by AgentKC

  Possible Duplicate: Techniques to re-factor garbage and maintain sanity? I have a fairly large PHP code base that I have been writing for the past 3 years. The problem is, I wrote this code when I was a terrible programmer and now it's tens of thousands of lines of conditionals and random MySQL queries everywhere. As you can imagine, there are a ton of bugs and they are extremely hard to find and fix. So I would like a good method to refactor this code so that it is much more manageable. The source code is quite bad; I did not even use classes or functions when I originally wrote it. At this point, I am considering rewriting the whole thing. I am the only developer and my time is pretty limited. I would like to get this done as quickly as possible, so I can get back to writing new features. Since rewriting the code would take a long time, I am looking for some methods that I can use to clean up the code as quickly as possible without leaving more bad architecture that will come back to haunt me later. So this is the basic question: What is a good way for a single developer to take a fairly large code base that has no architecture and refactor it into something with reasonable architecture that is not a nightmare to maintain and expand?

  Read the article

• recovering raid 0 hard disk

  - by Hiawatha

  I bumped to a huge (for me) problem. I was running dual boot system (win 7 / linux) and at some point I decided to test fedora ( I am new in Linux ). My hard disk conf: 3 hard disks each 1 TB, 2 set to raid 0 with windows running on it and 1 for linux. After installing it from live usb I found out that windows 7 is not in grub anymore and while booting shows raid error. I installed back Ubuntu and ran Disk Utility and checked now I have one disks (raid 0) failed (READ) error. First has 5 bad sectors and second has 1 bad sector. And now I dont know what to do and how to repair. further I dont know which data i could provide to get help. I tried ntfsfix and got this output: Mounting volume... NTFS signature is missing. FAILED Attempting to correct errors... NTFS signature is missing. FAILED Failed to startup volume: Invalid argument NTFS signature is missing. Trying the alternate boot sector Unrecoverable error Volume is corrupt. You should run chkdsk. #sudo ntfs-3g -o force,rw /dev/sdb /media/windows NTFS signature is missing. Failed to mount '/dev/sdb': Invalid argument The device '/dev/sdb' doesn't seem to have a valid NTFS. Maybe the wrong device is used? Or the whole disk instead of a partition (e.g. /dev/sda, not /dev/sda1)? Or the other way around?

  Read the article

• Which is the best way to catch an expiring domain name? [closed]

  - by newspeak

  I know a similar question has been asked, but I really don't know what to do. There is this .com domain which is currently on redemption period and should likely be available again within a month. I was wondering which is the best way to get it at a reasonable price. I don't think it's a highly valuable domain, it shows to have very bad ranking and has 0 exact same searches according to adwords. Why it is valuable to me is very simple: I have a project responding to this name. I already own the .net domain and would love to have the .com. I discovered the domain was going to be available thanks to an email I received by a backorder site. I did some research and these guys have a bad reputation on the web. I did further research and found that more reputable (at least in theory) companies should be the likes of snapnames, pool, namejet, godaddy, etc. I am a bit suspicious using these drop cathing services: What if they shill bids? What if they make it go into auction even if I'm the only person interested? What if I raise attention and interest to the domain by backordering? I just would rather wait for it to be deleted and available again to register it manually. It is really not an interesting domain name, and I don't think anyone would care to have it. But what if the domain is already being watched by the domain industry sharks? I did a whois research and my desired domain nameserves point to domcollect.com, which appears to be an auction site. What if I decide to wait for manual registration and I miss the chance to get it? I'm willing to spend the 60/70$ fees these sites require, but not really more than that. Suggestions? Thank you very much. I'm a bit confused and undecided.

  Read the article

• ?????Exadata????

  - by Liu Maclean(???)

  ??check Exadata Image & OS versions , GI & DB patches sundiag exacheck cellserv ==> imageinfo dbhost ==> /usr/local/bin/imagehistory Also check the version of the switch. Login to Switch and execute the following command [root@myswitch-1 sbin]# version [root@dmorlsw-ib2 sbin]# cd /usr/local/bin [root@dmorlsw-ib2 bin]# ls -lrt version -rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 20356 Apr 4 2011 version Output will look as below. [root@dmorlsw-ib2 ~]# version SUN DCS 36p version: 1.3.3-2 Build time: Apr 4 2011 11:15:19 SP board info: Manufacturing Date: 2009.05.05 Serial Number: "NCD3X0178" Hardware Revision: 0x0006 Firmware Revision: 0x0102 BIOS version: NOW1R112 BIOS date: 04/24/2009 ib8# cat /sys/class/infiniband/is4_0/fw_ver 7.2.300 ib8 # cat /sys/class/dmi/id/bios_version NOW1R112 ib8 # nm2version NM2-36p version: 1.0.1-1 Build time: Sep 14 2009 12:52:51 ComExpress info: Manufacturing Date: 2009.08.19 Serial Number: Hardware Revision: 0x0006 Firmware Revision: 0x0102 { case `uname` in Linux ) ILOM="/usr/bin/ipmitool sunoem cli" ;; SunOS ) ILOM="/opt/ipmitool/bin/ipmitool sunoem cli" ;; esac ; ImageInfo="/opt/oracle.cellos/imageinfo" ; uname -srm ; head -1 /etc/*release ; uptime | cut -d, -f1 ; $ILOM "show /SP system_description system_identifier" | grep = ; $ImageInfo -activated -node -status -ver | grep -v ^$ ; } | tee /tmp/ExaInfo.log $GRID_HOME/OPatch/opatch lsinv -all -oh $GRID_HOME | tee /tmp/OPatchInv.log $ORACLE_HOME/OPatch/opatch lsinv -all | tee -a /tmp/OPatchInv.log cat /tmp/ExaInfo.log Linux 2.6.18-128.1.16.0.1.el5 x86_64 ==> /etc/enterprise-release <== Enterprise Linux Enterprise Linux Server release 5.3 (Carthage) ==> /etc/redhat-release <== Enterprise Linux Enterprise Linux Server release 5.3 (Carthage) 20:37:56 up 458 days system_description = SUN FIRE X4170 SERVER, ILOM v3.0.6.10.b, r52264 system_identifier = Sun Oracle Database Machine Active image version: 11.2.1.2.3 Active image activated: XXXX-XX-XX 12:27:12 +0800 Active image status: success Active node type: COMPUTE Inactive image version: undefined FileName: OPatchInv.log ---------------- ... Oracle Home       : /u01/app/11.2.0/grid Central Inventory : /u01/app/oraInventory   from           : /etc/oraInst.loc OPatch version    : 11.2.0.1.2 OUI version       : 11.2.0.1.0 OUI location      : /u01/app/11.2.0/grid/oui ... -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- List of Oracle Homes:   Name                                       Location   Ora11g_gridinfrahome1         /u01/app/11.2.0/grid   OraDb11g_home1                  /u01/app/oracle/product/11.2.0/dbhome_1 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Installed Top-level Products (1): Oracle Grid Infrastructure                                           11.2.0.1.0 ... Interim patches (2) : Patch  9524394      : applied on Thu Jun 03 20:46:05 CST 2010 ... {TRACKING BUG FOR 11.2.0.1 DB MACHINE BUNDLE PATCH 3} Patch  9455587      : applied on Fri Apr 02 18:27:47 CST 2010 ... {MERGE REQUEST ON TOP OF 11.2.0.1.0 FOR BUGS 8483425 8667622 8702731 8730804} Rac system comprising of multiple nodes  Local node = dbserv01  Remote node = dbserv02  Remote node = dbserv03  Remote node = dbserv04 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- OPatch succeeded. ... Oracle Home       : /u01/app/oracle/product/11.2.0/dbhome_1 ... Oracle Database 11g                                                  11.2.0.1.0 ... Interim patches (5) : Patch  8888434      : applied on Sat Jan 08 00:27:33 CST 2011 ... {AIX-ASM-CF: LMHB TERMINATE INSTANCE WHEN OFFLINE ONE FAILGROUP IN ASM DG} Patch  8730312      : applied on Thu Jun 03 21:30:03 CST 2010 ... {FWD MERGE FOR BASE BUG 8715387 FOR 12G} Patch  9502717      : applied on Thu Jun 03 21:25:54 CST 2010 ... {LMS HIT ORA-600 [KJBLDRMNEXTPKEY:SEEN] AND CRASHED THE INSTANCE} { + same 2 as GI above} ?? cell server Cache Policy cell08# MegaCli64 -LDInfo -Lall -aALL | grep 'Current Cache Policy' Current Cache Policy: WriteThrough, ReadAheadNone, Direct, No Write Cache if Bad BBU cell09# MegaCli64 -LDInfo -Lall -aALL | grep 'Current Cache Policy' Current Cache Policy: WriteBack, ReadAheadNone, Direct, No Write Cache if Bad BBU Default Cache Policy: WriteBack, ReadAheadNone, Direct, No Write Cache if Bad BBU Current Cache Policy: WriteThrough, ReadAheadNone, Direct, No Write Cache if Bad BBU Cache policy is in WB Would recommend proactive  battery repalcement. Example : a. /opt/MegaRAID/MegaCli/MegaCli64 -LDGetProp  -Cache -LALL -aALL ####( Will list the cache policy) b. /opt/MegaRAID/MegaCli/MegaCli64 -LDSetProp  -WB  -LALL -aALL ####( Will try to change teh policy from xx to WB)     So policy Change to WB will not come into effect immediately     Set Write Policy to WriteBack on Adapter 0, VD 0 (target id: 0) success     Battery capacity is below the threshold value ??cell BBU??????: cell08# /opt/MegaRAID/MegaCli/MegaCli64 -AdpBbuCmd -GetBbuStatus -a0 BBU status for Adapter: 0 BatteryType: iBBU Voltage: 4061 mV Current: 0 mA Temperature: 36 C BBU Firmware Status: Charging Status : None Voltage : OK Temperature : OK Learn Cycle Requested : No Learn Cycle Active : No Learn Cycle Status : OK Learn Cycle Timeout : No I2c Errors Detected : No Battery Pack Missing : No Battery Replacement required : No Remaining Capacity Low : Yes Periodic Learn Required : No Battery state: GasGuageStatus: Fully Discharged : No Fully Charged : Yes Discharging : Yes Initialized : Yes Remaining Time Alarm : No Remaining Capacity Alarm: No Discharge Terminated : No Over Temperature : No Charging Terminated : No Over Charged : No Relative State of Charge: 99 % Charger System State: 49168 Charger System Ctrl: 0 Charging current: 0 mA Absolute state of charge: 21 % Max Error: 2 % Exit Code: 0x00 ????BBU ??: dcli -g ~/cell_group -l root -t '{ uname -srm ; head -1 /etc/*release ; uptime | cut -d, -f1 ; imagehistory ; ipmitool sunoem cli "show /SP system_description system_identifier" | grep = ; ipmitool sunoem cli "show /SP/policy FLASH_ACCELERATOR_CARD_INSTALLED /opt/MegaRAID/MegaCli/MegaCli64 -AdpBbuCmd -GetBbuStatus -a0 | egrep -i 'BBU|Battery|Charge:|Fully|Low|Learn' ; }' | tee /tmp/ExaInfo.log Target cells: ['cellserv01', 'cellserv02', 'cellserv03', 'cellserv04', 'cellserv05', 'cellserv06', 'cellserv07'] cellserv01: Linux 2.6.18-128.1.16.0.1.el5 x86_64 cellserv01: ==> /etc/enterprise-release <== cellserv01: Enterprise Linux Enterprise Linux Server release 5.3 (Carthage) cellserv01: cellserv01: ==> /etc/redhat-release <== cellserv01: Enterprise Linux Enterprise Linux Server release 5.3 (Carthage) cellserv01: 01:17:39 up 635 days cellserv01: Version : 11.2.1.2.1 cellserv01: Image activation date : 2011-03-25 11:59:34 -0800 cellserv01: Imaging mode : fresh cellserv01: Imaging status : success cellserv01: cellserv01: Version : 11.2.1.2.3 cellserv01: Image activation date : 2011-04-13 12:15:46 +0800 cellserv01: Imaging mode : patch cellserv01: Imaging status : success cellserv01: cellserv01: Version : 11.2.1.2.6 cellserv01: Image activation date : 2011-05-27 23:08:22 +0800 cellserv01: Imaging mode : patch cellserv01: Imaging status : success cellserv01: cellserv01: system_description = SUN FIRE X4275 SERVER, ILOM v3.0.6.10.b, r52264 cellserv01: system_identifier = Sun Oracle Database Machine cellserv01: Connected. Use ^D to exit. cellserv01: -> show /SP/policy FLASH_ACCELERATOR_CARD_INSTALLED cellserv01: show: No matching properties found. cellserv01: cellserv01: -> Session closed cellserv01: Disconnected cellserv01: BBU status for Adapter: 0 cellserv01: BatteryType: iBBU cellserv01: BBU Firmware Status: cellserv01: Learn Cycle Requested : No cellserv01: Learn Cycle Active : No cellserv01: Learn Cycle Status : OK cellserv01: Learn Cycle Timeout : No cellserv01: Battery Pack Missing : No cellserv01: Battery Replacement required : No cellserv01: Remaining Capacity Low : Yes cellserv01: Periodic Learn Required : No cellserv01: Battery state: cellserv01: Fully Discharged : No cellserv01: Fully Charged : Yes cellserv01: Relative State of Charge: 99 % cellserv01: Absolute state of charge: 21 % dcli -l root -g /root/all_group '/opt/MegaRAID/MegAaCli/MegaCli64 -AdpBbuCmd -a0' > BBU.out check ipmi: dcli -g ~/cell_group -l root -t '{ > ipmitool sunoem cli "show /SP/policy FLASH_ACCELERATOR_CARD_INSTALLED" | grep = ; MegaCli64 -LDInfo -Lall -aALL | grep 'Current Cache Policy' ; }' | tee /tmp/ExaCells.log

  Read the article

• Vista/7: How to get glass color?

  - by Ian Boyd

  How do you use DwmGetColorizationColor? The documentation says it returns two values: a 32-bit 0xAARRGGBB containing the color used for glass composition a boolean parameter that is true "if the color is an opaque blend" (whatever that means) Here's a color that i like, a nice puke green: You can notice the color is greeny, and the translucent title bar (against a white background) shows the snot color very clearly: i try to get the color from Windows: DwmGetColorizationColor(dwCcolorization, bIsOpaqueBlend); And i get dwColorization: 0x0D0A0F04 bIsOpaqueBlend: false According to the documentation this value is of the format AARRGGBB, and so contains: AA: 0x0D (13) RR: 0x0A (10) GG: 0x0F (15) BB: 0x04 (4) This supposedly means that the color is (10, 15, 4), with an opacity of ~5.1%. But if you actually look at this RGB value, it's nowhere near my desired snot green. Here is (10, 15, 4) with zero opacity (the original color), and (10,15,4) with 5% opacity against a white/checkerboard background: So the question is: How to get glass color in Windows Vista/7? i tried using DwmGetColorizationColor, but that doesn't work very well. A person with same problem, but a nicer shiny picture to attract you squirrels: So, it boils down to – DwmGetColorizationColor is completely unusable for applications attempting to apply the current color onto an opaque surface. i love this guy's screenshots much better than mine. Using his screenshots as a template, i made up a few more sparklies: For the last two screenshots, the alpha blended chip is a true partially transparent PNG, blending to your browser's background. Cool! (i'm such a geek) Edit 2: Had to arrange them in rainbow color. (i'm such a geek) Edit 3: Well now i of course have to add Yellow. Undocumented/Unsupported/Fragile Workarounds There is an undocumented export from DwmApi.dll at entry point 137, which we'll call DwmGetColorizationParameters: HRESULT GetColorizationParameters_Undocumented(out DWMCOLORIZATIONPARAMS params); struct DWMCOLORIZATIONPARAMS { public UInt32 ColorizationColor; public UInt32 ColorizationAfterglow; public UInt32 ColorizationColorBalance; public UInt32 ColorizationAfterglowBalance; public UInt32 ColorizationBlurBalance; public UInt32 ColorizationGlassReflectionIntensity; public UInt32 ColorizationOpaqueBlend; } We're interested in the first parameter: ColorizationColor. We can also read the value out of the registry: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\DWM ColorizationColor: REG_DWORD = 0x6614A600 So you pick your poison of creating appcompat issues. You can rely on an undocumented API (which is bad, bad, bad, and can go away at any time) use an undocumented registry key (which is also bad, and can go away at any time) See also Is there a list of valid parameter combinations for GetThemeColor / Visual Styles API How does Windows change Aero Glass color? DWM - Colorization Color Handling Using DWMGetColorizationColor Retrieving Aero Glass base color for opaque surface rendering i've been wanting to ask this question for over a year now. i always knew that it's impossible to answer, and that the only way to get anyone to actually pay attention is to have colorful screenshots; developers are attracted to shiny things. But on the downside it means i had to put all kinds of work into making the lures.

  Read the article

• Why Software Sucks...and What You Can Do About It – book review

  - by DigiMortal

      How do our users see the products we are writing for them and how happy they are with our work? Are they able to get their work done without fighting with cool features and crashes or are they just switching off resistance part of their brain to survive our software? Yeah, the overall picture of software usability landscape is not very nice. Okay, it is not even nice. But, fortunately, Why Software Sucks...and What You Can Do About It by David S. Platt explains everything. Why Software Sucks… is book for software users but I consider it as a-must reading also for developers and specially for their managers whose politics often kills all usability topics as soon as they may appear. For managers usability is soft topic that can be manipulated the way it is best in current state of project. Although developers are not UI designers and usability experts they are still very often forced to deal with these topics and this is how usability problems start (of course, also designers are able to produce designs that are stupid and too hard to use for users, but this blog here is about development). I found this book to be very interesting and funny reading. It is not humor book but it explains you all so you remember later very well what you just read. It took me about three evenings to go through this book and I am still enjoying what I found and how author explains our weird young working field to end users. I suggest this book to all developers – while you are demanding your management to hire or outsource usability expert you are at least causing less pain to end users. So, go and buy this book, just like I did. And… they thanks to mr. Platt :) There is one book more I suggest you to read if you are interested in usability - Don't Make Me Think: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability, 2nd Edition by Steve Krug. Editorial review from Amazon Today’s software sucks. There’s no other good way to say it. It’s unsafe, allowing criminal programs to creep through the Internet wires into our very bedrooms. It’s unreliable, crashing when we need it most, wiping out hours or days of work with no way to get it back. And it’s hard to use, requiring large amounts of head-banging to figure out the simplest operations. It’s no secret that software sucks. You know that from personal experience, whether you use computers for work or personal tasks. In this book, programming insider David Platt explains why that’s the case and, more importantly, why it doesn’t have to be that way. And he explains it in plain, jargon-free English that’s a joy to read, using real-world examples with which you’re already familiar. In the end, he suggests what you, as a typical user, without a technical background, can do about this sad state of our software—how you, as an informed consumer, don’t have to take the abuse that bad software dishes out. As you might expect from the book’s title, Dave’s expose is laced with humor—sometimes outrageous, but always dead on. You’ll laugh out loud as you recall incidents with your own software that made you cry. You’ll slap your thigh with the same hand that so often pounded your computer desk and wished it was a bad programmer’s face. But Dave hasn’t written this book just for laughs. He’s written it to give long-overdue voice to your own discovery—that software does, indeed, suck, but it shouldn’t. Table of contents Acknowledgments xiii Introduction Chapter 1: Who’re You Calling a Dummy? Where We Came From Why It Still Sucks Today Control versus Ease of Use I Don’t Care How Your Program Works A Bad Feature and a Good One Stopping the Proceedings with Idiocy Testing on Live Animals Where We Are and What You Can Do Chapter 2: Tangled in the Web Where We Came From How It Works Why It Still Sucks Today Client-Centered Design versus Server-Centered Design Where’s My Eye Opener? It’s Obvious—Not! Splash, Flash, and Animation Testing on Live Animals What You Can Do about It Chapter 3: Keep Me Safe The Way It Was Why It Sucks Today What Programmers Need to Know, but Don’t A Human Operation Budgeting for Hassles Users Are Lazy Social Engineering Last Word on Security What You Can Do Chapter 4: Who the Heck Are You? Where We Came From Why It Still Sucks Today Incompatible Requirements OK, So Now What? Chapter 5: Who’re You Looking At? Yes, They Know You Why It Sucks More Than Ever Today Users Don’t Know Where the Risks Are What They Know First Milk You with Cookies? Privacy Policy Nonsense Covering Your Tracks The Google Conundrum Solution Chapter 6: Ten Thousand Geeks, Crazed on Jolt Cola See Them in Their Native Habitat All These Geeks Who Speaks, and When, and about What Selling It The Next Generation of Geeks—Passing It On Chapter 7: Who Are These Crazy Bastards Anyway? Homo Logicus Testosterone Poisoning Control and Contentment Making Models Geeks and Jocks Jargon Brains and Constraints Seven Habits of Geeks Chapter 8: Microsoft: Can’t Live With ’Em and Can’t Live Without ’Em They Run the World Me and Them Where We Came From Why It Sucks Today Damned if You Do, Damned if You Don’t We Love to Hate Them Plus ça Change Growing-Up Pains What You Can Do about It The Last Word Chapter 9: Doing Something About It 1. Buy 2. Tell 3. Ridicule 4. Trust 5. Organize Epilogue About the Author

  Read the article

• Who broke the build?

  - by Martin Hinshelwood

  I recently sent round a list of broken builds at SSW and asked for them to be fixed or deleted if they are not being used. My colleague Peter came back with a couple of questions which I love as it tells me that at least one person reads my email I think first we need to answer a couple of other questions related to builds in general.   Why do we want the build to pass? Any developer can pick up a project and build it Standards can be enforced Constant quality is maintained Problems in code are identified early What could a failed build signify? Developers have not built and tested their code properly before checking in. Something added depends on a local resource that is not under version control or does not exist on the target computer. Developers are not writing tests to cover common problems. There are not enough tests to cover problems. Now we know why, lets answer Peters questions: Where is this list? (can we see it somehow) You can normally only see the builds listed for each project. But, you have a little application called “Build Notifications” on your computer. It is installed when you install Visual Studio 2010. Figure: Staring the build notification application on Windows 7. Once you have it open (it may disappear into your system tray) you should click “Options” and select all the projects you are involved in. This application only lists projects that have builds, so don’t worry if it is not listed. This just means you are about to setup a build, right? I just selected ALL projects that have builds. Figure: All builds are listed here In addition to seeing the list you will also get toast notification of build failure’s. How can we get more info on what broke the build? (who is interesting too, to point the finger but more important is what) The only thing worse than breaking the build, is continuing to develop on a broken build! Figure: I have highlighted the users who either are bad for braking the build, or very bad for not fixing it. To find out what is wrong with a build you need to open the build definition. You can open a web version by double clicking the build in the image above, or you can open it from “Team Explorer”. Just connect to your project and open out the “Builds” tree. Then Open the build by double clicking on it. Figure: Opening a build is easy, but double click it and then open a build run from the list. Figure: Good example, the build and tests have passed Figure: Bad example, there are 133 errors preventing POK from being built on the build server. For identifying failures see: Solution: Getting Silverlight to build on Team Build 2010 RC Solution: Testing Web Services with MSTest on Team Build Finding the problem on a partially succeeded build So, Peter asked about blame, let’s have a look and see: Figure: The build has been broken for so long I have no idea when it was broken, but everyone on this list is to blame (I am there too) The rest of the history is lost in the sands of time, there is no way to tell when the build was originally broken, or by whom, or even if it ever worked in the first place. Build should be protected by the team that uses them and the only way to do that is to have them own them. It is fine for me to go in and setup a build, but the ownership for a build should always reside with the person who broke it last. Conclusion This is an example of a pointless build. Lets be honest, if you have a system like TFS in place and builds are constantly left broken, or not added to projects then your developers don’t yet understand the value. I have found that adding a Gated Check-in helps instil that understanding of value. If you prevent them from checking in without passing that basic quality gate of “your code builds on another computer” then it makes them look more closely at why they can’t check-in. I have had builds fail because one developer had a “d” drive, but the build server did not. That is what they are there to catch.   If you want to know what builds to create and why I wrote a post on “Do you know the minimum builds to create on any branch?”   Technorati Tags: TFS2010,Gated Check-in,Builds,Build Failure,Broken Build

  Read the article

• How do I prove or disprove "god" objects are wrong?

  - by honestduane

  Problem Summary: Long story short, I inherited a code base and an development team I am not allowed to replace and the use of God Objects is a big issue. Going forward, I want to have us re-factor things but I am getting push-back from the teams who want to do everything with God Objects "because its easier" and this means I would not be allowed to re-factor. I pushed back citing my years of dev experience, that I'm the new boss who was hired to know these things, etc, and so did the third party offshore companies account sales rep, and this is now at the executive level and my meeting is tomorrow and I want to go in with a lot of technical ammo to advocate best practices because I feel it will be cheaper in the long run (And I personally feel that is what the third party is worried about) for the company. My issue is from a technical level, I know its good long term but I'm having trouble with the ultra short term and 6 months term, and while its something I "know" I cant prove it with references and cited resources outside of one person (Robert C. Martin, aka Uncle Bob), as that is what I am being asked to do as I have been told having data from one person and only one person (Robert C Martin) is not good enough of an argument. Question: What are some resources I can cite directly (Title, year published, page number, quote) by well known experts in the field that explicitly say this use of "God" Objects/Classes/Systems is bad (or good, since we are looking for the most technically valid solution)? Research I have already done: I have a number of books here and I have searched their indexes for the use of the words "god object" and "god class". I found that oddly its almost never used and the copy of the GoF book I have for example, never uses it (At least according to the index in front of me) but I have found it in 2 books per the below, but I want more I can use. I checked the Wikipedia page for "God Object" and its currently a stub with little reference links so although I personally agree with that it says, It doesn't have much I can use in an environment where personal experience is not considered valid. The book cited is also considered too old to be valid by the people I am debating these technical points with as the argument they are making is that "it was once thought to be bad but nobody could prove it, and now modern software says "god" objects are good to use". I personally believe that this statement is incorrect, but I want to prove the truth, whatever it is. In Robert C Martin's "Agile Principles, Patterns, and Practices in C#" (ISBN: 0-13-185725-8, hardcover) where on page 266 it states "Everybody knows that god classes are a bad idea. We don't want to concentrate all the intelligence of a system into a single object or a single function. One of the goals of OOD is the partitioning and distribution of behavior into many classes and many function." -- And then goes on to say sometimes its better to use God Classes anyway sometimes (Citing micro-controllers as an example). In Robert C Martin's "Clean Code: A Handbook of Agile Software Craftsmanship" page 136 (And only this page) talks about the "God class" and calls it out as a prime example of a violation of the "classes should be small" rule he uses to promote the Single Responsibility Principle" starting on on page 138. The problem I have is all my references and citations come from the same person (Robert C. Martin), and am from the same single person/source. I am being told that because he is just one guy, my desire to not use "God Classes" is invalid and not accepted as a standard best practice in the software industry. Is this true? Am I doing things wrong from a technical perspective by trying to keep to the teaching of Uncle Bob? God Objects and Object Oriented Programming and Design: The more I think of this the more I think this is more something you learn when you study OOP and its never explicitly called out; Its implicit to good design is my thinking (Feel free to correct me, please, as I want to learn), The problem is I "know" this, but but not everybody does, so in this case its not considered a valid argument because I am effectively calling it out as universal truth when in fact most people are statistically ignorant of it since statistically most people are not programmers. Conclusion: I am at a loss on what to search for to get the best additional results to cite, since they are making a technical claim and I want to know the truth and be able to prove it with citations like a real engineer/scientist, even if I am biased against god objects due to my personal experience with code that used them. Any assistance or citations would be deeply appreciated.

  Read the article

• Video games, content strategy, and failure - oh my.

  - by Roger Hart

  Last night was the CS London group's event Content Strategy, Manhattan Style. Yes, it's a terrible title, feeling like a self-conscious grasp for chic, sadly commensurate with the venue. Fortunately, this was not commensurate with the event itself, which was lively, relevant, and engaging. Although mostly if you're a consultant. This is a strong strain in current content strategy discourse, and I think we're going to see it remedied quite soon. Not least in Paris on Friday. A lot of the bloggers, speakers, and commentators in the sphere are consultants, or part of agencies and other consulting organisations. A lot of the talk is about how you sell content strategy to your clients. This is completely acceptable. Of course it is. And it's actually useful if that's something you regularly have to do. To an extent, it's even portable to those of us who have to sell content strategy within an organisation. We're still competing for credibility and resource. What we're doing less is living in the beginning of a project. This was touched on by Jeffrey MacIntyre (albeit in a your-clients kind of a way) who described "the day two problem". Companies, he suggested, build websites for launch day, and forget about the need for them to be ongoing entities. Consultants, agencies, or even internal folks on short projects will live through Day Two quite often: the trainwreck moment where somebody realises that even if the content is right (which it often isn't), and on time (which it often isn't), it'll be redundant, outdated, or inaccurate by the end of the week/month/fickle social media attention cycle. The thing about living through a lot of Day Two is that you see a lot of failure. Nothing succeeds like failure? Failure is good. When it's structured right, it's an awesome tool for learning - that's kind of how video games work. I'm chewing over a whole blog post about this, but basically in game-like learning, you try, fail, go round the loop again. Success eventually yields joy. It's a relatively well-known phenomenon. It works best when that failing step is acutely felt, but extremely inexpensive. Dying in Portal is highly frustrating and surprisingly characterful, but the save-points are well designed and the reload unintrusive. The barrier to re-entry into the loop is very low, as is the cost of your failure out in meatspace. So it's easy (and fun) to learn. Yeah, spot the difference with business failure. As an external content strategist, you get to rock up with a big old folder full of other companies' Day Two (and ongoing day two hundred) failures. You can't send the client round the learning loop - although you may well be there because they've been round it once - but you can show other people's round trip. It's not as compelling, but it's not bad. What about internal content strategists? We can still point to things that are wrong, and there are some very compelling tools at our disposal - content inventories, user testing, and analytics, for instance. But if we're picking up big organically sprawling legacy content, Day Two may well be a distant memory, and the felt experience of web content failure is unlikely to be immediate to many people in the organisation. What to do? My hunch here is that the first task is to create something immediate and felt, but that it probably needs to be a success. Something quickly doable and visible - a content problem solved with a measurable business result. Now, that's a tall order; but scrape of the "quickly" and it's the whole reason we're here. At Red Gate, I've started with the text book fear and passion introduction to content strategy. In fact, I just typo'd that as "contempt strategy", and it isn't a bad description. Yelling "look at this, our website is rubbish!" gets you the initial attention, but it doesn't make you many friends. And if you don't produce something pretty sharp-ish, it's easy to lose the momentum you built up for change. The first thing I've done - after the visual content inventory - is to delete a bunch of stuff. About 70% of the SQL Compare web content has gone, in fact. This is a really, really cheap operation. It's visible, and it's powerful. It's cheap because you don't have to create any new content. It's not free, however, because you do have to validate your deletions. This means analytics, actually reading that content, and talking to people whose business purposes that content has to serve. If nobody outside the company uses it, and nobody inside the company thinks they ought to, that's a no-brainer for the delete list. The payoff here is twofold. There's the nebulous hard-to-illustrate "bad content does user experience and brand damage" argument; and there's the "nobody has to spend time (money) maintaining this now" argument. One or both are easily felt, and the second at least should be measurable. But that's just one approach, and I'd be interested to hear from any other internal content strategy folks about how they get buy-in, maintain momentum, and generally get things done.

  Read the article

• Amanda Todd&ndash;What Parents Can Learn From Her Story

  - by D'Arcy Lussier

  Amanda Todd was a bullied teenager who committed suicide this week. Her story has become headline news due in part to her You Tube video she posted telling her story:   The story is heartbreaking for so many reasons, but I wanted to talk about what we as parents can learn from this. Being the dad to two girls, one that’s 10, I’m very aware of the dangers that the internet holds. When I saw her story, one thing jumped out at me – unmonitored internet access at an early age. My daughter (then 9) came home from a friends place once and asked if she could be in a YouTube video with her friend. Apparently this friend was allowed to do whatever she wanted on the internet, including posting goofy videos. This set off warning bells and we ensured our daughter realized the dangers and that she was not to ever post videos of herself. In looking at Amanda’s story, the access to unmonitored internet time along with just being a young girl and being flattered by an online predator were the key events that ultimately led to her suicide. Yes, the reaction of her classmates and “friends” was horrible as well, I’m not diluting that. But our youth don’t fully understand yet that what they do on the internet today will follow them potentially forever. And the people they meet online aren’t necessarily who they claim to be. So what can we as parents learn from Amanda’s story? Parents Shouldn’t Feel Bad About Being Internet Police Our job as parents is in part to protect our kids and keep them safe, even if they don’t like our measures. This includes monitoring, supervising, and restricting their internet activities. In our house we have a family computer in the living room that the kids can watch videos and surf the web. It’s in plain view of everyone, so you can’t hide what you’re looking at. If our daughter goes to a friend’s place, we ask about what they did and what they played. If the computer comes up, we ask about what they did on it. Luckily our daughter is very up front and honest in telling us things, so we have very open discussions. Parents Need to Be Honest About the Dangers of the Internet I’m sure every generation says that “kids grow up so fast these days”, but in our case the internet really does push our kids to be exposed to things they otherwise wouldn’t experience. One wrong word in a Google search, a click of a link in a spam email, or just general curiosity can expose a child to things they aren’t ready for or should never be exposed to (and I’m not just talking about adult material – have you seen some of the graphic pictures from war zones posted on news sites recently?). Our stance as parents has been to be open about discussing the dangers with our kids before they encounter any content – be proactive instead of reactionary. Part of this is alerting them to the monsters that lurk on the internet as well. As kids explore the world wide web, they’re eventually going to encounter some chat room or some Facebook friend invite or other personal connection with someone. More than ever kids need to be educated on the dangers of engaging with people online and sharing personal information. You can think of it as an evolved discussion that our parents had with us about using the phone: “Don’t say ‘I’m home alone’, don’t say when mom or dad get home, don’t tell them any information, etc.” Parents Need to Talk Self Worth at Home Katie makes the point better than I ever could (one bad word towards the end): Our children need to understand their value beyond what the latest issue of TigerBeat says, or the media who continues flaunting physical attributes over intelligence and character, or a society that puts focus on status and wealth. They also have to realize that just because someone pays you a compliment, that doesn’t mean you should ignore personal boundaries and limits. What does this have to do with the internet? Well, in days past if you wanted to be social you had to go out somewhere. Now you can video chat with any number of people from the comfort of wherever your laptop happens to be – and not just text but full HD video with sound! While innocent children head online in the hopes of meeting cool people, predators with bad intentions are heading online too. As much as we try to monitor their online activity and be honest about the dangers of the internet, the human side of our kids isn’t something we can control. But we can try to influence them to see themselves as not needing to search out the acceptance of complete strangers online. Way easier said than done, but ensuring self-worth is something discussed, encouraged, and celebrated is a step in the right direction. Parental Wake Up Call This post is not a critique of Amanda’s parents. The reality is that cyber bullying/abuse is happening every day, and there are millions of parents that have no clue its happening to their children. Amanda’s story is a wake up call that our children’s online activities may be putting them in danger. My heart goes out to the parents of this girl. As a father of daughters, I can’t imagine what I would do if I found my daughter having to hide in a ditch to avoid a mob or call 911 to report my daughter had attempted suicide by drinking bleach or deal with a child turning to drugs/alcohol/cutting to cope. It would be horrendous if we as parents didn’t re-evaluate our family internet policies in light of this event. And in the end, Amanda’s video was meant to bring attention to her plight and encourage others going through the same thing. We may not be kids, but we can still honour her memory by helping safeguard our children.

  Read the article

• To My 24 Year Old Self, Wherever You Are&hellip;

  - by D'Arcy Lussier

  A decade is a milestone in one’s life, regardless of when it occurs. 2011 might seem like a weird year to mark a decade, but 2001 was a defining year for me. It marked my emergence into the technology industry, an unexpected loss of innocence, and triggered an ongoing struggle with faith and belief. Once you go through a valley, climbing the mountain and looking back over where you travelled, you can take in the entirety of the journey. Over the last 10 years I kept journals, and in this new year I took some time to review them. For those today that are me a decade ago, I share with you what I’ve gleamed from my experiences. Take it for what it’s worth, and safe travels on your own journeys through life. Life is a Performance-Based Sport Have confidence, believe you’re capable, but realize that life is a performance-based sport. Everything you get in life is based on whether you can show that you deserve it. Performance is also your best defense against personal attacks. Just make sure you know what standards you’re expected to hit and if people want to poke holes at you let them do the work of trying to find them. Sometimes performance won’t matter though. Good things will happen to bad people, and bad things to good people. What’s important is that you do the right things and ensure the good and bad even out in your own life. How you finish is just as important as how you start. Start strong, end strong. Respect is Your Most Prized Reward Respect is more important than status or ego. The formula is simple: Performing Well + Building Trust + Showing Dedication = Respect Focus on perfecting your craft and helping your team and respect will come. Life is a Team Sport Whatever aspect of your life, you can’t do it alone. You need to rely on the people around you and ensure you’re a positive aspect of their lives; even those that may be difficult or unpleasant. Avoid criticism and instead find ways to help colleagues and superiors better whatever environment you’re in (work, home, etc.). Don’t just highlight gaps and issues, but also come to the table with solutions. At the same time though, stand up for yourself and hold others accountable for the commitments they make to the team. A healthy team needs accountability. Give feedback early and often, and make it verbal. Issues should be dealt with immediately, and positives should be celebrated as they happen. Life is a Contact Sport Difficult moments will happen. Don’t run from them or shield yourself from experiencing them. Embrace them. They will further mold you and reveal who you will become. Find Your Tribe and Embrace Your Community We all need a tribe: a group of people that we gravitate to for support, guidance, wisdom, and friendship. Discover your tribe and immerse yourself in them. Don’t look for a non-existent tribe just to fill the need of belonging though that will leave you empty and bitter when they don’t meet your unrealistic expectations. Try to associate with people more experienced and more knowledgeable than you. You’ll always learn, and you’ll always remember you have much to learn. Put yourself out there, get involved with the community. Opportunities will present themselves. When we open ourselves up to be vulnerable, we also give others the chance to do the same. This helps us all to grow and help each other, it’s very important. And listen to your wife. (Easter *is* a romantic holiday btw, regardless of what you may think.) Don’t Believe Your Own Press Clippings (and by that I mean the ones you write) Until you have a track record of performance to refer to, any notions of grandeur are just that: notions. You lose your rookie status through trials and tribulations, not by the number of stamps in your passport. Be realistic about your own “experience and leadership” and be honest when you aren’t ready for something. And always remember: nobody really cares about you as much as you think they do. Don’t Let Assholes Get You Down The world isn’t evil, but there is evil in the world. Know the difference and don’t paint all people with the same brush. Do be wary of those that use personal beliefs to describe their business (i.e. “We’re a [religion] company”). What matters is the culture of the organization, and that will tell you the moral compass and what is truly valued. Don’t make someone or something a priority that only makes you an option. Life is unfair and enemies/opponents will succeed when you fail. Don’t waste your energy getting upset at this; the only one that will lose out is you. As mentioned earlier, nobody really cares about you as much as you think they do. Misc Ecclesiastes is bullshit. Everything is certainly *not* meaningless. Software development is about delivery, not the process. Having a great process means nothing if you don’t produce anything. Watch “The Weatherman” (“It’s not easy, but easy doesn’t enter into grownup life.”). Read Tony Dungee’s autobiography, even if you don’t like football, and even if you aren’t a Christian. Say no, don’t feel like you have to commit right away when someone asks you to.

  Read the article

• Multi Monitor Setup Problems

  - by Shamballa

  I have Ubuntu 10.04 LTS - the Lucid Lynx. I have until recently been using a nVida Graphics card (NVIDIA GeForce 9800 GT) with two monitors attached, this all worked fine and dandy. A couple of days ago I bought two new identical LCD monitors for a multi monitor setup and two ATI graphics cards (ATI Sapphire Radeon HD5450). NOTE *All monitors work fine in Windows XP, 2k, Vista and 7 After I had booted into Ubuntu only one display came on, that I kind of expected anyway, then I removed the driver for the nVidia card and downloaded the ATI version which gave me the ATI Catalyst Control Center - in that only two of the displays were showing the third was disabled and showing unknown driver. I enabled the third monitor that stated "Unkown Driver" and had to reboot, upon reboot none of the displays work. I restarted and booted up into recovery mode and from now that is only what I can get into using a failsafe driver. It seems according to the log that a server is already active for Display 0 and I have to remove /tmp/.X0-lock and start again. This is what the log file is saying: Fatal Server Error Server is already active for display 0 if this server is no longer running, remove /tmp/.X0-lock and start again. (WW) xf86 closeconsole: KDSETMODE failed: Bad file descriptor (WW) xf86 closeconsole: VT_GETMODE failed: Bad file descriptor (WW) xf86 closeconsole: VT_GETSTATE failed: Bad file descriptor ddxSigGiveUp: closing log I have tried looking at my xorg.config file but unfortunately I have not really got a clue as to how it "should" be - I have tried regenerating it using this command from a terminal: sudo dpkg-reconfigure -phigh xserver-xorg but that had no effect so I am currently stuck in failsafe driver mode but two monitors are active but are mirroring each other. I hope that this is not to long - looking back I have been going on a bit! but I am just trying to explain as much as I can... I have asked this on Linuxquestions but nobody seems to know either or at least I have not had any responses. Could some kind soul please help explain what I can do from here? I would be eternally grateful. Chris * Update * Removing xorg.conf does nothing other than allowing me to use only two monitors - using the command: sudo aticonfig --initial generates the xorg.conf file below: but does not work either - I just get two monitors... Section "ServerLayout" Identifier "aticonfig Layout" Screen 0 "aticonfig-Screen[0]-0" 0 0 EndSection Section "Files" EndSection Section "Module" EndSection Section "Monitor" Identifier "aticonfig-Monitor[0]-0" Option "VendorName" "ATI Proprietary Driver" Option "ModelName" "Generic Autodetecting Monitor" Option "DPMS" "true" EndSection Section "Device" Identifier "aticonfig-Device[0]-0" Driver "fglrx" BusID "PCI:1:0:0" EndSection Section "Screen" Identifier "aticonfig-Screen[0]-0" Device "aticonfig-Device[0]-0" Monitor "aticonfig-Monitor[0]-0" DefaultDepth 24 SubSection "Display" Viewport 0 0 Depth 24 EndSubSection EndSection I have tried using this command from a thread on the Ubuntu Forums with a question similar to mine: sudo aticonfig --initial=dual-head --adapter=all Generated xorg.conf file Section "ServerLayout" Identifier "aticonfig Layout" Screen 0 "aticonfig-Screen[0]-0" 0 0 Screen "aticonfig-Screen[0]-1" RightOf "aticonfig-Screen[0]-0" Screen "aticonfig-Screen[1]-0" RightOf "aticonfig-Screen[0]-1" Screen "aticonfig-Screen[1]-1" RightOf "aticonfig-Screen[1]-0" EndSection Section "Files" EndSection Section "Module" EndSection Section "Monitor" Identifier "aticonfig-Monitor[0]-0" Option "VendorName" "ATI Proprietary Driver" Option "ModelName" "Generic Autodetecting Monitor" Option "DPMS" "true" EndSection Section "Monitor" Identifier "aticonfig-Monitor[0]-1" Option "VendorName" "ATI Proprietary Driver" Option "ModelName" "Generic Autodetecting Monitor" Option "DPMS" "true" EndSection Section "Monitor" Identifier "aticonfig-Monitor[1]-0" Option "VendorName" "ATI Proprietary Driver" Option "ModelName" "Generic Autodetecting Monitor" Option "DPMS" "true" EndSection Section "Monitor" Identifier "aticonfig-Monitor[1]-1" Option "VendorName" "ATI Proprietary Driver" Option "ModelName" "Generic Autodetecting Monitor" Option "DPMS" "true" EndSection Section "Device" Identifier "aticonfig-Device[0]-0" Driver "fglrx" BusID "PCI:1:0:0" EndSection Section "Device" Identifier "aticonfig-Device[0]-1" Driver "fglrx" BusID "PCI:1:0:0" Screen 1 EndSection Section "Device" Identifier "aticonfig-Device[1]-0" Driver "fglrx" BusID "PCI:2:0:0" EndSection Section "Device" Identifier "aticonfig-Device[1]-1" Driver "fglrx" BusID "PCI:2:0:0" Screen 1 EndSection Section "Screen" Identifier "aticonfig-Screen[0]-0" Device "aticonfig-Device[0]-0" Monitor "aticonfig-Monitor[0]-0" DefaultDepth 24 SubSection "Display" Viewport 0 0 Depth 24 EndSubSection EndSection Section "Screen" Identifier "aticonfig-Screen[0]-1" Device "aticonfig-Device[0]-1" Monitor "aticonfig-Monitor[0]-1" DefaultDepth 24 SubSection "Display" Viewport 0 0 Depth 24 EndSubSection EndSection Section "Screen" Identifier "aticonfig-Screen[1]-0" Device "aticonfig-Device[1]-0" Monitor "aticonfig-Monitor[1]-0" DefaultDepth 24 SubSection "Display" Viewport 0 0 Depth 24 EndSubSection EndSection Section "Screen" Identifier "aticonfig-Screen[1]-1" Device "aticonfig-Device[1]-1" Monitor "aticonfig-Monitor[1]-1" DefaultDepth 24 SubSection "Display" Viewport 0 0 Depth 24 EndSubSection EndSection This upon reboot renders ALL monitors blank and I have to go into recovery mode and use a failsafe driver. This is so much harder than I thought it would be, I don't think Ubuntu likes ATI for multi (3) monitors or maybe the other way around. Can anyone help still?

  Read the article

• TCP RST right after FIN/ACK

  - by Nitzan Shaked

  I am having the weirdest issue: I have a web server which sometimes, only on very specific requests, will send a RST to the client after having sent the FIN datagram. First, a description of the setup: The server runs on an Ubuntu 12.04.1 LTS, which itself is a VM guest inside a Win7 x64 host, in bridged mode. ufw is disabled on the host The client runs on a iOS simulator, which runs on OS X Mountain Lion, which is a VM guest (hackintosh) inside a Win7 x64 host, in bridged mode. Both client and server are on the same LAN, one is connected to the home router via an Ethernet cable, and then other thru WiFi. I happened to glimpse over the server's http logs and found that the client sometimes issuing multiple subsequent identical requests. Further investigation led me to discover that this happens when the server sends a RST, and that the client is simply re-trying. I am attaching several tcpdump's: Good1 is the server-side tcpdump of a good session ("good" meaning no RST was generated). Good3 is another sever-side tcpdump of a good session. (The difference between Good1 and Good3 is the order in which ACK's were sent from the server to the client, ACK'ing the client's request. The client's request arives in 2 segements (specifically: one for the http headers, and another for a body containing an empty json object, "{}"). In Good1, the server ACK's both request segments, using 2 ACK segments, after the second request has arrived. In Good3, the server ACK's each request segment with an ACK segment as soon as the request segment arrives. Not that it should make a difference.) Bad1 is a dump, both client- and server-side, of a bad session. Bad2 is another bad session, this time server-side only. Note that in all "bad" sessions, the server ACK's each request segments immediately after having received it. I've looked at a few other bad sessions, and the situation is the same in all of them. But this is also the behavior in "Good3", so I don't see how that observation helps me, of for that matter why it should matter. I can't find any difference between good and bad sessions, or at least one that I think should matter. My question is: why are those RST's being generated? Or at least: how do I go about debugging this, or providing more info here that'll help? Edit 2 new facts that I have learned: Section 4.2.2.13 of the RFC (1122) (and Wikipedia, in the article "TCP", under "Connection Termination") says that a TCP application on one host may close the connection before it has read all of the data in its socket buffer, and in such a case the TCP on the host will sent a RST to the other side, to let it know that not all the data it has sent has been read. I'm not sure I completely understand this, since closing my side of the connection still allows me to read, no? It also means that I can't write any more. I am not sure this is relevant, though, since I see a RST after FIN. There are multiple complaints of this happening with wsgiref (Python's dev-mode HTTP server), which is exactly what I'm using. I'll keep updating as I find out more. Thanks! ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Good1 -- Server Side ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 13:28:02.308319 IP 192.168.1.51.51479 > 192.168.1.132.5000: Flags [S], seq 94268074, win 65535, options [mss 1460,nop,wscale 4,nop,nop,TS val 943308864 ecr 0,sackOK,eol], length 0 13:28:02.308336 IP 192.168.1.132.5000 > 192.168.1.51.51479: Flags [S.], seq 1726304574, ack 94268075, win 14480, options [mss 1460,sackOK,TS val 326480982 ecr 943308864,nop,wscale 3], length 0 13:28:02.309750 IP 192.168.1.51.51479 > 192.168.1.132.5000: Flags [.], ack 1, win 8235, options [nop,nop,TS val 943308865 ecr 326480982], length 0 13:28:02.310744 IP 192.168.1.51.51479 > 192.168.1.132.5000: Flags [P.], seq 1:351, ack 1, win 8235, options [nop,nop,TS val 943308865 ecr 326480982], length 350 13:28:02.310766 IP 192.168.1.51.51479 > 192.168.1.132.5000: Flags [P.], seq 351:353, ack 1, win 8235, options [nop,nop,TS val 943308865 ecr 326480982], length 2 13:28:02.310841 IP 192.168.1.132.5000 > 192.168.1.51.51479: Flags [.], ack 351, win 1944, options [nop,nop,TS val 326480983 ecr 943308865], length 0 13:28:02.310918 IP 192.168.1.132.5000 > 192.168.1.51.51479: Flags [.], ack 353, win 1944, options [nop,nop,TS val 326480983 ecr 943308865], length 0 13:28:02.315931 IP 192.168.1.132.5000 > 192.168.1.51.51479: Flags [P.], seq 1:18, ack 353, win 1944, options [nop,nop,TS val 326480984 ecr 943308865], length 17 13:28:02.316107 IP 192.168.1.132.5000 > 192.168.1.51.51479: Flags [FP.], seq 18:684, ack 353, win 1944, options [nop,nop,TS val 326480984 ecr 943308865], length 666 13:28:02.317651 IP 192.168.1.51.51479 > 192.168.1.132.5000: Flags [.], ack 18, win 8234, options [nop,nop,TS val 943308872 ecr 326480984], length 0 13:28:02.318288 IP 192.168.1.51.51479 > 192.168.1.132.5000: Flags [.], ack 685, win 8192, options [nop,nop,TS val 943308872 ecr 326480984], length 0 13:28:02.318640 IP 192.168.1.51.51479 > 192.168.1.132.5000: Flags [F.], seq 353, ack 685, win 8192, options [nop,nop,TS val 943308872 ecr 326480984], length 0 13:28:02.318651 IP 192.168.1.132.5000 > 192.168.1.51.51479: Flags [.], ack 354, win 1944, options [nop,nop,TS val 326480985 ecr 943308872], length 0 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Good3 -- Server Side ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 13:28:03.311143 IP 192.168.1.51.51486 > 192.168.1.132.5000: Flags [S], seq 1982901126, win 65535, options [mss 1460,nop,wscale 4,nop,nop,TS val 943309853 ecr 0,sackOK,eol], length 0 13:28:03.311155 IP 192.168.1.132.5000 > 192.168.1.51.51486: Flags [S.], seq 2245063571, ack 1982901127, win 14480, options [mss 1460,sackOK,TS val 326481233 ecr 943309853,nop,wscale 3], length 0 13:28:03.312671 IP 192.168.1.51.51486 > 192.168.1.132.5000: Flags [.], ack 1, win 8235, options [nop,nop,TS val 943309854 ecr 326481233], length 0 13:28:03.313330 IP 192.168.1.51.51486 > 192.168.1.132.5000: Flags [P.], seq 1:351, ack 1, win 8235, options [nop,nop,TS val 943309855 ecr 326481233], length 350 13:28:03.313337 IP 192.168.1.132.5000 > 192.168.1.51.51486: Flags [.], ack 351, win 1944, options [nop,nop,TS val 326481234 ecr 943309855], length 0 13:28:03.313342 IP 192.168.1.51.51486 > 192.168.1.132.5000: Flags [P.], seq 351:353, ack 1, win 8235, options [nop,nop,TS val 943309855 ecr 326481233], length 2 13:28:03.313346 IP 192.168.1.132.5000 > 192.168.1.51.51486: Flags [.], ack 353, win 1944, options [nop,nop,TS val 326481234 ecr 943309855], length 0 13:28:03.327942 IP 192.168.1.132.5000 > 192.168.1.51.51486: Flags [P.], seq 1:18, ack 353, win 1944, options [nop,nop,TS val 326481237 ecr 943309855], length 17 13:28:03.328253 IP 192.168.1.132.5000 > 192.168.1.51.51486: Flags [FP.], seq 18:684, ack 353, win 1944, options [nop,nop,TS val 326481237 ecr 943309855], length 666 13:28:03.329076 IP 192.168.1.51.51486 > 192.168.1.132.5000: Flags [.], ack 18, win 8234, options [nop,nop,TS val 943309868 ecr 326481237], length 0 13:28:03.329688 IP 192.168.1.51.51486 > 192.168.1.132.5000: Flags [.], ack 685, win 8192, options [nop,nop,TS val 943309868 ecr 326481237], length 0 13:28:03.330361 IP 192.168.1.51.51486 > 192.168.1.132.5000: Flags [F.], seq 353, ack 685, win 8192, options [nop,nop,TS val 943309869 ecr 326481237], length 0 13:28:03.330370 IP 192.168.1.132.5000 > 192.168.1.51.51486: Flags [.], ack 354, win 1944, options [nop,nop,TS val 326481238 ecr 943309869], length 0 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Bad1 -- Server Side ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 13:28:01.311876 IP 192.168.1.51.51472 > 192.168.1.132.5000: Flags [S], seq 920400580, win 65535, options [mss 1460,nop,wscale 4,nop,nop,TS val 943307883 ecr 0,sackOK,eol], length 0 13:28:01.311896 IP 192.168.1.132.5000 > 192.168.1.51.51472: Flags [S.], seq 3103085782, ack 920400581, win 14480, options [mss 1460,sackOK,TS val 326480733 ecr 943307883,nop,wscale 3], length 0 13:28:01.313509 IP 192.168.1.51.51472 > 192.168.1.132.5000: Flags [.], ack 1, win 8235, options [nop,nop,TS val 943307884 ecr 326480733], length 0 13:28:01.315614 IP 192.168.1.51.51472 > 192.168.1.132.5000: Flags [P.], seq 1:351, ack 1, win 8235, options [nop,nop,TS val 943307886 ecr 326480733], length 350 13:28:01.315727 IP 192.168.1.132.5000 > 192.168.1.51.51472: Flags [.], ack 351, win 1944, options [nop,nop,TS val 326480734 ecr 943307886], length 0 13:28:01.316229 IP 192.168.1.51.51472 > 192.168.1.132.5000: Flags [P.], seq 351:353, ack 1, win 8235, options [nop,nop,TS val 943307886 ecr 326480733], length 2 13:28:01.316242 IP 192.168.1.132.5000 > 192.168.1.51.51472: Flags [.], ack 353, win 1944, options [nop,nop,TS val 326480734 ecr 943307886], length 0 13:28:01.321019 IP 192.168.1.132.5000 > 192.168.1.51.51472: Flags [P.], seq 1:18, ack 353, win 1944, options [nop,nop,TS val 326480735 ecr 943307886], length 17 13:28:01.321294 IP 192.168.1.132.5000 > 192.168.1.51.51472: Flags [FP.], seq 18:684, ack 353, win 1944, options [nop,nop,TS val 326480736 ecr 943307886], length 666 13:28:01.321386 IP 192.168.1.132.5000 > 192.168.1.51.51472: Flags [R.], seq 685, ack 353, win 1944, options [nop,nop,TS val 326480736 ecr 943307886], length 0 13:28:01.322727 IP 192.168.1.51.51472 > 192.168.1.132.5000: Flags [.], ack 18, win 8234, options [nop,nop,TS val 943307891 ecr 326480735], length 0 13:28:01.322733 IP 192.168.1.132.5000 > 192.168.1.51.51472: Flags [R], seq 3103085800, win 0, length 0 13:28:01.323221 IP 192.168.1.51.51472 > 192.168.1.132.5000: Flags [.], ack 685, win 8192, options [nop,nop,TS val 943307892 ecr 326480736], length 0 13:28:01.323231 IP 192.168.1.132.5000 > 192.168.1.51.51472: Flags [R], seq 3103086467, win 0, length 0 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Bad1 -- Client Side ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 13:28:11.374654 IP 192.168.1.51.51472 > 192.168.1.132.5000: Flags [S], seq 920400580, win 65535, options [mss 1460,nop,wscale 4,nop,nop,TS val 943307883 ecr 0,sackOK,eol], length 0 13:28:11.375764 IP 192.168.1.132.5000 > 192.168.1.51.51472: Flags [S.], seq 3103085782, ack 920400581, win 14480, options [mss 1460,sackOK,TS val 326480733 ecr 943307883,nop,wscale 3], length 0 13:28:11.376352 IP 192.168.1.51.51472 > 192.168.1.132.5000: Flags [.], ack 1, win 8235, options [nop,nop,TS val 943307884 ecr 326480733], length 0 13:28:11.378252 IP 192.168.1.51.51472 > 192.168.1.132.5000: Flags [P.], seq 1:351, ack 1, win 8235, options [nop,nop,TS val 943307886 ecr 326480733], length 350 13:28:11.379027 IP 192.168.1.51.51472 > 192.168.1.132.5000: Flags [P.], seq 351:353, ack 1, win 8235, options [nop,nop,TS val 943307886 ecr 326480733], length 2 13:28:11.379732 IP 192.168.1.132.5000 > 192.168.1.51.51472: Flags [.], ack 351, win 1944, options [nop,nop,TS val 326480734 ecr 943307886], length 0 13:28:11.380592 IP 192.168.1.132.5000 > 192.168.1.51.51472: Flags [.], ack 353, win 1944, options [nop,nop,TS val 326480734 ecr 943307886], length 0 13:28:11.384968 IP 192.168.1.132.5000 > 192.168.1.51.51472: Flags [P.], seq 1:18, ack 353, win 1944, options [nop,nop,TS val 326480735 ecr 943307886], length 17 13:28:11.385044 IP 192.168.1.51.51472 > 192.168.1.132.5000: Flags [.], ack 18, win 8234, options [nop,nop,TS val 943307891 ecr 326480735], length 0 13:28:11.385586 IP 192.168.1.132.5000 > 192.168.1.51.51472: Flags [FP.], seq 18:684, ack 353, win 1944, options [nop,nop,TS val 326480736 ecr 943307886], length 666 13:28:11.385743 IP 192.168.1.51.51472 > 192.168.1.132.5000: Flags [.], ack 685, win 8192, options [nop,nop,TS val 943307892 ecr 326480736], length 0 13:28:11.385966 IP 192.168.1.132.5000 > 192.168.1.51.51472: Flags [R.], seq 685, ack 353, win 1944, options [nop,nop,TS val 326480736 ecr 943307886], length 0 13:28:11.387343 IP 192.168.1.132.5000 > 192.168.1.51.51472: Flags [R], seq 3103085800, win 0, length 0 13:28:11.387344 IP 192.168.1.132.5000 > 192.168.1.51.51472: Flags [R], seq 3103086467, win 0, length 0 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Bad2 -- Server Side ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 13:28:01.319185 IP 192.168.1.51.51473 > 192.168.1.132.5000: Flags [S], seq 1631526992, win 65535, options [mss 1460,nop,wscale 4,nop,nop,TS val 943307889 ecr 0,sackOK,eol], length 0 13:28:01.319197 IP 192.168.1.132.5000 > 192.168.1.51.51473: Flags [S.], seq 2524685719, ack 1631526993, win 14480, options [mss 1460,sackOK,TS val 326480735 ecr 943307889,nop,wscale 3], length 0 13:28:01.320692 IP 192.168.1.51.51473 > 192.168.1.132.5000: Flags [.], ack 1, win 8235, options [nop,nop,TS val 943307890 ecr 326480735], length 0 13:28:01.322219 IP 192.168.1.51.51473 > 192.168.1.132.5000: Flags [P.], seq 1:351, ack 1, win 8235, options [nop,nop,TS val 943307890 ecr 326480735], length 350 13:28:01.322336 IP 192.168.1.132.5000 > 192.168.1.51.51473: Flags [.], ack 351, win 1944, options [nop,nop,TS val 326480736 ecr 943307890], length 0 13:28:01.322689 IP 192.168.1.51.51473 > 192.168.1.132.5000: Flags [P.], seq 351:353, ack 1, win 8235, options [nop,nop,TS val 943307890 ecr 326480735], length 2 13:28:01.322700 IP 192.168.1.132.5000 > 192.168.1.51.51473: Flags [.], ack 353, win 1944, options [nop,nop,TS val 326480736 ecr 943307890], length 0 13:28:01.326307 IP 192.168.1.132.5000 > 192.168.1.51.51473: Flags [P.], seq 1:18, ack 353, win 1944, options [nop,nop,TS val 326480737 ecr 943307890], length 17 13:28:01.326614 IP 192.168.1.132.5000 > 192.168.1.51.51473: Flags [FP.], seq 18:684, ack 353, win 1944, options [nop,nop,TS val 326480737 ecr 943307890], length 666 13:28:01.326710 IP 192.168.1.132.5000 > 192.168.1.51.51473: Flags [R.], seq 685, ack 353, win 1944, options [nop,nop,TS val 326480737 ecr 943307890], length 0 13:28:01.328499 IP 192.168.1.51.51473 > 192.168.1.132.5000: Flags [.], ack 18, win 8234, options [nop,nop,TS val 943307896 ecr 326480737], length 0 13:28:01.328509 IP 192.168.1.132.5000 > 192.168.1.51.51473: Flags [R], seq 2524685737, win 0, length 0 13:28:01.328514 IP 192.168.1.51.51473 > 192.168.1.132.5000: Flags [.], ack 685, win 8192, options [nop,nop,TS val 943307896 ecr 326480737], length 0 13:28:01.328517 IP 192.168.1.132.5000 > 192.168.1.51.51473: Flags [R], seq 2524686404, win 0, length 0

  Read the article

• CodePlex Daily Summary for Thursday, March 01, 2012

  CodePlex Daily Summary for Thursday, March 01, 2012Popular ReleasesMetodología General Ajustada - MGA: 01.09.08: Cambios John: Cambios en el MDI: Habilitación del menú e ícono de Imprimir. Deshabilitación de menú Ayuda y opciones de Importar y Exportar del menú Proyectos temporalmente. Integración con código de Crystal Report. Validaciones con Try-Catch al generar los reportes, personalización de los formularios en estilos y botones y validación de selección de tipo de reporte. Creación de instalador con TODOS los cambios y la creación de las carpetas asociadas a los RPT.WatchersNET CKEditor™ Provider for DotNetNuke®: CKEditor Provider 1.14.01: Whats NewAdded New Plugin "Ventrian News Articles Link Selector" to select an Article Link from the News Article Module (This Plugin is not visible by default in your Toolbar, you need to manually add the 'newsarticleslinks' to your toolbarset) http://www.watchersnet.de/Portals/0/screenshots/dnn/CKEditorNewsArticlesLinks.png File-Browser: Added Paging to the Files List. You can define the Page Size in the Options (Default Value: 20) http://www.watchersnet.de/Portals/0/screenshots/dnn/CKEdito...MyRouter (Virtual WiFi Router): MyRouter 1.0 (Beta): A friendlier User Interface. A logger file to catch exceptions so you may send it to use to improve and fix any bugs that may occur. A feedback form because we always love hearing what you guy's think of MyRouter. Check for update menu item for you to stay up to date will the latest changes. Facebook fan page so you may spread the word and share MyRouter with friends and family And Many other exciting features were sure your going to love!WPF Sound Visualization Library: WPF SVL 0.3 (Source, Binaries, Examples, Help): Version 0.3 of WPFSVL. This includes three new controls: an equalizer, a digital clock, and a time editor.Thai Flood Watch: Thai Flood Watch - Source: non commercial use only ** This project supported by Department of Computer Science KhonKaen University Thailand.ZXing.Net: ZXing.Net 0.4.0.0: sync with rev. 2196 of the java version important fix for RGBLuminanceSource generating barcode bitmaps Windows Phone demo client (only tested with emulator, because I don't have a Windows Phone) Barcode generation support for Windows Forms demo client Webcam support for Windows Forms demo clientOrchard Project: Orchard 1.4: Please read our release notes for Orchard 1.4: http://docs.orchardproject.net/Documentation/Orchard-1-4-Release-Notes.NET Assembly Information: Assembly Information 2.1.0.1: - Fixed the issue in which AnyCPU binaries were shown as 32bit - Added support to show the errors in-case if some dlls failed to load.FluentData -Micro ORM with a fluent API that makes it simple to query a database: FluentData version 1.2: New features: - QueryValues method - Added support for automapping to enumerations (both int and string are supported). Fixed 2 reported issues.NetSqlAzMan - .NET SQL Authorization Manager: 3.6.0.15: 3.6.0.15 28-Feb-2012 • Fix: The communication object, System.ServiceModel.Channels.ServiceChannel, cannot be used for communication because it is in the Faulted state. Work Item 10435: http://netsqlazman.codeplex.com/workitem/10435 • Fix: Made StorageCache thread safe. Thanks to tangrl. • Fix: Members property of SqlAzManApplicationGroup is not functioning. Thanks to tangrl. Work Item 10267: http://netsqlazman.codeplex.com/workitem/10267 • Fix: Indexer are making database calls. Thanks to t...SCCM Client Actions Tool: Client Actions Tool v1.1: SCCM Client Actions Tool v1.1 is the latest version. It comes with following changes since last version: Added stop button to stop the ongoing process. Added action "Query update status". Added option "saveOnlineComputers" in config.ini to enable saving list of online computers from last session. Default value for "LatestClientVersion" set to SP2 R3 (4.00.6487.2157). Wuauserv service manual startup mode is considered healthy on Windows 7. Errors are now suppressed in checkReleases...Kinect PowerPoint Control: Kinect PowerPoint Control v1.1: Updated for Kinect SDK 1.0.SharpCompress - a fully native C# library for RAR, 7Zip, Zip, Tar, GZip, BZip2: SharpCompress 0.8: API Updates: SOLID Extract Method for Archives (7Zip and RAR). ExtractAllEntries method on Archive classes will extract archives as a streaming file. This can offer better 7Zip extraction performance if any of the entries are solid. The IsSolid method on 7Zip archives will return true if any are solid. Removed IExtractionListener was removed in favor of events. Unit tests show example. Bug fixes: PPMd passes tests plus other fixes (Thanks Pavel) Zip used to always write a Post Descri...Social Network Importer for NodeXL: SocialNetImporter(v.1.3): This new version includes: - Download new networks for Facebook fan pages. - New options for downloading more posts - Bug fixes To use the new graph data provider, do the following: Unzip the Zip file into the "PlugIns" folder that can be found in the NodeXL installation folder (i.e "C:\Program Files\Social Media Research Foundation\NodeXL Excel Template\PlugIns") Open NodeXL template and you can access the new importer from the "Import" menuASP.NET REST Services Framework: Release 1.1 - Standard version: Beginning from v1.1 the REST-services Framework is compatible with ASP.NET Routing model as well with CRUD (Create, Read, Update, and Delete) principle. These two are often important when building REST API functionality within your application. It also includes ability to apply Filters to a class to target all WebRest methods, as well as some performance enhancements. New version includes Metadata Explorer providing ability exploring the existing services that becomes essential as the number ...SQL Live Monitor: SQL Live Monitor 1.31: A quick fix to make it this version work with SQL 2012. Version 2 already has 2012 working, but am still developing the UI in version 2, so this is just an interim fix to allow user to monitor SQL 2012.Content Slider Module for DotNetNuke: 01.02.00: This release has the following updates and new features: Feature: One-Click Enabling of Pager Setting Feature: Cache Sliders for Performance Feature: Configurable Cache Setting Enhancement: Transitions can be Selected Bug: Secure Folder Images not Viewable Bug: Sliders Disappear on Postback Bug: Remote Images Cause Error Bug: Deleted Images Cause Error System Requirements DotNetNuke v06.00.00 or newer .Net Framework v3.5 SP1 or newer SQL Server 2005 or newerImage Resizer for Windows: Image Resizer 3 Preview 3: Here is yet another iteration toward what will eventually become Image Resizer 3. This release is stable. However, I'm calling it a preview since there are still many features I'd still like to add before calling it complete. Updated on February 28 to fix an issue with installing on multi-user machines. As usual, here is my progress report. Done Preview 3 Fix: 3206 3076 3077 5688 Fix: 7420 Fix: 7527 Fix: 7576 7612 Preview 2 6308 6309 Fix: 7339 Fix: 7357 Preview 1 UI...Finestra Virtual Desktops: 2.5.4500: This is a bug fix release for version 2.5. It fixes several things and adds a couple of minor features. See the 2.5 release notes for more information on the major new features in that version. Important - If Finestra crashes on startup for you, you must install the Visual C++ 2010 runtime from http://www.microsoft.com/download/en/details.aspx?id=5555. Fixes a bug with window animations not refreshing the screen on XP and with DWM off Fixes a bug with with crashing on XP due to a bug in t...Media Companion: MC 3.432b Release: General Now remembers window location. Catching a few more exceptions when an image is blank TV A couple of UI tweaks Movies Fixed the actor name displaying HTML Fixed crash when using Save files as "movie.nfo", "movie.tbn", & "fanart.jpg" New CSV template for HTML output function Added <createdate> tag for HTML output A couple of UI tweaks Known Issues Multiepisodes are not handled correctly in MC. The created nfo is valid, but they are not displayed in MC correctly & saving the...New Projectsabac: abac cn websiteAION Launcher: simple aion launcher...just edit the background image of your choosing inside the code and other things such as the links for the buttons and the ip adress and port of the serverAXTFSTool: Dynamics AX tool that connects to your project's TFS and lists the objects your colleagues have changed. Written in C#, still under development and improvements. Useful for team leaders, deployment managers, etc.cookieTopo: Topo map viewerCrmFetchKit.js: Simple Library at allows the execution of fetchxml queries via JavaScript for Dynamics CRM 2011 (using the new WCF endpoints). Like the CrmRestKit this framework uses the promise/A capacities of jQuery. The code and the idea for this framework bases on the CrmServiceToolkit (http://crmtoolkit.codeplex.com/) developed by Daniel Cai. cy univerX engine: ????????DNSAPI.NET: A common API for managing DNS servers on Windows. This project is based on the work I started back in 2002 when I needed to create a web front-end for Windows' DNS server using the .Net framework. The plan is to expand on the project and include support for the BIND server on Windows too. ego.net: ego.netfdTFS: Team Foundation Server Source Control Plugin for FlashDevelopGeoWPS: GeoWPS is an implementation of the OGC WPS. It will be developed in C#. IThink: A new project.King Garden: Boy King's .net practical projects.King Garret: Boy King's .net learning projects.LottoCheck: Follow LottoNot-Terraria: This is a like terraria game but NOT terrariaPassword Protector: Password Protector SharePoint 2010 BlobCache Manager: Manage your web application's blobcache settings directly in the central administration.SharePoint 2010 SilverLight Multiple File Uploader: SharePoint 2010 SilverLight Multiple File Uploader for Documents Libraries with MetaData.Sharepoint Tool Collection: I want to Integrate Various Utilities of Sharepoint at one place. It is for easy working of user or developer. Ex-1. A utility which takes some params & csv file and upload 100s of items on the sharepoint list easily. Ex-2 A utility to upload documents in a library. etc.SQLCLR Cmd Exec Framework Example: For users of MS SQL Server, xp_cmdshell is a utility that we usually want to have disabled. However there are still cases where calling a command line is needed. This project provides an framework/example to make command line calls. It is not meant as an xp_cmdshell replacement but as a workaround.Symmetric Designs Python 3.2: Symmetric Designs for Python 3.2 helps graphical artists to design and develop their own designs freestyle. It uses the pygame module for Python 3.2. It can also be analysed in order to get a grasp of graphics programming in Python.Terminsoft open CLR libraries: Terminsoft open CLR libraries. The first is Terminsoft.Intervals, intended for modeling the sets of intervals with elements, the comparison operation is defined for. The second is Terminsoft.Syntax, intended for text parsing and transformation and built upon regular expressions.Thai Flood Watch: Thai Flood Watch provides useful information, up-to-date and visual access to the major canal in Bangkok, Thailand using data from department of drainage and sewerage. Easily monitor river and canal flow information in Bangkok area, right from your hand.TheNerd: Sample video game source code. Using Sunburn.Unity.WebAPI: A library that allows simple Integration of Microsoft's Unity IoC container with ASP.NET's WebAPI. This project includes a bespoke DependencyResolver that creates a child container per HTTP request and disposes of all registered IDisposable instances at the end of the request.Wholemy.RemoteTouch: The project is a remote touch-sensitive keyboard with a customizable interface which allows to supplement control of another computer, regardless of the wires. For example, if you have not so fast Tablet PC - a client and a fast desktop computer - the server using the network.WindowPlace: WindowPlace makes it possible to save Window positions and sizes to a profile. Switching between profiles will effortlessly move and resize your windows. Help improve productivity - especially for multi-monitor systems. Developed in C# using WPF and a few Windows API calls in the background. WP Error Manager (Devv.Core.WPErrorManager): Library to log, handle and report errors on Windows Phone 7 apps. Fully customizable and extremely easy to implement. Works with any WP7 app. Tested with the emulator, Nokia Lumia 800 and Samsung Focus Flash.WPMatic: Windows Phone7 App to manage Homematic (eQ-3) Devices. The App is like the Homematic Central Configuration Unit (CCU) in German.www.Nabaza.com Freeware and Ebooks: www.Nabaza.com Freeware and Ebooks by William R. NabazaZap: Zap is a light weight .NET communication framework. It is designed for programs running in local area network. Zap provides code generation tool that enables user to call remote methods, add/remote event listener to remote objects, while hides the lower details.

  Read the article

• Metro: Introduction to CSS 3 Grid Layout

  - by Stephen.Walther

  The purpose of this blog post is to provide you with a quick introduction to the new W3C CSS 3 Grid Layout standard. You can use CSS Grid Layout in Metro style applications written with JavaScript to lay out the content of an HTML page. CSS Grid Layout provides you with all of the benefits of using HTML tables for layout without requiring you to actually use any HTML table elements. Doing Page Layouts without Tables Back in the 1990’s, if you wanted to create a fancy website, then you would use HTML tables for layout. For example, if you wanted to create a standard three-column page layout then you would create an HTML table with three columns like this: <table height="100%"> <tr> <td valign="top" width="300px" bgcolor="red"> Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column </td> <td valign="top" bgcolor="green"> Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column </td> <td valign="top" width="300px" bgcolor="blue"> Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column </td> </tr> </table> When the table above gets rendered out to a browser, you end up with the following three-column layout: The width of the left and right columns is fixed – the width of the middle column expands or contracts depending on the width of the browser. Sometime around the year 2005, everyone decided that using tables for layout was a bad idea. Instead of using tables for layout — it was collectively decided by the spirit of the Web — you should use Cascading Style Sheets instead. Why is using HTML tables for layout bad? Using tables for layout breaks the semantics of the TABLE element. A TABLE element should be used only for displaying tabular information such as train schedules or moon phases. Using tables for layout is bad for accessibility (The Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 1.0 is explicit about this) and using tables for layout is bad for separating content from layout (see http://CSSZenGarden.com). Post 2005, anyone who used HTML tables for layout were encouraged to hold their heads down in shame. That’s all well and good, but the problem with using CSS for layout is that it can be more difficult to work with CSS than HTML tables. For example, to achieve a standard three-column layout, you either need to use absolute positioning or floats. Here’s a three-column layout with floats: <style type="text/css"> #container { min-width: 800px; } #leftColumn { float: left; width: 300px; height: 100%; background-color:red; } #middleColumn { background-color:green; height: 100%; } #rightColumn { float: right; width: 300px; height: 100%; background-color:blue; } </style> <div id="container"> <div id="rightColumn"> Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column </div> <div id="leftColumn"> Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column </div> <div id="middleColumn"> Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column </div> </div> The page above contains four DIV elements: a container DIV which contains a leftColumn, middleColumn, and rightColumn DIV. The leftColumn DIV element is floated to the left and the rightColumn DIV element is floated to the right. Notice that the rightColumn DIV appears in the page before the middleColumn DIV – this unintuitive ordering is necessary to get the floats to work correctly (see http://stackoverflow.com/questions/533607/css-three-column-layout-problem). The page above (almost) works with the most recent versions of most browsers. For example, you get the correct three-column layout in both Firefox and Chrome: And the layout mostly works with Internet Explorer 9 except for the fact that for some strange reason the min-width doesn’t work so when you shrink the width of your browser, you can get the following unwanted layout: Notice how the middle column (the green column) bleeds to the left and right. People have solved these issues with more complicated CSS. For example, see: http://matthewjamestaylor.com/blog/holy-grail-no-quirks-mode.htm But, at this point, no one could argue that using CSS is easier or more intuitive than tables. It takes work to get a layout with CSS and we know that we could achieve the same layout more easily using HTML tables. Using CSS Grid Layout CSS Grid Layout is a new W3C standard which provides you with all of the benefits of using HTML tables for layout without the disadvantage of using an HTML TABLE element. In other words, CSS Grid Layout enables you to perform table layouts using pure Cascading Style Sheets. The CSS Grid Layout standard is still in a “Working Draft” state (it is not finalized) and it is located here: http://www.w3.org/TR/css3-grid-layout/ The CSS Grid Layout standard is only supported by Internet Explorer 10 and there are no signs that any browser other than Internet Explorer will support this standard in the near future. This means that it is only practical to take advantage of CSS Grid Layout when building Metro style applications with JavaScript. Here’s how you can create a standard three-column layout using a CSS Grid Layout: <!DOCTYPE html> <html> <head> <style type="text/css"> html, body, #container { height: 100%; padding: 0px; margin: 0px; } #container { display: -ms-grid; -ms-grid-columns: 300px auto 300px; -ms-grid-rows: 100%; } #leftColumn { -ms-grid-column: 1; background-color:red; } #middleColumn { -ms-grid-column: 2; background-color:green; } #rightColumn { -ms-grid-column: 3; background-color:blue; } </style> </head> <body> <div id="container"> <div id="leftColumn"> Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column </div> <div id="middleColumn"> Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column </div> <div id="rightColumn"> Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column </div> </div> </body> </html> When the page above is rendered in Internet Explorer 10, you get a standard three-column layout: The page above contains four DIV elements: a container DIV which contains a leftColumn DIV, middleColumn DIV, and rightColumn DIV. The container DIV is set to Grid display mode with the following CSS rule: #container { display: -ms-grid; -ms-grid-columns: 300px auto 300px; -ms-grid-rows: 100%; } The display property is set to the value “-ms-grid”. This property causes the container DIV to lay out its child elements in a grid. (Notice that you use “-ms-grid” instead of “grid”. The “-ms-“ prefix is used because the CSS Grid Layout standard is still preliminary. This implementation only works with IE10 and it might change before the final release.) The grid columns and rows are defined with the “-ms-grid-columns” and “-ms-grid-rows” properties. The style rule above creates a grid with three columns and one row. The left and right columns are fixed sized at 300 pixels. The middle column sizes automatically depending on the remaining space available. The leftColumn, middleColumn, and rightColumn DIVs are positioned within the container grid element with the following CSS rules: #leftColumn { -ms-grid-column: 1; background-color:red; } #middleColumn { -ms-grid-column: 2; background-color:green; } #rightColumn { -ms-grid-column: 3; background-color:blue; } The “-ms-grid-column” property is used to specify the column associated with the element selected by the style sheet selector. The leftColumn DIV is positioned in the first grid column, the middleColumn DIV is positioned in the second grid column, and the rightColumn DIV is positioned in the third grid column. I find using CSS Grid Layout to be just as intuitive as using an HTML table for layout. You define your columns and rows and then you position different elements within these columns and rows. Very straightforward. Creating Multiple Columns and Rows In the previous section, we created a super simple three-column layout. This layout contained only a single row. In this section, let’s create a slightly more complicated layout which contains more than one row: The following page contains a header row, a content row, and a footer row. The content row contains three columns: <!DOCTYPE html> <html> <head> <style type="text/css"> html, body, #container { height: 100%; padding: 0px; margin: 0px; } #container { display: -ms-grid; -ms-grid-columns: 300px auto 300px; -ms-grid-rows: 100px 1fr 100px; } #header { -ms-grid-column: 1; -ms-grid-column-span: 3; -ms-grid-row: 1; background-color: yellow; } #leftColumn { -ms-grid-column: 1; -ms-grid-row: 2; background-color:red; } #middleColumn { -ms-grid-column: 2; -ms-grid-row: 2; background-color:green; } #rightColumn { -ms-grid-column: 3; -ms-grid-row: 2; background-color:blue; } #footer { -ms-grid-column: 1; -ms-grid-column-span: 3; -ms-grid-row: 3; background-color: orange; } </style> </head> <body> <div id="container"> <div id="header"> Header, Header, Header </div> <div id="leftColumn"> Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column </div> <div id="middleColumn"> Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column </div> <div id="rightColumn"> Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column </div> <div id="footer"> Footer, Footer, Footer </div> </div> </body> </html> In the page above, the grid layout is created with the following rule which creates a grid with three rows and three columns: #container { display: -ms-grid; -ms-grid-columns: 300px auto 300px; -ms-grid-rows: 100px 1fr 100px; } The header is created with the following rule: #header { -ms-grid-column: 1; -ms-grid-column-span: 3; -ms-grid-row: 1; background-color: yellow; } The header is positioned in column 1 and row 1. Furthermore, notice that the “-ms-grid-column-span” property is used to span the header across three columns. CSS Grid Layout and Fractional Units When you use CSS Grid Layout, you can take advantage of fractional units. Fractional units provide you with an easy way of dividing up remaining space in a page. Imagine, for example, that you want to create a three-column page layout. You want the size of the first column to be fixed at 200 pixels and you want to divide the remaining space among the remaining three columns. The width of the second column is equal to the combined width of the third and fourth columns. The following CSS rule creates four columns with the desired widths: #container { display: -ms-grid; -ms-grid-columns: 200px 2fr 1fr 1fr; -ms-grid-rows: 1fr; } The fr unit represents a fraction. The grid above contains four columns. The second column is two times the size (2fr) of the third (1fr) and fourth (1fr) columns. When you use the fractional unit, the remaining space is divided up using fractional amounts. Notice that the single row is set to a height of 1fr. The single grid row gobbles up the entire vertical space. Here’s the entire HTML page: <!DOCTYPE html> <html> <head> <style type="text/css"> html, body, #container { height: 100%; padding: 0px; margin: 0px; } #container { display: -ms-grid; -ms-grid-columns: 200px 2fr 1fr 1fr; -ms-grid-rows: 1fr; } #firstColumn { -ms-grid-column: 1; background-color:red; } #secondColumn { -ms-grid-column: 2; background-color:green; } #thirdColumn { -ms-grid-column: 3; background-color:blue; } #fourthColumn { -ms-grid-column: 4; background-color:orange; } </style> </head> <body> <div id="container"> <div id="firstColumn"> First Column, First Column, First Column </div> <div id="secondColumn"> Second Column, Second Column, Second Column </div> <div id="thirdColumn"> Third Column, Third Column, Third Column </div> <div id="fourthColumn"> Fourth Column, Fourth Column, Fourth Column </div> </div> </body> </html>   Summary There is more in the CSS 3 Grid Layout standard than discussed in this blog post. My goal was to describe the basics. If you want to learn more than you can read through the entire standard at http://www.w3.org/TR/css3-grid-layout/ In this blog post, I described some of the difficulties that you might encounter when attempting to replace HTML tables with Cascading Style Sheets when laying out a web page. I explained how you can take advantage of the CSS 3 Grid Layout standard to avoid these problems when building Metro style applications using JavaScript. CSS 3 Grid Layout provides you with all of the benefits of using HTML tables for laying out a page without requiring you to use HTML table elements.

  Read the article

• Metro: Introduction to CSS 3 Grid Layout

  - by Stephen.Walther

  The purpose of this blog post is to provide you with a quick introduction to the new W3C CSS 3 Grid Layout standard. You can use CSS Grid Layout in Metro style applications written with JavaScript to lay out the content of an HTML page. CSS Grid Layout provides you with all of the benefits of using HTML tables for layout without requiring you to actually use any HTML table elements. Doing Page Layouts without Tables Back in the 1990’s, if you wanted to create a fancy website, then you would use HTML tables for layout. For example, if you wanted to create a standard three-column page layout then you would create an HTML table with three columns like this: <table height="100%"> <tr> <td valign="top" width="300px" bgcolor="red"> Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column </td> <td valign="top" bgcolor="green"> Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column </td> <td valign="top" width="300px" bgcolor="blue"> Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column </td> </tr> </table> When the table above gets rendered out to a browser, you end up with the following three-column layout: The width of the left and right columns is fixed – the width of the middle column expands or contracts depending on the width of the browser. Sometime around the year 2005, everyone decided that using tables for layout was a bad idea. Instead of using tables for layout — it was collectively decided by the spirit of the Web — you should use Cascading Style Sheets instead. Why is using HTML tables for layout bad? Using tables for layout breaks the semantics of the TABLE element. A TABLE element should be used only for displaying tabular information such as train schedules or moon phases. Using tables for layout is bad for accessibility (The Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 1.0 is explicit about this) and using tables for layout is bad for separating content from layout (see http://CSSZenGarden.com). Post 2005, anyone who used HTML tables for layout were encouraged to hold their heads down in shame. That’s all well and good, but the problem with using CSS for layout is that it can be more difficult to work with CSS than HTML tables. For example, to achieve a standard three-column layout, you either need to use absolute positioning or floats. Here’s a three-column layout with floats: <style type="text/css"> #container { min-width: 800px; } #leftColumn { float: left; width: 300px; height: 100%; background-color:red; } #middleColumn { background-color:green; height: 100%; } #rightColumn { float: right; width: 300px; height: 100%; background-color:blue; } </style> <div id="container"> <div id="rightColumn"> Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column </div> <div id="leftColumn"> Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column </div> <div id="middleColumn"> Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column </div> </div> The page above contains four DIV elements: a container DIV which contains a leftColumn, middleColumn, and rightColumn DIV. The leftColumn DIV element is floated to the left and the rightColumn DIV element is floated to the right. Notice that the rightColumn DIV appears in the page before the middleColumn DIV – this unintuitive ordering is necessary to get the floats to work correctly (see http://stackoverflow.com/questions/533607/css-three-column-layout-problem). The page above (almost) works with the most recent versions of most browsers. For example, you get the correct three-column layout in both Firefox and Chrome: And the layout mostly works with Internet Explorer 9 except for the fact that for some strange reason the min-width doesn’t work so when you shrink the width of your browser, you can get the following unwanted layout: Notice how the middle column (the green column) bleeds to the left and right. People have solved these issues with more complicated CSS. For example, see: http://matthewjamestaylor.com/blog/holy-grail-no-quirks-mode.htm But, at this point, no one could argue that using CSS is easier or more intuitive than tables. It takes work to get a layout with CSS and we know that we could achieve the same layout more easily using HTML tables. Using CSS Grid Layout CSS Grid Layout is a new W3C standard which provides you with all of the benefits of using HTML tables for layout without the disadvantage of using an HTML TABLE element. In other words, CSS Grid Layout enables you to perform table layouts using pure Cascading Style Sheets. The CSS Grid Layout standard is still in a “Working Draft” state (it is not finalized) and it is located here: http://www.w3.org/TR/css3-grid-layout/ The CSS Grid Layout standard is only supported by Internet Explorer 10 and there are no signs that any browser other than Internet Explorer will support this standard in the near future. This means that it is only practical to take advantage of CSS Grid Layout when building Metro style applications with JavaScript. Here’s how you can create a standard three-column layout using a CSS Grid Layout: <!DOCTYPE html> <html> <head> <style type="text/css"> html, body, #container { height: 100%; padding: 0px; margin: 0px; } #container { display: -ms-grid; -ms-grid-columns: 300px auto 300px; -ms-grid-rows: 100%; } #leftColumn { -ms-grid-column: 1; background-color:red; } #middleColumn { -ms-grid-column: 2; background-color:green; } #rightColumn { -ms-grid-column: 3; background-color:blue; } </style> </head> <body> <div id="container"> <div id="leftColumn"> Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column </div> <div id="middleColumn"> Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column </div> <div id="rightColumn"> Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column </div> </div> </body> </html> When the page above is rendered in Internet Explorer 10, you get a standard three-column layout: The page above contains four DIV elements: a container DIV which contains a leftColumn DIV, middleColumn DIV, and rightColumn DIV. The container DIV is set to Grid display mode with the following CSS rule: #container { display: -ms-grid; -ms-grid-columns: 300px auto 300px; -ms-grid-rows: 100%; } The display property is set to the value “-ms-grid”. This property causes the container DIV to lay out its child elements in a grid. (Notice that you use “-ms-grid” instead of “grid”. The “-ms-“ prefix is used because the CSS Grid Layout standard is still preliminary. This implementation only works with IE10 and it might change before the final release.) The grid columns and rows are defined with the “-ms-grid-columns” and “-ms-grid-rows” properties. The style rule above creates a grid with three columns and one row. The left and right columns are fixed sized at 300 pixels. The middle column sizes automatically depending on the remaining space available. The leftColumn, middleColumn, and rightColumn DIVs are positioned within the container grid element with the following CSS rules: #leftColumn { -ms-grid-column: 1; background-color:red; } #middleColumn { -ms-grid-column: 2; background-color:green; } #rightColumn { -ms-grid-column: 3; background-color:blue; } The “-ms-grid-column” property is used to specify the column associated with the element selected by the style sheet selector. The leftColumn DIV is positioned in the first grid column, the middleColumn DIV is positioned in the second grid column, and the rightColumn DIV is positioned in the third grid column. I find using CSS Grid Layout to be just as intuitive as using an HTML table for layout. You define your columns and rows and then you position different elements within these columns and rows. Very straightforward. Creating Multiple Columns and Rows In the previous section, we created a super simple three-column layout. This layout contained only a single row. In this section, let’s create a slightly more complicated layout which contains more than one row: The following page contains a header row, a content row, and a footer row. The content row contains three columns: <!DOCTYPE html> <html> <head> <style type="text/css"> html, body, #container { height: 100%; padding: 0px; margin: 0px; } #container { display: -ms-grid; -ms-grid-columns: 300px auto 300px; -ms-grid-rows: 100px 1fr 100px; } #header { -ms-grid-column: 1; -ms-grid-column-span: 3; -ms-grid-row: 1; background-color: yellow; } #leftColumn { -ms-grid-column: 1; -ms-grid-row: 2; background-color:red; } #middleColumn { -ms-grid-column: 2; -ms-grid-row: 2; background-color:green; } #rightColumn { -ms-grid-column: 3; -ms-grid-row: 2; background-color:blue; } #footer { -ms-grid-column: 1; -ms-grid-column-span: 3; -ms-grid-row: 3; background-color: orange; } </style> </head> <body> <div id="container"> <div id="header"> Header, Header, Header </div> <div id="leftColumn"> Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column, Left Column </div> <div id="middleColumn"> Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column, Middle Column </div> <div id="rightColumn"> Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column, Right Column </div> <div id="footer"> Footer, Footer, Footer </div> </div> </body> </html> In the page above, the grid layout is created with the following rule which creates a grid with three rows and three columns: #container { display: -ms-grid; -ms-grid-columns: 300px auto 300px; -ms-grid-rows: 100px 1fr 100px; } The header is created with the following rule: #header { -ms-grid-column: 1; -ms-grid-column-span: 3; -ms-grid-row: 1; background-color: yellow; } The header is positioned in column 1 and row 1. Furthermore, notice that the “-ms-grid-column-span” property is used to span the header across three columns. CSS Grid Layout and Fractional Units When you use CSS Grid Layout, you can take advantage of fractional units. Fractional units provide you with an easy way of dividing up remaining space in a page. Imagine, for example, that you want to create a three-column page layout. You want the size of the first column to be fixed at 200 pixels and you want to divide the remaining space among the remaining three columns. The width of the second column is equal to the combined width of the third and fourth columns. The following CSS rule creates four columns with the desired widths: #container { display: -ms-grid; -ms-grid-columns: 200px 2fr 1fr 1fr; -ms-grid-rows: 1fr; } The fr unit represents a fraction. The grid above contains four columns. The second column is two times the size (2fr) of the third (1fr) and fourth (1fr) columns. When you use the fractional unit, the remaining space is divided up using fractional amounts. Notice that the single row is set to a height of 1fr. The single grid row gobbles up the entire vertical space. Here’s the entire HTML page: <!DOCTYPE html> <html> <head> <style type="text/css"> html, body, #container { height: 100%; padding: 0px; margin: 0px; } #container { display: -ms-grid; -ms-grid-columns: 200px 2fr 1fr 1fr; -ms-grid-rows: 1fr; } #firstColumn { -ms-grid-column: 1; background-color:red; } #secondColumn { -ms-grid-column: 2; background-color:green; } #thirdColumn { -ms-grid-column: 3; background-color:blue; } #fourthColumn { -ms-grid-column: 4; background-color:orange; } </style> </head> <body> <div id="container"> <div id="firstColumn"> First Column, First Column, First Column </div> <div id="secondColumn"> Second Column, Second Column, Second Column </div> <div id="thirdColumn"> Third Column, Third Column, Third Column </div> <div id="fourthColumn"> Fourth Column, Fourth Column, Fourth Column </div> </div> </body> </html>   Summary There is more in the CSS 3 Grid Layout standard than discussed in this blog post. My goal was to describe the basics. If you want to learn more than you can read through the entire standard at http://www.w3.org/TR/css3-grid-layout/ In this blog post, I described some of the difficulties that you might encounter when attempting to replace HTML tables with Cascading Style Sheets when laying out a web page. I explained how you can take advantage of the CSS 3 Grid Layout standard to avoid these problems when building Metro style applications using JavaScript. CSS 3 Grid Layout provides you with all of the benefits of using HTML tables for laying out a page without requiring you to use HTML table elements.

  Read the article

< Previous Page | 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74  | Next Page >