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  • Hiding an item conditionally through SPEL in OAF ( VO Extension + Personalization )

    - by Manoj Madhusoodanan
    In this blog I will explain how to conditionally set property of an item through personalization.Let me discuss using a business scenario. My customer wants to make Hold from Payment/ All Invoices column readonly when the Operating Unit is UK ( Configured in a lookup XXCUST_EXCLUDED_ORGS ). Analysis First thing is we have to find out the page and business components. Page: /oracle/apps/pos/supplier/webui/QuickUpdatePGView Object: oracle.apps.pos.supplier.server.SitesVO Solution Download oracle.apps.pos.supplier.server.SitesVO from $JAVA_TOP to JDEV_USER_HOME/myprojects.Make sure the transfer mode of the file (See below table). Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;} File Type Transfer Mode .xml ASCII .class Binary .tar Binary .java ASCII  Since there is no VO attribute available to determine the Site Org against the lookup Org we have to add the logic inside a custom VO attribute. So VO extension is required in this scenario. Add an attribute "isPymtReadOnlyStr" in the existing query.This column returns 'Y' if there is a match in the lookup otherwise 'N'. Create a transient attribute "isPymtReadOnly" of type BOOLEAN.This will return TRUE if "isPymtReadOnlyStr" is "Y" otherwise FALSE. The reason behind adding the "isPymtReadOnly" is we are setting the item property as readonly through SPEL.It will recognize only BOOLEAN.But SQL query doesn't support BOOLEAN.So we are building a BOOLEAN attribute from the SQL which will use in the personalization layer to set the item property. Steps 1) Create a new VO xxcust.oracle.apps.pos.supplier.server.XXCUSTSitesVO which extends from oracle.apps.pos.supplier.server.SitesVO. Make sure the binding style should be same as SitesVO. Create the XXCUSTSitesVO which same query of SitesVO.Later we will add the new attribute to XXCUSTSitesVO. At this point of time all the existing VO attributes are of Updatable property as "Always". Press Finish without creating XXCUSTSitesVORowImpl.java 2) Select the XXCUSTSitesVO from JDeveloper Application Navigator. Modify the query and add the extra column. 3) Create a new transient attribute as follows. 4) Once you modify the query all the existing attributes Updatable property will change to Never.So revert that property back to orginal. 5) Create XXCUSTSitesVORowImpl.java by checking the following check box. 6) Add the following code snippet in XXCUSTSitesVORowImpl.java 7) Create the substitution for SitesVO as follows. Following entry will get created in current jpx file.    <Substitutes>      <Substitute OldName ="oracle.apps.pos.supplier.server.SitesVO" NewName ="xxcust.oracle.apps.pos.supplier.server.XXCUSTSitesVO" />   </Substitutes> 8) Migrate XXCUSTSitesVOImpl.java,XXCUSTSitesVORowImpl.java and XXCUSTSitesVO.xml from desktop to actual instance. 9) Migrate the substitution using jpximporter. 10) Restart the server and verify the substitution has done perfectly. 11) Go to /oracle/apps/pos/supplier/webui/QuickUpdatePG and personalize the page.Set the item read only property to ${oa.SitesVO.IsPymtReadOnly} 12) Click on Apply and in next page click on Return to Application. Verify your output.  Note: You can remove the substitution using following script.Please click here.

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  • Dynamic Data Connections

    - by Tim Dexter
    I have had a long running email thread running between Dan and David over at Valspar and myself. They have built some impressive connectivity between their in house apps and BIP using web services. The crux of their problem has been that they have multiple databases that need the same report executed against them. Not such an unusual request as I have spoken to two customers in the last month with the same situation. Of course, you could create a report against each data connection and just run or call the appropriate report. Not too bad if you have two or three data connections but more than that and it becomes a maintenance nightmare having to update queries or layouts. Ideally you want to have just a single report definition on the BIP server and to dynamically set the connection to be used at runtime based on the user or system that the user is in. A quick bit of digging and help from Shinji on the development team and I had an answer. Rather embarassingly, the solution has been around since the Oct 2010 rollup patch last year. Still, I grabbed the latest Jan 2011 patch - check out Note 797057.1 for the latest available patches. Once installed, I used the best web service testing tool I have yet to come across - SoapUI. Just point it at the WSDL and you can check out the available services and their parameters and then test them too. The XML packet has a new dynamic data source entry. You can set you own custom JDBC connection or just specify an existing data source name thats defined on the server. <pub:runReport> <pub:reportRequest> <pub:attributeFormat>xml</pub:attributeFormat> <pub:attributeTemplate>0</pub:attributeTemplate> <pub:byPassCache>true</pub:byPassCache> <pub:dynamicDataSource> <pub:JDBCDataSource> <pub:JDBCDriverClass></pub:JDBCDriverClass> <pub:JDBCDriverType></pub:JDBCDriverType> <pub:JDBCPassword></pub:JDBCPassword> <pub:JDBCURL></pub:JDBCURL> <pub:JDBCUserName></pub:JDBCUserName> <pub:dataSourceName>Conn1</pub:dataSourceName> </pub:JDBCDataSource> </pub:dynamicDataSource> <pub:reportAbsolutePath>/Test/Employee Report/Employee Report.xdo</pub:reportAbsolutePath> </pub:reportRequest> <pub:userID>Administrator</pub:userID> <pub:password>Administrator</pub:password> </pub:runReport> So I have Conn1 and Conn2 defined that are connections to different databases. I can just flip the name, make the WS call and get the appropriate dataset in my report. Just as an example, here's my web service call java code. Just a case of bringing in the BIP java libs to my java project. publicReportServiceService = new PublicReportServiceService(); PublicReportService publicReportService = publicReportServiceService.getPublicReportService_v11(); String userID = "Administrator"; String password = "Administrator"; ReportRequest rr = new ReportRequest(); rr.setAttributeFormat("xml"); rr.setAttributeTemplate("1"); rr.setByPassCache(true); rr.setReportAbsolutePath("/Test/Employee Report/Employee Report.xdo"); rr.setReportOutputPath("c:\\temp\\output.xml"); BIPDataSource bipds = new BIPDataSource(); JDBCDataSource jds = new JDBCDataSource(); jds.setDataSourceName("Conn1"); bipds.setJDBCDataSource(jds); rr.setDynamicDataSource(bipds); try { publicReportService.runReport(rr, userID, password); } catch (InvalidParametersException e) { e.printStackTrace(); } catch (AccessDeniedException e) { e.printStackTrace(); } catch (OperationFailedException e) { e.printStackTrace(); } } Note, Im no java whiz kid or whizzy old bloke, at least not unless Ive had a coffee. JDeveloper has a nice feature where you point it at the WSDL and it creates everything to support your calling code for you. Couple of things to remember: 1. When you call the service, remember to set the bypass the cache option. Forget it and much scratching of your head and taking my name in vain will ensue. 2. My demo actually hit the same database but used two users, one accessed the base tables another views with the same name. For far too long I thought the connection swapping was not working. I was getting the same results for both users until I realized I was specifying the schema name for the table/view in my query e.g. select * from EMP.EMPLOYEES. So remember to have a generic query that will depend entirely on the connection. Its a neat feature if you want to be able to switch connections and only define a single report and call it remotely. Now if you want the connection to be set dynamically based on the user and the report run via the user interface, thats going to be more tricky ... need to think about that one!

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  • ASP.NET Web API and Simple Value Parameters from POSTed data

    - by Rick Strahl
    In testing out various features of Web API I've found a few oddities in the way that the serialization is handled. These are probably not super common but they may throw you for a loop. Here's what I found. Simple Parameters from Xml or JSON Content Web API makes it very easy to create action methods that accept parameters that are automatically parsed from XML or JSON request bodies. For example, you can send a JavaScript JSON object to the server and Web API happily deserializes it for you. This works just fine:public string ReturnAlbumInfo(Album album) { return album.AlbumName + " (" + album.YearReleased.ToString() + ")"; } However, if you have methods that accept simple parameter types like strings, dates, number etc., those methods don't receive their parameters from XML or JSON body by default and you may end up with failures. Take the following two very simple methods:public string ReturnString(string message) { return message; } public HttpResponseMessage ReturnDateTime(DateTime time) { return Request.CreateResponse<DateTime>(HttpStatusCode.OK, time); } The first one accepts a string and if called with a JSON string from the client like this:var client = new HttpClient(); var result = client.PostAsJsonAsync<string>(http://rasxps/AspNetWebApi/albums/rpc/ReturnString, "Hello World").Result; which results in a trace like this: POST http://rasxps/AspNetWebApi/albums/rpc/ReturnString HTTP/1.1Content-Type: application/json; charset=utf-8Host: rasxpsContent-Length: 13Expect: 100-continueConnection: Keep-Alive "Hello World" produces… wait for it: null. Sending a date in the same fashion:var client = new HttpClient(); var result = client.PostAsJsonAsync<DateTime>(http://rasxps/AspNetWebApi/albums/rpc/ReturnDateTime, new DateTime(2012, 1, 1)).Result; results in this trace: POST http://rasxps/AspNetWebApi/albums/rpc/ReturnDateTime HTTP/1.1Content-Type: application/json; charset=utf-8Host: rasxpsContent-Length: 30Expect: 100-continueConnection: Keep-Alive "\/Date(1325412000000-1000)\/" (yes still the ugly MS AJAX date, yuk! This will supposedly change by RTM with Json.net used for client serialization) produces an error response: The parameters dictionary contains a null entry for parameter 'time' of non-nullable type 'System.DateTime' for method 'System.Net.Http.HttpResponseMessage ReturnDateTime(System.DateTime)' in 'AspNetWebApi.Controllers.AlbumApiController'. An optional parameter must be a reference type, a nullable type, or be declared as an optional parameter. Basically any simple parameters are not parsed properly resulting in null being sent to the method. For the string the call doesn't fail, but for the non-nullable date it produces an error because the method can't handle a null value. This behavior is a bit unexpected to say the least, but there's a simple solution to make this work using an explicit [FromBody] attribute:public string ReturnString([FromBody] string message) andpublic HttpResponseMessage ReturnDateTime([FromBody] DateTime time) which explicitly instructs Web API to read the value from the body. UrlEncoded Form Variable Parsing Another similar issue I ran into is with POST Form Variable binding. Web API can retrieve parameters from the QueryString and Route Values but it doesn't explicitly map parameters from POST values either. Taking our same ReturnString function from earlier and posting a message POST variable like this:var formVars = new Dictionary<string,string>(); formVars.Add("message", "Some Value"); var content = new FormUrlEncodedContent(formVars); var client = new HttpClient(); var result = client.PostAsync(http://rasxps/AspNetWebApi/albums/rpc/ReturnString, content).Result; which produces this trace: POST http://rasxps/AspNetWebApi/albums/rpc/ReturnString HTTP/1.1Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencodedHost: rasxpsContent-Length: 18Expect: 100-continue message=Some+Value When calling ReturnString:public string ReturnString(string message) { return message; } unfortunately it does not map the message value to the message parameter. This sort of mapping unfortunately is not available in Web API. Web API does support binding to form variables but only as part of model binding, which binds object properties to the POST variables. Sending the same message as in the previous example you can use the following code to pick up POST variable data:public string ReturnMessageModel(MessageModel model) { return model.Message; } public class MessageModel { public string Message { get; set; }} Note that the model is bound and the message form variable is mapped to the Message property as would other variables to properties if there were more. This works but it's not very dynamic. There's no real easy way to retrieve form variables (or query string values for that matter) in Web API's Request object as far as I can discern. Well only if you consider this easy:public string ReturnString() { var formData = Request.Content.ReadAsAsync<FormDataCollection>().Result; return formData.Get("message"); } Oddly FormDataCollection does not allow for indexers to work so you have to use the .Get() method which is rather odd. If you're running under IIS/Cassini you can always resort to the old and trusty HttpContext access for request data:public string ReturnString() { return HttpContext.Current.Request.Form["message"]; } which works fine and is easier. It's kind of a bummer that HttpRequestMessage doesn't expose some sort of raw Request object that has access to dynamic data - given that it's meant to serve as a generic REST/HTTP API that seems like a crucial missing piece. I don't see any way to read query string values either. To me personally HttpContext works, since I don't see myself using self-hosted code much.© Rick Strahl, West Wind Technologies, 2005-2012Posted in Web Api   Tweet !function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];if(!d.getElementById(id)){js=d.createElement(s);js.id=id;js.src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js";fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js,fjs);}}(document,"script","twitter-wjs"); (function() { var po = document.createElement('script'); po.type = 'text/javascript'; po.async = true; po.src = 'https://apis.google.com/js/plusone.js'; var s = document.getElementsByTagName('script')[0]; s.parentNode.insertBefore(po, s); })();

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  • CQRS - Benefits

    - by Dylan Smith
    Thanks to all the comments and feedback from the last post I think I have a better understanding now of the benefits of CQRS (separate from the benefits of Event Sourcing). I’m going to try and sum it up here, and point out some areas where I could still use some advice: CQRS Benefits Sounds like the primary benefit of CQRS as an architecture is it allows you to create a simpler domain model by sucking out everything related to queries. I can definitely see the benefit to this, in general the domain logic related to commands is the high-value behavior in the software, but the logic required to service the queries would add a lot of low-value “noise” to the domain model that would dilute the high-value (command) behavior – sorting, paging, filtering, pre-fetch paths, etc. Also the most appropriate domain structure for implementing commands might not be the most optimal for implementing queries. To paraphrase Greg, this usually results in a domain model that is mediocre at both, piss-poor at one, or more likely piss-poor at both commands and queries. Not only will you be able to simplify your domain model by pulling out all the query logic, but at least a handful of commands in most systems will probably be “pass-though” type commands with little to no logic that just generate events. If these can be implemented directly in the command-handler and never touch the domain model, this allows you to slim down the domain model even more. Also, if you were to do event sourcing without CQRS, you no longer have a database containing the current state (only the domain model would) which makes it difficult (or impossible) to support ad-hoc querying and/or reporting that is common in most business software. Of course CQRS provides some great scalability benefits, not only scalability but I have to assume that it provides extremely low latency for most operations, especially if you have an asynchronous event bus. I know Greg says that you get a 3x scaling (Commands, Queries, Client) of your ability to perform parallel development, but IMHO, it seems like it only provides 1.5x scaling since even without CQRS you’re going to have your client loosely coupled to your domain - which is still a great benefit to be able to realize. Questions / Concerns If all the queries against an aggregate get pulled out to the Query layer, what if the only commands for that aggregate can be handled in a “pass-through” manner with the command handler directly generating events. Is it possible to have an aggregate that isn’t modeled in the domain model? Are there any issues or downsides to this? I know in the feedback from my previous posts it was suggested that having one domain model handling both commands and queries requires implementing a lot of traversals between objects that wouldn’t be necessary if it was only servicing commands. My question is, do you include traversals in your domain model based on the needs of the code, or based on the conceptual domain model? If none of my Commands require a Customer.Orders traversal, but the conceptual domain includes the concept of a set of orders belonging to a customer – should I model that in my domain model or not? I like the idea of using the Query side of the architecture as a place to put junior devs where the risk of them screwing something up has minimal impact. But I’m not sold on the idea that you can actually outsource it. Like I said in one of my comments on my previous post, the code to handle a query and generate DTO’s is going to be dead simple, but the code to process events and apply them to the tables on the query side is going to require a significant amount of domain knowledge to know which events to listen for to update each of the de-normalized tables (and what changes need to be made when each event is processed). I don’t know about everybody else, but having Indian/Russian/whatever outsourced developers have to do anything that requires significant domain knowledge has never been successful in my experience. And if you need to spec out for each new query which events to listen to and what to do with each one, well that’s probably going to be just as much work to document as it would be to just implement it. Greg made the point in a comment that doing an aggregate query like “Total Sales By Customer” is going to be inefficient if you use event sourcing but not CQRS. I don’t understand why that would be the case. I imagine in that case you’d simply have a method/property on the Customer object that calculated total sales for that customer by enumerating over the Orders collection. Then the application services layer would generate DTO’s off of the Customers collection that included say the CustomerID, CustomerName, TotalSales, or whatever the case may be. As long as you use a snapshotting implementation, I don’t see why that would be anymore inefficient in a DDD+Event Sourcing implementation than in a typical DDD implementation. Like I mentioned in my last post I still have some questions about query logic that haven’t been answered yet, but before I start asking those I want to make sure I have a strong grasp on what benefits CQRS provides.  My main concern with the query logic was that I know I could just toss it all into the query side, but I was concerned that I would be losing the benefits of using CQRS in the first place if I did that.  I want to elaborate more on this though with some example situations in an upcoming post.

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  • JavaOne Afterglow by Simon Ritter

    - by JuergenKress
    Last week was the eighteenth JavaOne conference and I thought it would be a good idea to write up my thoughts about how things went. Firstly thanks to Yoshio Terada for the photos, I didn't bother bringing a camera with me so it's good to have some pictures to add to the words. Things kicked off full-throttle on Sunday.  We had the Java Champions and JUG leaders breakfast, which was a great way to meet up with a lot of familiar faces and start talking all things Java.  At midday the show really started with the Strategy and Technical Keynotes.  This was always going to be tougher job than some years because there was no big shiny ball to reveal to the audience.  With the Java EE 7 spec being finalised a few months ago and Java SE 8, Java ME 8 and JDK8 not due until the start of next year there was not going to be any big announcement.  I thought both keynotes worked really well each focusing on the things most important to Java developers: Strategy One of the things that is becoming more and more prominent in many companies marketing is the Internet of Things (IoT).  We've moved from the conventional desktop/laptop environment to much more mobile connected computing with smart phones and tablets.  The next wave of the internet is not just billions of people connected, but 10s or 100s of billions of devices connected to the network, all generating data and providing much more precise control of almost any process you can imagine.  This ties into the ideas of Big Data and Cloud Computing, but implementation is certainly not without its challenges.  As Peter Utzschneider explained it's about three Vs: Volume, Velocity and Value.  All these devices will create huge volumes of data at very high speed; to avoid being overloaded these devices will need some sort of processing capabilities that can filter the useful data from the redundant.  The raw data then needs to be turned into useful information that has value.  To make this happen will require applications on devices, at gateways and on the back-end servers, all very tightly integrated.  This is where Java plays a pivotal role, write once, run everywhere becomes essential, having nine million developers fluent in the language makes it the defacto lingua franca of IoT.  There will be lots more information on how this will become a reality, so watch this space. Technical How do we make the IoT a reality, technically?  Using the game of chess Mark Reinhold, with the help of people like John Ceccarelli, Jasper Potts and Richard Bair, showed what you could do.  Using Java EE on the back end, Java SE and JavaFX on the desktop and Java ME Embedded and JavaFX on devices they showed a complete end-to-end demo. This was really impressive, using 3D features from JavaFX 8 (that's included with JDK8) to make a 3D animated Duke chess board.  Jasper also unveiled the "DukePad" a home made tablet using a Raspberry Pi, touch screen and accelerometer. Although the Raspberry Pi doesn't have earth shattering CPU performance (about the same level as a mid 1990s Pentium), it does have really quite good GPU performance so the GUI works really well.  The plans are all open sourced and available here.  One small, but very significant announcement was that Java SE will now be included with the NOOB and Raspbian Linux distros provided by the Raspberry Pi foundation (these can be found here).  No more hassle having to download and install the JDK after you've flashed your SD card OS image.  The finale was the Raspberry Pi powered chess playing robot.  Really very, very cool.  I talked to Jasper about this and he told me each of the chess pieces had been 3D printed and then he had to use acetone to give them a glossy finish (not sure what his wife thought of him spending hours in the kitchen in a gas mask!)  The way the robot arm worked was very impressive as it did not have any positioning data (like a potentiometer connected to each motor), but relied purely on carefully calibrated timings to get the arm to the right place.  Having done things like this myself in the past I know how easy it is to find a small error gets magnified into very big mistakes. Here's some pictures from the keynote: The "Dukepad" architecture Nice clear perspex case so you can see the innards. The very nice 3D chess set.  Maya's obviously a great tool. Read the full article here. WebLogic Partner Community For regular information become a member in the WebLogic Partner Community please visit: http://www.oracle.com/partners/goto/wls-emea ( OPN account required). If you need support with your account please contact the Oracle Partner Business Center. Blog Twitter LinkedIn Mix Forum Wiki Technorati Tags: Simon Ritter,Java One,OOW,Oracle OpenWorld,WebLogic,WebLogic Community,Oracle,OPN,Jürgen Kress

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  • How-to filter table filter input to only allow numeric input

    - by frank.nimphius
    In a previous ADF Code Corner post, I explained how to change the table filter behavior by intercepting the query condition in a query filter. See sample #30 at http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/developer-tools/adf/learnmore/index-101235.html In this OTN Harvest post I explain how to prevent users from providing invalid character entries as table filter criteria to avoid problems upon re-querying the table. In the example shown next, only numeric values are allowed for a table column filter. To create a table that allows data filtering, drag a View Object – or a data collection of a Web Service or JPA business service – from the DataControls panel and drop it as a table. Choose the Enable Filtering option in the Edit Table Columns dialog so the table renders with the column filter boxes displayed. The table filter fields are created using implicit af:inputText components that need to be customized for you to apply a custom filter input component, or to change the input behavior. To change the input filter, so only a defined set of input keys is allowed, you need to change the default filter field with your own af:inputText field to which you apply an af:clientListener tag that filters user keyboard entries. For this, in the Oracle JDeveloper visual editor, select the column which filter you want to change and expand the column node in the Oracle JDeveloper Structure Window. Part of the column definition is the Column facet node. Expand the facets so you see the filter facet entry. The filter facet is grayed out as there is no custom facet defined. In a next step, open theComponent Palette (ctrl+shift+P) and drag an Input Text component onto the facet. This demarks the first part in the filter customization. To make the custom filter component work, you need to map the af:inputText component value property to the ADF filter criteria that is exposed in the Expression Builder. Open the Expression Builder for the filter input component value property by clicking the arrow icon to its right. In the Expression Builder expand the JSP Objects | vs | filterCriteria node to select the attribute name represented by the table column. The vs entry is the name of a variable that is defined on the table and that grants you access to the table attributes. Now that the filter works as before – though using a custom filter input component – you can add the af:clientListener tag to your custom filter component – af:inputText – to call out to JavaScript when users type in the column filter field Point the client filter method property to a JavaScript function that you reference or add through using the af:resource tag and set the type property value to keyDown. <af:document id="d1">     <af:resource type="javascript" source="/js/filterHandler.js"/> … The filter definition looks as shown below <af:inputText label="Label 1" id="it1"                         value="#{vs.filterCriteria.Employe        <af:clientListener method="suppressCharacterInput"                                     type="keyDown"/> </af:inputText> The JavaScript code that you can use to either filter character inputs or numeric inputs is shown below. Just store this code in an external JavaScript (.js) file and reference it from the af:resource tag. //Allow numbers, cursor control keys and delete keys function suppressCharacterInput(evt) {     var _keyCode = evt.getKeyCode();     var _filterField = evt.getCurrentTarget();     var _oldValue = _filterField.getValue();     if (!((_keyCode < 57) ||(_keyCode > 96 && _keyCode < 105))) {         _filterField.setValue(_oldValue);         evt.cancel();     } } //Allow characters, cursor control keys and delete keys function suppressNumericInput(evt) {  var _keyCode = evt.getKeyCode();  var _filterField = evt.getCurrentTarget();  var _oldValue = _filterField.getValue();  //check for numbers  if ((_keyCode < 57 && _keyCode > 47) ||      (_keyCode > 96 && _keyCode < 105)){     _filterField.setValue(_oldValue);     evt.cancel();   } } But what if browsers don't allow JavaScript ? Don't worry about this. If browsers would not support JavaScript then ADF Faces as a whole would not work and you had a different problem.

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  • OTN Architect Day Headed to Reston, VA - May 16

    - by Bob Rhubart
    In 2011 OTN Architect Day made stops in Chicago, Denver, Phoenix, Redwood Shores, and Toronto. The 2012 series begins with OTN Architect Day in Reston, VA on Wednesday May 16. Registration is now open for this free event, but don't get caught napping -- seating is limited, and the event is just 5 weeks away. The information below reflects the most recent updates to the event agenda, including the addition of Oracle ACE Director Kai Yu as the guest keynote speaker. Kai is Senior System Engineer / Architect at Dell, Inc., and has been very busy of late as a speaker at various industry and Oracle User Group events. I'm very happy Kai has agreed to make the trek from his hometown in Austin, TX to share his insight at the Architect Day event in Reston.  If you're in the area, put this one on your calendar. You won't be sorry.   Venue Sheraton Reston Hotel 11810 Sunrise Valley Drive Reston, VA 20191 Event Agenda 8:30 am - 9:00 am Registration and Continental Breakfast 9:00 am - 9:15 am Welcome and Opening Comments 9:15 am - 10:00 am Engineered Systems: Oracle's Vision for the Future | Ralf Dossman Oracle's Exadata and Exalogic are impressive products in their own right. But working in combination they deliver unparalleled transaction processing performance with up to a 30x increase over existing legacy systems, with the lowest cost of ownership over a 3 or 5 year basis than any other hardware. In this session you'll learn how to leverage Oracle's Engineered Systems within your enterprise to deliver record-breaking performance at the lowest TCO. 10:00 am - 10:30 am High Availability Infrastructure for Cloud Computing | Kai Yu Infrastructure high availability is extremely critical to Cloud Computing. In a Cloud system that hosts a large number of databases and applications with different SLAs, any unplanned outage can be devastating, and even a small planned downtime may be unacceptable. This presentation will discuss various technology solutions and the related best practices that system architects should consider in cloud infrastructure design to ensure high availability. 10:30 am - 10:45 am Break 10:45 am - 11:30 am Breakout Sessions: (pick one) Innovations in Grid Computing with Oracle Coherence | Bjorn Boe Learn how Coherence can increase the availability, scalability and performance of your existing applications with its advanced low-latency data-grid technologies. Also hear some interesting industry-specific use cases that customers had implemented and how Oracle is integrating Coherence into its Enterprise Java stack. Cloud Computing - Making IT Simple | Scott Mattoon The road to Cloud Computing is not without a few bumps. This session will help to smooth out your journey by tackling some of the potential complications. We'll examine whether standardization is a prerequisite for the Cloud. We'll look at why refactoring isn't just for application code. We'll check out deployable entities and their simplification via higher levels of abstraction. And we'll close out the session with a look at engineered systems and modular clouds. 11:30 pm - 12:15 pm Breakout Sessions: (pick one) Oracle Enterprise Manager | Joe Diemer Oracle Enterprise Manager (EM) provides complete lifecycle management for the cloud - from automated cloud setup to self-service delivery to cloud operations. In this session you'll learn how to take control of your cloud infrastructure with EM features including Consolidation Planning and Self-Service provisioning with Metering and Chargeback. Come hear how Oracle is expanding its management capabilities into the cloud! Rationalization and Defense in Depth - Two Steps Closer to the Clouds | Dave Chappelle Security represents one of the biggest concerns about cloud computing. In this session we'll get past the FUD with a real-world look at some key issues. We'll discuss the infrastructure necessary to support rationalization and security services, explore architecture for defense -in-depth, and deal frankly with the good, the bad, and the ugly in Cloud security. 12:15 pm - 1:15 pm Lunch 1:40 pm - 2:00 pm Panel Discussion - Q&A 2:00 pm - 2:45 pm Breakout Sessions: (pick one) 21st Century SOA | Peter Belknap Service Oriented Architecture has evolved from concept to reality in the last decade. The right methodology coupled with mature SOA technologies has helped customers demonstrate success in both innovation and ROI. In this session you will learn how Oracle SOA Suite's orchestration, virtualization, and governance capabilities provide the infrastructure to run mission critical business and system applications. And we'll take a special look at the convergence of SOA & BPM using Oracle's Unified technology stack. Track B: Oracle Cloud Reference Architecture | Anbu Krishnaswamy Cloud initiatives are beginning to dominate enterprise IT roadmaps. Successful adoption of Cloud and the subsequent governance challenges warrant a Cloud reference architecture that is applied consistently across the enterprise. This presentation gives an overview of Oracle's Cloud Reference Architecture, which is part of the Cloud Enterprise Technology Strategy (ETS). Concepts covered include common management layer capabilities, service models, resource pools, and use cases. 2:45 pm - 3:00 pm Break 3:00 pm - 4:00 pm Roundtable Discussions 4:00 pm - 4:15 pm Closing Comments & Readouts from Roundtable 4:15 pm - 5:00 pm Cocktail Reception / Networking Session schedule and content subject to change.

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  • Spolskism or Twitterism: A Doctor writes...

    - by Phil Factor
    "I never realized I had a problem. I just 'twittered' because it was a social thing to do. All my mates were doing it. It made me feel good to have 'followers'; it bolstered my self-esteem. Of course, you don't think of the long-term effects on your work and on the way you think. There's no denying that it impairs your judgment…" Yes, this story is typical. Hundreds of people are waking up to the long term effects of twittering, and seeking help. Dave, who wishes to remain anonymous, told our reporter… "I started using Twitter at work. Just a few minutes now and then, throughout the day. A lot of my colleagues were doing it and I thought 'Well, that's cool; it must be part of what I should be doing at work'. Soon, I was avidly reading every twitter that came my way, and counting the minutes between my own twitters. I tried to kid myself that it was all about professional development and getting other people to help you with work-related problems, but in truth I had become addicted to the buzz of the social network. The worse thing was that it made me seem busy even when I was really just frittering my time away. Inevitably, I started to get behind with my real work." Experts have identified the syndrome and given it a name: 'Twitterism', sometimes referred to as 'Spolskism', after the person who first drew attention to the pernicious damage to well-being that the practice caused, and who had the courage to take the pledge of rejecting it. According to one expert… "The occasional Twitter does little harm to the participant, and can be an adaptive way of dealing with stress. Unfortunately, it rarely stops there. The addictive qualities of the practice have put a strain on the caring professions who are faced with a flood of people making that first bold step to seeking help". Dave is one of those now seeking help for his addiction… "I had lost touch with reality. Even though I twittered my work colleagues constantly, I found I actually spoke to them less and less. Even when out socializing, I would frequently disengage from the conversation, in order to twitter. I stopped blogging. I stopped responding to emails; the only way to reach me was through the world of Twitter. Unfortunately, my denial about the harm that twittering was doing to me, my friends, and my work-colleagues was so strong that I truly couldn't see that I had a problem." Like other addictions, the help and support of others who are 'taking the cure' is important. There is a common bond between those who have 'been through hell and back' and are once more able to experience the joys of actually conversing and socializing, rather than the false comfort of solitary 'twittering'. Complete abstinence is essential to the cure. Most of those who risk even an occasional twitter face a headlong slide back into 'binge' twittering. Tom, another twitterer who has managed to kick the habit explains… "My twittering addiction now seems more like a bad dream. You get to work, and switch on the PC. You say to yourself, just open up the browser, just for a minute, just to see what people are saying on Twitter. The next thing you know, half the day has gone by. The worst thing is that when you're addicted, you get good at covering up the habit; I spent so much time looking at the screen and typing on the keyboard, people just assumed I was working hard.I know that I must never forget what it was like then, and what it's like now that I've kicked the habit. I now have more time for productive work and a real social life." Like many addictions, Spolskism has its most detrimental effects on family, friends and workmates, rather than the addict. So often nowadays, we hear the sad stories of Twitter-Widows; tales of long lonely evenings spent whilst their partners are engrossed in their twittering into their 'mobiles' or indulging in their solitary spolskistic habits in privacy, under cover of 'having to do work at home'. Workmates suffer too, when the addicts even take their laptops or mobiles into meetings in order to 'twitter' with their fellow obsessives, even stooping to complain to their followers how boring the meeting is. No; The best advice is to leave twittering to the birds. You know it makes sense.

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  • Spotlight on Claims: Serving Customers Under Extreme Conditions

    - by [email protected]
    Oracle Insurance's director of marketing for EMEA, John Sinclair, recently attended the CII Spotlight on Claims event in London. Bad weather and its implications for the insurance industry have become very topical as the frequency and diversity of natural disasters - including rains, wind and snow - has surged across Europe this winter. On England's wettest day on record, the county of Cumbria was flooded with 12 inches of rain within 24 hours. Freezing temperatures wreaked havoc on European travel, causing high speed TVG trains to break down and stranding hundreds of passengers under the English Chanel in a tunnel all night long without heat or electricity. A storm named Xynthia thrashed France and surrounding countries with hurricane force, flooding ports and killing 51 people. After the Spring Equinox, insurers may have thought the worst had past. Then came along Eyjafjallajökull, spewing out vast quantities of volcanic ash in what is turning out to be one of most costly natural disasters in history. Such extreme events challenge insurance companies' ability to service their customers just when customers need their help most. When you add economic downturn and competitive pressures to the mix, insurers are further stretched and required to continually learn and innovate to meet high customer expectations with reduced budgets. These and other issues were hot topics of discussion at the recent "Spotlight on Claims" seminar in London, focused on how weather is affecting claims and the insurance industry. The event was organized by the CII (Chartered Insurance Institute), a group with 90,000 members. CII has been at the forefront in setting professional standards for the insurance industry for over a century. Insurers came to the conference to hear how they could better serve their customers under extreme weather conditions, learn from the experience of their peers, and hear about technological breakthroughs in climate modeling, geographic intelligence and IT. Customer case studies at the conference highlighted the importance of effective and constant communication in handling the overflow of catastrophe related claims. First and foremost is the need to rapidly establish initial communication with claimants to build their confidence in a positive outcome. Ongoing communication then needs to be continued throughout the claims cycle to mange expectations and maintain ownership of the process from start to finish. Strong internal communication to support frontline staff was also deemed critical to successful crisis management, as was communication with the broader insurance ecosystem to tap into extended resources and business intelligence. Advances in technology - such web based systems to access policies and enter first notice of loss in the field - as well as customer-focused self-service portals and multichannel alerts, are instrumental in improving customer satisfaction and helping insurers to deal with the claims surge, which often can reach four or more times normal workloads. Dynamic models of the global climate system can now be used to better understand weather-related risks, and as these models mature it is hoped that they will soon become more accurate in predicting the timing of catastrophic events. Geographic intelligence is also being used within a claims environment to better assess loss reserves and detect fraud. Despite these advances in dealing with catastrophes and predicting their occurrence, there will never be a substitute for qualified front line staff to deal with customers. In light of pressures to streamline efficiency, there was debate as to whether outsourcing was the solution, or whether it was better to build on the people you have. In the final analysis, nearly everybody agreed that in the future insurance companies would have to work better and smarter to keep on top. An appeal was also made for greater collaboration amongst industry participants in dealing with the extreme conditions and systematic stress brought on by natural disasters. It was pointed out that the public oftentimes judged the industry as a whole rather than the individual carriers when it comes to freakish events, and that all would benefit at such times from the pooling of limited resources and professional skills rather than competing in silos for competitive advantage - especially the end customer. One case study that stood out was on how The Motorists Insurance Group was able to power through one of the most devastating catastrophes in recent years - Hurricane Ike. The keys to Motorists' success were superior people, processes and technology. They did a lot of upfront planning and invested in their people, creating a healthy team environment that delivered "max service" even when they were experiencing the same level of devastation as the rest of the population. Processes were rapidly adapted to meet the challenge of the catastrophe and continually adapted to Ike's specific conditions as they evolved. Technology was fundamental to the execution of their strategy, enabling them anywhere access, on the fly reassigning of resources and rapid training to augment the work force. You can learn more about the Motorists experience by watching this video. John Sinclair is marketing director for Oracle Insurance in EMEA. He has more than 20 years of experience in insurance and financial services.

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  • Find only physical network adapters with WMI Win32_NetworkAdapter class

    - by Mladen Prajdic
    WMI is Windows Management Instrumentation infrastructure for managing data and machines. We can access it by using WQL (WMI querying language or SQL for WMI). One thing to remember from the WQL link is that it doesn't support ORDER BY. This means that when you do SELECT * FROM wmiObject, the returned order of the objects is not guaranteed. It can return adapters in different order based on logged-in user, permissions of that user, etc… This is not documented anywhere that I've looked and is derived just from my observations. To get network adapters we have to query the Win32_NetworkAdapter class. This returns us all network adapters that windows detect, real and virtual ones, however it only supplies IPv4 data. I've tried various methods of combining properties that are common on all systems since Windows XP. The first thing to do to remove all virtual adapters (like tunneling, WAN miniports, etc…) created by Microsoft. We do this by adding WHERE Manufacturer!='Microsoft' to our WMI query. This greatly narrows the number of adapters we have to work with. Just on my machine it went from 20 adapters to 5. What was left were one real physical Realtek LAN adapter, 2 virtual adapters installed by VMware and 2 virtual adapters installed by VirtualBox. If you read the Win32_NetworkAdapter help page you'd notice that there's an AdapterType that enumerates various adapter types like LAN or Wireless and AdapterTypeID that gives you the same information as AdapterType only in integer form. The dirty little secret is that these 2 properties don't work. They are both hardcoded, AdapterTypeID to "0" and AdapterType to "Ethernet 802.3". The only exceptions I've seen so far are adapters that have no values at all for the two properties, "RAS Async Adapter" that has values of AdapterType = "Wide Area Network" and AdapterTypeID = "3" and various tunneling adapters that have values of AdapterType = "Tunnel" and AdapterTypeID = "15". In the help docs there isn't even a value for 15. So this property was of no help. Next property to give hope is NetConnectionId. This is the name of the network connection as it appears in the Control Panel -> Network Connections. Problem is this value is also localized into various languages and can have different names for different connection. So both of these properties don't help and we haven't even started talking about eliminating virtual adapters. Same as the previous one this property was also of no help. Next two properties I checked were ConfigManagerErrorCode and NetConnectionStatus in hopes of finding disabled and disconnected adapters. If an adapter is enabled but disconnected the ConfigManagerErrorCode = 0 with different NetConnectionStatus. If the adapter is disabled it reports ConfigManagerErrorCode = 22. This looked like a win by using (ConfigManagerErrorCode=0 or ConfigManagerErrorCode=22) in our condition. This way we get enabled (connected and disconnected adapters). Problem with all of the above properties is that none of them filter out the virtual adapters installed by virtualization software like VMware and VirtualBox. The last property to give hope is PNPDeviceID. There's an interesting observation about physical and virtual adapters with this property. Every virtual adapter PNPDeviceID starts with "ROOT\". Even VMware and VirtualBox ones. There were some really, really old physical adapters that had PNPDeviceID starting with "ROOT\" but those were in pre win XP era AFAIK. Since my minimum system to check was Windows XP SP2 I didn't have to worry about those. The only virtual adapter I've seen to not have PNPDeviceID start with "ROOT\" is the RAS Async Adapter for Wide Area Network. But because it is made by Microsoft we've eliminated it with the first condition for the manufacturer. Using the PNPDeviceID has so far proven to be really effective and I've tested it on over 20 different computers of various configurations from Windows XP laptops with wireless and bluetooth cards to virtualized Windows 2008 R2 servers. So far it always worked as expected. I will appreciate you letting me know if you find a configuration where it doesn't work. Let's see some C# code how to do this: ManagementObjectSearcher mos = null;// WHERE Manufacturer!='Microsoft' removes all of the // Microsoft provided virtual adapters like tunneling, miniports, and Wide Area Network adapters.mos = new ManagementObjectSearcher(@"SELECT * FROM Win32_NetworkAdapter WHERE Manufacturer != 'Microsoft'");// Trying the ConfigManagerErrorCode and NetConnectionStatus variations // proved to still not be enough and it returns adapters installed by // the virtualization software like VMWare and VirtualBox// ConfigManagerErrorCode = 0 -> Device is working properly. This covers enabled and/or disconnected devices// ConfigManagerErrorCode = 22 AND NetConnectionStatus = 0 -> Device is disabled and Disconnected. // Some virtual devices report ConfigManagerErrorCode = 22 (disabled) and some other NetConnectionStatus than 0mos = new ManagementObjectSearcher(@"SELECT * FROM Win32_NetworkAdapter WHERE Manufacturer != 'Microsoft' AND (ConfigManagerErrorCode = 0 OR (ConfigManagerErrorCode = 22 AND NetConnectionStatus = 0))");// Final solution with filtering on the Manufacturer and PNPDeviceID not starting with "ROOT\"// Physical devices have PNPDeviceID starting with "PCI\" or something else besides "ROOT\"mos = new ManagementObjectSearcher(@"SELECT * FROM Win32_NetworkAdapter WHERE Manufacturer != 'Microsoft' AND NOT PNPDeviceID LIKE 'ROOT\\%'");// Get the physical adapters and sort them by their index. // This is needed because they're not sorted by defaultIList<ManagementObject> managementObjectList = mos.Get() .Cast<ManagementObject>() .OrderBy(p => Convert.ToUInt32(p.Properties["Index"].Value)) .ToList();// Let's just show all the properties for all physical adapters.foreach (ManagementObject mo in managementObjectList){ foreach (PropertyData pd in mo.Properties) Console.WriteLine(pd.Name + ": " + (pd.Value ?? "N/A"));}   That's it. Hope this helps you in some way.

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  • XNA Notes 005

    - by George Clingerman
    Another week and another crazy amount of activity going on in the XNA community. I’m fairly certain I missed over half of it. In fact, if I am missing things, make sure to email me and I’ll try and make sure I catch it next week! ([email protected]). Also, if you’ve got any advice, things you like/don’t like about the way these XNA Notes are going let me know. I always appreciate feedback (currently spammers are leaving me the nicest comments so you guys have work to do!) Without further ado, here’s this week’s notes! Time Critical XNA News The XNA Team Blob reminds us that February 7th is the last day to submit XNA 3.1 games to peer review! http://blogs.msdn.com/b/xna/archive/2011/01/31/7-days-left-to-submit-xna-gs-3-1-games-on-app-hub.aspx XNA MVPS Chris Williams kicks off the marketing campaign for our book http://geekswithblogs.net/cwilliams/archive/2011/01/28/143680.aspx Catalin Zima posts the comparison cheat sheet for why Angry Birds is different than Chickens Can’t Fly http://www.amusedsloth.com/2011/02/comparison-cheat-sheet-for-chickens-cant-fly-and-angry-birds/ Jim Perry congratulates the developers selected by Game Developer Magazine for Best Xbox LIVE Indie Games of 2010 http://machxgames.com/blog/?p=24 @NemoKrad posts his XNAKUUG talks for all to enjoy http://twitter.com/NemoKrad/statuses/33142362502864896 http://xna-uk.net/blogs/randomchaos/archive/2011/02/03/xblig-uk-2011-january-amp-february-talk.aspx George  (that’s me!) preps for his XNA talk coming up on the 8th http://twitter.com/clingermangw/statuses/32669550554124288 http://www.portlandsilverlight.net/Meetings/Details/15 XNA Developers FireFly posts the last tutorial in his XNA Tower Defense tutorial series http://forums.create.msdn.com/forums/p/26442/451460.aspx#451460 http://xnatd.blogspot.com/2011/01/tutorial-14-polishing-game.html @fredericmy posts the main difference when porting a game from Windows Phone 7 to Xbox 360 http://fairyengine.blogspot.com/2011/01/main-differences-when-porting-game-from.html @ElementCy creates a pretty rad video of a MineCraft type terrain created using XNA http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Waw1f7wnl9I Andrew Russel gets the first XNA badge on gamedev.stackexchange http://twitter.com/_AndrewRussell/statuses/32322877004972032 http://gamedev.stackexchange.com/badges?tab=tags And his funding for ExEn has passed $7000 only $3000 to go http://twitter.com/_AndrewRussell/statuses/33042412804771840 Subodh Pushpak blogs about his Windows Phone 7 XNA talk http://geekswithblogs.net/subodhnpushpak/archive/2011/02/01/windows-phone-7-silverlight--xna-development-talk.aspx Slyprid releases the latest version of Transmute and needs more people to test http://twitter.com/slyprid/statuses/32452488418299904 http://forgottenstarstudios.com/ SpynDoctorGames celebrates the 1 year anniversary of Your Doodles Are Bugged! Congrats! http://twitter.com/SpynDoctorGames/statuses/32511689068908544 Noogy (creator of Dust the Elysian Tail) prepares his conversion to XNA 4.0 http://twitter.com/NoogyTweet/statuses/32522008449253376 @philippedasilva posts about the Indiefreaks Game Framework v0.2.0.0 Input management system http://twitter.com/philippedasilva/statuses/32763393957957632 http://indiefreaks.com/2011/02/02/behind-smart-input-system-feature/ Mommy’s Best Games debates what to do about High Scores with their new update http://mommysbest.blogspot.com/2011/02/high-score-shake-up.html @BinaryTweedDeej want to know if there’s anything the community needs to make XNA games for the PC. Give him some feedback! http://twitter.com/BinaryTweedDeej/status/32895453863354368 @mikebmcl promises to write us all a book (I can’t wait to read it!) http://twitter.com/mikebmcl/statuses/33206499102687233 @werezompire is going to live, LIVE, thanks to all the generosity and support from the community! http://twitter.com/werezompire/statuses/32840147644977153 Xbox LIVE Indie Games (XBLIG) Making money in Xbox 360 indie game development. Is it possible? http://www.bitmob.com/articles/making-money-in-xbox-360-indie-game-development-is-it-possible @AlejandroDaJ posts some thoughts abut the bitmob article http://twitter.com/AlejandroDaJ/statuses/31068552165330944 http://www.apathyworks.com/blog/view.php?id=00215 Kobun gets my respect as an XBLIG champion. I’m not sure who Kobun is, but if you’ve every read through the comment sections any time Kotaku writes about XBLIGs you’ll see a lot of confusion, disinformation in there. Kobun has been waging a secret war battling that lack of knowledge and he does it well. Also he’s running a pretty kick ass site for Xbox LIVE Indie Game reviews http://xboxindies.teamkobun.com/ @radiangames releases his last Xbox LIVE Indie Game...for now http://bit.ly/gMK6lE Playing Avaglide with the Kinect controller http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UqAYbHww53o http://www.joystiq.com/2011/01/30/kinect-hacks-take-to-the-skies-with-avaglide/ Luke Schneider of Radiangames interviewed in Edge magazine http://www.next-gen.biz/features/radiangames-venture Digital Quarters posts thoughts on why XBLIG’s online requirement kills certain genres http://digitalquarters.blogspot.com/2011/02/thoughts-why-xbligs-online-requirement.html Mommy’s Best Games shares the news that several XBLIGs were featured in the March 2011 issue of Famitsu 360 http://forums.create.msdn.com/forums/p/33455/451487.aspx#451487 NaviFairy continues with his Indie-Game-A-Day http://gaygamer.net/2011/02/indie_game_a_day_epic_dungeon.html http://gaygamer.net/2011/02/indie_game_a_day_break_limit_r.html and more every day...that’s kind of the point! Keep your eye on this series! VVGTV continues with it’s awesome reviews/promotions for XBLIGs http://vvgtv.com/ http://vvgtv.com/2011/02/03/iredia-atrams-secret-xblig-review-2/ http://vvgtv.com/2011/02/02/poopocalypse-coming-soon-to-xblig/ ….and even more, you get the point. Magicka is an Indie Game doing really well on Steam AND it’s made using XNA http://www.magickagame.com/ http://twitter.com/Magickagame/statuses/32712762580799488 GameMarx reviews Antipole http://www.gamemarx.com/reviews/73/antipole-is-vvvvvvery-good.aspx Armless Octopus review Alpha Squad http://www.armlessoctopus.com/2011/01/28/xbox-indie-review-alpha-squad/ An interesting article about Kodu that Jim Perry found http://twitter.com/MachXGames/statuses/32848044105924608 http://www.develop-online.net/news/36915/10-year-old-Jordan-makes-games-The-UK-needs-more-like-her XNA Game Development Sgt. Conker posts about the Natur beta, a new book and whether you can make money with XBLIG http://www.sgtconker.com/ http://www.sgtconker.com/2011/01/a-new-book-on-the-block-and-a-new-natur-beta/ http://www.sgtconker.com/2011/01/making-money-in-xbox-360-indie-game-development-is-it-possible/ Tips for setting up SVN http://bit.ly/fKxgFh @bsimser found tons of royalty free music and soundfx for your XNA Games http://twitter.com/bsimser/statuses/31426632933711872 Post on the new features in the next Sunburn Editor http://www.synapsegaming.com/blogs/fivesidedbarrel/archive/2011/01/28/new-editor-features-prefabs-components-and-more.aspx @jasons_novaleaf posts source code for light pre-pass optimizations for #xna http://twitter.com/jasons_novaleaf/statuses/33348855403642880 http://jcoluna.wordpress.com/2011/02/01/xna-4-0-light-pre-pass-optimization-round-one/ I’ve been learning about doing an A.I. for turn based games and this article was a great resource. http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/1535/designing_ai_algorithms_for_.php?print=1

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  • International Radio Operators Alphabet in F# &amp; Silverlight &ndash; Part 1

    - by MarkPearl
    So I have been delving into F# more and more and thought the best way to learn the language is to write something useful. I have been meaning to get some more Silverlight knowledge (up to now I have mainly been doing WPF) so I came up with a really simple project that I can actually use at work. Simply put – I often get support calls from clients wanting new activation codes. One of our main app’s was written in VB6 and had its own “security” where it would require about a 45 character sequence for it to be activated. The catch being that each time you reopen the program it would require a different character sequence, which meant that when we activate clients systems we have to do it live! This involves us either referring them to a website, or reading the characters to them over the phone and since nobody in the office knows the IROA off by heart we would come up with some interesting words to represent characters… 9 times out of 10 the client would type in the wrong character and we would have to start all over again… with this app I am hoping to reduce the errors of reading characters over the phone by treating it like a ham radio. My “Silverlight” application will allow for the user to input a series of characters and the system will then generate the equivalent IROA words… very basic stuff e.g. Character Input – abc Words Generated – Alpha Bravo Charlie After listening to Anders Hejlsberg on Dot Net Rocks Show 541 he mentioned that he felt many applications could make use of F# but in an almost silo basis – meaning that you would write modules that leant themselves to Functional Programming in F# and then incorporate it into a solution where the front end may be in C# or where you would have some other sort of glue. I buy into this kind of approach, so in this project I will use F# to do my very intensive “Business Logic” and will use Silverlight/C# to do the front end. F# Business Layer I am no expert at this, so I am sure to get some feedback on way I could improve my algorithm. My approach was really simple. I would need a function that would convert a single character to a string – i.e. ‘A’ –> “Alpha” and then I would need a function that would take a string of characters, convert them into a sequence of characters, and then apply my converter to return a sequence of words… make sense? Lets start with the CharToString function let CharToString (element:char) = match element.ToString().ToLower() with | "1" -> "1" | "5" -> "5" | "9" -> "9" | "2" -> "2" | "6" -> "6" | "0" -> "0" | "3" -> "3" | "7" -> "7" | "4" -> "4" | "8" -> "8" | "a" -> "Alpha" | "b" -> "Bravo" | "c" -> "Charlie" | "d" -> "Delta" | "e" -> "Echo" | "f" -> "Foxtrot" | "g" -> "Golf" | "h" -> "Hotel" | "i" -> "India" | "j" -> "Juliet" | "k" -> "Kilo" | "l" -> "Lima" | "m" -> "Mike" | "n" -> "November" | "o" -> "Oscar" | "p" -> "Papa" | "q" -> "Quebec" | "r" -> "Romeo" | "s" -> "Sierra" | "t" -> "Tango" | "u" -> "Uniform" | "v" -> "Victor" | "w" -> "Whiskey" | "x" -> "XRay" | "y" -> "Yankee" | "z" -> "Zulu" | element -> "Unknown" Quite simple, an element is passed in, this element is them converted to a lowercase single character string and then matched up with the equivalent word. If by some chance a character is not recognized, “Unknown” will be returned… I know need a function that can take a string and can parse each character of the string and generate a new sequence with the converted words… let ConvertCharsToStrings (s:string) = s |> Seq.toArray |> Seq.map(fun elem -> CharToString(elem)) Here… the Seq.toArray converts the string to a sequence of characters. I then searched for some way to parse through every element in the sequence. Originally I tried Seq.iter, but I think my understanding of what iter does was incorrect. Eventually I found Seq.map, which applies a function to every element in a sequence and then creates a new collection with the adjusted processed element. It turned out to be exactly what I needed… To test that everything worked I created one more function that parsed through every element in a sequence and printed it. AT this point I realized the the Seq.iter would be ideal for this… So my testing code is below… let PrintStrings items = items |> Seq.iter(fun x -> Console.Write(x.ToString() + " ")) let newSeq = ConvertCharsToStrings("acdefg123") PrintStrings newSeq Console.ReadLine()   Pretty basic stuff I guess… I hope my approach was right? In Part 2 I will look into doing a simple Silverlight Frontend, referencing the projects together and deploying….

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  • NTFS Issues in Windows 7 and 2008 R2 - 'Is it a Bug?'

    - by renewieldraaijer
    I have been using the various versions of the Microsoft Windows product line since NT4 and I really thought I knew the ins and outs about the NTFS filesystem by now. There were always a few rules of thumb to understand what happens if you move data around. These rules were: "If you copy data, the copied data will inherit the permissions of the location it is being copied to. The same goes for moving data between disk partitions. Only when you move data within the same partition, the permissions are kept."  Recently I was asked to assist in troubleshooting some NTFS related issues. This forced me to have another good look at this theory. To my surprise I found out that this theory does not completely stand anymore. Apparently some things have changed since the release of Windows Vista / Windows 2008. Since the release of these Operating Systems, a move within the same disk partition results in the data inheriting the permissions of the location it is being copied into. A major change in the NTFS filesystem you would think!  Not quite! The above only counts when the move operation is being performed by using Windows Explorer. A move by using the 'move' command from within a cmd prompt for example, retains the NTFS permissions, just like before in Windows XP and older systems. Conclusion: The Windows Explorer is responsible for changing the ACL's of the moved data. This is a remarkable change, but if you follow this theory, the resulting ACL after a move operation is still predictable.  We could say that since Windows Vista and Windows 2008, a new rule set applies: "If you copy data, the copied data will inherit the permissions of the location it is being copied to. Same goes for moving data between disk partitions and within disk partitions. Only when you move data within the same partition by using something else than the Windows Explorer, the permissions are kept." The above behavior should be unchanged in Windows 7 / Windows 2008 R2, compared to Windows Vista / 2008. But somehow the NTFS permissions are not so predictable in Windows 7 and Windows 2008 R2. Moving data within the same disk partition the one time results in the permissions being kept and the next time results in inherited permissions from the destination location. I will try to demonstrate this in a few examples: Example 1 (Incorrect behavior): Consider two folders, 'Folder A' and 'Folder B' with the following permissions configured.                    Now we create the test file 'test file 1.txt' in 'Folder A' and afterwards move this file to 'Folder B' using Windows Explorer.                       According to the new theory, the file should inherit the permissions of 'Folder B' and therefore 'Group B' should appear in the ACL of 'test file 1.txt'. In the screenshot below the resulting permissions are displayed. The permissions from the originating location are kept, while the permissions of 'Folder B' should be inherited.                   Example 2 (Correct behavior): Again, consider the same two folders. This time we make a small modification to the ACL of 'Folder A'. We add 'Group C' to the ACL and again we create a file in 'Folder A' which we name 'test file 2.txt'.                    Next, we move 'test file 2.txt' to 'Folder B'.                       Again, we check the permissions of 'test file 2.txt' at the target location. We can now see that the permissions are inherited. This is what should be happening, and can be considered 'correct behavior' for Windows Vista / 2008 / 7 / 2008 R2. It remains uncertain why this behavior is so inconsistent. At this time, this is under investigation with Microsoft Support. The investigation has been going for the last two weeks and it is beginning to look like there is no rational reason for this, other than a bug in the Windows Explorer in Windows 7 and 2008 R2. As soon as there is any certainty on this, I will note it here in this blog.                   The examples above are harmless tests, by using my own laptop. If you would create the same set of folders and groups, and configure exactly the same permissions, you will see exactly the same behavior. Be sure to use Windows 7 or Windows 2008 R2.   Initially the problem arose at a customer site where move operations on data on the fileserver by users would result in unpredictable results. This resulted in the wrong set of people having àccess permissions on data that they should not have permissions to. Off course this is something we want to prevent at all costs.   I have also done several tests with move operations by using the move command in a cmd prompt. This way the behavior is always consistent. The inconsistent behavior is only exposed when using the Windows Explorer to initiate the move operation, and only when using Windows 7 or Windows 2008 R2 systems. It is evident that this behavior changes when the ACL of a folder has been changed, for example by adding an extra entry. The reason for this remains uncertain though. To be continued…. A dutch version of this post can be found at: http://blogs.platani.nl/?p=612

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  • Alien deletes .deb when converting from .rpm

    - by Stann
    I'm trying to convert .rpm to .deb using alien. sudo alien -k libtetra-1.0.0-2.i386.rpm Alien says that: libtetra-1.0.0-2.i386.deb generated But when I check the folder - there is just original .rpm and no .deb. Also - I can see that for a split second there is a .deb file in a folder. so it looks like alien create .deb and deletes it right away. I suspect that it's maybe because I run 64 bit os and package is 32? Can somebody explain why alien deletes .deb automatically? Verbose output: LANG=C rpm -qp --queryformat %{NAME} libtetra-1.0.0-2.i386.rpm LANG=C rpm -qp --queryformat %{VERSION} libtetra-1.0.0-2.i386.rpm LANG=C rpm -qp --queryformat %{RELEASE} libtetra-1.0.0-2.i386.rpm LANG=C rpm -qp --queryformat %{ARCH} libtetra-1.0.0-2.i386.rpm LANG=C rpm -qp --queryformat %{CHANGELOGTEXT} libtetra-1.0.0-2.i386.rpm LANG=C rpm -qp --queryformat %{SUMMARY} libtetra-1.0.0-2.i386.rpm LANG=C rpm -qp --queryformat %{DESCRIPTION} libtetra-1.0.0-2.i386.rpm LANG=C rpm -qp --queryformat %{PREFIXES} libtetra-1.0.0-2.i386.rpm LANG=C rpm -qp --queryformat %{POSTIN} libtetra-1.0.0-2.i386.rpm LANG=C rpm -qp --queryformat %{POSTUN} libtetra-1.0.0-2.i386.rpm LANG=C rpm -qp --queryformat %{PREUN} libtetra-1.0.0-2.i386.rpm LANG=C rpm -qp --queryformat %{LICENSE} libtetra-1.0.0-2.i386.rpm LANG=C rpm -qp --queryformat %{PREIN} libtetra-1.0.0-2.i386.rpm LANG=C rpm -qcp libtetra-1.0.0-2.i386.rpm rpm -qpi libtetra-1.0.0-2.i386.rpm LANG=C rpm -qpl libtetra-1.0.0-2.i386.rpm mkdir libtetra-1.0.0 chmod 755 libtetra-1.0.0 rpm2cpio libtetra-1.0.0-2.i386.rpm | lzma -t -q > /dev/null 2>&1 rpm2cpio libtetra-1.0.0-2.i386.rpm | (cd libtetra-1.0.0; cpio --extract --make-directories --no-absolute-filenames --preserve-modification-time) 2>&1 chmod 755 libtetra-1.0.0/./ chmod 755 libtetra-1.0.0/./usr chmod 755 libtetra-1.0.0/./usr/lib chown 0:0 libtetra-1.0.0//usr/lib/libtetra.so.1.0.0 chmod 755 libtetra-1.0.0//usr/lib/libtetra.so.1.0.0 mkdir libtetra-1.0.0/debian date -R date -R chmod 755 libtetra-1.0.0/debian/rules debian/rules binary 2>&1 libtetra_1.0.0-3_i386.deb generated find libtetra-1.0.0 -type d -exec chmod 755 {} ; rm -rf libtetra-1.0.0 Very Verbose output LANG=C rpm -qp --queryformat %{NAME} libtetra-1.0.0-2.i386.rpm libtetra LANG=C rpm -qp --queryformat %{VERSION} libtetra-1.0.0-2.i386.rpm 1.0.0 LANG=C rpm -qp --queryformat %{RELEASE} libtetra-1.0.0-2.i386.rpm 2 LANG=C rpm -qp --queryformat %{ARCH} libtetra-1.0.0-2.i386.rpm i386 LANG=C rpm -qp --queryformat %{CHANGELOGTEXT} libtetra-1.0.0-2.i386.rpm - First RPM Package LANG=C rpm -qp --queryformat %{SUMMARY} libtetra-1.0.0-2.i386.rpm Panasonic KX-MC6000 series Printer Driver for Linux. LANG=C rpm -qp --queryformat %{DESCRIPTION} libtetra-1.0.0-2.i386.rpm This software is Panasonic KX-MC6000 series Printer Driver for Linux. You can print from applications by using CUPS(Common Unix Printing System) which is the printing system for Linux. Other functions for KX-MC6000 series are not supported by this software. LANG=C rpm -qp --queryformat %{PREFIXES} libtetra-1.0.0-2.i386.rpm (none) LANG=C rpm -qp --queryformat %{POSTIN} libtetra-1.0.0-2.i386.rpm (none) LANG=C rpm -qp --queryformat %{POSTUN} libtetra-1.0.0-2.i386.rpm (none) LANG=C rpm -qp --queryformat %{PREUN} libtetra-1.0.0-2.i386.rpm (none) LANG=C rpm -qp --queryformat %{LICENSE} libtetra-1.0.0-2.i386.rpm GPL and LGPL (Version2) LANG=C rpm -qp --queryformat %{PREIN} libtetra-1.0.0-2.i386.rpm (none) LANG=C rpm -qcp libtetra-1.0.0-2.i386.rpm rpm -qpi libtetra-1.0.0-2.i386.rpm Name : libtetra Relocations: (not relocatable) Version : 1.0.0 Vendor: Panasonic Communications Co., Ltd. Release : 2 Build Date: Tue 27 Apr 2010 05:16:40 AM EDT Install Date: (not installed) Build Host: localhost.localdomain Group : System Environment/Daemons Source RPM: libtetra-1.0.0-2.src.rpm Size : 31808 License: GPL and LGPL (Version2) Signature : (none) URL : http://panasonic.net/pcc/support/fax/world.htm Summary : Panasonic KX-MC6000 series Printer Driver for Linux. Description : This software is Panasonic KX-MC6000 series Printer Driver for Linux. You can print from applications by using CUPS(Common Unix Printing System) which is the printing system for Linux. Other functions for KX-MC6000 series are not supported by this software. LANG=C rpm -qpl libtetra-1.0.0-2.i386.rpm /usr/lib/libtetra.so /usr/lib/libtetra.so.1.0.0 mkdir libtetra-1.0.0 chmod 755 libtetra-1.0.0 rpm2cpio libtetra-1.0.0-2.i386.rpm | lzma -t -q > /dev/null 2>&1 rpm2cpio libtetra-1.0.0-2.i386.rpm | (cd libtetra-1.0.0; cpio --extract --make-directories --no-absolute-filenames --preserve-modification-time) 2>&1 63 blocks chmod 755 libtetra-1.0.0/./ chmod 755 libtetra-1.0.0/./usr chmod 755 libtetra-1.0.0/./usr/lib chown 0:0 libtetra-1.0.0//usr/lib/libtetra.so.1.0.0 chmod 755 libtetra-1.0.0//usr/lib/libtetra.so.1.0.0 mkdir libtetra-1.0.0/debian date -R Mon, 07 Feb 2011 11:03:58 -0500 date -R Mon, 07 Feb 2011 11:03:58 -0500 chmod 755 libtetra-1.0.0/debian/rules debian/rules binary 2>&1 dh_testdir dh_testdir dh_testroot dh_clean -k -d dh_clean: No packages to build. dh_installdirs dh_installdocs dh_installchangelogs find . -maxdepth 1 -mindepth 1 -not -name debian -print0 | \ xargs -0 -r -i cp -a {} debian/ dh_compress dh_makeshlibs dh_installdeb dh_shlibdeps dh_gencontrol dh_md5sums dh_builddeb libtetra_1.0.0-2_i386.deb generated find libtetra-1.0.0 -type d -exec chmod 755 {} ; rm -rf libtetra-1.0.0 Resolution Oh well. It looks like it's perhaps a bug? or I don't know. I simply installed 32-bit version of Ubuntu in VirtualBox and converted package there. For some reason I couldn't convert 32-bit package in 64 OS. and that is that. If someone ever finds the reason ffor this behavior - plz. post somewhere in comments. Thanks

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  • How to Sync Any Folder With SkyDrive on Windows 8.1

    - by Chris Hoffman
    Before Windows 8.1, it was possible to sync any folder on your computer with SkyDrive using symbolic links. This method no longer works now that SkyDrive is baked into Windows 8.1, but there are other tricks you can use. Creating a symbolic link or directory junction inside your SkyDrive folder will give you an empty folder in your SkyDrive cloud storage. Confusingly, the files will appear inside the SkyDrive Modern app as if they were being synced, but they aren’t. The Solution With SkyDrive refusing to understand and accept symbolic links in its own folder, the best option is probably to use symbolic links anyway — but in reverse. For example, let’s say you have a program that automatically saves important data to a folder anywhere on your hard drive — whether it’s C:\Users\USER\Documents\, C:\Program\Data, or anywhere else. Rather than trying to trick SkyDrive into understanding a symbolic link, we could instead move the actual folder itself to SkyDrive and then use a symbolic link at the folder’s original location to trick the original program. This may not work for every single program out there. But it will likely work for most programs, which use standard Windows API calls to access folders and save files. We’re just flipping the old solution here — we can’t trick SkyDrive anymore, so let’s try to trick other programs instead. Moving a Folder and Creating a Symbolic Link First, ensure no program is using the external folder. For example, if it’s a program data or settings folder, close the program that’s using the folder. Next, simply move the folder to your SkyDrive folder. Right-click the external folder, select Cut, go to the SkyDrive folder, right-click and select Paste. The folder will now be located in the SkyDrive folder itself, so it will sync normally. Next, open a Command Prompt window as Administrator. Right-click the Start button on the taskbar or press Windows Key + X and select Command Prompt (Administrator) to open it. Run the following command to create a symbolic link at the original location of the folder: mklink /d “C:\Original\Folder\Location” “C:\Users\NAME\SkyDrive\FOLDERNAME\” Enter the correct paths for the exact location of the original folder and the current location of the folder in your SkyDrive. Windows will then create a symbolic link at the folder’s original location. Most programs should hopefully be tricked by this symbolic location, saving their files directly to SkyDrive. You can test this yourself. Put a file into the folder at its original location. It will be saved to SkyDrive and sync normally, appearing in your SkyDrive storage online. One downside here is that you won’t be able to save a file onto SkyDrive without it taking up space on the same hard drive SkyDrive is on. You won’t be able to scatter folders across multiple hard drives and sync them all. However, you could always change the location of the SkyDrive folder on Windows 8.1 and put it on a drive with a larger amount of free space. To do this, right-click the SkyDrive folder in File Explorer, select Properties, and use the options on the Location tab. You could even use Storage Spaces to combine the drives into one larger drive. Automatically Copy the Original Files to SkyDrive Another option would be to run a program that automatically copies files from another folder on your computer to your SkyDrive folder. For example, let’s say you want to sync copies of important log files that a program creates in a specific folder. You could use a program that allows you to schedule automatic folder-mirroring, configuring the program to regularly copy the contents of your log folder to your SkyDrive folder. This may be a useful alternative for some use cases, although it isn’t the same as standard syncing. You’ll end up with two copies of the files taking up space on your system, which won’t be ideal for large files. The files also won’t be instantly uploaded to your SkyDrive storage after they’re created, but only after the scheduled task runs. There are many options for this, including Microsoft’s own SyncToy, which continues to work on Windows 8. If you were using the symbolic link trick to automatically sync copies of PC game save files with SkyDrive, you could just install GameSave Manager. It can be configured to automatically create backup copies of your computer’s PC game save files on a schedule, saving them to SkyDrive where they’ll be synced and backed up online. SkyDrive support was completely rewritten for Windows 8.1, so it’s not surprising that this trick no longer works. The ability to use symbolic links in previous versions of SkyDrive was never officially supported, so it’s not surprising to see it break after a rewrite. None of the methods above are as convenient and quick as the old symbolic link method, but they’re the best we can do with the SkyDrive integration Microsoft has given us in Windows 8.1. It’s still possible to use symbolic links to easily sync other folders with competing cloud storage services like Dropbox and Google Drive, so you may want to consider switching away from SkyDrive if this feature is critical to you.     

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  • Oracle Fusion Applications User Experience Design Patterns: Feeling the Love after Launch

    - by mvaughan
    By Misha Vaughan, Oracle Applications User ExperienceIn the first video by the Oracle Applications User Experience team on the Oracle Partner Network, Vice President Jeremy Ashley said that Oracle is looking to expand the ecosystem of support for Oracle’s applications customers as they begin to assess their investment and adoption of Oracle Fusion Applications. Oracle has made a massive investment to maintain the benefits of the Fusion Applications User Experience. This summer, the Applications User Experience team released the Oracle Fusion Applications user experience design patterns.Design patterns help create consistent experiences across devices.The launch has been very well received:Angelo Santagata, Senior Principal Technologist and Fusion Middleware evangelist for Oracle,  wrote this to the system integrator community: “The web site is the result of many years of Oracle R&D into user interface design for Fusion Applications and features a really cool web app which allows you to visualise the UI components in action.”  Grant Ronald, Director of Product Management, Application Development Framework (ADF) said: “It’s a science I don't understand, but now I don't have to ... Now you can learn from the UX experience of Fusion Applications.”Frank Nimphius, Senior Principal Product Manager, Oracle (ADF) wrote about the launch of the design patterns for the ADF Code Corner, and Jürgen Kress, Senior Manager EMEA Alliances & Channels for Fusion MiddleWare and Service Oriented Architecture, (SOA), shared the news with his Partner Community. Oracle Twitter followers also helped spread the message about the design patterns launch: ?@bex – Brian Huff, founder and Chief Software Architect for Bezzotech, and Oracle ACE Director:“Nifty! The Oracle Fusion UX team just released new ADF design patterns.”@maiko_rocha, Maiko Rocha, Oracle Consulting Solutions Architect and Oracle FMW engineer: “Haven't seen any other vendor offer such comprehensive UX Design Patterns catalog for free!”@zirous_chad, Chad Thompson, Senior Solutions Architect for Zirous, Inc. and ADF Developer:Wow - @ultan and company did a great job with the Fusion UX PatternsWhat is a user experience design pattern?A user experience design pattern is a re-usable, usability tested functional blueprint for a particular user experience.  Some examples are guided processes, shopping carts, and search and search results.  Ultan O’Broin discusses the top design patterns every developer should know.The patterns that were just released are based on thousands of hours of end-user field studies, state-of-the-art user interface assessments, and usability testing.  To be clear, these are functional design patterns, not technical design patterns that developers may be used to working with.  Because we know there is a gap, we are putting together some training that will help close that gap.Who should care?This is an offering targeted primarily at Application Development Framework (ADF) developers. If you are faced with the following questions regarding Fusion Applications, you will want to know and learn more:•    How do I build something that looks like Fusion Applications?•    How do I build a next-generation application?•    How do I extend a Fusion Application and maintain the user experience?•    I don’t want to re-invent the wheel on the user interface, so where do I start?•    I need to build something that will eventually co-exist with Fusion Applications. How do I do that?These questions are relevant to partners with an ADF competency, individual practitioners, or small consultancies with an ADF specialization, and customers who are trying to shift their IT staff over to supporting Fusion Applications.Where you can find out more?OnlineOur Fusion User Experience design patterns maven is Ultan O’Broin. The Oracle Partner Network is helping our team bring this first e-seminar to you in order to go into a more detail on what this means and how to take advantage of it:? Webinar: Build a Better User Experience with Oracle: Oracle Fusion Applications Functional Design PatternsSept 20, 2012 , 10:30am-11:30am PacificDial-In:  1. 877-664-9137 / Passcode 102546?International:  706-634-9619  http://www.intercall.com/national/oracleuniversity/gdnam.htmlAccess the Live Event Or Via Webconference Access http://ouweb.webex.com  ?and enter this session number: 598036234At a Usergroup eventThe Fusion User Experience Advocates (FXA) are also going to be getting some deep-dive training on this content and can share it with local user groups.At OpenWorld Ultan O’Broin               Chris MuirIf you will be at OpenWorld this year, our own Ultan O’Broin will be visiting the ADF demopod to say hello, thanks to Shay Shmeltzer, Senior Group Manager for ADF outbound communication and at the OTN lounge: Monday 10-10:45, Tuesday 2:15-2:45, Wednesday 2:15-3:30 ?  Oracle JDeveloper and Oracle ADF,  Moscone South, Right - S-207? “ADF Meet and Greett”, OTN Lounge, Wednesday 4:30 And I cannot talk about OpenWorld and ADF without mentioning Chris Muir’s ADF EMG event: the Year After the Year Of the ADF Developer – Sunday, Sept 30 of OpenWorld. Chris has played host to Ultan and the Applications user experience message for his online community and is now a seasoned UX expert.Expect to see additional announcements about expanded and training on similar topics in the future.

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  • SQL SERVER – The Story of a Lesser Known Startup Parameter in SQL Server – Guest Post by Balmukund Lakhani

    - by Pinal Dave
    This is a fantastic blog post from my dear friend Balmukund ( blog | twitter | facebook ). He had presented a fantastic session in our last UG and there were lots of requests from attendees that he blogs about it. Well, here is the blog post about the same very popular UG session. Let us read the entire blog post in the voice of the Balmukund himself. During my last session in SQL Bangalore User Group (Facebook) meeting, I was lucky enough to deliver a session on SQL Server Startup issue. The name of the session was “SQL Engine Starting Trouble – How to start?” From the feedback, I realized that one of the “not well known” startup parameter is “-m”. Okay, you might say “I know that this is used to start the SQL in single user mode”. But what you might not know is that you can pass a string with -m which has special meaning and use. I have used this parameter in my blog here but looks like not many of you have seen that. It happens most of the time when we want to start SQL Server in single user mode, someone else makes connection before you can. The only choice you have is to repeat same process again till you succeed. Some smart DBAs may disable the remote network protocols (TCP/IP and Named Pipes) of SQL Instance and allow only local connections to SQL. Once the activity is complete, our dear smart DBA has to remember to re-enable network protocols. Sometimes, it may be a local service or application getting connection to SQL before we can. There is a better way to deal with it. Yes, you have guessed it correctly: -m parameter which a string. Since I work with SQL Product Support team, I may know little more undocumented commands and parameters, but this is not an undocumented stuff. It’s already documented in books online. So in this blog, I am going to show a demo of its usage. As documentation shows, “Do not use this option as a security feature.” So please read this blog as knowledge enhancer and troubleshooting issues not security feature. In my laptop, I have a default instance of SQL Server 2012 and here is what we would in the configuration manager. Now, I would go ahead and stop SQL Service by selecting SQL Server (MSSQLServer) > Right Click > Stop. There are multiple ways to start SQL with startup parameter. 1) Use Net Start Command from command prompt Net Start MSSQLServer /mSQLCMD The above command is the simplest way to add startup parameter to SQL. This parameter would be cleared once we stop and start SQL. 2) Add Startup Parameter via configuration manager. Step is already listed here. We need to add -mSQLCMD If we compare 1 and 2, it’s clear that unless we modify startup parameter and remove -m, it would be in effect. 3) Start SQL Service via command line SQLServr.exe –mSQLCMD –s<InstanceName> Wait, what does SQLCMD mean with /m? It’s the instruction to SQL that start SQL Server in Single User Mode and allow only the application which is SQLCMD. Any other application would fail with Login Failed for User Error message. It would be important to note that string is case sensitive. This value should be picked up from application_name column from sys.dm_exec_sessions. I have made a connection using SQLCMD and as we can see it comes as upper case “SQLCMD”. If we want only management studio query windows to connect then we need to give -m” Microsoft SQL Server Management Studio – Query” as startup parameter. In below example, I have given it as SQLCMd (lower case d at the end) and we would notice that we would not be able to connect to SQL Instance. Above proves that parameter works as expected and it’s case sensitive. Error Log would show below information. How to get error log location? I have already blogged about it. Hope you have learned something new. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com) Filed under: PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Server Management Studio, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL, Technology

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  • Slow boot on Ubuntu 12.04

    - by Hailwood
    My Ubuntu is booting really slow (Windows is booting faster...). I am using Ubuntu a Dell Inspiron 1545 Pentium(R) Dual-Core CPU T4300 @ 2.10GHz, 4GB Ram, 500GB HDD running Ubuntu 12.04 with gnome-shell 3.4.1. After running dmesg the culprit seems to be this section, in particular the last three lines: [26.557659] ADDRCONF(NETDEV_UP): eth0: link is not ready [26.565414] ADDRCONF(NETDEV_UP): eth0: link is not ready [27.355355] Console: switching to colour frame buffer device 170x48 [27.362346] fb0: radeondrmfb frame buffer device [27.362347] drm: registered panic notifier [27.362357] [drm] Initialized radeon 2.12.0 20080528 for 0000:01:00.0 on minor 0 [27.617435] init: udev-fallback-graphics main process (1049) terminated with status 1 [30.064481] init: plymouth-stop pre-start process (1500) terminated with status 1 [51.708241] CE: hpet increased min_delta_ns to 20113 nsec [59.448029] eth2: no IPv6 routers present But I have no idea how to start debugging this. sudo lshw -C video $ sudo lshw -C video *-display description: VGA compatible controller product: RV710 [Mobility Radeon HD 4300 Series] vendor: Hynix Semiconductor (Hyundai Electronics) physical id: 0 bus info: pci@0000:01:00.0 version: 00 width: 32 bits clock: 33MHz capabilities: pm pciexpress msi vga_controller bus_master cap_list rom configuration: driver=fglrx_pci latency=0 resources: irq:48 memory:e0000000-efffffff ioport:de00(size=256) memory:f6df0000-f6dfffff memory:f6d00000-f6d1ffff After loading the propriety driver my new dmesg log is below (starting from the first major time gap): [2.983741] EXT4-fs (sda6): mounted filesystem with ordered data mode. Opts: (null) [25.094327] ADDRCONF(NETDEV_UP): eth0: link is not ready [25.119737] udevd[520]: starting version 175 [25.167086] lp: driver loaded but no devices found [25.215341] fglrx: module license 'Proprietary. (C) 2002 - ATI Technologies, Starnberg, GERMANY' taints kernel. [25.215345] Disabling lock debugging due to kernel taint [25.231924] wmi: Mapper loaded [25.318414] lib80211: common routines for IEEE802.11 drivers [25.318418] lib80211_crypt: registered algorithm 'NULL' [25.331631] [fglrx] Maximum main memory to use for locked dma buffers: 3789 MBytes. [25.332095] [fglrx] vendor: 1002 device: 9552 count: 1 [25.334206] [fglrx] ioport: bar 1, base 0xde00, size: 0x100 [25.334229] pci 0000:01:00.0: PCI INT A -> GSI 16 (level, low) -> IRQ 16 [25.334235] pci 0000:01:00.0: setting latency timer to 64 [25.337109] [fglrx] Kernel PAT support is enabled [25.337140] [fglrx] module loaded - fglrx 8.96.4 [Mar 12 2012] with 1 minors [25.342803] Adding 4189180k swap on /dev/sda7. Priority:-1 extents:1 across:4189180k [25.364031] type=1400 audit(1338241723.027:2): apparmor="STATUS" operation="profile_load" name="/sbin/dhclient" pid=606 comm="apparmor_parser" [25.364491] type=1400 audit(1338241723.031:3): apparmor="STATUS" operation="profile_load" name="/usr/lib/NetworkManager/nm-dhcp-client.action" pid=606 comm="apparmor_parser" [25.364760] type=1400 audit(1338241723.031:4): apparmor="STATUS" operation="profile_load" name="/usr/lib/connman/scripts/dhclient-script" pid=606 comm="apparmor_parser" [25.394328] wl 0000:0c:00.0: PCI INT A -> GSI 17 (level, low) -> IRQ 17 [25.394343] wl 0000:0c:00.0: setting latency timer to 64 [25.415531] acpi device:36: registered as cooling_device2 [25.416688] input: Video Bus as /devices/LNXSYSTM:00/device:00/PNP0A03:00/device:34/LNXVIDEO:00/input/input6 [25.416795] ACPI: Video Device [VID] (multi-head: yes rom: no post: no) [25.416865] [Firmware Bug]: Duplicate ACPI video bus devices for the same VGA controller, please try module parameter "video.allow_duplicates=1"if the current driver doesn't work. [25.425133] lib80211_crypt: registered algorithm 'TKIP' [25.448058] snd_hda_intel 0000:00:1b.0: PCI INT A -> GSI 21 (level, low) -> IRQ 21 [25.448321] snd_hda_intel 0000:00:1b.0: irq 47 for MSI/MSI-X [25.448353] snd_hda_intel 0000:00:1b.0: setting latency timer to 64 [25.738867] eth1: Broadcom BCM4315 802.11 Hybrid Wireless Controller 5.100.82.38 [25.761213] input: HDA Intel Mic as /devices/pci0000:00/0000:00:1b.0/sound/card0/input7 [25.761406] input: HDA Intel Headphone as /devices/pci0000:00/0000:00:1b.0/sound/card0/input8 [25.783432] dcdbas dcdbas: Dell Systems Management Base Driver (version 5.6.0-3.2) [25.908318] EXT4-fs (sda6): re-mounted. Opts: errors=remount-ro [25.928155] input: Dell WMI hotkeys as /devices/virtual/input/input9 [25.960561] udevd[543]: renamed network interface eth1 to eth2 [26.285688] init: failsafe main process (835) killed by TERM signal [26.396426] input: PS/2 Mouse as /devices/platform/i8042/serio2/input/input10 [26.423108] input: AlpsPS/2 ALPS GlidePoint as /devices/platform/i8042/serio2/input/input11 [26.511297] Bluetooth: Core ver 2.16 [26.511383] NET: Registered protocol family 31 [26.511385] Bluetooth: HCI device and connection manager initialized [26.511388] Bluetooth: HCI socket layer initialized [26.511391] Bluetooth: L2CAP socket layer initialized [26.512079] Bluetooth: SCO socket layer initialized [26.530164] Bluetooth: BNEP (Ethernet Emulation) ver 1.3 [26.530168] Bluetooth: BNEP filters: protocol multicast [26.553893] type=1400 audit(1338241724.219:5): apparmor="STATUS" operation="profile_replace" name="/sbin/dhclient" pid=928 comm="apparmor_parser" [26.554860] Bluetooth: RFCOMM TTY layer initialized [26.554866] Bluetooth: RFCOMM socket layer initialized [26.554868] Bluetooth: RFCOMM ver 1.11 [26.557910] type=1400 audit(1338241724.223:6): apparmor="STATUS" operation="profile_load" name="/usr/lib/lightdm/lightdm/lightdm-guest-session-wrapper" pid=927 comm="apparmor_parser" [26.559166] type=1400 audit(1338241724.223:7): apparmor="STATUS" operation="profile_replace" name="/usr/lib/NetworkManager/nm-dhcp-client.action" pid=928 comm="apparmor_parser" [26.559574] type=1400 audit(1338241724.223:8): apparmor="STATUS" operation="profile_replace" name="/usr/lib/connman/scripts/dhclient-script" pid=928 comm="apparmor_parser" [26.575519] type=1400 audit(1338241724.239:9): apparmor="STATUS" operation="profile_load" name="/usr/lib/telepathy/mission-control-5" pid=931 comm="apparmor_parser" [26.581100] type=1400 audit(1338241724.247:10): apparmor="STATUS" operation="profile_load" name="/usr/lib/telepathy/telepathy-*" pid=931 comm="apparmor_parser" [26.582794] type=1400 audit(1338241724.247:11): apparmor="STATUS" operation="profile_load" name="/usr/bin/evince" pid=929 comm="apparmor_parser" [26.605672] ppdev: user-space parallel port driver [27.592475] sky2 0000:09:00.0: eth0: enabling interface [27.604329] ADDRCONF(NETDEV_UP): eth0: link is not ready [27.606962] ADDRCONF(NETDEV_UP): eth0: link is not ready [27.852509] vesafb: mode is 1024x768x32, linelength=4096, pages=0 [27.852513] vesafb: scrolling: redraw [27.852515] vesafb: Truecolor: size=0:8:8:8, shift=0:16:8:0 [27.852523] mtrr: type mismatch for e0000000,400000 old: write-back new: write-combining [27.852527] mtrr: type mismatch for e0000000,200000 old: write-back new: write-combining [27.852531] mtrr: type mismatch for e0000000,100000 old: write-back new: write-combining [27.852534] mtrr: type mismatch for e0000000,80000 old: write-back new: write-combining [27.852538] mtrr: type mismatch for e0000000,40000 old: write-back new: write-combining [27.852541] mtrr: type mismatch for e0000000,20000 old: write-back new: write-combining [27.852544] mtrr: type mismatch for e0000000,10000 old: write-back new: write-combining [27.852548] mtrr: type mismatch for e0000000,8000 old: write-back new: write-combining [27.852551] mtrr: type mismatch for e0000000,4000 old: write-back new: write-combining [27.852554] mtrr: type mismatch for e0000000,2000 old: write-back new: write-combining [27.852558] mtrr: type mismatch for e0000000,1000 old: write-back new: write-combining [27.853154] vesafb: framebuffer at 0xe0000000, mapped to 0xffffc90005580000, using 3072k, total 3072k [27.853405] Console: switching to colour frame buffer device 128x48 [27.853426] fb0: VESA VGA frame buffer device [28.539800] fglrx_pci 0000:01:00.0: irq 48 for MSI/MSI-X [28.540552] [fglrx] Firegl kernel thread PID: 1168 [28.540679] [fglrx] Firegl kernel thread PID: 1169 [28.540789] [fglrx] Firegl kernel thread PID: 1170 [28.540932] [fglrx] IRQ 48 Enabled [29.845620] [fglrx] Gart USWC size:1236 M. [29.845624] [fglrx] Gart cacheable size:489 M. [29.845629] [fglrx] Reserved FB block: Shared offset:0, size:1000000 [29.845632] [fglrx] Reserved FB block: Unshared offset:fc21000, size:3df000 [29.845635] [fglrx] Reserved FB block: Unshared offset:1fffb000, size:5000 [59.700023] eth2: no IPv6 routers present

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  • Red Gate does Byte Night 2012

    - by red(at)work
    On the 5th of October 2012, a team of nine plucky Red Gaters braved the howling wind and the driving rain to sleep outside. No tents or mattresses were allowed – all we took for protection were sleeping bags, groundsheets, plastic sacks and Colin’s enormous fishing umbrella (a godsend in umbrella-y disguise). Why would we do such a thing? For Byte Night, an annual tech sector sleepout in support of Action for Children, who tackle the causes as well as the consequences of youth homelessness. Byte Night encourages technology professionals to do for one night a year what thousands of young people have to do every night – sleep rough.  We signed up for Byte Night in the warm, heady midst of the British summer, thinking it couldn’t possibly be all that bad. Even on the night itself – before the rain began to fall, sat in the comfort and warmth of a company canteen, drinking wine and eating chill and preparing to win the pub quiz – we were excited and optimistic about the night that lay ahead of us. All of that changed as soon as we stepped out into one of the worst rainstorms of the year. Brian, the team’s birthday boy, describes it best: Picture the scene: it’s 3 am on a Friday. I’m lying outside, fully clothed in a sleeping bag, wearing a raincoat, trussed up inside a large plastic pocket, on a ground sheet beneath a giant umbrella, wedged so tightly between two of my colleagues that I can’t move my arms. I’m wide awake, staring up at the grey sky beyond the edge of the umbrella; a limp, flickering white glow hints at a moon somewhere behind the drifting clouds. I haven’t slept since we first moved outside at 11 pm. Outside. Did I mention we were outside? I’m hung over. I need the loo. But there is no way on earth that I’m getting out of this sleeping bag. It’s cold. It’s raining. Not just raining, but chucking it down. It’s been doing this non-stop since 10pm. The rain sounds like a hyperactive drummer on the fishing umbrella, and the noise is loud and relentless. Puddles of water are forming all over the groundsheet, and, despite being ensconced inside the plastic pouch, I am wet. The fishing umbrella is protecting me from the worst of the driving rain, but not all of me is under it, and five hours of rain is no match for it. Everything is wet. My left side has become horribly damp. My trainers, which I placed next to my sleeping bag, are now completely soaked through. Mmm. That’ll be fun in the morning. My head is next to Colin’s head on one side, and a multi-pack of McCoy’s cheddar and onion crisps on the other. Don’t ask about the tub of hummus. That’s somewhere down by my ankles, abandoned to the night. Jess, who is lying next to me, rolls over onto her side. A mini waterfall cascades from her rain-pouch onto my face. Bah. I continue to stare into the heavens, willing the dawn to hurry up. Something lands on my face. It’s a mosquito. Great. Midnight, when this still seemed like fun – when we opened some champagne and my colleagues presented me with a caterpillar birthday cake, when everyone was drunk and jolly and full of stoic resolve – feels like a long time ago. Did I mention that today is my birthday? The remains of the caterpillar cake endure the same fate as the hummus, left out in the rain like a metaphor for sadness. It’s getting colder. I can see my breath. Silence has descended on the group, apart from the rustle of plastic. And the rain, obviously. Someone snores, and I envy whoever it is the sweet escape of sleep. I try to wriggle a bit further down inside my sleeping bag, but it doesn’t want to be wriggled into. Only 3 hours till dawn. 180 minutes. I begin to count them off, one at a time.  All nine of us got to go home in the morning, but thousands of children across the UK don’t have that luxury. If you’d like to sponsor the Red Gate Byte Night team, our JustGiving page can be found here.   Chris, before the outside bit actually happened. More photos from Byte Night Cambridge 2012 can be found here.

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  • Do Not Optimize Without Measuring

    - by Alois Kraus
    Recently I had to do some performance work which included reading a lot of code. It is fascinating with what ideas people come up to solve a problem. Especially when there is no problem. When you look at other peoples code you will not be able to tell if it is well performing or not by reading it. You need to execute it with some sort of tracing or even better under a profiler. The first rule of the performance club is not to think and then to optimize but to measure, think and then optimize. The second rule is to do this do this in a loop to prevent slipping in bad things for too long into your code base. If you skip for some reason the measure step and optimize directly it is like changing the wave function in quantum mechanics. This has no observable effect in our world since it does represent only a probability distribution of all possible values. In quantum mechanics you need to let the wave function collapse to a single value. A collapsed wave function has therefore not many but one distinct value. This is what we physicists call a measurement. If you optimize your application without measuring it you are just changing the probability distribution of your potential performance values. Which performance your application actually has is still unknown. You only know that it will be within a specific range with a certain probability. As usual there are unlikely values within your distribution like a startup time of 20 minutes which should only happen once in 100 000 years. 100 000 years are a very short time when the first customer tries your heavily distributed networking application to run over a slow WIFI network… What is the point of this? Every programmer/architect has a mental performance model in his head. A model has always a set of explicit preconditions and a lot more implicit assumptions baked into it. When the model is good it will help you to think of good designs but it can also be the source of problems. In real world systems not all assumptions of your performance model (implicit or explicit) hold true any longer. The only way to connect your performance model and the real world is to measure it. In the WIFI example the model did assume a low latency high bandwidth LAN connection. If this assumption becomes wrong the system did have a drastic change in startup time. Lets look at a example. Lets assume we want to cache some expensive UI resource like fonts objects. For this undertaking we do create a Cache class with the UI themes we want to support. Since Fonts are expensive objects we do create it on demand the first time the theme is requested. A simple example of a Theme cache might look like this: using System; using System.Collections.Generic; using System.Drawing; struct Theme { public Color Color; public Font Font; } static class ThemeCache { static Dictionary<string, Theme> _Cache = new Dictionary<string, Theme> { {"Default", new Theme { Color = Color.AliceBlue }}, {"Theme12", new Theme { Color = Color.Aqua }}, }; public static Theme Get(string theme) { Theme cached = _Cache[theme]; if (cached.Font == null) { Console.WriteLine("Creating new font"); cached.Font = new Font("Arial", 8); } return cached; } } class Program { static void Main(string[] args) { Theme item = ThemeCache.Get("Theme12"); item = ThemeCache.Get("Theme12"); } } This cache does create font objects only once since on first retrieve of the Theme object the font is added to the Theme object. When we let the application run it should print “Creating new font” only once. Right? Wrong! The vigilant readers have spotted the issue already. The creator of this cache class wanted to get maximum performance. So he decided that the Theme object should be a value type (struct) to not put too much pressure on the garbage collector. The code Theme cached = _Cache[theme]; if (cached.Font == null) { Console.WriteLine("Creating new font"); cached.Font = new Font("Arial", 8); } does work with a copy of the value stored in the dictionary. This means we do mutate a copy of the Theme object and return it to our caller. But the original Theme object in the dictionary will have always null for the Font field! The solution is to change the declaration of struct Theme to class Theme or to update the theme object in the dictionary. Our cache as it is currently is actually a non caching cache. The funny thing was that I found out with a profiler by looking at which objects where finalized. I found way too many font objects to be finalized. After a bit debugging I found the allocation source for Font objects was this cache. Since this cache was there for years it means that the cache was never needed since I found no perf issue due to the creation of font objects. the cache was never profiled if it did bring any performance gain. to make the cache beneficial it needs to be accessed much more often. That was the story of the non caching cache. Next time I will write something something about measuring.

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  • Create a Social Community of Trust Along With Your Federal Digital Services Governance

    - by TedMcLaughlan
    The Digital Services Governance Recommendations were recently released, supporting the US Federal Government's Digital Government Strategy Milestone Action #4.2 to establish agency-wide governance structures for developing and delivering digital services. Figure 1 - From: "Digital Services Governance Recommendations" While extremely important from a policy and procedure perspective within an Agency's information management and communications enterprise, these recommendations only very lightly reference perhaps the most important success enabler - the "Trusted Community" required for ultimate usefulness of the services delivered. By "ultimate usefulness", I mean the collection of public, transparent properties around government information and digital services that include social trust and validation, social reach, expert respect, and comparative, standard measures of relative value. In other words, do the digital services meet expectations of the public, social media ecosystem (people AND machines)? A rigid governance framework, controlling by rules, policies and roles the creation and dissemination of digital services may meet the expectations of direct end-users and most stakeholders - including the agency information stewards and security officers. All others who may share comments about the services, write about them, swap or review extracts, repackage, visualize or otherwise repurpose the output for use in entirely unanticipated, social ways - these "stakeholders" will not be governed, but may observe guidance generated by a "Trusted Community". As recognized members of the trusted community, these stakeholders may ultimately define the right scope and detail of governance that all other users might observe, promoting and refining the usefulness of the government product as the social ecosystem expects. So, as part of an agency-centric governance framework, it's advised that a flexible governance model be created for stewarding a "Community of Trust" around the digital services. The first steps follow the approach outlined in the Recommendations: Step 1: Gather a Core Team In addition to the roles and responsibilities described, perhaps a set of characteristics and responsibilities can be developed for the "Trusted Community Steward/Advocate" - i.e. a person or team who (a) are entirely cognizant of and respected within the external social media communities, and (b) are trusted both within the agency and outside as practical, responsible, non-partisan communicators of useful information. The may seem like a standard Agency PR/Outreach team role - but often an agency or stakeholder subject matter expert with a public, active social persona works even better. Step 2: Assess What You Have In addition to existing, agency or stakeholder decision-making bodies and assets, it's important to take a PR/Marketing view of the social ecosystem. How visible are the services across the social channels utilized by current or desired constituents of your agency? What's the online reputation of your agency and perhaps the service(s)? Is Search Engine Optimization (SEO) a facet of external communications/publishing lifecycles? Who are the public champions, instigators, value-adders for the digital services, or perhaps just influential "communicators" (i.e. with no stake in the game)? You're essentially assessing your market and social presence, and identifying the actors (including your own agency employees) in the existing community of trust. Step 3: Determine What You Want The evolving Community of Trust will most readily absorb, support and provide feedback regarding "Core Principles" (Element B of the "six essential elements of a digital services governance structure") shared by your Agency, and obviously play a large, though probably very unstructured part in Element D "Stakeholder Input and Participation". Plan for this, and seek input from the social media community with respect to performance metrics - these should be geared around the outcome and growth of the trusted communities actions. How big and active is this community? What's the influential reach of this community with respect to particular messaging or campaigns generated by the Agency? What's the referral rate TO your digital services, FROM channels owned or operated by members of this community? (this requires governance with respect to content generation inclusive of "markers" or "tags"). At this point, while your Agency proceeds with steps 4 ("Build/Validate the Governance Structure") and 5 ("Share, Review, Upgrade"), the Community of Trust might as well just get going, and start adding value and usefulness to the existing conversations, existing data services - loosely though directionally-stewarded by your trusted advocate(s). Why is this an "Enterprise Architecture" topic? Because it's increasingly apparent that a Public Service "Enterprise" is not wholly contained within Agency facilities, firewalls and job titles - it's also manifested in actual, perceived or representative forms outside the walls, on the social Internet. An Agency's EA model and resulting investments both facilitate and are impacted by the "Social Enterprise". At Oracle, we're very active both within our Enterprise and outside, helping foster social architectures that enable truly useful public services, digital or otherwise.

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  • Why lock-free data structures just aren't lock-free enough

    - by Alex.Davies
    Today's post will explore why the current ways to communicate between threads don't scale, and show you a possible way to build scalable parallel programming on top of shared memory. The problem with shared memory Soon, we will have dozens, hundreds and then millions of cores in our computers. It's inevitable, because individual cores just can't get much faster. At some point, that's going to mean that we have to rethink our architecture entirely, as millions of cores can't all access a shared memory space efficiently. But millions of cores are still a long way off, and in the meantime we'll see machines with dozens of cores, struggling with shared memory. Alex's tip: The best way for an application to make use of that increasing parallel power is to use a concurrency model like actors, that deals with synchronisation issues for you. Then, the maintainer of the actors framework can find the most efficient way to coordinate access to shared memory to allow your actors to pass messages to each other efficiently. At the moment, NAct uses the .NET thread pool and a few locks to marshal messages. It works well on dual and quad core machines, but it won't scale to more cores. Every time we use a lock, our core performs an atomic memory operation (eg. CAS) on a cell of memory representing the lock, so it's sure that no other core can possibly have that lock. This is very fast when the lock isn't contended, but we need to notify all the other cores, in case they held the cell of memory in a cache. As the number of cores increases, the total cost of a lock increases linearly. A lot of work has been done on "lock-free" data structures, which avoid locks by using atomic memory operations directly. These give fairly dramatic performance improvements, particularly on systems with a few (2 to 4) cores. The .NET 4 concurrent collections in System.Collections.Concurrent are mostly lock-free. However, lock-free data structures still don't scale indefinitely, because any use of an atomic memory operation still involves every core in the system. A sync-free data structure Some concurrent data structures are possible to write in a completely synchronization-free way, without using any atomic memory operations. One useful example is a single producer, single consumer (SPSC) queue. It's easy to write a sync-free fixed size SPSC queue using a circular buffer*. Slightly trickier is a queue that grows as needed. You can use a linked list to represent the queue, but if you leave the nodes to be garbage collected once you're done with them, the GC will need to involve all the cores in collecting the finished nodes. Instead, I've implemented a proof of concept inspired by this intel article which reuses the nodes by putting them in a second queue to send back to the producer. * In all these cases, you need to use memory barriers correctly, but these are local to a core, so don't have the same scalability problems as atomic memory operations. Performance tests I tried benchmarking my SPSC queue against the .NET ConcurrentQueue, and against a standard Queue protected by locks. In some ways, this isn't a fair comparison, because both of these support multiple producers and multiple consumers, but I'll come to that later. I started on my dual-core laptop, running a simple test that had one thread producing 64 bit integers, and another consuming them, to measure the pure overhead of the queue. So, nothing very interesting here. Both concurrent collections perform better than the lock-based one as expected, but there's not a lot to choose between the ConcurrentQueue and my SPSC queue. I was a little disappointed, but then, the .NET Framework team spent a lot longer optimising it than I did. So I dug out a more powerful machine that Red Gate's DBA tools team had been using for testing. It is a 6 core Intel i7 machine with hyperthreading, adding up to 12 logical cores. Now the results get more interesting. As I increased the number of producer-consumer pairs to 6 (to saturate all 12 logical cores), the locking approach was slow, and got even slower, as you'd expect. What I didn't expect to be so clear was the drop-off in performance of the lock-free ConcurrentQueue. I could see the machine only using about 20% of available CPU cycles when it should have been saturated. My interpretation is that as all the cores used atomic memory operations to safely access the queue, they ended up spending most of the time notifying each other about cache lines that need invalidating. The sync-free approach scaled perfectly, despite still working via shared memory, which after all, should still be a bottleneck. I can't quite believe that the results are so clear, so if you can think of any other effects that might cause them, please comment! Obviously, this benchmark isn't realistic because we're only measuring the overhead of the queue. Any real workload, even on a machine with 12 cores, would dwarf the overhead, and there'd be no point worrying about this effect. But would that be true on a machine with 100 cores? Still to be solved. The trouble is, you can't build many concurrent algorithms using only an SPSC queue to communicate. In particular, I can't see a way to build something as general purpose as actors on top of just SPSC queues. Fundamentally, an actor needs to be able to receive messages from multiple other actors, which seems to need an MPSC queue. I've been thinking about ways to build a sync-free MPSC queue out of multiple SPSC queues and some kind of sign-up mechanism. Hopefully I'll have something to tell you about soon, but leave a comment if you have any ideas.

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  • Doing unit and integration tests with the Web API HttpClient

    - by cibrax
    One of the nice things about the new HttpClient in System.Net.Http is the support for mocking responses or handling requests in a http server hosted in-memory. While the first option is useful for scenarios in which we want to test our client code in isolation (unit tests for example), the second one enables more complete integration testing scenarios that could include some more components in the stack such as model binders or message handlers for example.   The HttpClient can receive a HttpMessageHandler as argument in one of its constructors. public class HttpClient : HttpMessageInvoker { public HttpClient(); public HttpClient(HttpMessageHandler handler); public HttpClient(HttpMessageHandler handler, bool disposeHandler); .csharpcode, .csharpcode pre { font-size: small; color: black; font-family: consolas, "Courier New", courier, monospace; background-color: #ffffff; /*white-space: pre;*/ } .csharpcode pre { margin: 0em; } .csharpcode .rem { color: #008000; } .csharpcode .kwrd { color: #0000ff; } .csharpcode .str { color: #006080; } .csharpcode .op { color: #0000c0; } .csharpcode .preproc { color: #cc6633; } .csharpcode .asp { background-color: #ffff00; } .csharpcode .html { color: #800000; } .csharpcode .attr { color: #ff0000; } .csharpcode .alt { background-color: #f4f4f4; width: 100%; margin: 0em; } .csharpcode .lnum { color: #606060; } For the first scenario, you can create a new HttpMessageHandler that fakes the response, which you can use in your unit test. The only requirement is that you somehow inject an HttpClient with this custom handler in the client code. public class FakeHttpMessageHandler : HttpMessageHandler { HttpResponseMessage response; public FakeHttpMessageHandler(HttpResponseMessage response) { this.response = response; } protected override Task<HttpResponseMessage> SendAsync(HttpRequestMessage request, System.Threading.CancellationToken cancellationToken) { var tcs = new TaskCompletionSource<HttpResponseMessage>(); tcs.SetResult(response); return tcs.Task; } } .csharpcode, .csharpcode pre { font-size: small; color: black; font-family: consolas, "Courier New", courier, monospace; background-color: #ffffff; /*white-space: pre;*/ } .csharpcode pre { margin: 0em; } .csharpcode .rem { color: #008000; } .csharpcode .kwrd { color: #0000ff; } .csharpcode .str { color: #006080; } .csharpcode .op { color: #0000c0; } .csharpcode .preproc { color: #cc6633; } .csharpcode .asp { background-color: #ffff00; } .csharpcode .html { color: #800000; } .csharpcode .attr { color: #ff0000; } .csharpcode .alt { background-color: #f4f4f4; width: 100%; margin: 0em; } .csharpcode .lnum { color: #606060; } In an unit test, you can do something like this. var fakeResponse = new HttpResponse(); var fakeHandler = new FakeHttpMessageHandler(fakeResponse); var httpClient = new HttpClient(fakeHandler); var customerService = new CustomerService(httpClient); // Do something // Asserts .csharpcode, .csharpcode pre { font-size: small; color: black; font-family: consolas, "Courier New", courier, monospace; background-color: #ffffff; /*white-space: pre;*/ } .csharpcode pre { margin: 0em; } .csharpcode .rem { color: #008000; } .csharpcode .kwrd { color: #0000ff; } .csharpcode .str { color: #006080; } .csharpcode .op { color: #0000c0; } .csharpcode .preproc { color: #cc6633; } .csharpcode .asp { background-color: #ffff00; } .csharpcode .html { color: #800000; } .csharpcode .attr { color: #ff0000; } .csharpcode .alt { background-color: #f4f4f4; width: 100%; margin: 0em; } .csharpcode .lnum { color: #606060; } CustomerService in this case is the class under test, and the one that receives an HttpClient initialized with our fake handler. For the second scenario in integration tests, there is a In-Memory host “System.Web.Http.HttpServer” that also derives from HttpMessageHandler and you can use with a HttpClient instance in your test. This has been discussed already in these two great posts from Pedro and Filip. 

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  • ASP.NET WebAPI Security 2: Identity Architecture

    - by Your DisplayName here!
    Pedro has beaten me to the punch with a detailed post (and diagram) about the WebAPI hosting architecture. So go read his post first, then come back so we can have a closer look at what that means for security. The first important takeaway is that WebAPI is hosting independent-  currently it ships with two host integration implementations – one for ASP.NET (aka web host) and WCF (aka self host). Pedro nicely shows the integration into the web host. Self hosting is not done yet so we will mainly focus on the web hosting case and I will point out security related differences when they exist. The interesting part for security (amongst other things of course) is the HttpControllerHandler (see Pedro’s diagram) – this is where the host specific representation of an HTTP request gets converted to the WebAPI abstraction (called HttpRequestMessage). The ConvertRequest method does the following: Create a new HttpRequestMessage. Copy URI, method and headers from the HttpContext. Copies HttpContext.User to the Properties<string, object> dictionary on the HttpRequestMessage. The key used for that can be found on HttpPropertyKeys.UserPrincipalKey (which resolves to “MS_UserPrincipal”). So the consequence is that WebAPI receives whatever IPrincipal has been set by the ASP.NET pipeline (in the web hosting case). Common questions are: Are there situations where is property does not get set? Not in ASP.NET – the DefaultAuthenticationModule in the HTTP pipeline makes sure HttpContext.User (and Thread.CurrentPrincipal – more on that later) are always set. Either to some authenticated user – or to an anonymous principal. This may be different in other hosting environments (again more on that later). Why so generic? Keep in mind that WebAPI is hosting independent and may run on a host that materializes identity completely different compared to ASP.NET (or .NET in general). This gives them a way to evolve the system in the future. How does WebAPI code retrieve the current client identity? HttpRequestMessage has an extension method called GetUserPrincipal() which returns the property as an IPrincipal. A quick look at self hosting shows that the moral equivalent of HttpControllerHandler.ConvertRequest() is HttpSelfHostServer.ProcessRequestContext(). Here the principal property gets only set when the host is configured for Windows authentication (inconsisteny). Do I like that? Well – yes and no. Here are my thoughts: I like that it is very straightforward to let WebAPI inherit the client identity context of the host. This might not always be what you want – think of an ASP.NET app that consists of UI and APIs – the UI might use Forms authentication, the APIs token based authentication. So it would be good if the two parts would live in a separate security world. It makes total sense to have this generic hand off point for identity between the host and WebAPI. It also makes total sense for WebAPI plumbing code (especially handlers) to use the WebAPI specific identity abstraction. But – c’mon we are running on .NET. And the way .NET represents identity is via IPrincipal/IIdentity. That’s what every .NET developer on this planet is used to. So I would like to see a User property of type IPrincipal on ApiController. I don’t like the fact that Thread.CurrentPrincipal is not populated. T.CP is a well established pattern as a one stop shop to retrieve client identity on .NET.  That makes a lot of sense – even if the name is misleading at best. There might be existing library code you want to call from WebAPI that makes use of T.CP (e.g. PrincipalPermission, or a simple .Name or .IsInRole()). Having the client identity as an ambient property is useful for code that does not have access to the current HTTP request (for calling GetUserPrincipal()). I don’t like the fact that that the client identity conversion from host to WebAPI is inconsistent. This makes writing security plumbing code harder. I think the logic should always be: If the host has a client identity representation, copy it. If not, set an anonymous principal on the request message. Btw – please don’t annoy me with the “but T.CP is static, and static is bad for testing” chant. T.CP is a getter/setter and, in fact I find it beneficial to be able to set different security contexts in unit tests before calling in some logic. And, in case you have wondered – T.CP is indeed thread static (and the name comes from a time where a logical operation was bound to a thread – which is not true anymore). But all thread creation APIs in .NET actually copy T.CP to the new thread they create. This is the case since .NET 2.0 and is certainly an improvement compared to how Win32 does things. So to sum it up: The host plumbing copies the host client identity to WebAPI (this is not perfect yet, but will surely be improved). or in other words: The current WebAPI bits don’t ship with any authentication plumbing, but solely use whatever authentication (and thus client identity) is set up by the host. WebAPI developers can retrieve the client identity from the HttpRequestMessage. Hopefully my proposed changes around T.CP and the User property on ApiController will be added. In the next post, I will detail how to add WebAPI specific authentication support, e.g. for Basic Authentication and tokens. This includes integrating the notion of claims based identity. After that we will look at the built-in authorization bits and how to improve them as well. Stay tuned.

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  • Oracle ATG Web Commerce 10 Implementation Developer Boot Camp - Reading (UK) - October 1-12, 2012

    - by Richard Lefebvre
    REGISTER NOW: Oracle ATG Web Commerce 10 Implementation Developer Boot Camp Reading, UK, October 1-12, 2012! OPN invites you to join us for a 10-day implementation bootcamp on Oracle ATG Web Commerce in Reading, UK from October 1-12, 2012.This 10-day boot camp is designed to provide partners with hands-on experience and technical training to successfully build and deploy Oracle ATG Web Commerce 10 Applications. This particular boot camp is focused on helping partners develop the essential skills needed to implement every aspect of an ATG Commerce Application from scratch, (not CRS-based), with a specific goal of enabling experienced Java/J2EE developers with a path towards becoming functional, effective, and contributing members of an ATG implementation team. Built for both new and experienced ATG developers alike, the collaborative nature of this program and its exercises, have proven to be highly effective and extremely valuable in learning the best practices for implementing ATG solutions. Though not required, this bootcamp provides a structured path to earning a Certified Oracle ATG Web Commerce 10 Specialization! What Is Covered: This boot camp is for Application Developers and Software Architects wanting to gain valuable insight into ATG application development best practices, as well as relevant and applicable implementation experience on projects modeled after four of the most common types of applications built on the ATG platform. The following learning objectives are all critical, and are of equal priority in enabling this role to succeed. This learning boot camp will help with: Building a basic functional transaction-ready ATG Web Commerce 10 Application. Utilizing ATG’s platform features such as scenarios, slots, targeters, user profiles and segments, to create a personalized user experience. Building Nucleus components to support and/or extend application functionality. Understanding the intricacies of ATG order checkout and fulfillment. Specifying, designing and implementing new commerce features in ATG 10. Building a functional commerce application modeled after four of the most common types of applications built on the ATG platform, within an agile-based project team environment and under simulated real-world project conditions. Duration: The Oracle ATG Web Commerce 10 Implementation Developer Boot Camp is an instructor-led workshop spanning 10 days. Audience: Application Developers Software Architects Prerequisite Training and Environment Requirements: Programming and Markup Experience with Java J2EE, JavaScript, XML, HTML and CSS Completion of Oracle ATG Web Commerce 10 Implementation Specialist Development Guided Learning Path modules Participants will be required to bring their own laptop that meets the minimum specifications:   64-bit PC and OS (e.g. Windows 7 64-bit) 4GB RAM or more 40GB Hard Disk Space Laptops will require access to the Internet through Remote Desktop via Windows. Agenda Topics: Week 1 – Day 1 through 5 Build a Basic Commerce Application In week one of the boot camp training, we will apply knowledge learned from the ATG Web Commerce 10 Implementation Developer Guided Learning Path modules, towards building a basic transaction-ready commerce application. There will be little to no lectures delivered in this boot camp, as developers will be fully engaged in ATG Application Development activities and best practices. Developers will work independently on the following lab assignments from day's 1 through 5: Lab Assignments  1 Environment Setup 2 Build a dynamic Home Page 3 Site Authentication 4 Build Customer Registration 5 Display Top Level Categories 6 Display Product Sub-Categories 7 Display Product List Page 8 Display Product Detail Page 9 ATG Inventory 10 Build “Add to Cart” Functionality 11 Build Shopping Cart 12 Build Checkout Page  13 Build Checkout Review Page 14 Create an Order and Build Order Confirmation Page 15 Implement Slots and Targeters for Personalization 16 Implement Pricing and Promotions 17 Order Fulfillment Back to top Week 2 – Day 6 through 10 Team-based Case Project In the second week of the boot camp training, participants will be asked to join a project team that will select a case project for the team to implement. Teams will be able to choose from four of the most common application types developed and deployed on the ATG platform. They are as follows: Hard goods with physical fulfillment, Soft goods with electronic fulfillment, a Service or subscription case example, a Course/Event registration case example. Team projects will have approximately 160 hours of use cases/stories for each team to build (40 hours per developer). Each day's Use Cases/Stories will build upon the prior day's work, and therefore must be fully completed at the end of each day. Please note that this boot camp intends to simulate real-world project conditions, and as such will likely require the need for project teams to possibly work beyond normal business hours. To promote further collaboration and group learning, each team will be asked to present their work and share the methodologies and solutions that they've applied to their cases at the end of each day. Location: Oracle Reading CVC TPC510 Room: Wraysbury Reading, UK 9:00 AM – 5:00 PM  Registration Fee (10 Days): US $3,375 Please click on the following link to REGISTER or  visit the Oracle ATG Web Commerce 10 Implementation Developer Boot Camp page for more information. Questions: Patrick Ty Partner Enablement, Oracle Commerce Phone: 310.343.7687 Mobile: 310.633.1013 Email: [email protected]

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