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• SQLAuthority News – Social Media Series – LinkedIn and Professional Profile

  - by pinaldave

  Pinal Dave on LinkedIn! It seems like a few year ago, there was a big “boom” in social media websites.  All of a sudden there were so many sites to choose from.  MySpace or Orkut?  Blogging websites for your business or a LinkedIn account?  The nature of the internet is to always be changing, but I believe that out of this huge growth of websites, a few have come to stay.  Facebook is obviously the leader in social media networking, especially for your personal life.  Blogging is great, but it can be more of a way to get your ideas out there, rather than a place for people to connect to you professionally.  If you want to have a professional “face” on the internet, LinkedIn is the way to go. LinkedIn is best explained as “professional Facebook.”  This is simplifying things a little bit too much, but it is certainly a website where you link up with professional contacts, so that others can see where you have worked, who you have worked with, and what projects you have done.  This is a much better place for professional contacts to find you than someplace like Facebook, where all they will see is your face and maybe picture of you at a birthday party or something like that! Because so much of my SQL Server life is conducted on the internet, especially on my blog, I felt that it would be a good idea to have a well-maintained LinkedIn web page as well, so that if anyone is curious about me and my credentials they can quickly and easily find me and see that I am for real, and not someone pretending to know a lot about SQL Server. My linked in profile is www.linkedin.com/in/pinaldave.  I keep all my professional information here, and I update it as often as possible.  Feel free to come find me, especially if you would like to “link up” and share professional information.  The technology world is becoming more and more interconnected, and more and more international.  I feel that it is very important to stay linked up virtually, because so many of us are so far apart physically. I try to keep very connected with my LinkedIn profile.  I let anyone connect with me, and I read updates from the professional world very often.  I keep this profile updated, but do not post things about my personal life or anything that I might put on Twitter, for example.  I also include my e-mail address here, if you would like to contact me professionally.  This is the best place for me to conduct business. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com) Filed under: PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, SQLServer, T SQL, Technology Tagged: Social Media

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• Add an Opera Style Status Bar to Firefox

  - by Asian Angel

  Anyone who has used Opera will be familiar with the information presented for the webpage that is currently loading in the browser (i.e. number of images loaded). If you would like to have that same functionality in Firefox then join us as we look at the Extended Statusbar extension. Before Here is the default setup for Firefox…not a lot of information available to indicate exactly how much of the webpage has already loaded versus what has not. For some people this is enough but what if you like more details? Extended Statusbar in Action You may be curious about the information that the Extended Statusbar extension will provide. The information includes: Percentage of the webpage loaded The number of images loaded Bytes downloaded Average download speed The load time After emptying the cache we once again reloaded the HTG homepage. The default style/mode is “Classic Style” and the “webpage load information” will be displayed within your “Status Bar” as shown here. The information available after the webpage finished loading in “Classic Style”. If you prefer “Slim Mode” this is how your “Status Bar” should look afterwards…very condensed. For those preferring the “New Style” a temporary addition will appear above your regular “Status Bar” and disappear just a few seconds after the webpage has fully loaded (unless changed in the “Settings”). Settings The “Settings” are set up in two different ways. For those who prefer to use the “Classic Style & Slim Mode” these are the options available to you. If you prefer the “New Style” then you will have a whole different set of options available. Notice that you can exclude certain webpages and set a custom style if desired. Conclusion If you have been wanting to add Opera style webpage loading information to your “Status Bar” then you should definitely give this extension a try. Links Download the Extended Statusbar extension (Mozilla Add-ons) Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Move the Progress Bar to the Tabs in FirefoxSet the Speed Dial as the Opera Startup PageAuto-Hide Your Cluttered Firefox Status Bar ItemsSimplify Text Copying & Pasting in Firefox with AutoCopyScan Files for Viruses Before You Download With Dr.Web 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 If it were only this easy SyncToy syncs Files and Folders across Computers on a Network (or partitions on the same drive) Classic Cinema Online offers 100’s of OnDemand Movies OutSync will Sync Photos of your Friends on Facebook and Outlook Windows 7 Easter Theme YoWindoW, a real time weather screensaver

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• Control Your Favorite Music Player from Firefox

  - by Asian Angel

  Do you love listening to music while you browse? Now you can access and control your favorite music player directly from Firefox with the FoxyTunes extension. FoxyTunes in Action Once you have installed the extension and restarted Firefox you will see the FoxyTunes Toolbar located in the “Status Bar”. The default media app is Windows Media Player but can be easily changed. Here are the buttons/items available with the default settings: Search, FoxyTunes Main Menu, Show Player, Select Player, Previous Track, Play, Next Track, Mute On/Off, Volume, Play File, Twitty Tunes, Foxy Tunes Search/Explore, Open FoxyTunes Planet, & Toggle Visibility/Drag and drop to move. Note: You can hide or show individual buttons/items using the “FoxyTunes Menus”. Curious about the media players that FoxyTunes works with? Here is a complete listing…that definitely looks terrific! Notice that the currently selected media app is “bold and blue”. For our example we chose Spotify which we have previously covered. Keep in mind that you may or may not need to have your favorite media app open prior to “starting” FoxyTunes up (i.e. Play Button). Here is a good look at the “FoxyTunes Main Menu” and “Controls Sub-Menu”. The “Extras Menu”…if you click on skins you will be taken to the FoxyTunes Skins webpage. Here is a closer look into the “Configurations Menu” and one of the sub-menus. You do not need to look for options in the “Add-ons Manager Window”…everything you need is contained in these menus. If you do not like having FoxyTunes in the “Status Bar” you can easily drag and drop it to another toolbar. You can also condense the appearance of FoxyTunes using the small “triangle buttons” that are located in different spots throughout the “FoxyTunes Toolbar”. With just a click or two you can greatly reduce its’ impact on your UI. Conclusion If you love listening to music while browsing then the FoxyTunes extension will let you take care of everything right from your browser. Links Download the FoxyTunes extension (Mozilla Add-ons) Download the FoxyTunes extension (Extension Homepage) *Note: FoxyTunes add-ins for Internet Explorer and Yahoo! Messenger available here. Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Fixing When Windows Media Player Library Won’t Let You Add Files5 Awesome Music Desktop Gadgets for Vista and Windows 7Make Windows Media Player Automatically Open in Mini Player ModeSearch for Install Packages from the Ubuntu Command LineInstalling Windows Media Player Plugin for Firefox 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 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 ! Find That Elusive Icon with FindIcons

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• My thoughts on the future of the web with respect to flash, plugins, etc…

  - by joelvarty

  More than 10 years ago I was coding Java applets.  They were great at the time because I could reasonably expect them to run the same way in Netscape and Internet Explorer.  I could also reliably do asynchronous networking back to the server.  But then, Microsoft pulled their native Java runtime from Windows and Internet Explorer.  It got a lot harder to get applets running in people’s browsers. So I started writing ActiveX controls for IE and Java applets for Netscape. Then I switched to Flash, not for too long, but it was enough for me to see that it was a capable and curious implementation of animation, multimedia and script. I even wrote a few Silverlight controls, but then I stopped. I stepped back from all of the “richness” and “interactivity” and I thought about things like accessibility and SEO.  I wondered how my apps and sites might appear to the greater world.  I wondered how the developers I am working with, or who might be inheriting my code down the road, might interact with it. And I thought to myself, What the hell was I thinking? Those embedded controls are not what the web is about, and they run contrary to nearly all of the things that makes the web exciting and fosters innovation within and around.   Those plugins or controls, or whatever you want to refer to them as, are only stop-gaps that fill a hole in the basic HTML/Script/CSS specifications, and that’s all they should ever be used for.  Full stop.  Period.  For instance, I still make use of a nifty little flash control called SWFUpload because it lets me check file size before an upload starts.  I can do the same thing from a Silverlight control.  But rest assured, if I could do this from native javascript, I would in a second.  In fact, the only reason I chose SWFUpload over a ton of other alternatives is that it has a great javascript API so I can do (nearly) all of the UI in regular HTML.  And I ALWAYS provide a non-flash alternative for uploading, and for the rest of any website where the designer has insisted on some piece of creativity that requires flash (usually because the designer is also the flash developer, but that’s an aside…). The web is about openness, and about exposing that openness in such a way that it can be taken advantage of as a small part of a greater whole.  Sure we need security and authentication and ssl and all that stuff, but for me, its something more profound.  For me, the majority of what the web is, is about exposing something that delivers meaning.  What meaning can we derive from an <object> tag?   more later - joel

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• Using MAC Authentication for simple Web API’s consumption

  - by cibrax

  For simple scenarios of Web API consumption where identity delegation is not required, traditional http authentication schemas such as basic, certificates or digest are the most used nowadays. All these schemas rely on sending the caller credentials or some representation of it in every request message as part of the Authorization header, so they are prone to suffer phishing attacks if they are not correctly secured at transport level with https. In addition, most client applications typically authenticate two different things, the caller application and the user consuming the API on behalf of that application. For most cases, the schema is simplified by using a single set of username and password for authenticating both, making necessary to store those credentials temporally somewhere in memory. The true is that you can use two different identities, one for the user running the application, which you might authenticate just once during the first call when the application is initialized, and another identity for the application itself that you use on every call. Some cloud vendors like Windows Azure or Amazon Web Services have adopted an schema to authenticate the caller application based on a Message Authentication Code (MAC) generated with a symmetric algorithm using a key known by the two parties, the caller and the Web API. The caller must include a MAC as part of the Authorization header created from different pieces of information in the request message such as the address, the host, and some other headers. The Web API can authenticate the caller by using the key associated to it and validating the attached MAC in the request message. In that way, no credentials are sent as part of the request message, so there is no way an attacker to intercept the message and get access to those credentials. Anyways, this schema also suffers from some deficiencies that can generate attacks. For example, brute force can be still used to infer the key used for generating the MAC, and impersonate the original caller. This can be mitigated by renewing keys in a relative short period of time. This schema as any other can be complemented with transport security. Eran Rammer, one of the brains behind OAuth, has recently published an specification of a protocol based on MAC for Http authentication called Hawk. The initial version of the spec is available here. A curious fact is that the specification per se does not exist, and the specification itself is the code that Eran initially wrote using node.js. In that implementation, you can associate a key to an user, so once the MAC has been verified on the Web API, the user can be inferred from that key. Also a timestamp is used to avoid replay attacks. As a pet project, I decided to port that code to .NET using ASP.NET Web API, which is available also in github under https://github.com/pcibraro/hawknet Enjoy!.

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• Network Solutions Gold VIP Program

  - by GGBlogger

  Today I received an email advising me “Congratulations! You have been selected for the Network Solutions Gold VIP Program” Now I get a bunch of messages from Network Solutions because a long time ago I chose them as my registrar. I usually just save these to my Outlook Network Solutions folder and move on. This time my wife was in the room and I chuckled and said something about “Network Solutions has made me a Gold VIP member.” She said “So what does that mean?” Prompted by that I scrolled down the page to look at my “perks". Let’s see – Special pricing, 1 year free Web Forwarding, 1 hour of free support… etc etc until I hit “Enrollment in SafeRenew* SafeRenew* simplifies your renewal process. It protects your domain name registrations and corresponding services in the event you forget or are unable to renew on time. I’m thinking “Now ain’t that neat” I don’t use auto renew anyway and never have. Then I continued reading: Beginning June 24th, 2012 your domains* (that’s 10 days away) will automatically renew. To ensure continuation of service, please be certain you have a valid credit card on file. If you do not wish for your services to be automatically renewed, please click here to log into account manager and opt out of the SafeRenew™ service. Whoa Network Solutions is going to start spending my money without so much as a by your leave sir!!! I don’t bloody think so and how truly magnanimous of them I can “click here” to opt out of what I didn’t opt in for. Talk about furious! I still am. Now the kicker is: if my wife hadn’t been curious and if I’d had a working credit card on file I wouldn’t have know this until one of my unwanted domain names auto renewed. Of course I was told “Oh – we’d have refunded your money” to which I say bull. In my view Networks Solutions is guilty of a crime of some sort. They DO NOT have a right to spend my money without asking!!!!! So watch out folks.

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• Share Your Top 30 Visited Domains with Visitation Cloud for Firefox

  - by Asian Angel

  Curious about the domains that you visit most or perhaps you want a way to share that information on a social website? Now you can see and share the 30 most visited domains in your browser’s history with the Visitation Cloud extension. Accessing Visitation Cloud As soon as you install the extension you can get started using it. Depending on how your browser’s UI is set up there are three methods for accessing Visitation Cloud: a “Visitation Cloud Button” inserted at the end of your “Bookmarks Toolbar”, a menu listing in the “Tools Menu”, and a “Toolbar Button” (not shown here). Visitation Cloud in Action As soon as you activate Visitation Cloud a new window will appear with your top domains displayed in a cloud format. Keep in mind that this is more than just a static image…each listing is actually a clickable link. Clicking on any of the listings will open that domain in a new tab or window depending on your particular browser settings. If you feel that you have a great set of links and want to share it with your friends then that is easy to do. Right click anywhere within the Visitation Cloud Window and select “Save as…”. The “cloud image” can be saved in “.png, .jpg, or Scalable Vector Graphics (.svg)” format. For our example we chose the “.svg format”. Perhaps you love the set of links but not the layout…right click and select “Randomize” to change how the cloud looks. Here is our cloud after being “Randomized”. Things definitely got moved around… Accessing the Visitation Cloud Image in other Browsers Once you have your “cloud image” saved you can share it with friends or save it for your own future use in other browsers. Here is our “cloud image” open in Opera Browser with link opening in progress. The same “cloud image” open in Google Chrome. Very nice… Conclusion While this may not be something that everyone will use Visitation Cloud does make for a rather unique, interesting, & fun way to access and share your most visited domains. Links Download the Visitation Cloud extension (Mozilla Add-ons) Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Fix "Security Error: Domain Name Mismatch" Warning in FirefoxAdd Variety to Your Searches with Search CloudletRestore Your Missing/Deleted Smart Bookmarks Folder in Firefox 3Blocking Spam from International Senders in Windows Vista MailSee Where a Package is Installed on Ubuntu 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 Revo Uninstaller Pro Registry Mechanic 9 for Windows PC Tools Internet Security Suite 2010 PCmover Professional Share High Res Photos using Divvyshot Draw Online using Harmony How to Browse Privately in Firefox Kill Processes Quickly with Process Assassin Need to Come Up with a Good Name? Try Wordoid StockFox puts a Lightweight Stock Ticker in your Statusbar

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• How can I save my university's Computer Science & Engineering department? [closed]

  - by Blake

  I'm currently pursuing a B.S. in Computer Engineering at the University of Florida, and we're having a bit of a problem right now... The state recently passed a budget plan that cuts funding for higher education in Florida. The dean of UF's College of Engineering decided that the best way for us to absorb the blow is by executing the following plan: All of the Computer Engineering Degree programs, BS, MS and PhD, would be moved from the Computer & Information Science and Engineering Dept. to the Electrical and Computer Engineering Dept. along with most of the advising staff. Roughly half of the faculty would be offered the opportunity to move to Electrical/Computer Eng., Biomedical Eng., or Industrial/Systems Eng. Staff positions in CISE which are currently supporting research and graduate programs would be eliminated. The activities currently covered by TAs would be reassigned to faculty and the TA budget for CISE would be eliminated. Any faculty member who wishes to stay in CISE may do so, but with a revised assignment focused on teaching and advising. In short: our department (at least as we know it) is being decimated. Computer & Information Sciences & Engineering (one of 9 departments in the College of Engineering) is taking more than 50% of the cuts. If you're interested in reading the full proposal, you can access it here. A vast, VAST majority of the students and faculty in the department are vehemently opposed to this plan, however the dean is already taking measures to implement it. This is the only proposal on the table right now, and she has not entertained our requests for alternatives. She sees it as an obvious (albeit drastic) solution to our budget problem, citing that many other universities have combined Computer and Electrical Engineering departments. I'll bet those universities didn't have to eliminate an established department to get there, though. The budget goes into effect July 1, 2012 (this is non-negotiable), and the dean's proposal is currently set to be finalized some time next week. We don't have much time! My question to everyone here is this: Are we overreacting to this plan, or are we justified? And could you explain why or why not? It's obvious that CISE students will resist any cuts to our department, but I'm curious to see what other people in the field have to say. Any feedback is greatly appreciated. I will select the answer that saves our department. Just kidding, I'll pick the one that best explains why this is a good or bad decision for the dean to make. Please note that anything you say can and will be used to further our cause (and we might track you down if you provide a compelling argument against us).

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• Can a Printer Print White?

  - by Jason Fitzpatrick

  The vast majority of the time we all print on white media: white paper, white cardstock, and other neutral white surfaces. But what about printing white? Can modern printers print white and if not, why not? Read on as we explore color theory, printer design choices, and why white is the foundation of the printing process. Today’s Question & Answer session comes to us courtesy of SuperUser—a subdivision of Stack Exchange, a community-driven grouping of Q&A web sites. Image by Coiote O.; available as wallpaper here. The Question SuperUser reader Curious_Kid is well, curious, about printers. He writes: I was reading about different color models, when this question hit my mind. Can the CMYK color model generate white color? Printers use CMYK color mode. What will happen if I try to print a white colored image (rabbit) on a black paper with my printer? Will I get any image on the paper? Does the CMYK color model have room for white? The Answer SuperUser contributor Darth Android offers some insight into the CMYK process: You will not get anything on the paper with a basic CMYK inkjet or laser printer. The CMYK color mixing is subtractive, meaning that it requires the base that is being colored to have all colors (i.e., White) So that it can create color variation through subtraction: White - Cyan - Yellow = Green White - Yellow - Magenta = Red White - Cyan - Magenta = Blue White is represented as 0 cyan, 0 yellow, 0 magenta, and 0 black – effectively, 0 ink for a printer that simply has those four cartridges. This works great when you have white media, as “printing no ink” simply leaves the white exposed, but as you can imagine, this doesn’t work for non-white media. If you don’t have a base color to subtract from (i.e., Black), then it doesn’t matter what you subtract from it, you still have the color Black. [But], as others are pointing out, there are special printers which can operate in the CMYW color space, or otherwise have a white ink or toner. These can be used to print light colors on top of dark or otherwise non-white media. You might also find my answer to a different question about color spaces helpful or informative. Given that the majority of printer media in the world is white and printing pure white on non-white colors is a specialty process, it’s no surprise that home and (most) commercial printers alike have no provision for it. Have something to add to the explanation? Sound off in the the comments. Want to read more answers from other tech-savvy Stack Exchange users? Check out the full discussion thread here.     

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• Poll Results: Foreign Key Constraints

  - by Darren Gosbell

  A few weeks ago I did the following post asking people – if they used foreign key constraints in their star schemas. The poll is still open if you are interested in adding to it, but here is what the chart looks like as of today. (at the bottom of the poll itself there is a link to the live results, unfortunately I cannot link the live results in here as the blogging platform blocks the required javascript)   Interestingly the results are fairly even. Of the 78 respondents, fractionally over half at least aim to start with referential integrity in their star schemas. I did not want to influence the results by sharing my opinion, but my personal preference is to always aim to have foreign key constraints. But at the same time, I am pragmatic about it, I do have projects where for various reasons some constraints are not defined. And I also have other designs that I have inherited, where it would just be too much work to go back and add foreign key constraints. If you are going to implement foreign keys in your star schema, they really need to be there at the start. In fact this poll was was the result of a feature request for BIDSHelper asking for a feature to check for null/missing foreign keys and I am entirely convinced that BIDS is the wrong place for this sort of functionality. BIDS is a design tool, your data needs to be constantly checked for consistency. It's not that I think that it's impossible to get a design working without foreign key constraints, but I like the idea of failing as soon as possible if there is an error and enforcing foreign key constraints lets me "fail early" if there are constancy issues with my data. By far the biggest concern with foreign keys is performance and I suppose I'm curious as to how often people actually measure and quantify this. I worked on a project a number of years ago that had very large data volumes and we did find that foreign key constraints did have a measurable impact, but what we did was to disable the constraints before loading the data, then enabled and checked them afterwards. This saved as time (although not as much as not having constraints at all), but still let us know early in the process if there were any consistency issues. For the people that do not have consistent data, if you have ETL processes that you control that are building your star schema which you also control, then to be blunt you only have yourself to blame. It is the job of the ETL process to make the data consistent. There are techniques for handling situations like missing data as well as  early and late arriving data. Ralph Kimball's book – The Data Warehouse Toolkit goes through some design patterns for handling data consistency. Having foreign key relationships can also help the relational engine to optimize queries as noted in this recent blog post by Boyan Penev

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• What is the current state of Ubuntu's transition from init scripts to Upstart?

  - by Adam Eberlin

  What is the current state of Ubuntu's transition from init.d scripts to upstart? I was curious, so I compared the contents of /etc/init.d/ to /etc/init/ on one of our development machines, which is running Ubuntu 12.04 LTS Server. # /etc/init.d/ # /etc/init/ acpid acpid.conf apache2 --------------------------- apparmor --------------------------- apport apport.conf atd atd.conf bind9 --------------------------- bootlogd --------------------------- cgroup-lite cgroup-lite.conf --------------------------- console.conf console-setup console-setup.conf --------------------------- container-detect.conf --------------------------- control-alt-delete.conf cron cron.conf dbus dbus.conf dmesg dmesg.conf dns-clean --------------------------- friendly-recovery --------------------------- --------------------------- failsafe.conf --------------------------- flush-early-job-log.conf --------------------------- friendly-recovery.conf grub-common --------------------------- halt --------------------------- hostname hostname.conf hwclock hwclock.conf hwclock-save hwclock-save.conf irqbalance irqbalance.conf killprocs --------------------------- lxc lxc.conf lxc-net lxc-net.conf module-init-tools module-init-tools.conf --------------------------- mountall.conf --------------------------- mountall-net.conf --------------------------- mountall-reboot.conf --------------------------- mountall-shell.conf --------------------------- mounted-debugfs.conf --------------------------- mounted-dev.conf --------------------------- mounted-proc.conf --------------------------- mounted-run.conf --------------------------- mounted-tmp.conf --------------------------- mounted-var.conf networking networking.conf network-interface network-interface.conf network-interface-container network-interface-container.conf network-interface-security network-interface-security.conf newrelic-sysmond --------------------------- ondemand --------------------------- plymouth plymouth.conf plymouth-log plymouth-log.conf plymouth-splash plymouth-splash.conf plymouth-stop plymouth-stop.conf plymouth-upstart-bridge plymouth-upstart-bridge.conf postgresql --------------------------- pppd-dns --------------------------- procps procps.conf rc rc.conf rc.local --------------------------- rcS rcS.conf --------------------------- rc-sysinit.conf reboot --------------------------- resolvconf resolvconf.conf rsync --------------------------- rsyslog rsyslog.conf screen-cleanup screen-cleanup.conf sendsigs --------------------------- setvtrgb setvtrgb.conf --------------------------- shutdown.conf single --------------------------- skeleton --------------------------- ssh ssh.conf stop-bootlogd --------------------------- stop-bootlogd-single --------------------------- sudo --------------------------- --------------------------- tty1.conf --------------------------- tty2.conf --------------------------- tty3.conf --------------------------- tty4.conf --------------------------- tty5.conf --------------------------- tty6.conf udev udev.conf udev-fallback-graphics udev-fallback-graphics.conf udev-finish udev-finish.conf udevmonitor udevmonitor.conf udevtrigger udevtrigger.conf ufw ufw.conf umountfs --------------------------- umountnfs.sh --------------------------- umountroot --------------------------- --------------------------- upstart-socket-bridge.conf --------------------------- upstart-udev-bridge.conf urandom --------------------------- --------------------------- ureadahead.conf --------------------------- ureadahead-other.conf --------------------------- wait-for-state.conf whoopsie whoopsie.conf To be honest, I'm not entirely sure if I'm interpreting the division of responsibilities properly, as I didn't expect to see any overlap (of what framework handles which services). So I was quite surprised to learn that there was a significant amount of overlap in service references, in addition to being unable to discern which of the two was intended to be the primary service framework. Why does there seem to be a fair amount of redundancy in individual service handling between init.d and upstart? Is something else at play here that I'm missing? What is preventing upstart from completely taking over for init.d? Is there some functionality that certain daemons require which upstart does not yet have, which are preventing some services from converting? Or is it something else entirely?

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• WPF TextBlock refresh in real time

  - by TheOnlyBrien

  I'm new to C#, in fact, this is one of the first projects I've tried to start on my own. I am curious why the TextBlock will not refresh with the following code? The WPF window does not even show up when I add the "while" loop to the code. I just want this to have a real time display of the days since I was born. Please help me out or give me constructive direction. using System; using System.Collections.Generic; using System.Linq; using System.Text; using System.Threading.Tasks; using System.Windows; using System.Windows.Controls; using System.Windows.Data; using System.Windows.Documents; using System.Windows.Input; using System.Windows.Media; using System.Windows.Media.Imaging; using System.Windows.Navigation; using System.Windows.Shapes; namespace daysAliveWPF { /// <summary> /// Interaction logic for MainWindow.xaml /// </summary> public partial class MainWindow : Window { public MainWindow() { InitializeComponent(); DateTime myBirthday = new DateTime(1984, 01, 19); while (true) { TimeSpan daysAlive = DateTime.Now.Subtract(myBirthday); MyTextBlock.Text = daysAlive.TotalDays.ToString(); } } } } Similar code has worked in a Console Window application, so I don't understand what's going on here. Console Application code snip that did work is: using System; using System.Collections.Generic; using System.Linq; using System.Text; using System.Threading.Tasks; namespace DisplayRealTime { class Program { static void Main(string[] args) { DateTime myBirthday = new DateTime(1984, 06, 19); while (true) { TimeSpan daysAlive = DateTime.Now.Subtract(myBirthday); Console.Write("\rTotal Days Alive: {0}", daysAlive.TotalDays.ToString(".#####")); } } } } Thank you!

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• Does using GCC specific builtins qualify as incorporation within a project?

  - by DavidJFelix

  I understand that linking to a program licensed under the GPL requires that you release the source of your program under the GPL as well, while the LGPL does not require this. The terminology of the (L)GPL is very clear about this. #include "gpl_program.h" means you'd have to license GPL, because you're linking to GPL licensed code. And #include "lgpl_program.h" means you're free to license however you want, so that it doesn't explicitly prohibit linking to LGPL source. Now, my question about what isn't clear is: [begin question] GCC is GPL licensed, compiling with GCC, does not constitute "integration" into your program, as the GPL puts it; does using builtin functions (which are specific to GCC) constitute "incorporation" even though you haven't explicitly linked to this GPL licensed code? My intuition tells me that this isn't the intention, but legality isn't always intuitive. I'm not actually worried, but I'm curious if this could be considered the case. [end question] [begin aside] The reason for my equivocation is that GCC builtins like __builtin_clzl() or __builtin_expect() are an API technically and could be implemented in another way. For example, many builtins were replicated by LLVM and the argument could be made that it's not implementation specific to GCC. However, many builtins have no parallel and when compiled will link GPL licensed code in GCC and will not compile on other compilers. If you make the argument here that the API could be replicated by another compiler, couldn't you make that identical claim about any program you link to, so long as you don't distribute that source? I understand that I'm being a legal snake about this, but it strikes me as odd that the GPL isn't more specific. I don't see this as a reasonable ploy for proprietary software creators to bypass the GPL, as they'd have to bundle the GPL software to make it work, removing their plausible deniability. However, isn't it possible that if builtins don't constitute linking, then open source proponents who oppose the GPL could simply write a BSD/MIT/Apache/Apple licensed product that links to a GPL'd program and claim that they intend to write a non-GPL interface that is identical to the GPL one, preserving their BSD license until it's actually compiled? [end aside] Sorry for the aside, I didn't think many people would follow why I care about this if I'm not facing any legal trouble or implications. Don't worry too much about the hypotheticals there, I'm just extrapolating what either answer to my actual question could imply.

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• Increase application performance

  - by Prayos

  I'm writing a program for a company that will generate a daily report for them. All of the data that they use for this report is stored in a local SQLite database. For this report, the utilize pretty much every bit of the information in the database. So currently, when I query the datbase, I retrieve everything, and store the information in lists. Here's what I've got: using (var dataReader = _connection.Select(query)) { if (dataReader.HasRows) { while (dataReader.Read()) { _date.Add(Convert.ToDateTime(dataReader["date"])); _measured.Add(Convert.ToDouble(dataReader["measured_dist"])); _bit.Add(Convert.ToDouble(dataReader["bit_loc"])); _psi.Add(Convert.ToDouble(dataReader["pump_press"])); _time.Add(Convert.ToDateTime(dataReader["timestamp"])); _fob.Add(Convert.ToDouble(dataReader["force_on_bit"])); _torque.Add(Convert.ToDouble(dataReader["torque"])); _rpm.Add(Convert.ToDouble(dataReader["rpm"])); _pumpOneSpm.Add(Convert.ToDouble(dataReader["pump_1_strokes_pm"])); _pumpTwoSpm.Add(Convert.ToDouble(dataReader["pump_2_strokes_pm"])); _pullForce.Add(Convert.ToDouble(dataReader["pull_force"])); _gpm.Add(Convert.ToDouble(dataReader["flow"])); } } } I then utilize these lists for the calculations. Obviously, the more information that is in this database, the longer the initial query will take. I'm curious if there is a way to increase the performance of the query at all? Thanks for any and all help. EDIT One of the report rows is called Daily Drilling Hours. For this calculation, I use this method: // Retrieves the timestamps where measured depth == bit depth and PSI >= 50 public double CalculateDailyProjectDrillingHours(DateTime date) { var dailyTimeStamps = _time.Where((t, i) => _date[i].Equals(date) && _measured[i].Equals(_bit[i]) && _psi[i] >= 50).ToList(); return _dailyDrillingHours = Convert.ToDouble(Math.Round(TimeCalculations(dailyTimeStamps).TotalHours, 2, MidpointRounding.AwayFromZero)); } // Checks that the interval is less than 10, then adds the interval to the total time private static TimeSpan TimeCalculations(IList<DateTime> timeStamps) { var interval = new TimeSpan(0, 0, 10); var totalTime = new TimeSpan(); TimeSpan timeDifference; for (var j = 0; j < timeStamps.Count - 1; j++) { if (timeStamps[j + 1].Subtract(timeStamps[j]) <= interval) { timeDifference = timeStamps[j + 1].Subtract(timeStamps[j]); totalTime = totalTime.Add(timeDifference); } } return totalTime; }

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• Binary on the Coat of Arms of the Governor General of Canada

  - by user132636

  Can you help me further this investigation? Here is about 10% of the work I have done on it. I present it only to see if there are any truly curious people among you. I made a video a few weeks ago showing some strange things about the Governor General's Coat of Arms and the binary on it. Today, I noticed something kinda cool and thought I would share. Here is the binary as it appears on the COA: 110010111001001010100100111010011 As DEC: 6830770643 (this is easily found on the web) Take a close look at that number. What do you notice about it? It has a few interesting features, but here is the one no one has pointed out... Split it down the middle and you have 68307 70643. The first digit is double the value of the last digit. The second digit is double the second last digit. The third digit is half of the third to last digit. And the middle ones are even or neutral. At first, I thought of it as energy. ++-nnnn+-- But actually you can create something else with it using the values. 221000211. See how that works. You may be asking why that is significant. Bare with me. I know 99% are rolling their eyes. 221000211 as base3 gives you this as binary: 100011101000111 100011101000111 as HEX is 4747, which converts to "GG". Initials of Governor General. GG.ca is his website. When you convert to base 33 (there are 33 digits in the original code) you get "GOV" Interesting? :D There is a lot more to it. I'll continue to show some strange coincidences if anyone is interested. Sorry if I am not explaining this correctly. By now you have probably figured out that I have no background in this. Which is why I am here. Thank you.

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• Convert Chrome Bookmark Toolbar Folders to Icons

  - by Asian Angel

  So you have your regular bookmarks reduced to icons but what about the folders? With our little hack and a few minutes of your time you can turn those folders into icons too. Condensing the Folders Reducing bookmark folders to icons is a little more tricky than regular bookmarks but not hard to do. Right click on the folder and select “Rename…”. The folder’s name should already be highlighted/selected as shown here. Delete the text…notice that the “OK Button” has become unusable for the moment. Now what you will need to do is: Hold down the “Alt Key” Type in “0160” (without the quotes) using the numbers keypad on the right side of your keyboard Release the “Alt Key” after you have finished typing in the number above Once you have released the “Alt Key” you will notice two things…the “cursor” has moved further into the text area and you can now click on the “OK Button” again. There is our folder after editing. And it works just as well as before but without taking up so much room. Here is how our “iconized” folder looks next to our bookmarks. Perfect! What if you want to reduce multiple folders to icons? Perform the same exact steps shown above for each folder and pack your “Bookmarks Toolbar” full of folder goodness! As seen here the folders will have a little more space between them in comparison with singular bookmarks due to the “blank name” for each folder. For those who may be curious this is what your bookmarks will look like in the “Bookmark Manager Page”. Note: If you export your bookmarks all bookmarks contained in multiple blank name folders will be combined into a single folder. Conclusion With just a little bit of work you can pack a lot of goodness into your “Bookmarks Toolbar”. No more wasted space… Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Condense the Bookmarks in the Firefox Bookmarks ToolbarAccess Your Bookmarks with a Toolbar Button in Google ChromeAdd the Bookmarks Menu to Your Bookmarks Toolbar with Bookmarks UI ConsolidatorAdd a Vertical Bookmarks Toolbar to FirefoxReduce Your Bookmarks Toolbar to a Toolbar Button 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 OutlookStatView Scans and Displays General Usage Statistics How to Add Exceptions to the Windows Firewall Office 2010 reviewed in depth by Ed Bott FoxClocks adds World Times in your Statusbar (Firefox) Have Fun Editing Photo Editing with Citrify Outlook Connector Upgrade Error

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• Desktop Fun: Happy New Year Icon and Font Packs

  - by Asian Angel

  With the Christmas holiday so near, New Year’s Eve and Day will not be far behind. To help you prepare those New Year’s Eve and Day celebrations we have put together a nice collection of fonts for party invitations, fliers, decorations, and more. We also have icon goodness to make your desktop all bright and shiny for the new year. Sneak Preview This is the New Year’s desktop that we put together using the Birthday Icon Set shown below. Note: The original unmodified version of this wallpaper can be found here. An up close look at the icons that we used… The Icon Packs Note: To customize the icon setup on your Windows 7 & Vista systems see our article here. Using Windows XP? We have you covered here. New Year Celebration Icon Set *.ico format only Download New Year Party Icon *.ico, .png, and .icns format Note: This icon is available for download in single file format (based on format type and/or image size). Download Celebration *.ico format only Download Birthday *.ico, .png, and .icns format Special Note: While not an official New Year’s set of icons, it will still work nicely for a New Year’s or celebration desktop setup. Download The Font Packs Note: To manage the fonts on your Windows 7, Vista, & XP systems see our article here. Cocktail Bubbly Download Fontdinerdotcom Sparkly Download Confetti Download KR Happy New Year 2002 Note: For those who are curious about this font’s shape, it is a cork popping out of a champagne bottle. Download NewYearBats *includes 52 individual characters Note: This group represents A – Z in all capital letters. Note: This group represents A – Z in all lower case letters. Download LCR Party Dings *includes 26 individual characters (A – Z), not case sensitive Special Note: This font is an all-purpose type that covers a variety of party/celebration types from New Year’s to birthdays. Download For more great ways to customize your computer be certain to look through our Desktop Fun section. Latest Features How-To Geek ETC The Complete List of iPad Tips, Tricks, and Tutorials The 50 Best Registry Hacks that Make Windows Better The How-To Geek Holiday Gift Guide (Geeky Stuff We Like) LCD? LED? Plasma? The How-To Geek Guide to HDTV Technology The How-To Geek Guide to Learning Photoshop, Part 8: Filters Improve Digital Photography by Calibrating Your Monitor Track Weather Conditions with the Weather Underground Web App for Chrome These 8-Bit Mario Wood Magnets Put Video Games on Your Fridge Christmas Themes 4 Pack for Chrome and Iron Browser Enjoy the First Total Lunar Eclipse in 372 Years This Evening Gmail’s Free Calling Extended Through 2011 Voice Search Brings Android-Style Voice Search to Google Chrome

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• Working with Reporting Services Filters – Part 3: The TOP and BOTTOM Operators

  - by smisner

  Thus far in this series, I have described using the IN operator and the LIKE operator. Today, I’ll continue the series by reviewing the TOP and BOTTOM operators. Today, I happened to be working on an example of using the TOP N operator and was not successful on my first try because the behavior is just a bit different than we find when using an “equals” comparison as I described in my first post in this series. In my example, I wanted to display a list of the top 5 resellers in the United States for AdventureWorks, but I wanted it based on a filter. I started with a hard-coded filter like this: Expression Data Type Operator Value [ResellerSalesAmount] Float Top N 5 And received the following error: A filter value in the filter for tablix 'Tablix1' specifies a data type that is not supported by the 'TopN' operator. Verify that the data type for each filter value is Integer. Well, that puzzled me. Did I really have to convert ResellerSalesAmount to an integer to use the Top N operator? Just for kicks, I switched to the Top % operator like this: Expression Data Type Operator Value [ResellerSalesAmount] Float Top % 50 This time, I got exactly the results I expected – I had a total of 10 records in my dataset results, so 50% of that should yield 5 rows in my tablix. So thinking about the problem with Top N some  more, I switched the Value to an expression, like this: Expression Data Type Operator Value [ResellerSalesAmount] Float Top N =5 And it worked! So the value for Top N or Top % must reflect a number to plug into the calculation, such as Top 5 or Top 50%, and the expression is the basis for determining what’s in that group. In other words, Reporting Services will sort the rows by the expression – ResellerSalesAmount in this case – in descending order, and then filter out everything except the topmost rows based on the operator you specify. The curious thing is that, if you’re going to hard-code the value, you must enter the value for Top N with an equal sign in front of the integer, but you can omit the equal sign when entering a hard-coded value for Top %. This experience is why working with Reporting Services filters is not always intuitive! When you use a report parameter to set the value, you won’t have this problem. Just be sure that the data type of the report parameter is set to Integer. Jessica Moss has an example of using a Top N filter in a tablix which you can view here. Working with Bottom N and Bottom % works similarly. You just provide a number for N or for the percentage and Reporting Services works from the bottom up to determine which rows are kept and which are excluded.

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• Returning null vs Throwing exceptions

  - by Svish

  Is in a bit of disagreement with a more experienced developer on this issue, and was wondering what you guys here think about this. Environment is Java, EJB 3, services, etc. The code I wrote calls a service to get things and to create things. Problem was that I got null pointer exceptions in places that didn't make sense. For example when I asked the service to create an object, I got null back. And when I tried to look up an object with an id I knew existed, I still got null back. Was like it was ignoring me. Spent some time trying to figure out what was wrong in my code (since I'm less experienced I usually assume I have messed up). Turns out the reason was security. If the user principal using my service didn't have the right permissions to use the service I called from my service, then that service simply returned null. The services that are here already are usually not documented either, so this is just something you have to know... somehow... So here is the thing: I mean that this is rather confusing as a developer interacting with this service. To me it would make much more sense if that service thew an exception which would tell me that hey, you don't have the proper permissions to get info about this thing or to create this new thing. I would then immediately know why my service wasn't working as expected. However, he argued that asking is not wrong. Exceptions should only be thrown when there is an error and asking for a thing is not an error. Even if you don't have permission to "see" that the thing you asked for. The things are often looked up in a GUI by users and for those users not having the right permissions, these things simply "do not exist". So, in short: Asking is not wrong, hence no exception. Get methods return null because to those users those things "doesn't exist". Create methods return null because nothing was created, since the user wasn't allowed to create anything. So, what do you guys think? Is this normal and/or good practice? I prefer exceptions as I prefer throwing and catching exceptions because I find it much easier to know what's going on. So I would for example also prefer to throw a NotFoundException if you asked for an id which didn't exist, rather than returning null. Anyways, just curious to what others think about this as I'm not the most experienced developer yet.

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• Preview Links and Images in Google Chrome

  - by Asian Angel

  Anyone who has used the CoolPreviews extension in Firefox knows how wonderful that preview window can be. Now you can get the same kind of functionality in Chrome with the ezLinkPreview extension. Note: Extension will not work on websites containing “frame buster” code (navigation to the actual URL will occur). Before Normally if you want to have a better look at a particular webpage the only option you have is to go ahead and open it in a new tab or window. But it would certainly be nice to be able to take a quick “sneak peek” before-hand… After As soon as you have finished installing the extension everything is ready to go…just refresh any pages open prior to installation and enjoy the preview goodness. When you hover your mouse near any link you will notice a small “Preview Button” appear with the letters “EZ” inside. A closer look at the “Preview Button”. Click on the “Preview Button” to open the popup window. Now you can get a very good idea of whether the page is worth visiting or not. Here is a closer look at the popup window. Notice that you can see the URL for the webpage and access a convenient set of buttons on the right side (Open to new tab, Pin to keep overlay open, and Close). You can even resize the window as desired to best suit your needs (you can actually grab any of the four corners to resize the popup window). It is also possible to open a “preview window” inside the popup window…you can see the “Preview Button” here… If you have Chrome maximized you can enjoy using a large sized “preview window”. Now that is nice! For those who may be curious you can see that ezLinkPreview works nicely with images too. Conclusion The ezLinkPreview extension provides a quick and simple way to preview links and/or images while you are browsing. If you are looking for similar functionality in Firefox then be sure to read our article on CoolPreviews here. Links Download the ezLinkPreview extension (Google Chrome Extensions) Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Google Image Search Quick FixSubscribe to RSS Feeds in Chrome with a Single ClickFind a Website’s Actual Location with Chrome FlagsHow to Make Google Chrome Your Default BrowserEnable Auto-Paging Goodness in Google Chrome 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 QuicklyCode Provides Cheatsheets & Other Programming Stuff Download Free MP3s from Amazon 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?

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• Don't Miss At Devoxx!!!

  - by Yolande Poirier

  Come by IoT Hack Fest which starts with the session: kickstart your Raspberry Pi and/or Leap Motion project, part II on Tuesday from 9:30am to 12:00pm to learn how to start a project with the Raspberry Pi and Leap Motion. In the afternoon, you can still join a project and create your own project with the help of experts on Raspberry Pi, Leap Motion and other boards.  At the Oracle booth, Java experts will be available  to answer your  questions and demo the new features of the Java Platform, including Java Embedded, JavaFX, Java SE and Java EE. This year, the chess game that was first demoed at JavaOne keynotes last September will be showcased at Devoxx.  Duke is coming to Devoxx this year. You can get your picture taken with Duke on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday (Nov. 12-14) from 12:00 to 18:00 Beer bash will be Tuesday from 17:30-19:30 and Wednesday/Thursday from 18:00 to 20:00 at the booth. Oracle is raffling off five Raspberry Pi's and a number of books every day. Make sure to stop by and get your badge scanned to enter the raffle. Raffles are Tuesday at 19:15 and Wednesday/Thursday at 19:45 at the Oracle booth.  The main conference sessions from Oracle Java experts are:  Wednesday 13 November Beyond Beauty: JavaFX, Parallax, Touch, Raspberry Pi, Gyroscopes, and Much More Angela Caicedo, Senior Member, Technical Staff, Oracle Room 7, 12:00–13:00 Lambda: A Peek Under the Hood, Brian Goetz, Software Architect, Oracle Room 8, 12:00–13:00 In Full Flow: Java 8 Lambdas in the Stream, Paul Sandoz, Software Developer, Oracle Room 8, 14:00–15:00 The Modular Java Platform and Project Jigsaw, Mark Reinhold, Chief Architect, Java Platform Group, Oracle, Room 8, 15:10–16:10 The Curious Case of JavaScript on the JVM, Attila Szegedi, Principal Member, Technical Staff, Oracle, Room 5, 16:40–17:40 Is It a Car? Is It a Computer? No, It’s a Raspberry Pi JavaFX Informatics System. Simon Ritter, Principal Technology Evangelist, Oracle Room 7, 16:40–17:40 Thursday 14 November Java EE 7: What’s New in the Java EE Platform Linda DeMichiel, Consulting Member, Technical Staff, Oracle, Room 8, 10:50–11:50 Java Microbenchmark Harness: The Lesser of the Two Evils, Aleksey Shipilev, Principal Member, Technical Staff, Oracle. Room 6, 14:00–15:00 Practical Restful Persistence, Shaun Smith, Senior Principal Product Manager, Oracle Room 8, 17:50–18:50 Friday 15 November Avatar.js, Server-Side JavaScript on the Java Platform, Jean-Francois Denise, Software Developer, Oracle Room 8, 11:50–12:50

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• What can a Service do on Windows?

  - by Akemi Iwaya

  If you open up Task Manager or Process Explorer on your system, you will see many services running. But how much of an impact can a service have on your system, especially if it is ‘corrupted’ by malware? Today’s SuperUser Q&A post has the answers to a curious reader’s questions. Today’s Question & Answer session comes to us courtesy of SuperUser—a subdivision of Stack Exchange, a community-driven grouping of Q&A web sites. The Question SuperUser reader Forivin wants to know how much impact a service can have on a Windows system, especially if it is ‘corrupted’ by malware: What kind malware/spyware could someone put into a service that does not have its own process on Windows? I mean services that use svchost.exe for example, like this: Could a service spy on my keyboard input? Take screenshots? Send and/or receive data over the internet? Infect other processes or files? Delete files? Kill processes? How much impact could a service have on a Windows installation? Are there any limits to what a malware ‘corrupted’ service could do? The Answer SuperUser contributor Keltari has the answer for us: What is a service? A service is an application, no more, no less. The advantage is that a service can run without a user session. This allows things like databases, backups, the ability to login, etc. to run when needed and without a user logged in. What is svchost? According to Microsoft: “svchost.exe is a generic host process name for services that run from dynamic-link libraries”. Could we have that in English please? Some time ago, Microsoft started moving all of the functionality from internal Windows services into .dll files instead of .exe files. From a programming perspective, this makes more sense for reusability…but the problem is that you can not launch a .dll file directly from Windows, it has to be loaded up from a running executable (exe). Thus the svchost.exe process was born. So, essentially a service which uses svchost is just calling a .dll and can do pretty much anything with the right credentials and/or permissions. If I remember correctly, there are viruses and other malware that do hide behind the svchost process, or name the executable svchost.exe to avoid detection. Have something to add to the explanation? Sound off in the comments. Want to read more answers from other tech-savvy Stack Exchange users? Check out the full discussion thread here.

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• Redgate ANTS Performance Profiler

  - by Jon Canning

  Seemingly forever I've been working on a business idea, it's a REST API delivering content to mobiles, and I've never really had much idea about its performance. Yes, I have a suite of unit tests and integration tests, but these only tell me that it works, not how well it works. I was also about to embark on a major refactor, swapping the database from MongoDB to RavenDB, and was curious to see if that impacted performance at all, so I needed a profiler that supported IIS Express that I can run my integration tests against, and Google gave me:   http://www.red-gate.com/supportcenter/content/ANTS_Performance_Profiler/help/7.4/app_iise   Excellent. Following the above guide an instance of IIS Express and is launched, as is Internet Explorer. The latter eventually becomes annoying, I would like to decide whether I want a browser opened, but thankfully the guide is wrong in that it can be closed and profiling will continue. So I ran my tests, stopped profiling, and was presented with a call tree listing the endpoints called and allowing me to drill down to the source code beneath.     Although useful and fascinating this wasn't what I was expecting to see, I was after the method timings from the entire test suite. Switching Show to Methods Grid presented me with a list of my methods, with the slowest lit up in red at the top. Marvellous.     I did find that if you switch to Methods Grid before Call tree has loaded, you do not get the red warnings.   StructureMap was very busy, and next on the list was a request filter that I didn't expect to be so overworked. Highlighting it, the source code was presented to me in the bottom window with timings and a nice red indicator to show me where to look. Oh horror, that reflection hack I put in months ago, I'd forgotten all about it. It was calling Validate<T>() which in turn was resolving a validator from StructureMap. Note to self, use //TODO: when leaving smelly code lying around.     Before refactoring, remember to Save Profile Results from the File menu. Annoyingly you are not prompted to save your results when exiting, and using Save Project will only leave you thankful that you have version control and can go back in time to run your tests again.   Having implemented StructureMap’s ForGenericType, I ran my tests again and:     Win, thankyou ANTS (What does ANTS stand for BTW?)   There's definitely room in my toolbox for a profiler; what started out as idle curiosity actually solved a potential problem. When presented with a new codebase I can see enormous benefit from getting an overview of the pipeline from the call tree before drilling into the code, and as a sanity check before release it gives a little more reassurance that you've done your best, and shows you exactly where to look if you haven’t.   Next I’m going to profile a load test.

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• `make install` fails apparently due to typo, but not in makefile: How to find and fix?

  - by Archelon

  I'm trying to install the fujitsu-usb-touchscreen drivers from here, on Kubuntu 12.04 on my new Fujitsu LifeBook P1630. (See fujitsu-usb-touchscreen on kubuntu 13.04 (64-bit) on P1630: `make` errors.) I downloaded the .zip file, unzipped it, and ran make in the directory thus created; this all worked as expected. However, when I run sudo checkinstall (which invokes make install), things go less well. On the first attempt the installation aborted with the following error: make: execvp: /etc/init.d/fujitsu_touchscreen: Permission denied make: *** [install] Error 127 I eventually resolved this by $ sudo chmod +x /etc/init.d/fujitsu_touchscreen But although a second sudo checkinstall then does not give the execvp error, it still fails at a later stage, and the log (on stdout) shows this dpkg error: dpkg: error processing /home/archelon/fujitsu-touchscreen-driver/cybergene-fujitsu-usb-touchscreen-112fdb75b406/cybergene-fujitsu-usb-touchscreen-112fdb75b406_amd64.deb (--install): unable to create `/sys/module/fujitsu/usb/touchscreen/parameters/touch_maxy.dpkg-new' (while processing `/sys/module/fujitsu/usb/touchscreen/parameters/touch_maxy'): No such file or directory And, indeed, there is no /sys/module/fujitsu/usb/touchscreen/parameters/touch_maxy; there is, however, /sys/module/fujitsu_usb_touchscreen/parameters/touch_maxy, and this is presumably what was intended. But this incorrect filename does not appear in the makefile or any other file in the directory, at least not that I can find. Nor does it appear, as I discovered after running sudo checkinstall --install=no as suggested below, in the .deb package created by checkinstall. Where might such a typographical error be originating, and how would I go about fixing it? Edited to add: I'm viewing the contents of the .deb file with ark, Kubuntu's default tool. It contains only three files: control.tar.gz, data.tar.gz, and debian-binary. data.tar.gz contains the directory tree that appears to match up to the usual root filesystem, with /etc, /lib, /sys, and /usr directories. (Looking at other .deb files on my system, this structure appears to be typical.) Here's a screenshot: . (Full size.) Here's another screenshot showing that control.tar.gz contains three files, one of which is empty: . (Full size.) Here's the actual .deb file: https://www.dropbox.com/s/odwxxez0fhyvg7a/cybergene-fujitsu-usb-touchscreen_112fdb75b406-1_amd64.deb Edited 2013-09-28 to add: After reinstalling Kubuntu 12.04 again, this time recreating the /home partition (which, again, had been generated during an install of 13.04), I can no longer reproduce this error. I am still curious to know how the underscores got changed to slashes, but it looks as though nobody has any idea. It is perhaps also of interest to note that while I have still not successfully run checkinstall against this package, I have done make install; it requires the executabilization of /etc/init.d/fujitsu_touchscreen and the installation of hal, and the GUI freezes shortly after installation completes, and there is no particular new functionality afterwards that I have noticed, and the system can no longer resume from being suspended; however, this will be pursued elsewhere.

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• Parallel MSBuild FTW - Build faster in parallel

  - by deadlydog

  Hey everyone, I just discovered this great post yesterday that shows how to have msbuild build projects in parallel Basically all you need to do is pass the switches “/m:[NumOfCPUsToUse] /p:BuildInParallel=true” into MSBuild. Example to use 4 cores/processes (If you just pass in “/m” it will use all CPU cores): MSBuild /m:4 /p:BuildInParallel=true "C:\dev\Client.sln" Obviously this trick will only be useful on PCs with multi-core CPUs (which we should all have by now) and solutions with multiple projects; So there’s no point using it for solutions that only contain one project.  Also, testing shows that using multiple processes does not speed up Team Foundation Database deployments either in case you’re curious Also, I found that if I didn’t explicitly use “/p:BuildInParallel=true” I would get many build errors (even though the MSDN documentation says that it is true by default). The poster boasts compile time improvements up to 59%, but the performance boost you see will vary depending on the solution and its project dependencies.  I tested with building a solution at my office, and here are my results (runs are in seconds): # of Processes 1st Run 2nd Run 3rd Run Avg Performance 1 192 195 200 195.67 100% 2 155 156 156 155.67 79.56% 4 146 149 146 147.00 75.13% 8 136 136 138 136.67 69.85%   So I updated all of our build scripts to build using 2 cores (~20% speed boost), since that gives us the biggest bang for our buck on our solution without bogging down a machine, and developers may sometimes compile more than 1 solution at a time.  I’ve put the any-PC-safe batch script code at the bottom of this post. The poster also has a follow-up post showing how to add a button and keyboard shortcut to the Visual Studio IDE to have VS build in parallel as well (so you don’t have to use a build script); if you do this make sure you use the .Net 4.0 MSBuild, not the 3.5 one that he shows in the screenshot.  While this did work for me, I found it left an MSBuild.exe process always hanging around afterwards for some reason, so watch out (batch file doesn’t have this problem though).  Also, you do get build output, but it may not be the same that you’re used to, and it doesn’t say “Build succeeded” in the status bar when completed, so I chose to not make this my default Visual Studio build option, but you may still want to. Happy building! ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- :: Calculate how many Processes to use to do the build. SET NumberOfProcessesToUseForBuild=1  SET BuildInParallel=false if %NUMBER_OF_PROCESSORS% GTR 2 (                 SET NumberOfProcessesToUseForBuild=2                 SET BuildInParallel=true ) MSBuild /maxcpucount:%NumberOfProcessesToUseForBuild% /p:BuildInParallel=%BuildInParallel% "C:\dev\Client.sln"

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