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• The Math of a Jump in a 2D game.

  - by ONi

  I have been all around with this question and I can't find the correct answer! So, behold, the description of my question: I'm working in J2ME, I have my gameloop that do the following: public void run() { Graphics g = this.getGraphics(); while (running) { long diff = System.currentTimeMillis() - lastLoop; lastLoop = System.currentTimeMillis(); input(); this.level.doLogic(); render(g, diff); try { Thread.sleep(10); } catch (InterruptedException e) { stop(e); } } } so it's just a basic gameloop, the doLogic() function calls for all the logic functions of the characters in the scene and render(g, diff) calls the animateChar function of every character on scene, following this, the animChar function in the Character class sets up everything in the screen as this: protected void animChar(long diff) { this.checkGravity(); this.move((int) ((diff * this.dx) / 1000), (int) ((diff * this.dy) / 1000)); if (this.acumFrame > this.framerate) { this.nextFrame(); this.acumFrame = 0; } else { this.acumFrame += diff; } } This ensures me that everything must to move according to the time that the machine takes to go from cycle to cycle (remember it's a phone, not a gaming rig). I'm sure it's not the most efficient way to achieve this behavior so I'm totally open for criticism of my programming skills in the comments, but here my problem: When I make I character jump, what I do is that I put his dy to a negative value, say -200 and I set the boolean jumping to true, that makes the character go up, and then I have this function called checkGravity() that ensure that everything that goes up has to go down, checkGravity also checks for the character being over platforms so I will strip it down a little for the sake of your time: public void checkGravity() { if (this.jumping) { this.jumpSpeed += 10; if (this.jumpSpeed > 0) { this.jumping = false; this.falling = true; } this.dy = this.jumpSpeed; } if (this.falling) { this.jumpSpeed += 10; if (this.jumpSpeed > 200) this.jumpSpeed = 200; this.dy = this.jumpSpeed; if (this.collidesWithPlatform()) { this.falling = false; this.standing = true; this.jumping = false; this.jumpSpeed = 0; this.dy = this.jumpSpeed; } } } So, the problem is, that this function updates the dy regardless of the diff, making the characters fly like Superman in slow machines, and I have no idea how to implement the diff factor so that when a character is jumping, his speed decrement in a proportional way to the game speed. Can anyone help me fix this issue? or give me pointers on how to make a 2D Jump in J2ME the right way. Thank you very much for your time.

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• Deterministic key serialization

  - by Mike Boers

  I'm writing a mapping class which uses SQLite as the storage backend. I am currently allowing only basestring keys but it would be nice if I could use a couple more types hopefully up to anything that is hashable (ie. same requirements as the builtin dict). To that end I would like to derive a deterministic serialization scheme. Ideally, I would like to know if any implementation/protocol combination of pickle is deterministic for hashable objects (e.g. can only use cPickle with protocol 0). I noticed that pickle and cPickle do not match: >>> import pickle >>> import cPickle >>> def dumps(x): ... print repr(pickle.dumps(x)) ... print repr(cPickle.dumps(x)) ... >>> dumps(1) 'I1\n.' 'I1\n.' >>> dumps('hello') "S'hello'\np0\n." "S'hello'\np1\n." >>> dumps((1, 2, 'hello')) "(I1\nI2\nS'hello'\np0\ntp1\n." "(I1\nI2\nS'hello'\np1\ntp2\n." Another option is to use repr to dump and ast.literal_eval to load. This would only be valid for builtin hashable types. I have written a function to determine if a given key would survive this process (it is rather conservative on the types it allows): def is_reprable_key(key): return type(key) in (int, str, unicode) or (type(key) == tuple and all( is_reprable_key(x) for x in key)) The question for this method is if repr itself is deterministic for the types that I have allowed here. I believe this would not survive the 2/3 version barrier due to the change in str/unicode literals. This also would not work for integers where 2**32 - 1 < x < 2**64 jumping between 32 and 64 bit platforms. Are there any other conditions (ie. do strings serialize differently under different conditions)? (If this all fails miserably then I can store the hash of the key along with the pickle of both the key and value, then iterate across rows that have a matching hash looking for one that unpickles to the expected key, but that really does complicate a few other things and I would rather not do it.) Any insights?

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• Error building C program

  - by John

  Here are my 2 source files: main.c: #include <stdio.h> #include "part2.c" extern int var1; extern int array1[]; int main() { var1 = 4; array1[0] = 2; array1[1] = 4; array1[2] = 5; array1[3] = 7; display(); printf("---------------"); printf("Var1: %d", var1); printf("array elements:"); int x; for(x = 0;x < 4;++x) printf("%d: %d", x, array1[x]); return 0; } part2.c #include <stdio.h> int var1; int array1[4]; void display(void); void display(void) { printf("Var1: %d", var1); printf("array elements:"); int x; for(x = 0;x < 4;++x) printf("%d: %d", x, array1[x]); } When i try to compile the program this is what i get: Ld /Users/John/Library/Developer/Xcode/DerivedData/Test-blxrdmnozbbrbwhcekmouessaprf/Build/Products/Debug/Test normal x86_64 cd /Users/John/Xcode/Test setenv MACOSX_DEPLOYMENT_TARGET 10.7 /Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/Toolchains/XcodeDefault.xctoolchain/usr/bin/clang -arch x86_64 -isysroot /Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/Platforms/MacOSX.platform/Developer/SDKs/MacOSX10.7.sdk -L/Users/John/Library/Developer/Xcode/DerivedData/Test-blxrdmnozbbrbwhcekmouessaprf/Build/Products/Debug -F/Users/John/Library/Developer/Xcode/DerivedData/Test-blxrdmnozbbrbwhcekmouessaprf/Build/Products/Debug -filelist /Users/John/Library/Developer/Xcode/DerivedData/Test-blxrdmnozbbrbwhcekmouessaprf/Build/Intermediates/Test.build/Debug/Test.build/Objects-normal/x86_64/Test.LinkFileList -mmacosx-version-min=10.7 -o /Users/John/Library/Developer/Xcode/DerivedData/Test-blxrdmnozbbrbwhcekmouessaprf/Build/Products/Debug/Test ld: duplicate symbol _display in /Users/John/Library/Developer/Xcode/DerivedData/Test-blxrdmnozbbrbwhcekmouessaprf/Build/Intermediates/Test.build/Debug/Test.build/Objects-normal/x86_64/part2.o and /Users/John/Library/Developer/Xcode/DerivedData/Test-blxrdmnozbbrbwhcekmouessaprf/Build/Intermediates/Test.build/Debug/Test.build/Objects-normal/x86_64/main.o for architecture x86_64 clang: error: linker command failed with exit code 1 (use -v to see invocation) I am using Xcode and both files are inside of a C project called Test What is causing the error and how do i fix it?

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• Reading and writing C++ vector to a file

  - by JB

  For some graphics work I need to read in a large amount of data as quickly as possible and would ideally like to directly read and write the data structures to disk. Basically I have a load of 3d models in various file formats which take too long to load so I want to write them out in their "prepared" format as a cache that will load much faster on subsequent runs of the program. Is it safe to do it like this? My worries are around directly reading into the data of the vector? I've removed error checking, hard coded 4 as the size of the int and so on so that i can give a short working example, I know it's bad code, my question really is if it is safe in c++ to read a whole array of structures directly into a vector like this? I believe it to be so, but c++ has so many traps and undefined behavour when you start going low level and dealing directly with raw memory like this. I realise that number formats and sizes may change across platforms and compilers but this will only even be read and written by the same compiler program to cache data that may be needed on a later run of the same program. #include <fstream> #include <vector> using namespace std; struct Vertex { float x, y, z; }; typedef vector<Vertex> VertexList; int main() { // Create a list for testing VertexList list; Vertex v1 = {1.0f, 2.0f, 3.0f}; list.push_back(v1); Vertex v2 = {2.0f, 100.0f, 3.0f}; list.push_back(v2); Vertex v3 = {3.0f, 200.0f, 3.0f}; list.push_back(v3); Vertex v4 = {4.0f, 300.0f, 3.0f}; list.push_back(v4); // Write out a list to a disk file ofstream os ("data.dat", ios::binary); int size1 = list.size(); os.write((const char*)&size1, 4); os.write((const char*)&list[0], size1 * sizeof(Vertex)); os.close(); // Read it back in VertexList list2; ifstream is("data.dat", ios::binary); int size2; is.read((char*)&size2, 4); list2.resize(size2); // Is it safe to read a whole array of structures directly into the vector? is.read((char*)&list2[0], size2 * sizeof(Vertex)); }

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• Windows Question: RunOnce/Second Boot Issues [closed]

  - by Greg

  Moved to Super User: Windows Question: RunOnce/Second Boot Issues I am attempting to create a Windows XP SP3 image that will run my application on Second Boot. Here is the intended workflow. 1) Run Image Prep Utility (I wrote) on windows to add my runonce entries and clean a few things up. 2) Reboot to ghost, make image file. 3) Package into my ISO and distribute. 4) System will be imaged by user. 5) On first boot, I have about 5 things that run, one of which includes a driver updater (I wrote) for my own specific devices. 6) One of the entries inside of HKCU/../runonce is a reg file, which adds another key to HKLM/../runonce. This is how second boot is acquired. 7) As a result of the driver updater, user is prompted to reboot. 8) My application is then launched from HKLM/../runonce on second boot. This workflow works perfectly, except for a select few legacy systems that contain devices that cause the add hardware wizard to pop up. When the add hardware wizard pops up is when I begin to see problems. It's important to note, that if I manually inspect the registry after the add hardware wizard pops up, it appears as I would expect, with all the first boot scripts having run, and it's sitting in a state I would correctly expect it to be in for a second boot scenario. The problem comes when I click next on the add hardware wizard, it seems to re-run the single entry I've added, and re-executes the runonce scripts. (only one script now as it's already executed and cleared out the initial entries). This causes my application to open as if it were a second boot, only when next is clicked on the add hardware wizard. If I click cancel, and reboot, then it also works as expected. I don't care as much about other solutions, because I could design a system that doesn't fully rely on Microsoft's registry. I simply can't find any information as to WHY this is happening. I believe this is some type of Microsoft issue that's presenting itself as a result of an overstretched image that's expected to support too many legacy platforms, but any help that can be provided would be appreciated. Thanks,

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• Audio/video streaming on Windows platform

  - by bushtucker

  I'm building an interactive language learning application to be used in a classroom environment. The idea is that a teacher should be able to talk to the students (=audio stream to all students), let students talk to each other (= audio P2P) in groups of two or more, let students watch a video coming from a the DVD player or coming from a media server. It should be possible to save the audio/video streams. The teacher should also be able to monitor, take-over or block the desktop of the students. The platform is Windows and it's a desktop application, no web application. The audio delay should be as minimal as poosible. Optionally a student sitting at home should be supported, but it's not a high priority. I am now finished with the classroom control part of the application (login, monitor, block, ...) and want to start the audio and video part. I've been evaluating several options like DirectX, GStreamer and SIP but now I have to make a decision. DirectX seems an obvious choice for the Windows platform, but it only lets me capture and playback audio and video. The encoding/decoding/network part I should do myself. GStreamer contains all kinds of options to capture/encode/stream/save audio and video streams. I've experimented a bit with it (ossbuild) and it does seem to involve a lot of trial and error to make something work: - microphone capture (via directsoundsrc) produces cracking noises on some computers - rtpL16 payloader didn't work well - streaming raw audio over the network only working at a sampling rate of 8000, no higher - there are a lot of errors when receiving mpeg4 video (bad I-frame), on some computers worse than others It is my impression that gstreamer is primary targetted at linux platforms. Development and support for the Windows platform seems to be a little behind. Nevertheless it's a powerful framework that could save me months and years of work. SIP seems to be able to do everything I want, but it is targeted towards telephony and IM. I don't know how flexible SIP is. It seems to me that the SIP layer would just be overhead as I already have a central (teacher) application that can control and setup all the streams. The interesting parts of frameworks like opalvoip and freeswitch are the actual audio/video capture, the encoding and transmission. Does anyone know how these interesting parts relate a framework like gstreamer? Are they easy to integrate into a custom application? Are they flexible enough? Does anyone have experience with all or one of these technologies? Maybe there are even other options I can look at? Many thanks for your advice

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• What would you suggest as a high school first language?

  - by ldigas

  Edit by OA: After reading some answers I'll just update the question a little. At first I put it a little bluntly, but some of those gave me some good arguments which have to be taken into consideration while making a stand on this one. (these are mostly picked up from comments and answers below). A few things to take into account: to many pupils this is a first programming language - at this stage most of them have trouble grasping a difference between data types, variable passing, ... and whatnot, less alone pointers and similar 'low level stuff' :) they will all have to pass this to get into next grade (well, big majority of them anyway) not all of them have computers at home, not all of them are willing to learn this, less alone interested in - so the concepts have to be taught on a finite time scale in school hours (as well as practice on computers) free literature is a bonus - the teacher will make some scripts and handaways, but still ... I wouldn't like to bear the parents with the burden of buying expensive literature (also, english is not a native language here ... and although they are all learning it, their ability to read it fluently is somewhat questionable) somebody gave an argument - "a language which does not get in the way of ideas" - good one accessibility on different platforms in not expecially important at this point - although most of the suggested ones are available on win as well as linux - not many macs in this part of europe (their prices are sky high for anything but specialised usage) I will check what are the licencing issues on ms express editions about using it massively in high schools for purposes like this - if someone has any info about this, please, do not be shy with it :) A friend of mine, informatics teacher - in EU it comes as something as junior cs teacher, in a local high school asked me what I thought about what should be the first language pupils should be taught? It is a technical school (a little more oriented towards mathematics than the gymnasium, but not computer oriented totally). So I'm asking you - what do you think should be the first language pupils are exposed to in highschool? They have been teaching Pascal so far, but she's not sure that's a good course. She thought about switching to C (which I resented; considering not all pupils have interests in programming, to start with, and should be taught something higher level since they are just gripping the idea of a loop and such ... for a start), I suggested python or ruby (preferably py since it handles all paradigms). What is your opinion on this one? I looked, but didn't find a similar question on SO, so if there is one, please just point me towards it. Edit: The assumption is that none of the pupils have been exposed to any programming in junior school. See also: What is the best way to teach young kids some basic programming concepts? Best ways to teach a beginner to program How and when do you teach a kid to code What is the easiest language to start with? High School Programming

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• Best of both worlds: browser and desktop game?

  - by Ricket

  When considering a platform for a game, I've decided on multi-platform (Win/Lin/Mac) but can't make up my mind as far as browser vs. desktop. As I'm not all too far in development, and now having second thoughts, I'd like your opinion! Browser-based games using Java applets: market penetration is reasonably high (for version 6, it's somewhere around 60% I believe?) using JOGL, 3D performance/quality is decent; certainly good enough to render the crappy 3D graphics that I make there's the (small?) possibility of porting something to Android great for an audience of gamers who switch computers often; can sit down at any computer, load a webpage and play it also great for casual gamers or less knowledgeable gamers who are quite happy with playing games in a browser but don't want to install more things to their computer written in a high-level language which I am more familiar with than C++ - but at the same time, I would like to improve my skills with C++ as it is probably where I am headed in the game industry once I get out of school... easier update process: reload the page. Desktop games using good ol' C++ and OpenGL 100% market penetration, assuming complete cross-platform; however, that number reduces when you consider how many people will go through downloading and installing an executable compared to just browsing to a webpage and hitting "yes" to a security warning. more trouble to maintain the cross-platform; but again, for learning purposes I would embrace the challenge and the knowledge I would gain better performance all around true full screen, whereas browser games often struggle with smooth full screen graphics (especially on Linux, in my experience) can take advantage of distribution platforms such as Steam more likely to be considered a "real" game, whereas browser and Java games are often dismissed as not being real games and therefore not played by "hardcore gamers" installer can be large; don't have to worry so much about download times Is there a way to have the best of both worlds? I love Java applets, but I also really like the reasons to write a desktop game. I don't want to constantly port everything between a Java applet project and a C++ project; that would be twice the work! Unity chose to write their own web player plugin. I don't like this, because I am one of the people that will not install their web player for anything, and I don't see myself being able to convince my audience to install a browser plugin. What are my options? Are there other examples out there besides Unity, of games that have browser and desktop versions? Did I leave out anything in the pro/con lists above?

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• Do You Really Know Your Programming Languages?

  - by Kristopher Johnson

  I am often amazed at how little some of my colleagues know or care about their craft. Something that constantly frustrates me is that people don't want to learn any more than they need to about the programming languages they use every day. Many programmers seem content to learn some pidgin sub-dialect, and stick with that. If they see a keyword or construct that they aren't familiar with, they'll complain that the code is "tricky." What would you think of a civil engineer who shied away from calculus because it had "all those tricky math symbols?" I'm not suggesting that we all need to become "language lawyers." But if you make your living as a programmer, and claim to be a competent user of language X, then I think at a minimum you should know the following: Do you know the keywords of the language and what they do? What are the valid syntactic forms? How are memory, files, and other operating system resources managed? Where is the official language specification and library reference for the language? The last one is the one that really gets me. Many programmers seem to have no idea that there is a "specification" or "standard" for any particular language. I still talk to people who think that Microsoft invented C++, and that if a program doesn't compile under VC6, it's not a valid C++ program. Programmers these days have it easy when it comes to obtaining specs. Newer languages like C#, Java, Python, Ruby, etc. all have their documentation available for free from the vendors' web sites. Older languages and platforms often have standards controlled by standards bodies that demand payment for specs, but even that shouldn't be a deterrent: the C++ standard is available from ISO for $30 (and why am I the only person I know who has a copy?). Programming is hard enough even when you do know the language. If you don't, I don't see how you have a chance. What do the rest of you think? Am I right, or should we all be content with the typical level of programming language expertise? Update: Several great comments here. Thanks. A couple of people hit on something that I didn't think about: What really irks me is not the lack of knowledge, but the lack of curiosity and willingness to learn. It seems some people don't have any time to hone their craft, but they have plenty of time to write lots of bad code. And I don't expect people to be able to recite a list of keywords or EBNF expressions, but I do expect that when they see some code, they should have some inkling of what it does. Few people have complete knowledge of every dark corner of their language or platform, but everyone should at least know enough that when they see something unfamiliar, they will know how to get whatever additional information they need to understand it.

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• Running daemon through rsh

  - by Max

  I want to run program as daemon in remote machine in Unix. I have rsh connection and I want the program to be running after disconnection. Suppose I have two programs: util.cpp and forker.cpp. util.cpp is some utility, for our purpose let it be just infinite root. util.cpp int main() { while (true) {}; return 0; } forker.cpp takes some program and run it in separe process through fork() and execve(): forker.cpp #include <stdio.h> #include <errno.h> #include <stdlib.h> #include <unistd.h> int main(int argc, char** argv) { if (argc != 2) { printf("./a.out <program_to_fork>\n"); exit(1); } pid_t pid; if ((pid = fork()) < 0) { perror("fork error."); exit(1); } else if (!pid) { // Child. if (execve(argv[1], &(argv[1]), NULL) == -1) { perror("execve error."); exit(1); } } else { // Parent: do nothing. } return 0; } If I run: ./forker util forker is finished very quickly, and bash 'is not paused', and util is running as daemon. But if I run: scp forker remote_server://some_path/ scp program remote_server://some_path/ rsh remote_server 'cd /some_path; ./forker program' then it is all the same (i.e. at the remote_sever forker is finishing quickly, util is running) but my bash in local machine is paused. It is waiting for util stopping (I checked it. If util.cpp is returning than it is ok.), but I don't understand why?! There are two questions: 1) Why is it paused when I run it through rsh? I am sure that I chose some stupid way to run daemon. So 2) How to run some program as daemon in C/C++ in unix-like platforms. Tnx!

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• WinForm-style Invoke() in unmanaged C++

  - by Matt Green

  I've been playing with a DataBus-type design for a hobby project, and I ran into an issue. Back-end components need to notify the UI that something has happened. My implementation of the bus delivers the messages synchronously with respect to the sender. In other words, when you call Send(), the method blocks until all the handlers have called. (This allows callers to use stack memory management for event objects.) However, consider the case where an event handler updates the GUI in response to an event. If the handler is called, and the message sender lives on another thread, then the handler cannot update the GUI due to Win32's GUI elements having thread affinity. More dynamic platforms such as .NET allow you to handle this by calling a special Invoke() method to move the method call (and the arguments) to the UI thread. I'm guessing they use the .NET parking window or the like for these sorts of things. A morbid curiosity was born: can we do this in C++, even if we limit the scope of the problem? Can we make it nicer than existing solutions? I know Qt does something similar with the moveToThread() function. By nicer, I'll mention that I'm specifically trying to avoid code of the following form: if(! this->IsUIThread()) { Invoke(MainWindowPresenter::OnTracksAdded, e); return; } being at the top of every UI method. This dance was common in WinForms when dealing with this issue. I think this sort of concern should be isolated from the domain-specific code and a wrapper object made to deal with it. My implementation consists of: DeferredFunction - functor that stores the target method in a FastDelegate, and deep copies the single event argument. This is the object that is sent across thread boundaries. UIEventHandler - responsible for dispatching a single event from the bus. When the Execute() method is called, it checks the thread ID. If it does not match the UI thread ID (set at construction time), a DeferredFunction is allocated on the heap with the instance, method, and event argument. A pointer to it is sent to the UI thread via PostThreadMessage(). Finally, a hook function for the thread's message pump is used to call the DeferredFunction and de-allocate it. Alternatively, I can use a message loop filter, since my UI framework (WTL) supports them. Ultimately, is this a good idea? The whole message hooking thing makes me leery. The intent is certainly noble, but are there are any pitfalls I should know about? Or is there an easier way to do this?

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• How can a C/C++ program put itself into background?

  - by Larry Gritz

  What's the best way for a running C or C++ program that's been launched from the command line to put itself into the background, equivalent to if the user had launched from the unix shell with '&' at the end of the command? (But the user didn't.) It's a GUI app and doesn't need any shell I/O, so there's no reason to tie up the shell after launch. But I want a shell command launch to be auto-backgrounded without the '&' (or on Windows). Ideally, I want a solution that would work on any of Linux, OS X, and Windows. (Or separate solutions that I can select with #ifdef.) It's ok to assume that this should be done right at the beginning of execution, as opposed to somewhere in the middle. One solution is to have the main program be a script that launches the real binary, carefully putting it into the background. But it seems unsatisfying to need these coupled shell/binary pairs. Another solution is to immediately launch another executed version (with 'system' or CreateProcess), with the same command line arguments, but putting the child in the background and then having the parent exit. But this seems clunky compared to the process putting itself into background. Edited after a few answers: Yes, a fork() (or system(), or CreateProcess on Windows) is one way to sort of do this, that I hinted at in my original question. But all of these solutions make a SECOND process that is backgrounded, and then terminate the original process. I was wondering if there was a way to put the EXISTING process into the background. One difference is that if the app was launched from a script that recorded its process id (perhaps for later killing or other purpose), the newly forked or created process will have a different id and so will not be controllable by any launching script, if you see what I'm getting at. Edit #2: fork() isn't a good solution for OS X, where the man page for 'fork' says that it's unsafe if certain frameworks or libraries are being used. I tried it, and my app complains loudly at runtime: "The process has forked and you cannot use this CoreFoundation functionality safely. You MUST exec()." I was intrigued by daemon(), but when I tried it on OS X, it gave the same error message, so I assume that it's just a fancy wrapper for fork() and has the same restrictions. Excuse the OS X centrism, it just happens to be the system in front of me at the moment. But I am indeed looking for a solution to all three platforms.

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• organizing external libraries and include files

  - by stijn

  Over the years my projects use more and more external libraries, and the way I did it starts feeling more and more awkward (although, that has to be said, it does work flawlessly). I use VS on Windows, CMake on others, and CodeComposer for targetting DSPs on Windows. Except for the DSPs, both 32bit and 64bit platforms are used. Here's a sample of what I am doing now; note that as shown, the different external libraries themselves are not always organized in the same way. Some have different lib/include/src folders, others have a single src folder. Some came ready-to-use with static and/or shared libraries, others were built /path/to/projects /projectA /projectB /path/to/apis /apiA /src /include /lib /apiB /include /i386/lib /amd64/lib /path/to/otherapis /apiC /src /path/to/sharedlibs /apiA_x86.lib -->some libs were built in all possible configurations /apiA_x86d.lib /apiA_x64.lib /apiA_x64d.lib /apiA_static_x86.lib /apiB.lib -->other libs have just one import library /path/to/dlls -->most of this directory also gets distributed to clients /apiA_x86.dll and it's in the PATH /apiB.dll Each time I add an external libary, I roughly use this process: build it, if needed, for different configurations (release/debug/platform) copy it's static and/or import libraries to 'sharedlibs' copy it's shared libraries to 'dlls' add an environment variable, eg 'API_A_DIR' that points to the root for ApiA, like '/path/to/apis/apiA' create a VS property sheet and a CMake file to state include path and eventually the library name, like include = '$(API_A_DIR)/Include' and lib = apiA.lib add the propertysheet/cmake file to the project needing the library It's especially step 4 and 5 that are bothering me. I am pretty sure I am not the only one facing this problem, and would like see how others deal with this. I was thinking to get rid of the environment variables per library, and use just one 'API_INCLUDE_DIR' and populating it with the include files in an organized way: /path/to/api/include /apiA /apiB /apiC This way I do not need the include path in the propertysheets nor the environment variables. For libs that are only used on windows I even don't need a propertysheet at all as I can use #pragmas to instruct the linker what library to link to. Also in the code it will be more clear what gets included, and no need for wrappers to include files having the same name but are from different libraries: #include <apiA/header.h> #include <apiB/header.h> #include <apiC_version1/header.h> The withdrawal is off course that I have to copy include files, and possibly** introduce duplicates on the filesystem, but that looks like a minor price to pay, doesn't it? ** actually once libraries are built, the only thing I need from them is the include files and thie libs. Since each of those would have a dedicated directory, the original source tree is not needed anymore so can be deleted..

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• What libraries provide cross-platform 3D and P2P support?

  - by uckelman

  I'm trying to find a constellation of libraries which, taken together, meet the following requirements: Smooth scaling, rotation, panning (in two dimensions). I'll have a large bitmap (or SVG, in some cases), maybe up to 10000x10000 pixels, which serves as map, with some middling number of small bitmaps (or, again, possibly SVG) that can be dragged around over it. I need to be able to zoom, rotate, and pan this scene; however, the view will always be normal to (i.e., looking head-on at) the large bitmap, so I'm not really using the depth dimension. Peer-to-peer. I'd like for multiple users to be able to connect in order to share one of the scenes mentioned above, preferably peer-to-peer, without much configuration by the user. I'm intending to have a server running for cases where users are unable to connect P2P; I'd like to have the failover happen automatically, or possibly have some way of promoting clients who are capable to be servers themselves. Synchronization. Once a user has started dragging one of the small bitmaps (a piece), no other user should be able to drag that piece until the drag stops. I haven't thought of exactly how to do this---there might be a simple solution, or this kind of synchronization might be something that a library provides. Cross(ish)-platform. I need to be able to run on Linux, Windows, and Mac OS. It would be nice to also be able to run on tablets. Having mostly the same code for all platforms is a plus, but not absolutely necessary. (L)GPL compatible. I'm planning to release under the LGPL or GPL, preferably the latter, so I need libraries which have compatible licenses. I'm not set on any particular language, I'd like to use the library or libraries which make the work easiest, though my preference is to work in at most two languages for the project. (The Model could potentially be in one language and the View in another, so they could talk to each other via some protocol I define, if that would get me a better selection of libraries to use.) Can anyone offer suggestions for what to use?

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• Suggest an alternative way to organize/build a database solution.

  - by Hamish Grubijan

  We are using Visual Studio 2010, but this was first conceived with VS2003. I will forward the best suggestions to my team. The current setup almost makes me vomit. It is a C# solution with most projects containing .sql files. Because we support Microsoft, Oracle, and Sybase, and so home-brewed a pre-processor, much like C preprocessor, except that substitutions are performed by a home-brewed C# program without using yacc and tools like that. #ifdefs are used for conditional macro definitions, and yeah - macros are the way this is done. A macro can expand to another macro or two, but this should eventually terminate. Only macros have #ifdef in them - the rest of the SQL-like code just uses these macros. Now, the various configurations: Debug, MNDebug, MNRelease, Release, SQL_APPLY_ALL, SQL_APPLY_MSFT, SQL_APPLY_ORACLE, SQL_APPLY_SYBASE, SQL_BUILD_OUTPUT_ALL, SQL_COMPILE, as well as 2 more. Also: Any CPU, Mixed Platforms, Win32. What drives me nuts is having to configure it correctly as well as choosing the right one out of 12 x 3 = 36 configurations as well as having to substitute database name depending on the type of database: config, main, or gateway. I am thinking that configuration should be reduced to just Debug, Release, and SQL_APPLY. Also, using 0, 1, and 2 seems so 80s ... Finally, I think my intention to build or not to build 3 types of databases for 3 types of vendors should be configured with just a tic tac toe board like: XOX OOX XXX In this case it would mean build MSFT+CONFIG, all SYBASE, and all GATEWAY. Still, the overall thing which uses a text file and a pre-processor and many configurations seems incredibly clunky. It is year 2010 now and someone out there is bound to have a very clean and/or creative tool/solution. The only pro would be that the existing collection of macros has been well tested. Have you ever had to write SQL that would work for several vendors? How did you do it? SqlVars.txt (Every one of 30 users makes a copy of a template and modifies this to suit their needs): // This is the default parameters file and should not be changed. // You can overwrite any of these parameters by copying the appropriate // section to override into SqlVars.txt and providing your own information. //Build types are 0-Config, 1-Main, 2-Gateway BUILD_TYPE=1 REMOVE_COMMENTS=1 // Login information used when applying to a Microsoft SQL server database SQL_APPLY_MSFT_version=SQL2005 SQL_APPLY_MSFT_database=msftdb SQL_APPLY_MSFT_server=ABC SQL_APPLY_MSFT_user=msftusr SQL_APPLY_MSFT_password=msftpwd // Login information used when applying to an Oracle database SQL_APPLY_ORACLE_version=ORACLE10g SQL_APPLY_ORACLE_server=oradb SQL_APPLY_ORACLE_user=orausr SQL_APPLY_ORACLE_password=orapwd // Login information used when applying to a Sybase database SQL_APPLY_SYBASE_version=SYBASE125 SQL_APPLY_SYBASE_database=sybdb SQL_APPLY_SYBASE_server=sybdb SQL_APPLY_SYBASE_user=sybusr SQL_APPLY_SYBASE_password=sybpwd ... (THIS GOES ON)

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• Preg_replace regex, newlines, connection resets

  - by bob_the_destroyer

  I have mixed html, custom code, and regular text I need to examine and change frequently on several, long wiki pages. I'm working with a proprietary wiki-like application and have no control over how the application functions or validates user input. The layout of pages that users add must follow a very specific standard layout and always include very specific text in only certain places - a standard which frequently changes. If users add pages that are so far out of the standard, they will be deleted. The fact that all this is obviously a complete waste of time when alternative platforms to do exactly what's needed here exist is already understood. I've built a PHP based API to automate this post-validation and frequent restandardization process for me. I've been able set up regex patterns to handle all this mixed text, and they all work fine for handling single lines. The problem I have is this: Poorly formed regex against long text with line breaks can lead to unexpected results, such as connection resets. I have no access to server-side logs to troubleshoot. How do I overcome this? This is just one example of what I currently have: {column} and {section} tags I'm searching for below can have any number of attributes, and wrap any text. {section} may or may not exist and may or may not be one or more lines under {column}, but it has to be wrapped inside {column}. {column} itself may or may not exist, and if it doesn't, I don't care. I want to grab the inner section contents and wrap it in an html div tag. I can't recall the exact pattern I'm using offhand at the moment, but it's close enough... $pattern = "/\{column:id=summary([|]?([a-zA-Z0-9-_ ]+[:][a-zA-Z0-9-_ ]+[ ]?))\}(.*)({section([|]([a-zA-Z0-9-_ ]+[:][a-zA-Z0-9-_ ]+[ ]?))\}(.*)\{section\}(.*))?{column\}/s"; $replacement = "{html}<div id='summary'$7</div{html}"; $text = preg_replace($pattern, $replacement, $subject); Handling the {column} and {section} attributes and passing only valid HTML parameters to the new html div or a subtext of it is itself a challenge, but my main focus above right now is getting that (.*) value within {section} above without causing a connection reset. Any pointers?

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• Keeping Velocity Constant and Player in Position - Sidescrolling

  - by user2904951

  I'm working on a Little Mobile Game with Cocos2D-X and Box2D. The Point where I got stuck is the movement of a box2d-body (the main actor) and the according Sprite. Now I want to : move this Body with a constant velocity along the x-axis, no matter if it's rolling (it's a circleshape) upwards or downwards keep the body nearly sticking to the ground on which it's rolling keep the Body and the according Sprite in the Center of the Screen. What I tried : in the update()- method I used body->SetLinearVelocity(b2Vec2(x,y)) to higher/lower values, if the Body was passing a constant value for his velocity I used to set very high y-Values in body->SetLinearVelocity(b2Vec2(x,y)) First tried to use CCFollow with my playerSprite, which was also Scrolling along the y-axis, as i only need to scroll along the x-axis, so I decided to move the whole layer which is containing the ambience (platforms etc.) to the left of my Screen and my Player Body & Player sprite to the right of the Screen, adjusting the speed values to Keep the Player in the Center of the Screen. Well... ...didn't work as i wanted it to, because each time i set the velocity manually (I also tried to use body->applyLinearImpulse(...) when the Body is moving upwards just as playing around with the value of velocityIterations in world->Step(...)) there's a small delay, which pushes the player Body more or less further of the Center of the Screen. ... didn't also work as I expected it to, because I needed to adjust the x-Values, when the Body was moving upwards to Keep it not getting slowed down, this made my Body even less sticky to the ground.... ... CCFollow did a good Job, except that I didn't want to scroll along the y-axis also and it Forces the overgiven sprite to start in the Center of the Screen. Moving the whole Layer even brought no good results, I have tried a Long time to adjust values of the movement Speed of the layer and the Body to Keep it negating each other, that the player stays nearly in the Center of the Screen.... So my question is : Does anyone of you have any Kind of new Approach for me to solve this cohesive bunch of Problems ? Cheers, Seb

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• Authenticating users in iPhone app

  - by Myron

  I'm developing an HTTP api for our web application. Initially, the primary consumer of the API will be an iPhone app we're developing, but I'm designing this with future uses in mind (such as mobile apps for other platforms). I'm trying to decide on the best way to authenticate users so they can access their accounts from the iPhone. I've got a design that I think works well, but I'm no security expert, so I figured it would be good to ask for feedback here. The design of the user authentication has 3 primary goals: Good user experience: We want to allow users to enter their credentials once, and remain logged in indefinitely, until they explicitly log out. I would have considered OAuth if not for the fact that the experience from an iPhone app is pretty awful, from what I've heard (i.e. it launches the login form in Safari, then tells the user to return to the app when authentication succeeds). No need to store the user creds with the app: I always hate the idea of having the user's password stored in either plain text or symmetrically encrypted anywhere, so I don't want the app to have to store the password to pass it to the API for future API requests. Security: We definitely don't need the intense security of a banking app, but I'd obviously like this to be secure. Overall, the API is REST-inspired (i.e. treating URLs as resources, and using the HTTP methods and status codes semantically). Each request to the API must include two custom HTTP headers: an API Key (unique to each client app) and a unique device ID. The API requires all requests to be made using HTTPS, so that the headers and body are encrypted. My plan is to have an api_sessions table in my database. It has a unique constraint on the API key and unique device ID (so that a device may only be logged into a single user account through a given app) as well as a foreign key to the users table. The API will have a login endpoint, which receives the username/password and, if they match an account, logs the user in, creating an api_sessions record for the given API key and device id. Future API requests will look up the api_session using the API key and device id, and, if a record is found, treat the request as being logged in under the user account referenced by the api_session record. There will also be a logout API endpoint, which deletes the record from the api_sessions table. Does anyone see any obvious security holes in this?

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• Which MS technologies would be suited for a data intensive application?

  - by steve.tse

  I'm a junior VB.net developer with little application design knowledge. I've been reading a lot of material online regarding different design patterns, frameworks, and methodologies. It's become a bit confusing for me. Right now I'm trying to decide on what language would be best suited to convert an existing VB6 application (with SQL server backend.) I need to update the UI and add more user functionality and reporting capabilities. Initially I was thinking of using WPF and attempting the MVVM model for this big project. Reports would be generated from SSRS. A peer suggested using ASP.net and I don't have enough experience to determine what would be better. The senior programmers here are stuck on using VB6 and don't have any input on what to use. They are encouraging me to use the latest technologies. This application would be for ~20 users in a central location. Ideally I would stick to a Microsoft .net language. Current interface is similar to a datagrid table where the user would click in to see the detail of each record. They would need to have multiple records open at any given time. I look forward to all the advice I can get. EDIT 2010/04/22 2:47 PM EST What is your audience? Internal clients within an intranet How complex are the interactions you expect to implement? not very... displaying data from SQL server to UI. Allow user updates to said data. Typically just one user modifying a record. Do you require near real-time data updates? no How often do you expect to update the application after the first release? twice/year Do you expect a well-defined set of client platforms? Yes, windows xp environment, potentially upgrading to Win7. Currently in IE.6 moving to IE7 or 8 within a couple of months. Do users need access from anywhere? No, just from their PC.

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• How to add Items to GridView in C# Windows Store App (Win8)

  - by flexage

  To keep things simple let's just say I have a c# Windows Store Project for Windows 8 that has the following items: GridView (PlatformsGrid) List«PlatformSearchResult» (allPlatforms) DataTemplate (PlatformDataTemplate) in standardstyles.xaml allPlatforms is a collection of "PlatformSearchResult"objects populated from an online API, and has the following 3 properties: ID Name Alias I am able to add a new item to the gridview for each object that exists in my allPlatforms collection, however the items are blank and do not show the data from my objects. A quick summary of the current code looks like this: XAML Markup: <!-- Platforms Content --> <GridView x:Name="PlatformsGrid" Grid.Row="1" CanReorderItems="True" CanDragItems="True" ItemTemplate="{StaticResource PlatformDataTemplate}" > <GridView.ItemsPanel> <ItemsPanelTemplate> <WrapGrid MaximumRowsOrColumns="2" VerticalChildrenAlignment="Top" HorizontalChildrenAlignment="Center" /> </ItemsPanelTemplate> </GridView.ItemsPanel> </GridView> Data Template <!-- Platform Item Template --> <DataTemplate x:Key="PlatformDataTemplate"> <Grid Background="#FF939598" Height="250" Width="250"> <Image Source="/SampleImage.png" Stretch="UniformToFill"/> <StackPanel Orientation="Vertical" Background="#CC000000" Height="90" VerticalAlignment="Bottom"> <TextBlock Text="{Binding Name}" Margin="10,3,0,0" Width="242" Height="62" TextTrimming="WordEllipsis" TextWrapping="Wrap" HorizontalAlignment="Left"/> <TextBlock Text="{Binding Alias}" Margin="10,2,0,0" Width="186" Height="14" TextTrimming="WordEllipsis" HorizontalAlignment="Left" FontSize="9" Opacity="0.49"/> </StackPanel> </Grid> </DataTemplate> Controlling Function private async void FetchItemInfo_Loaded(object sender, RoutedEventArgs e) { // Get List of Top Games List<PlatformSearchResult> allPlatforms = new List<PlatformSearchResult>(); allPlatforms = await GamesDB.GetPlatforms(); // Dynamically Create Platform Tiles foreach (PlatformSearchResult platform in allPlatforms) { PlatformsGrid.DataContext = platform; PlatformsGrid.Items.Add(platform); } } How do I get the added items to show the appropriate object properties (ignoring the image for now), I'm just interested in populating the content of the TextBlocks. I appreciate any help anyone can provide! Thanks, Alex.

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• Building nginx 1.0.4 on Amazon EC2 micro - perl and python problems

  - by digitaltoast

  I'd like to run nginx as a reverse proxy with apache2 on my EC2 micro instance. yum install nginx gives me nginx-0.8.53-1.2.amzn1.x86_64.rpm The current nginx is 1.0.4 I found and followed this guide: http://kdn2.info/2011/05/install-nginx-on-amazon-ec2/ It works fine up to and including "make". When I get to checkinstall --fstrans=no I get ERROR: ld.so: object '/usr/lib/installwatch.so' from LD_PRELOAD cannot be preloaded: ignored. test -d '/var/log/nginx' || mkdir -p '/var/log/nginx' ERROR: ld.so: object '/usr/lib/installwatch.so' from LD_PRELOAD cannot be preloaded: ignored. make[1]: Leaving directory `/root/src/nginx-1.0.4' ======================== Installation successful ========================== Copying documentation directory... ./ ./CHANGES ./LICENSE ./README cp: cannot stat `//var/tmp/gRWoVgIcdbmjfTjoVGBM/newfiles.tmp': No such file or directory Copying files to the temporary directory...OK Striping ELF binaries and libraries...OK Compressing man pages...OK Building file list...OK Building RPM package... FAILED! *** Failed to build the package ...and the logfile is full of: Building target platforms: x86_64 Building for target x86_64 Processing files: nginx-1.0.4-1.x86_64 error: File not found: /usr/src/rpm/BUILDROOT/nginx-1.0.4-1.x86_64/usr error: File not found: /usr/src/rpm/BUILDROOT/nginx-1.0.4-1.x86_64/usr/doc There IS /usr/src/rpm/BUILDROOT/nginx-1.0.4-1.x86_64/ but no /usr Following further down the page, it says: "If we want to use, for example, PHP 5.2 we can download PHP and Nginx compatible with Amazon Kernel(Xen Kernel) from the CentosALT Repository." So I install the two repositories, but when I yum install http://centos.alt.ru/pub/nginx/1.0/RPMS/x86_64/nginx-stable-1.0.4-1.el5.x86_64.rpm I get Error: Package: nginx-stable-1.0.4-1.el5.x86_64 (/nginx-stable-1.0.4-1.el5.x86_64) Requires: perl(:MODULE_COMPAT_5.8.8) You could try using --skip-broken to work around the problem but that doesn't fix it. When I do yum update, I get --> Finished Dependency Resolution Error: Package: python-distribute-0.6.19-10.1.x86_64 (devel_languages_python) Requires: python < 2.5 Installed: 1:python-2.6-1.19.amzn1.noarch (@amzn-main) python = 1:2.6-1.19.amzn1 Error: Package: python-distribute-0.6.19-10.1.i586 (devel_languages_python) Requires: python < 2.5 Installed: 1:python-2.6-1.19.amzn1.noarch (@amzn-main) python = 1:2.6-1.19.amzn1 I've tried everything - yum clean all and various other suggestions found on other sites. If anyone has any suggestions or a known package of the current 1.04 nginx working on EC2 Micro (Linux ip-10-56-63-85 2.6.35.11-83.9.amzn1.x86_64 #1 SMP Sat Feb 19 23:42:04 UTC 2011 x86_64 x86_64 x86_64 GNU/Linux - which I think is RHEL 5?) then I'd be grateful. Incidentally, does this repolist look right? repo id repo name status CentALT CentALT Packages for Enterprise Linux 5 - x86_64 enabled: 112+157 amzn-main amzn-main-Base enabled: 2,706 amzn-main-debuginfo amzn-main-debuginfo disabled amzn-main-nosrc amzn-main-nosrc disabled amzn-updates amzn-updates-Base enabled: 328 amzn-updates-debuginfo amzn-updates-debuginfo disabled amzn-updates-nosrc amzn-updates-nosrc disabled devel_languages_python Python and Python Modules (SLE_10) enabled: 1,452+768 epel Extra Packages for Enterprise Linux 5 - x86_64 enabled: 5,892+604 epel-debuginfo Extra Packages for Enterprise Linux 5 - x86_64 - Debug disabled epel-source Extra Packages for Enterprise Linux 5 - x86_64 - Source disabled epel-testing Extra Packages for Enterprise Linux 5 - Testing - x86_64 disabled epel-testing-debuginfo Extra Packages for Enterprise Linux 5 - Testing - x86_64 - Debug disabled epel-testing-source Extra Packages for Enterprise Linux 5 - Testing - x86_64 - Source disabled s3tools Tools for managing Amazon S3 - Simple Storage Service (RHEL_6) enabled: 2+1 repolist: 10,492

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• http.conf setup to simplify using 'localhost:81'

  - by Will

  I'm installing portable wampserver within my dropbox folder so I can access anywhere. I have this achieved and accessible using http://locahost:81 I want to access it by using a different address (dropping the :81 port number) such as http://myothersite. I'm fairly certain I need to add a virtualhosts directove somewhere within this, but I am not Apache experienced! This is the current Apache httpd.conf file: ServerRoot "C:/Users/will/Dropbox/Wampee-2.1-beta-2/bin/apache/apache2.2.17" Listen 81 ServerAdmin admin@localhost ServerName localhost:81 DocumentRoot "C:/Users/will/Dropbox/Wampee-2.1-beta-2/www/" <Directory /> Options FollowSymLinks AllowOverride None Order deny,allow Deny from all </Directory> <Directory "C:/Users/will/Dropbox/Wampee-2.1-beta-2/www/"> Options Indexes FollowSymLinks AllowOverride all # onlineoffline tag - don't remove Order Deny,Allow Deny from all Allow from 127.0.0.1 </Directory> <IfModule dir_module> DirectoryIndex index.php index.php3 index.html index.htm </IfModule> <FilesMatch "^\.ht"> Order allow,deny Deny from all Satisfy All </FilesMatch> ErrorLog "C:/Users/will/Dropbox/Wampee-2.1-beta-2/logs/apache_error.log" LogLevel warn <IfModule log_config_module> LogFormat "%h %l %u %t \"%r\" %>s %b \"%{Referer}i\" \"%{User-Agent}i\"" combined LogFormat "%h %l %u %t \"%r\" %>s %b" common <IfModule logio_module> LogFormat "%h %l %u %t \"%r\" %>s %b \"%{Referer}i\" \"%{User-Agent}i\" %I %O" combinedio </IfModule> CustomLog "C:/Users/will/Dropbox/Wampee-2.1-beta-2/logs/access.log" common #CustomLog "logs/access.log" combined </IfModule> <IfModule alias_module> ScriptAlias /cgi-bin/ "cgi-bin/" </IfModule> <IfModule cgid_module> #Scriptsock logs/cgisock </IfModule> <Directory "cgi-bin"> AllowOverride None Options None Order allow,deny Allow from all </Directory> DefaultType text/plain <IfModule mime_module> TypesConfig conf/mime.types AddType application/x-compress .Z AddType application/x-gzip .gz .tgz AddType application/x-httpd-php .php AddType application/x-httpd-php .php3 </IfModule> # Server-pool management (MPM specific) #Include conf/extra/httpd-mpm.conf # Multi-language error messages #Include conf/extra/httpd-multilang-errordoc.conf # Fancy directory listings Include conf/extra/httpd-autoindex.conf # Language settings #Include conf/extra/httpd-languages.conf # User home directories #Include conf/extra/httpd-userdir.conf # Real-time info on requests and configuration #Include conf/extra/httpd-info.conf # Virtual hosts #Include conf/extra/httpd-vhosts.conf # Local access to the Apache HTTP Server Manual #Include conf/extra/httpd-manual.conf # Distributed authoring and versioning (WebDAV) #Include conf/extra/httpd-dav.conf # Various default settings #Include conf/extra/httpd-default.conf # Secure (SSL/TLS) connections #Include conf/extra/httpd-ssl.conf # # Note: The following must must be present to support # starting without SSL on platforms with no /dev/random equivalent # but a statically compiled-in mod_ssl. # <IfModule ssl_module> SSLRandomSeed startup builtin SSLRandomSeed connect builtin </IfModule> Include "C:/Users/will/Dropbox/Wampee-2.1-beta-2/alias/*" Include "C:/Users/will/Dropbox/Wampee-2.1-beta-2/MyWebAp ps/etc/alias/*"

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• How To Start Your Own Professional Blog with WordPress

  - by Matthew Guay

  Would you like to start your own blog or website?  With a free WordPress  account, it’s free and easy to get started creating your own professional quality blog site. This is the first part in a series on how to create your own professional quality blog site. No, we’re not talking about some cheapo looking blog from Blogger or something on Facebook, but creating a quality blog you can be proud of and present to millions of readers online. WordPress is one of the most popular blogging platforms, powering hundreds of high-profile websites and blogs around the world.  It’s both powerful and easy to use, which makes it great whether you’re just starting out or are a blogging pro.  To start out with your blogging project WordPress is completely free, and you can use the online interface or install the WordPress software on your own server and blog from there. Getting Started You can start a blog in just a few minutes.  Head over to WordPress.com and click Sign up now on the right-hand side of the main page. Enter a username and password, check that you agree with the legal terms, select the “Gimme a blog” bullet, and click Next. WordPress may inform you that your username is already taken, simply choose a new one and try again. Next, choose a domain for your blog.  This will be the address for your site, and cannot be changed, so be sure to choose exactly what you want.  If you’d prefer your address to be yourname.com instead of yourname.wordpress.com, you can add your own domain for a fee after your blog is setup…but we’ll cover that later. Once you click signup, you will be sent a confirmation email.  While you wait for the email to arrive you can go ahead and enter in your name and a short bio about yourself. When you receive your confirmation email, click the link.  Congratulations; you now have your own blog! You can view your new blog immediately, though the default theme isn’t very interesting without your content and pictures. Back on the page you opened from the email, click Login to access your blog’s administration page and to start adding stuff to your blog.  You can also access your blog’s admin page anytime by from yourname.wordpress.com/admin, substituting your own blog name for yourname. Enter your username and password, then click Log in to get started. Adding Content to your WordPress.com Blog When you sign in to your WordPress blog, you’ll first see the WordPress Admin page.  Here you can see recent posts and comments, and you can see stats of how many people have visited your site.  You can also access all of your blog tools and settings right from this page. To add a new post to your blog, click the Posts link on the left, then click “Add New” either on the left menu or on the top of the Edit Posts page.  Or, if you want to edit the default first post, hover over it and select Edit. Or click the New Posts button on the top of the page.  This menu bar is always visible whenever you’re logged in, so it’s an easy way to add a post. The editor lets you easily write anything you want in a Microsoft Word-style editor.  You can format your text, add lists, links, quotes, and more.  When you’re ready to share your content with the world, click Publish on the right side. To add pictures or other files, click the picture icon beside “Upload/Insert”.  Your free blog account can store up to 3Gb of pictures and documents which will definitely give you a good start. Click Select Files, and then choose the pictures or documents you want to add to your post. When the pictures have uploaded, you can add a caption and choose how to position the picture.  When you’re finished, select “Insert into Post”.   Or, if you want to add a video, click the video button.  You have to add a paid upgrade to upload videos directly, but you can add YouTube and other online videos for free. Click the “From URL” tab, and then paste the link to the YouTube video and click Insert into post. If you’re a code geek, click the HTML tab in the editor and edit the HTML of your blog post the geeky way. Once you’ve added all your content and edited it the way you want, click the Publish button on the right of the editor.  Or, you can click Preview to make sure it looks right, and then click Publish. Here’s our blog with the new blog post containing a picture and video.  While you’re getting to know you’re way around the controls in WordPress, the Preview feature will be your best friend while you try to organize the content to your liking.   Conclusion It only takes a couple minutes to get started blogging at WordPress.com. Whether you want to write about your daily life, share pictures of your children, or review the latest books and gadgets, WordPress.com is a great place to get started for free.  But we’ve only covered a small portion of the WordPress features…but this should get you started. Check back for more WordPress and blogging coverage coming up soon! Links Signup for a free WordPress.com account Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Add Social Bookmarking (Digg This!) Links to your Wordpress BlogHow-To Geek SoftwareProtecting Your WordPress Admin Panel From Hackers With .htaccessMake a Backup Copy of your Production Wordpress Blog on UbuntuLinux QuickTip: Downloading and Un-tarring in One Step TouchFreeze Alternative in AutoHotkey The Icy Undertow Desktop Windows Home Server – Backup to LAN The Clear & Clean Desktop Use This Bookmarklet to Easily Get Albums Use AutoHotkey to Assign a Hotkey to a Specific Window Latest Software Reviews Tinyhacker Random Tips DVDFab 6 Revo Uninstaller Pro Registry Mechanic 9 for Windows PC Tools Internet Security Suite 2010 Awe inspiring, inter-galactic theme (Win 7) Case Study – How to Optimize Popular Wordpress Sites Restore Hidden Updates in Windows 7 & Vista Iceland an Insurance Job? Find Downloads and Add-ins for Outlook Recycle !

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• Silverlight 4 Tools for VS 2010 and WCF RIA Services Released

  - by ScottGu

  The final release of the Silverlight 4 Tools for Visual Studio 2010 and WCF RIA Services is now available for download.  Download and Install If you already have Visual Studio 2010 installed (or the free Visual Web Developer 2010 Express), then you can install both the Silverlight 4 Tooling Support as well as WCF RIA Services support by downloading and running this setup package (note: please make sure to uninstall the preview release of the Silverlight 4 Tools for VS 2010 if you have previously installed that).  The Silverlight 4 Tools for VS 2010 package extends the Silverlight support built into Visual Studio 2010 and enables support for Silverlight 4 applications as well.  It also installs WCF RIA Services application templates and libraries: Today’s release includes the English edition of the Silverlight 4 Tooling – localized versions will be available next month for other Visual Studio languages as well. Silverlight Tooling Support Visual Studio 2010 includes rich tooling support for building Silverlight and WPF applications. It includes a WYSIWYG designer surface that enables you to easily use controls to construct UI – including the ability to take advantage of layout containers, and apply styles and resources: The VS 2010 designer enables you to leverage the rich data binding support within Silverlight and WPF, and easily wire-up bindings on controls.  The Data Sources window within Silverlight projects can be used to reference POCO objects (plain old CLR objects), WCF Services, WCF RIA Services client proxies or SharePoint Lists.  For example, let’s assume we add a “Person” class like below to our project: We could then add it to the Data Source window which will cause it to show up like below in the IDE: We can optionally customize the default UI control types that are associated for each property on the object.  For example, below we’ll default the BirthDate property to be represented by a “DatePicker” control: And then when we drag/drop the Person type from the Data Sources onto the design-surface it will automatically create UI controls that are bound to the properties of our Person class: VS 2010 allows you to optionally customize each UI binding further by selecting a control, and then right-click on any of its properties within the property-grid and pull up the “Apply Bindings” dialog: This will bring up a floating data-binding dialog that enables you to easily configure things like the binding path on the data source object, specify a format convertor, specify string-format settings, specify how validation errors should be handled, etc: In addition to providing WYSIWYG designer support for WPF and Silverlight applications, VS 2010 also provides rich XAML intellisense and code editing support – enabling a rich source editing environment. Silverlight 4 Tool Enhancements Today’s Silverlight 4 Tooling Release for VS 2010 includes a bunch of nice new features.  These include: Support for Silverlight Out of Browser Applications and Elevated Trust Applications You can open up a Silverlight application’s project properties window and click the “Enable Running Application Out of Browser” checkbox to enable you to install an offline, out of browser, version of your Silverlight 4 application.  You can then customize a number of “out of browser” settings of your application within Visual Studio: Notice above how you can now indicate that you want to run with elevated trust, with hardware graphics acceleration, as well as customize things like the Window style of the application (allowing you to build a nice polished window style for consumer applications). Support for Implicit Styles and “Go to Value Definition” Support: Silverlight 4 now allows you to define “implicit styles” for your applications.  This allows you to style controls by type (for example: have a default look for all buttons) and avoid you having to explicitly reference styles from each control.  In addition to honoring implicit styles on the designer-surface, VS 2010 also now allows you to right click on any control (or on one of it properties) and choose the “Go to Value Definition…” context menu to jump to the XAML where the style is defined, and from there you can easily navigate onward to any referenced resources.  This makes it much easier to figure out questions like “why is my button red?”: Style Intellisense VS 2010 enables you to easily modify styles you already have in XAML, and now you get intellisense for properties and their values within a style based on the TargetType of the specified control.  For example, below we have a style being set for controls of type “Button” (this is indicated by the “TargetType” property).  Notice how intellisense now automatically shows us properties for the Button control (even within the <Setter> element): Great Video - Watch the Silverlight Designer Features in Action You can see all of the above Silverlight 4 Tools for Visual Studio 2010 features (and some more cool ones I haven’t mentioned) demonstrated in action within this 20 minute Silverlight.TV video on Channel 9: WCF RIA Services Today we also shipped the V1 release of WCF RIA Services.  It is included and automatically installed as part of the Silverlight 4 Tools for Visual Studio 2010 setup. WCF RIA Services makes it much easier to build business applications with Silverlight.  It simplifies the traditional n-tier application pattern by bringing together the ASP.NET and Silverlight platforms using the power of WCF for communication.  WCF RIA Services provides a pattern to write application logic that runs on the mid-tier and controls access to data for queries, changes and custom operations. It also provides end-to-end support for common tasks such as data validation, authentication and authorization based on roles by integrating with Silverlight components on the client and ASP.NET on the mid-tier. Put simply – it makes it much easier to query data stored on a server from a client machine, optionally manipulate/modify the data on the client, and then save it back to the server.  It supports a validation architecture that helps ensure that your data is kept secure and business rules are applied consistently on both the client and middle-tiers. WCF RIA Services uses WCF for communication between the client and the server  It supports both an optimized .NET to .NET binary serialization format, as well as a set of open extensions to the ATOM format known as ODATA and an optional JavaScript Object Notation (JSON) format that can be used by any client. You can hear Nikhil and Dinesh talk a little about WCF RIA Services in this 13 minutes Channel 9 video. Putting it all Together – the Silverlight 4 Training Kit Check out the Silverlight 4 Training Kit to learn more about how to build business applications with Silverlight 4, Visual Studio 2010 and WCF RIA Services. The training kit includes 8 modules, 25 videos, and several hands-on labs that explain Silverlight 4 and WCF RIA Services concepts and walks you through building an end-to-end application with them.    The training kit is available for free and is a great way to get started. Summary I’m really excited about today’s release – as they really complete the Silverlight development story and deliver a great end to end runtime + tooling story for building applications.  All of the above features are available for use both in VS 2010 as well as the free Visual Web Developer 2010 Express Edition – making it really easy to get started building great solutions. Hope this helps, Scott P.S. In addition to blogging, I am also now using Twitter for quick updates and to share links. Follow me at: twitter.com/scottgu

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• Week in Geek: 4chan Falls Victim to DDoS Attack Edition

  - by Asian Angel

  This week we learned how to tweak the low battery action on a Windows 7 laptop, access an eBook collection anywhere in the world, “extend iPad battery life, batch resize photos, & sync massive music collections”, went on a reign of destruction with Snow Crusher, and had fun decorating our desktops with abstract icon collections. Photo by pasukaru76. Random Geek Links We have included extra news article goodness to help you catch up on any developments that you may have missed during the holiday break this past week. Note: The three 27C3 articles listed here represent three different presentations at the 27th Chaos Communication Congress hacker conference. 4chan victim of DDoS as FBI investigates role in PayPal attack Users of 4chan may have gotten a taste of their own medicine after the site was knocked offline by a DDoS attack from an unknown origin early Thursday morning. Report: FBI seizes server in probe of WikiLeaks attacks The FBI has seized a server in Texas as part of its hunt for the groups behind the pro-WikiLeaks denial-of-service attacks launched in December against PayPal, Visa, MasterCard, and others. Mozilla exposes older user-account database Mozilla has disabled 44,000 older user accounts for its Firefox add-ons site after a security researcher found part of a database of the account information on a publicly available server. Data breach affects 4.9 million Honda customers Japanese automaker Honda has put some 2.2 million customers in the United States on a security breach alert after a database containing information on the owners and their cars was hacked. Chinese Trojan discovered in Android games An Android-based Trojan called “Geinimi” has been discovered in the wild and the Trojan is capable of sending personal information to remote servers and exhibits botnet-like behavior. 27C3 presentation claims many mobiles vulnerable to SMS attacks According to security experts, an ‘SMS of death’ threatens to disable many current Sony Ericsson, Samsung, Motorola, Micromax and LG mobiles. 27C3: GSM cell phones even easier to tap Security researchers have demonstrated how open source software on a number of revamped, entry-level cell phones can decrypt and record mobile phone calls in the GSM network. 27C3: danger lurks in PDF documents Security researcher Julia Wolf has pointed out numerous, previously hardly known, security problems in connection with Adobe’s PDF standard. Critical update for WordPress A critical update has been made available for WordPress in the form of version 3.0.4. The update fixes a security bug in WordPress’s KSES library. McAfee Labs Predicts Geolocation, Mobile Devices and Apple Will Top the List of Targets for Emerging Threats in 2011 The list comprises 2010’s most buzzed about platforms and services, including Google’s Android, Apple’s iPhone, foursquare, Google TV and the Mac OS X platform, which are all expected to become major targets for cybercriminals. McAfee Labs also predicts that politically motivated attacks will be on the rise. Windows Phone 7 piracy materializes with FreeMarketplace A proof-of-concept application, FreeMarketplace, that allows any Windows Phone 7 application to be downloaded and installed free of charge has been developed. Empty email accounts, and some bad buzz for Hotmail In the past few days, a number of Hotmail users have been complaining about a rather disconcerting issue: their Hotmail accounts, some up to 10 years old, appear completely empty.  No emails, no folders, nothing, just what appears to be a new account. Reports: Nintendo warns of 3DS risk for kids Nintendo has reportedly issued a warning that the 3DS, its eagerly awaited glasses-free 3D portable gaming device, should not be used by children under 6 when the gadget is in 3D-viewing mode. Google eyes ‘cloaking’ as next antispam target Google plans to take a closer look at the practice of “cloaking,” or presenting one look to a Googlebot crawling one’s site while presenting another look to users. Facebook, Twitter stock trading drawing SEC eye? The high degree of investor interest in shares of hot Silicon Valley companies that aren’t yet publicly traded–like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Zynga–may be leading to scrutiny from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Random TinyHacker Links Photo by jcraveiro. Exciting Software Set for Release in 2011 A few bloggers from great websites such as How-To Geek, Guiding Tech and 7 Tutorials took the time to sit down and talk about their software wishes for 2011. Take the time to read it and share… Wikileaks Infopr0n An infographic detailing the quest to plug WikiLeaks. The New York Times Guide to Mobile Apps A growing collection of all mobile app coverage by the New York Times as well as lists of favorite apps from Times writers. 7,000,000,000 (Video) A fascinating look at the world’s population via National Geographic Magazine. Super User Questions Check out the great answers to these hot questions from Super User. How to use a Personal computer as a Linux web server for development purposes? How to link processing power of old computers together? Free virtualization tool for testing suspicious files? Why do some actions not work with Remote Desktop? What is the simplest way to send a large batch of pictures to a distant friend or colleague? How-To Geek Weekly Article Recap Had a busy week and need to get caught up on your HTG reading? Then sit back and relax while enjoying these hot posts full of how-to roundup goodness. The 50 Best How-To Geek Windows Articles of 2010 The 20 Best How-To Geek Explainer Topics for 2010 The 20 Best How-To Geek Linux Articles of 2010 How to Search Just the Site You’re Viewing Using Google Search Ask the Readers: Backing Your Files Up – Local Storage versus the Cloud One Year Ago on How-To Geek Need more how-to geekiness for your weekend? Then look through this great batch of articles from one year ago that focus on dual-booting and O.S. installation goodness. Dual Boot Your Pre-Installed Windows 7 Computer with Vista Dual Boot Your Pre-Installed Windows 7 Computer with XP How To Setup a USB Flash Drive to Install Windows 7 Dual Boot Your Pre-Installed Windows 7 Computer with Ubuntu Easily Install Ubuntu Linux with Windows Using the Wubi Installer The Geek Note We hope that you and your families have had a terrific holiday break as everyone prepares to return to work and school this week. Remember to keep those great tips coming in to us at [email protected]! Photo by pjbeardsley. Latest Features How-To Geek ETC The 20 Best How-To Geek Linux Articles of 2010 The 50 Best How-To Geek Windows Articles of 2010 The 20 Best How-To Geek Explainer Topics for 2010 How to Disable Caps Lock Key in Windows 7 or Vista How to Use the Avira Rescue CD to Clean Your Infected PC The Complete List of iPad Tips, Tricks, and Tutorials Tune Pop Enhances Android Music Notifications Another Busy Night in Gotham City Wallpaper Classic Super Mario Brothers Theme for Chrome and Iron Experimental Firefox Builds Put Tabs on the Title Bar (Available for Download) Android Trojan Found in the Wild Chaos, Panic, and Disorder Wallpaper

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