Search Results

Search found 2166 results on 87 pages for 'hot spot'.

Page 83/87 | < Previous Page | 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 | Next Page >

Clean Code Developer & Certification in IT - MSCC 21.09.2013

It was a very busy weekend this time, and quite some hectic to organise the second meetup on a Saturday for the Mauritius Software Craftsmanship Community (MSCC) but it was absolutely fun. Following, I'm writing a brief summary about the topics we spoke about and the new impulses I got. "What a meetup... I was positively impressed. At the beginning I thought that noone would actually show up but then by the time the room got filled. Lots of conversation, great dialogues and fantastic networking between fresh students, experienced students, experienced employees, and self-employed attendees. That's what community is all about!" Above quote was my first reaction shortly after the gathering. And despite being busy during the weekend and yesterday, I took my time to reflect a little bit on things happened and statements made before writing it here on my blog. Additionally, I was also very curious about possible reactions and blogs from other attendees. Reactions from other craftsmen Let me quickly give you some links and quotes from others first... "Like Jochen posted on facebook, that was indeed a 5+ hours marathon (maybe 4 hours for me but still) … Wohoo! We’re indeed a bunch of crazy geeks who did not realise how time flew as we dived into the myriad discussions that sprouted. Yet in the end everyone was happy (:" -- Ish on MSCC meetup - The marathon (: "And the 4hours spent @ Talking drums bore its fruit..I was doing something I never did before....reading the borrowed book while walking....and though I was not that familiar with things mentionned in the book...I was skimming,scanning & flipping...reading titles...short paragraphs...and I skipped pages till I reached home." -- Yannick on Mauritius Software Craftsmanship 1st Meet-up "Hi Developers, Just wanted to share with you the meetups i attended last Saturday - [...] - The second meetup is the one hosted by Jochen Kirstätter, the MSCC, where the attendees were Craftsman, no woman, this time - all sharing the same passion of being a developer - even though it is on different platforms(Windows - Windows Phone - Linux - Adobe(yes a designer) - .Net) - but we manage to sit at the same table - sharing developer views and experience in the corporate world - also talking about good practice when coding( where Jochen initiated a discussion on Clean Coding ) i could not stay till the end - but from what i have heard - the longer you stay the more fun you have till 1600. Developers in the Facebook grouping i invite you to stay tuned about the various developer communities popping up - where you can come to share and learn good practices, develop the entrepreneurial spirit, and learn and share your passion about technologies" -- Arnaud on Facebook More feedback has been posted on the event directly. So, should I really write more? Wouldn't that spoil the impressions? Starting the day with a surprise Indeed, I was very pleased to stumble over the existence of Mobile Monday Mauritius on LinkedIn, an association about any kind of mobile app development, mobile gadgets and latest smartphones on the market. Despite the Monday in their name they had scheduled their recent meeting on Saturday between 10:00 and 12:00hrs. Wow, what a coincidence! Let's grap the bull by its horns and pay them an introductory visit. As they chose the Ebene Accelerator at the Orange Tower in Ebene it was a no-brainer to leave home a bit earlier and stop by. It was quite an experience and fun to talk to the geeks over there. Really looking forward to organise something together.... Arriving at the venue As the children got a bit uneasy at the MoMo gathering and I didn't want to disturb them too much, we arrived early at Bagatelle. Well, no problems as we went for a decent breakfast at Food Lover's Market. Shortly afterwards we went to our venue location, Talking Drums, and prepared the room for the meeting. We only had to take off a repro-painting of the wall in order to have a decent area for the projector. All went very smooth and my two little ones were of great help. Just in time, our first craftsman Avinash arrived on the spot. And then the waiting started... Luckily, not too long. Bit by bit more and more IT people came to join our meeting. Meanwhile, I used the time to give a brief introduction about the MSCC in general, what we are (hm, maybe I am) trying to achieve and that the recent phase is completely focused on creating more awareness that a community like the MSCC is active here in Mauritius. As soon as we reached some 'critical mass' of about ten people I asked everyone for a short introduction and bio, just in case... Conversation between participants started to kick in and we were actually more networking than having a focus on our topics of the day. Quick updates on latest news and development around the MSCC Finally, Clean Code Developer No matter how the position is actually called, whether it is Software Engineer, Software Developer, Programmer, Architect, or Craftsman, anyone working in IT is facing almost the same obstacles. As for the process of writing software applications there are re-occurring patterns and principles combined with some common exercise and best practices on how to resolve them. Initiated by the must-read book 'Clean Code' by Robert C. Martin (aka Uncle Bob) the concept of the Clean Code Developer (CCD) was born already some years ago. CCD is much likely to traditional martial arts where you create awareness of certain principles and learn how to apply practices to improve your style. The CCD initiative recommends to indicate your level of knowledge and experience with coloured wrist bands - equivalent to the belt colours - for various reasons. Frankly speaking, I think that the biggest advantage here is provided by the obvious recognition of conceptual understanding. For example, take the situation of a team meeting... A member with a higher grade in CCD, say Green grade, sees that there are mainly Red grades to talk to, and adjusts her way of communication to their level of understanding. The choice of words might change as certain elements of CCD are not yet familiar to all team members. So instead of talking in an abstract way which only Green grades could follow the whole scenario comes down to Red grade level. Different story, better results... Similar to learning martial arts, we only covered two grades during this occasion - black and red. Most interestingly, there was quite some positive feedback and lots of questions about the principles and practices of the red grade. And we gathered real-world examples from various craftsman and discussed them. Following the Clean Code Developer Red Grade and some annotations from our meetup: CCD Red Grade - Principles Don't Repeat Yourself - DRY Keep It Simple, Stupid (and Short) - KISS Beware of Optimisations! Favour Composition over Inheritance - FCoI Interestingly most of the attendees already heard about those key words but couldn't really classify or categorize them. It's very similar to a situation in which you do not the particular for a thing and have to describe it to others... until someone tells you the actual name and suddenly all is very simple. CCD Red Grade - Practices Follow the Boy Scouts Rule Root Cause Analysis - RCA Use a Version Control System Apply Simple Refactoring Pattern Reflect Daily Introduction to the principles and practices of Clean Code Developer - here: Red Grade As for the various ToDo's we commonly agreed that the Boy Scout Rule clearly is not limited to software development or IT administration but applies to daily life in general. Same for the root cause analysis, btw. We really had good stories with surprisingly endings and conclusions. A quick check about who is using a version control system brought more drive into the conversation. Not only that we had people that aren't using any VCS at all, we also had the 'classic' approach of backup folders and naming conventions as well as the VCS 'junkie' that has to use multiple systems at a time. Just for the records: Git and GitHub seem to be in favour of some of the attendees. Regarding the daily reflection at the end of the day we came up with an easy solution: Wrap it up as a blog entry! Certifications in IT This is kind of a controversy in IT in general. Is it interesting to go for certifications or are they completely obsolete? What are the possibilities to get certified? What are the options we have in Mauritius? How would certificates stand compared to other educational tracks like Computer Science or Web Design. The ratio between craftsmen with certifications like MCP, MSTS, CCNA or LPI versus the ones without wasn't in favour for the first group but there was a high interest in the topic itself and some were really surprised to hear that exam preparations are completely free available online including temporarily voucher codes for either discounts or completely free exams. Furthermore, we discussed possible options on forming so-called study groups on a specific certificates and organising more frequent meetups in order to learn together. Taking into consideration that we have sponsored access to the video course material of Pluralsight (and now PeepCode as well as TrainSignal), we might give it a try by the end of the year. Current favourites are LPIC Level 1 and one of the Microsoft exams 40-78x. Feedback and ideas for the MSCC The closing conversations and discussions about how the MSCC is recently doing, what are the possibilities and what's (hopefully) going to happen in the future were really fertile and I made a couple of mental bullet points which I'm looking forward to tackle down together with orher craftsmen. Eventually, it might be a good option to elaborate on some issues during our weekly Code & Coffee sessions one Wednesday morning. Active discussion on various IT topics like certifications (LPI, MCP, CCNA, etc) and sharing experience Finally, we made it till the end of the planned time. Well, actually the talk was still on and we continued even after 16:00hrs. Unfortunately, we (the children and I) had to leave for evening activities. My resume of the day... It was great to have 15 craftsmen in one room. There are hundreds of IT geeks out there in Mauritius, and as Mauritius Software Craftsmanship Community we still have a lot of work to do to pass on the message to some more key players and companies. Currently, it seems that we are able to attract a good number of students in Computer Science... but we have a lot more to offer, even or especially for IT people on the job. I'm already looking forward to our next Saturday meetup in the near future. PS: Meetup pictures are courtesy of Nirvan Pagooah. Thanks for sharing...

Read the article
Solaris: What comes next?

- by alanc

As you probably know by now, a few months ago, we released Solaris 11 after years of development. That of course means we now need to figure out what comes next - if Solaris 11 is “The First Cloud OS”, then what do we need to make future releases of Solaris be, to be modern and competitive when they're released? So we've been having planning and brainstorming meetings, and I've captured some notes here from just one of those we held a couple weeks ago with a number of the Silicon Valley based engineers. Now before someone sees an idea here and calls their product rep wanting to know what's up, please be warned what follows are rough ideas, and as I'll discuss later, none of them have any committment, schedule, working code, or even plan for integration in any possible future product at this time. (Please don't make me force you to read the full Oracle future product disclaimer here, you should know it by heart already from the front of every Oracle product slide deck.) To start with, we did some background research, looking at ideas from other Oracle groups, and competitive OS'es. We examined what was hot in the technology arena and where the interesting startups were heading. We then looked at Solaris to see where we could apply those ideas. Making Network Admins into Socially Networking Admins We all know an admin who has grumbled about being the only one stuck late at work to fix a problem on the server, or having to work the weekend alone to do scheduled maintenance. But admins are humans (at least most are), and crave companionship and community with their fellow humans. And even when they're alone in the server room, they're never far from a network connection, allowing access to the wide world of wonders on the Internet. Our solution here is not building a new social network - there's enough of those already, and Oracle even has its own Oracle Mix social network already. What we proposed is integrating Solaris features to help engage our system admins with these social networks, building community and bringing them recognition in the workplace, using achievement recognition systems as found in many popular gaming platforms. For instance, if you had a Facebook account, and a group of admin friends there, you could register it with our Social Network Utility For Facebook, and then your friends might see: Alan earned the achievement Critically Patched (April 2012) for patching all his servers. Matt is only at 50% - encourage him to complete this achievement today! To avoid any undue risk of advertising who has unpatched servers that are easier targets for hackers to break into, this information would be tightly protected via Facebook's world-renowned privacy settings to avoid it falling into the wrong hands. A related form of gamification we considered was replacing simple certfications with role-playing-game-style Experience Levels. Instead of just knowing an admin passed a test establishing a given level of competency, these would provide recruiters with a more detailed level of how much real-world experience an admin has. Achievements such as the one above would feed into it, but larger numbers of experience points would be gained by tougher or more critical tasks - such as recovering a down system, or migrating a service to a new platform. (As long as it was an Oracle platform of course - migrating to an HP or IBM platform would cause the admin to lose points with us.) Unfortunately, we couldn't figure out a good way to prevent (if you will) “gaming” the system. For instance, a disgruntled admin might decide to start ignoring warnings from FMA that a part is beginning to fail or skip preventative maintenance, in the hopes that they'd cause a catastrophic failure to earn more points for bolstering their resume as they look for a job elsewhere, and not worrying about the effect on your business of a mission critical server going down. More Z's for ZFS Our suggested new feature for ZFS was inspired by the worlds most successful Z-startup of all time: Zynga. Using the Social Network Utility For Facebook described above, we'd tie it in with ZFS monitoring to help you out when you find yourself in a jam needing more disk space than you have, and can't wait a month to get a purchase order through channels to buy more. Instead with the click of a button you could post to your group: Alan can't find any space in his server farm! Can you help? Friends could loan you some space on their connected servers for a few weeks, knowing that you'd return the favor when needed. ZFS would create a new filesystem for your use on their system, and securely share it with your system using Kerberized NFS. If none of your friends have space, then you could buy temporary use space in small increments at affordable rates right there in Facebook, using your Facebook credits, and then file an expense report later, after the urgent need has passed. Universal Single Sign On One thing all the engineers agreed on was that we still had far too many "Single" sign ons to deal with in our daily work. On the web, every web site used to have its own password database, forcing us to hope we could remember what login name was still available on each site when we signed up, and which unique password we came up with to avoid having to disclose our other passwords to a new site. In recent years, the web services world has finally been reducing the number of logins we have to manage, with many services allowing you to login using your identity from Google, Twitter or Facebook. So we proposed following their lead, introducing PAM modules for web services - no more would you have to type in whatever login name IT assigned and try to remember the password you chose the last time password aging forced you to change it - you'd simply choose which web service you wanted to authenticate against, and would login to your Solaris account upon reciept of a cookie from their identity service. Pinning notes to the cloud We also all noted that we all have our own pile of notes we keep in our daily work - in text files in our home directory, in notebooks we carry around, on white boards in offices and common areas, on sticky notes on our monitors, or on scraps of paper pinned to our bulletin boards. The contents of the notes vary, some are things just for us, some are useful for our groups, some we would share with the world. For instance, when our group moved to a new building a couple years ago, we had a white board in the hallway listing all the NIS & DNS servers, subnets, and other network configuration information we needed to set up our Solaris machines after the move. Similarly, as Solaris 11 was finishing and we were all learning the new network configuration commands, we shared notes in wikis and e-mails with our fellow engineers. Users may also remember one of the popular features of Sun's old BigAdmin site was a section for sharing scripts and tips such as these. Meanwhile, the online "pin board" at Pinterest is taking the web by storm. So we thought, why not mash those up to solve this problem? We proposed a new BigAddPin site where users could “pin” notes, command snippets, configuration information, and so on. For instance, once they had worked out the ideal Automated Installation manifest for their app server, they could pin it up to share with the rest of their group, or choose to make it public as an example for the world. Localized data, such as our group's notes on the servers for our subnet, could be shared only to users connecting from that subnet. And notes that they didn't want others to see at all could be marked private, such as the list of phone numbers to call for late night pizza delivery to the machine room, the birthdays and anniversaries they can never remember but would be sleeping on the couch if they forgot, or the list of automatically generated completely random, impossible to remember root passwords to all their servers. For greater integration with Solaris, we'd put support right into the command shells — redirect output to a pinned note, set your path to include pinned notes as scripts you can run, or bring up your recent shell history and pin a set of commands to save for the next time you need to remember how to do that operation. Location service for Solaris servers A longer term plan would involve convincing the hardware design groups to put GPS locators with wireless transmitters in future server designs. This would help both admins and service personnel trying to find servers in todays massive data centers, and could feed into location presence apps to help show potential customers that while they may not see many Solaris machines on the desktop any more, they are all around. For instance, while walking down Wall Street it might show “There are over 2000 Solaris computers in this block.” [Note: this proposal was made before the recent media coverage of a location service aggregrator app with less noble intentions, and in hindsight, we failed to consider what happens when such data similarly falls into the wrong hands. We certainly wouldn't want our app to be misinterpreted as “There are over $20 million dollars of SPARC servers in this building, waiting for you to steal them.” so it's probably best it was rejected.] Harnessing the power of the GPU for Security Most modern OS'es make use of the widespread availability of high powered GPU hardware in today's computers, with desktop environments requiring 3-D graphics acceleration, whether in Ubuntu Unity, GNOME Shell on Fedora, or Aero Glass on Windows, but we haven't yet made Solaris fully take advantage of this, beyond our basic offering of Compiz on the desktop. Meanwhile, more businesses are interested in increasing security by using biometric authentication, but must also comply with laws in many countries preventing discrimination against employees with physical limations such as missing eyes or fingers, not to mention the lost productivity when employees can't login due to tinted contacts throwing off a retina scan or a paper cut changing their fingerprint appearance until it heals. Fortunately, the two groups considering these problems put their heads together and found a common solution, using 3D technology to enable authentication using the one body part all users are guaranteed to have - pam_phrenology.so, a new PAM module that uses an array USB attached web cams (or just one if the user is willing to spin their chair during login) to take pictures of the users head from all angles, create a 3D model and compare it to the one in the authentication database. While Mythbusters has shown how easy it can be to fool common fingerprint scanners, we have not yet seen any evidence that people can impersonate the shape of another user's cranium, no matter how long they spend beating their head against the wall to reshape it. This could possibly be extended to group users, using modern versions of some of the older phrenological studies, such as giving all users with long grey beards access to the System Architect role, or automatically placing users with pointy spikes in their hair into an easy use mode. Unfortunately, there are still some unsolved technical challenges we haven't figured out how to overcome. Currently, a visit to the hair salon causes your existing authentication to expire, and some users have found that shaving their heads is the only way to avoid bad hair days becoming bad login days. Reaction to these ideas After gathering all our notes on these ideas from the engineering brainstorming meeting, we took them in to present to our management. Unfortunately, most of their reaction cannot be printed here, and they chose not to accept any of these ideas as they were, but they did have some feedback for us to consider as they sent us back to the drawing board. They strongly suggested our ideas would be better presented if we weren't trying to decipher ink blotches that had been smeared by the condensation when we put our pint glasses on the napkins we were taking notes on, and to that end let us know they would not be approving any more engineering offsites in Irish themed pubs on the Friday of a Saint Patrick's Day weekend. (Hopefully they mean that situation specifically and aren't going to deny the funding for travel to this year's X.Org Developer's Conference just because it happens to be in Bavaria and ending on the Friday of the weekend Oktoberfest starts.) They recommended our research techniques could be improved over just sitting around reading blogs and checking our Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest accounts, such as considering input from alternate viewpoints on topics such as gamification. They also mentioned that Oracle hadn't fully adopted some of Sun's common practices and we might have to try harder to get those to be accepted now that we are one unified company. So as I said at the beginning, don't pester your sales rep just yet for any of these, since they didn't get approved, but if you have better ideas, pass them on and maybe they'll get into our next batch of planning.

Read the article
Day 6 - Game Menuing Woes and Future Screen Sneak Peeks

- by dapostolov

So, after my last post on Day 5 I dabbled with my game class design. I took the approach where each game objects is tightly coupled with a graphic. The good news is I got the menu working but not without some hard knocks and game growing pains. I'll explain later, but for now...here is a class diagram of my first stab at my class structure and some code... Ok, there are few mistakes, however, I'm going to leave it as is for now... As you can see I created an inital abstract base class called GameSprite. This class when inherited will provide a simple virtual default draw method: public virtual void DrawSprite(SpriteBatch spriteBatch) { spriteBatch.Draw(Sprite, Position, Color.White); } The benefits of coding it this way allows me to inherit the class and utilise the method in the screen draw method...So regardless of what the graphic object type is it will now have the ability to render a static image on the screen. Example: public class MyStaticTreasureChest : GameSprite {} If you remember the window draw method from Day 3's post, we could use the above code as follows... protected override void Draw(GameTime gameTime) { GraphicsDevice.Clear(Color.CornflowerBlue); spriteBatch.Begin(SpriteBlendMode.AlphaBlend); foreach(var gameSprite in ListOfGameObjects) { gameSprite.DrawSprite(spriteBatch); } spriteBatch.End(); base.Draw(gameTime); } I have to admit the GameSprite object is pretty plain as with its DrawSprite method... But ... we now have the ability to render 3 static menu items on the screen ... BORING! I want those menu items to do something exciting, which of course involves animation... So, let's have a peek at AnimatedGameSprite in the above game diagram. The idea with the AnimatedGameSprite is that it has an image to animate...such as ... characters, fireballs, and... menus! So after inheriting from GameSprite class, I added a few more options such as UpdateSprite... public virtual void UpdateSprite(float elapsed) { _totalElapsed += elapsed; if (_totalElapsed > _timePerFrame) { _frame++; _frame = _frame % _framecount; _totalElapsed -= _timePerFrame; } } And an overidden DrawSprite... public override void DrawSprite(SpriteBatch spriteBatch) { int FrameWidth = Sprite.Width / _framecount; Rectangle sourcerect = new Rectangle(FrameWidth * _frame, 0, FrameWidth, Sprite.Height); spriteBatch.Draw(Sprite, Position, sourcerect, Color.White, _rotation, _origin, _scale, SpriteEffects.None, _depth); } With these two methods...I can animate and image, all I had to do was add a few more lines to the screens Update Method (From Day 3), like such: float elapsed = (float) gameTime.ElapsedGameTime.TotalSeconds; foreach (var item in ListOfAnimatedGameObjects) { item.UpdateSprite(elapsed); } And voila! My images begin to animate in one spot, on the screen... Hmm, but how do I interact with the menu items using a mouse...well the mouse cursor was easy enough... this.IsMouseVisible = true; But, to have it "interact" with an image was a bit more tricky...I had to perform collision detection! mouseStateCurrent = Mouse.GetState(); var uiEnabledSprites = (from s in menuItems where s.IsEnabled select s).ToList(); foreach (var item in uiEnabledSprites) { var r = new Rectangle((int)item.Position.X, (int)item.Position.Y, item.Sprite.Width, item.Sprite.Height); item.MenuState = MenuState.Normal; if (r.Intersects(new Rectangle(mouseStateCurrent.X, mouseStateCurrent.Y, 0, 0))) { item.MenuState = MenuState.Hover; if (mouseStatePrevious.LeftButton == ButtonState.Pressed && mouseStateCurrent.LeftButton == ButtonState.Released) { item.MenuState = MenuState.Pressed; } } } mouseStatePrevious = mouseStateCurrent; So, basically, what it is doing above is iterating through all my interactive objects and detecting a rectangle collision and the object , plays the state animation (or static image). Lessons Learned, Time Burned... So, I think I did well to start, but after I hammered out my prototype...well...things got sloppy and I began to realise some design flaws... At the time: I couldn't seem to figure out how to open another window, such as the character creation screen Input was not event based and it was bugging me My menu design relied heavily on mouse input and I couldn't use keyboard. Mouse input, is tightly bound with graphic rendering / positioning, so its logic will have to be in each scene. Menu animations would stop mid frame, then continue when the action occured again. This is bad, because...what if I had a sword sliding onthe screen? Then it would slide a quarter of the way, then stop due to another action, then render again mid-slide... it just looked sloppy. Menu, Solved!? To solve the above problems I did a little research and I found some great code in the XNA forums. The one worth mentioning was the GameStateManagementSample. With this sample, you can create a basic "text based" menu system which allows you to swap screens, popup screens, play the game, and quit....basic game state management... In my next post I'm going to dwelve a bit more into this code and adapt it with my code from this prototype. Text based menus just won't cut it for me, for now...however, I'm still going to stick with my animated menu item idea. A sneak peek using the Game State Management Sample...with no changes made... Cool Things to Mention: At work ... I tend to break out in random conversations every-so-often and I get talking about some of my challenges with this game (or some stupid observation about something... stupid) During one conversation I was discussing how I should animate my images; I explained that I knew I had to use the Update method provided, but I didn't know how (at the time) to render an image at an appropriate "pace" and how many frames to use, etc.. I also got thinking that if a machine rendered my images faster / slower, that was surely going to f-up my animations. To which a friend, Sheldon, answered, surely the Draw method is like a camera taking a snapshot of a scene in time. Then it clicked...I understood the big picture of the game engine... After some research I discovered that the Draw method attempts to keep a framerate of 60 fps. From what I understand, the game engine will even leave out a few calls to the draw method if it begins to slow down. This is why we want to put our sprite updates in the update method. Then using a game timer (provided by the engine), we want to render the scene based on real time passed, not framerate. So even the engine renders at 20 fps, the animations will still animate at the same real time speed! Which brings up another point. Why 60 fps? I'm speculating that Microsoft capped it because LCD's dont' refresh faster than 60 fps? On another note, If the game engine knows its falling behind in rendering...then surely we can harness this to speed up our games. Maybe I can find some flag which tell me if the game is lagging, and what the current framerate is, etc...(instead of coding it like I did last time) Sheldon, suggested maybe I can render like WoW does, in prioritised layers...I think he's onto something, however I don't think I'll have that many graphics to worry about such a problem of graphic latency. We'll see. People to Mention: Well,as you are aware I hadn't posted in a couple days and I was surprised to see a few emails and messenger queries about my game progress (and some concern as to why I stopped). I want to thank everyone for their kind words of support and put everyone at ease by stating that I do intend on completing this project. Granted I only have a few hours each night, but, I'll do it. Thank you to Garth for mailing in my next screen! That was a nice surprise! The Sneek Peek you've been waiting for... Garth has also volunteered to render me some wizard images. He was a bit shocked when I asked for them in 2D animated strips. He said I was going backward (and that I have really bad Game Development Lingo). But, I advised Garth that I will use 3D images later...for now...2D images. Garth also had some great game design ideas to add on. I advised him that I will save his ideas and include them in the future design document (for the 3d version?). Lastly, my best friend Alek, is going to join me in developing this game. This was a project we started eons ago but never completed because of our careers. Now, priorities change and we have some spare time on our hands. Let's see what trouble Alek and I can get into! Tonight I'll be uploading my prototypes and base game to a source control for both of us to work off of. D.

Read the article
Changing html <-> ajax <-> php/mysql to threaded approach

- by Saif Bechan

I have an application that needs to be updated real-time. There are various counters and other information that have to come from the database and the system needs to be up to date for the user. My approach now is just a normal ajax request every second to get the new values from the database. There is a JavaScript which loops every second getting the values trough ajax. This works fine but I think its very inefficient. The problem There is an ajax script that loops every second requesting data from php # On the server it has to load the PHP interpeter The PHP file has to get the data and format it correctly # PHP has to make a connection with the mysql database Work with the database(reads,never writes) Format the data so it can be send Send the data back to the browser # Close the database connection, and close the php interpeter Last the browser has to read these values and update the various html parts Now with this approach it has to load the interpreter and make a db connection every second. I was thinking of a way to make this more efficient, and maybe use a threaded approach to this. Threaded aprouch Do a post to the PHP when you enter the page and keep the connection alive In PHP only load the interpreter once, and make a connection to the DB ones Every second send an ajax response to the javascript listener The javascript listener than just changes values as the response from php arrives. I think this approach will be a great optimization to the server load and overall performance. But I can spot some weak point in the system and i need some help with these. Problems with the approach PHP execution time limit I don't think PHP is designed for such a setup. I know there is a time limit on php script execution. I don't know if an everlasting loop in PHP will cause any serious cpu/memory problems. Sending ajax request without breaking I don't know if it is possible to have just one ajax post action and have open and accepting data. user exists the page What will happen when the user exists the page and the PHP script is still going. Will it go on forever. security issues so far i can't think of any security issues. Almost every setup you use have some security issues. Maybe there are some with this solution I do not know of. Open to other solution I really want to change the setup as it is now and move to a threaded approach or better. If someone has a better approach to tackle this I definitely want to hear that. Maybe the usage of some other scripts is better suited for having an ongoing runtime. I only know php and java so any suggestions are welcome and I am willing to dig trough. I know there are things like perl, python etcetera that are used for this type of threaded but i don't know which one is best suited. When using other script If the best way is to go with other type of script like perl,python etcetera I do have some critera. The script has to be accessible via ajax post If it accepts some kind of json encode/decode it would be nice The script has to be able to access the session file This is essential because I need to know if the user is logged in The script has to be able to easily talk to MySQL All comments are welcome, and I hope this question is helpful to other also. Cheers!

Read the article
Persistence classes in Qt

- by zarzych

Hi, I'm porting a medium-sized CRUD application from .Net to Qt and I'm looking for a pattern for creating persistence classes. In .Net I usually created abstract persistence class with basic methods (insert, update, delete, select) for example: public class DAOBase<T> { public T GetByPrimaryKey(object primaryKey) {...} public void DeleteByPrimaryKey(object primaryKey) {...} public List<T> GetByField(string fieldName, object value) {...} public void Insert(T dto) {...} public void Update(T dto) {...} } Then, I subclassed it for specific tables/DTOs and added attributes for DB table layout: [DBTable("note", "note_id", NpgsqlTypes.NpgsqlDbType.Integer)] [DbField("note_id", NpgsqlTypes.NpgsqlDbType.Integer, "NoteId")] [DbField("client_id", NpgsqlTypes.NpgsqlDbType.Integer, "ClientId")] [DbField("title", NpgsqlTypes.NpgsqlDbType.Text, "Title", "")] [DbField("body", NpgsqlTypes.NpgsqlDbType.Text, "Body", "")] [DbField("date_added", NpgsqlTypes.NpgsqlDbType.Date, "DateAdded")] class NoteDAO : DAOBase<NoteDTO> { } Thanks to .Net reflection system I was able to achieve heavy code reuse and easy creation of new ORMs. The simplest way to do this kind of stuff in Qt seems to be using model classes from QtSql module. Unfortunately, in my case they provide too abstract an interface. I need at least transactions support and control over individual commits which QSqlTableModel doesn't provide. Could you give me some hints about solving this problem using Qt or point me to some reference materials? Update: Based on Harald's clues I've implemented a solution that is quite similar to the .Net classes above. Now I have two classes. UniversalDAO that inherits QObject and deals with QObject DTOs using metatype system: class UniversalDAO : public QObject { Q_OBJECT public: UniversalDAO(QSqlDatabase dataBase, QObject *parent = 0); virtual ~UniversalDAO(); void insert(const QObject &dto); void update(const QObject &dto); void remove(const QObject &dto); void getByPrimaryKey(QObject &dto, const QVariant &key); }; And a generic SpecializedDAO that casts data obtained from UniversalDAO to appropriate type: template<class DTO> class SpecializedDAO { public: SpecializedDAO(UniversalDAO *universalDao) virtual ~SpecializedDAO() {} DTO defaultDto() const { return DTO; } void insert(DTO dto) { dao->insert(dto); } void update(DTO dto) { dao->update(dto); } void remove(DTO dto) { dao->remove(dto); } DTO getByPrimaryKey(const QVariant &key); }; Using the above, I declare the concrete DAO class as following: class ClientDAO : public QObject, public SpecializedDAO<ClientDTO> { Q_OBJECT public: ClientDAO(UniversalDAO *dao, QObject *parent = 0) : QObject(parent), SpecializedDAO<ClientDTO>(dao) {} }; From within ClientDAO I have to set some database information for UniversalDAO. That's where my implementation gets ugly because I do it like this: QMap<QString, QString> fieldMapper; fieldMapper["client_id"] = "clientId"; fieldMapper["name"] = "firstName"; /* ...all column <-> field pairs in here... */ dao->setFieldMapper(fieldMapper); dao->setTable("client"); dao->setPrimaryKey("client_id"); I do it in constructor so it's not visible at a first glance for someone browsing through the header. In .Net version it was easy to spot and understand. Do you have some ideas how I could make it better?

Read the article
C program runs in Cygwin but not Linux (Malloc)

- by Shawn

I have a heap allocation error that I cant spot in my code that is picked up on vanguard/gdb on Linux but runs perfectly on a Windows cygwin environment. I understand that Linux could be tighter with its heap allocation than Windows but I would really like to have a response that discovers the issue/possible fix. I'm also aware that I shouldn't typecast malloc in C but it's a force of habit and doesn't change my problem from happening. My program actually compiles without error on both Linux & Windows but when I run it in Linux I get a scary looking result: malloc.c:3074: sYSMALLOc: Assertion `(old_top == (((mbinptr) (((char *) &((av)-bins[((1) - 1) * 2])) - __builtin_offsetof (struct malloc_chunk, fd)))) && old_size == 0) || ((unsigned long) (old_size) = (unsigned long)((((__builtin_offsetof (struct malloc_chunk, fd_nextsize))+((2 * (sizeof(size_t))) - 1)) & ~((2 * (sizeof(size_t))) - 1))) && ((old_top)-size & 0x1) && ((unsigned long)old_end & pagemask) == 0)' failed. Aborted Attached snippet from my code that is being pointed to as the error for review: /* Main */ int main(int argc, char * argv[]) { FILE *pFile; unsigned char *buffer; long int lSize; pFile = fopen ( argv[1] , "r" ); if (pFile==NULL) {fputs ("File error on arg[1]",stderr); return 1;} fseek (pFile , 0 , SEEK_END); lSize = ftell (pFile); rewind (pFile); buffer = (char*) malloc(sizeof(char) * lSize+1); if (buffer == NULL) {fputs ("Memory error",stderr); return 2;} bitpair * ppairs = (bitpair *) malloc(sizeof(bitpair) * (lSize+1)); //line 51 below calcpair(ppairs, (lSize+1)); /* irrelevant stuff */ fclose(pFile); free(buffer); free(ppairs); } typedef struct { long unsigned int a; //not actual variable names... Yes I need them to be long unsigned long unsigned int b; long unsigned int c; long unsigned int d; long unsigned int e; } bitpair; void calcpair(bitpair * ppairs, long int bits); void calcPairs(bitpair * ppairs, long int bits) { long int i, top, bot, var_1, var_2; int count = 0; for(i = 0; i < cs; i++) { top = 0; ppairs[top].e = 1; do { bot = count; count++; } while(ppairs[bot].e != 0); ppairs[bot].e = 1; var_1 = bot; var_2 = top; calcpair * bp = &ppairs[var_2]; bp->a = var_2; bp->b = var_1; bp->c = i; bp = &ppairs[var_1]; bp->a = var_2; bp->b = var_1; bp->c = i; } return; } gdb reports: free(): invalid pointer: 0x0000000000603290 * valgrind reports the following message 5 times before exiting due to "VALGRIND INTERNAL ERROR" signal 11 (SIGSEGV): Invalid read of size 8 ==2727== at 0x401043: calcPairs (in /home/user/Documents/5-3/ubuntu test/main) ==2727== by 0x400C9A: main (main.c:51) ==2727== Address 0x5a607a0 is not stack'd, malloc'd or (recently) free'd

Read the article
Problem trying to achieve a join using the `comments` contrib in Django

- by NiKo

Hi, Django rookie here. I have this model, comments are managed with the django_comments contrib: class Fortune(models.Model): author = models.CharField(max_length=45, blank=False) title = models.CharField(max_length=200, blank=False) slug = models.SlugField(_('slug'), db_index=True, max_length=255, unique_for_date='pub_date') content = models.TextField(blank=False) pub_date = models.DateTimeField(_('published date'), db_index=True, default=datetime.now()) votes = models.IntegerField(default=0) comments = generic.GenericRelation( Comment, content_type_field='content_type', object_id_field='object_pk' ) I want to retrieve Fortune objects with a supplementary nb_comments value for each, counting their respectve number of comments ; I try this query: >>> Fortune.objects.annotate(nb_comments=models.Count('comments')) From the shell: >>> from django_fortunes.models import Fortune >>> from django.db.models import Count >>> Fortune.objects.annotate(nb_comments=Count('comments')) [<Fortune: My first fortune, from NiKo>, <Fortune: Another One, from Dude>, <Fortune: A funny one, from NiKo>] >>> from django.db import connection >>> connection.queries.pop() {'time': '0.000', 'sql': u'SELECT "django_fortunes_fortune"."id", "django_fortunes_fortune"."author", "django_fortunes_fortune"."title", "django_fortunes_fortune"."slug", "django_fortunes_fortune"."content", "django_fortunes_fortune"."pub_date", "django_fortunes_fortune"."votes", COUNT("django_comments"."id") AS "nb_comments" FROM "django_fortunes_fortune" LEFT OUTER JOIN "django_comments" ON ("django_fortunes_fortune"."id" = "django_comments"."object_pk") GROUP BY "django_fortunes_fortune"."id", "django_fortunes_fortune"."author", "django_fortunes_fortune"."title", "django_fortunes_fortune"."slug", "django_fortunes_fortune"."content", "django_fortunes_fortune"."pub_date", "django_fortunes_fortune"."votes" LIMIT 21'} Below is the properly formatted sql query: SELECT "django_fortunes_fortune"."id", "django_fortunes_fortune"."author", "django_fortunes_fortune"."title", "django_fortunes_fortune"."slug", "django_fortunes_fortune"."content", "django_fortunes_fortune"."pub_date", "django_fortunes_fortune"."votes", COUNT("django_comments"."id") AS "nb_comments" FROM "django_fortunes_fortune" LEFT OUTER JOIN "django_comments" ON ("django_fortunes_fortune"."id" = "django_comments"."object_pk") GROUP BY "django_fortunes_fortune"."id", "django_fortunes_fortune"."author", "django_fortunes_fortune"."title", "django_fortunes_fortune"."slug", "django_fortunes_fortune"."content", "django_fortunes_fortune"."pub_date", "django_fortunes_fortune"."votes" LIMIT 21 Can you spot the problem? Django won't LEFT JOIN the django_comments table with the content_type data (which contains a reference to the fortune one). This is the kind of query I'd like to be able to generate using the ORM: SELECT "django_fortunes_fortune"."id", "django_fortunes_fortune"."author", "django_fortunes_fortune"."title", COUNT("django_comments"."id") AS "nb_comments" FROM "django_fortunes_fortune" LEFT OUTER JOIN "django_comments" ON ("django_fortunes_fortune"."id" = "django_comments"."object_pk") LEFT OUTER JOIN "django_content_type" ON ("django_comments"."content_type_id" = "django_content_type"."id") GROUP BY "django_fortunes_fortune"."id", "django_fortunes_fortune"."author", "django_fortunes_fortune"."title", "django_fortunes_fortune"."slug", "django_fortunes_fortune"."content", "django_fortunes_fortune"."pub_date", "django_fortunes_fortune"."votes" LIMIT 21 But I don't manage to do it, so help from Django veterans would be much appreciated :) Hint: I'm using Django 1.2-DEV Thanks in advance for your help.

Read the article
Unable to launch onscreen keyboard (osk.exe) from a 32-bit process on Win7 x64

- by Steven Robbins

90% of the time I am unable to launch osk.exe from a 32bit process on Win7 x64. Originally the code was just using: Process.Launch("osk.exe"); Which won't work on x64 because of the directory virtualization. Not a problem I thought, I'll just disable virtualization, launch the app, and enable it again, which I thought was the correct way to do things. I also added some code to bring the keyboard back up if it has been minimized (which works fine) - the code (in a sample WPF app) now looks as follows: using System; using System.Collections.Generic; using System.Linq; using System.Text; 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.Diagnostics; using System.Runtime.InteropServices; namespace KeyboardTest { /// <summary> /// Interaction logic for MainWindow.xaml /// </summary> public partial class MainWindow : Window { [DllImport("kernel32.dll", SetLastError = true)] private static extern bool Wow64DisableWow64FsRedirection(ref IntPtr ptr); [DllImport("kernel32.dll", SetLastError = true)] public static extern bool Wow64RevertWow64FsRedirection(IntPtr ptr); private const UInt32 WM_SYSCOMMAND = 0x112; private const UInt32 SC_RESTORE = 0xf120; [DllImport("user32.dll", CharSet = CharSet.Auto)] static extern IntPtr SendMessage(IntPtr hWnd, UInt32 Msg, IntPtr wParam, IntPtr lParam); private string OnScreenKeyboadApplication = "osk.exe"; public MainWindow() { InitializeComponent(); } private void KeyboardButton_Click(object sender, RoutedEventArgs e) { // Get the name of the On screen keyboard string processName = System.IO.Path.GetFileNameWithoutExtension(OnScreenKeyboadApplication); // Check whether the application is not running var query = from process in Process.GetProcesses() where process.ProcessName == processName select process; var keyboardProcess = query.FirstOrDefault(); // launch it if it doesn't exist if (keyboardProcess == null) { IntPtr ptr = new IntPtr(); ; bool sucessfullyDisabledWow64Redirect = false; // Disable x64 directory virtualization if we're on x64, // otherwise keyboard launch will fail. if (System.Environment.Is64BitOperatingSystem) { sucessfullyDisabledWow64Redirect = Wow64DisableWow64FsRedirection(ref ptr); } // osk.exe is in windows/system folder. So we can directky call it without path using (Process osk = new Process()) { osk.StartInfo.FileName = OnScreenKeyboadApplication; osk.Start(); osk.WaitForInputIdle(2000); } // Re-enable directory virtualisation if it was disabled. if (System.Environment.Is64BitOperatingSystem) if (sucessfullyDisabledWow64Redirect) Wow64RevertWow64FsRedirection(ptr); } else { // Bring keyboard to the front if it's already running var windowHandle = keyboardProcess.MainWindowHandle; SendMessage(windowHandle, WM_SYSCOMMAND, new IntPtr(SC_RESTORE), new IntPtr(0)); } } } } But this code, most of the time, throws the following exception on osk.Start(): The specified procedure could not be found at System.Diagnostics.Process.StartWithShellExecuteEx(ProcessStartInfo startInfo) I've tried putting long Thread.Sleep commands in around the osk.Start line, just to make sure it wasn't a race condition, but the same problem persists. Can anyone spot where I'm doing something wrong, or provide an alternative solution for this? It seems to work fine launching Notepad, it just won't play ball with the onscreen keyboard.

Read the article
CodePlex Daily Summary for Sunday, November 06, 2011

CodePlex Daily Summary for Sunday, November 06, 2011Popular ReleasesSelf-Tracking Entity Generator for WPF and Silverlight: Self-Tracking Entity Generator v 0.9.9 Update 2: Self-Tracking Entity Generator v 0.9.9 for Entity Framework 4.0. No change to the self-tracking entity generator v 0.9.9. WPF sample (SchoolSample) is updated with unit testing for both ViewModel and Model classes.SubExtractor: Release 1020: Feature: added "baseline double quotes" character to selector box Feature: added option to save SRT files as ANSI Feature: made "Save Sup files to Source directory" apply to both Sup and Idx source files. Fix: removed SDH text (...) or ... that is split over 2 lines Fix: better decision-making in when to prefix a line with a '-' because SDH was removedAcDown????? - Anime&Comic Downloader: AcDown????? v3.6.1: ?? ● AcDown??????????、??????，??????????????????????，???????Acfun、Bilibili、???、???、???、Tucao.cc、SF???、?????80????，???????????、?????????。 ● AcDown???????????????????????????，???，???????????????????。 ● AcDown???????C#??，????.NET Framework 2.0??。?????"Acfun?????"。 ????32??64? Windows XP/Vista/7 ????????????? ??：????????Windows XP???,?????????.NET Framework 2.0???(x86)?.NET Framework 2.0???(x64)，?????"?????????"??? ??????????????，??????????： ??"AcDown?????"????????? ?? v3.6.1?? ??.hlv...Track Folder Changes: Track Folder Changes 1.1: Fixed exception when right-clicking the root nodeKinect Toolbox: Kinect Toolbox v1.1.0.2: This version adds support for the Kinect for Windows SDK beta 2.MapWindow 4: MapWindow GIS v4.8.6 - Final release - 32Bit: This is the final release of MapWindow v4.8. It has 4.8.6 as version number. This version has been thoroughly tested. If you do get an exception send the exception to us. Don't forget to include your e-mail address. Use the forums at http://www.mapwindow.org/phorum/ for questions. Please consider donating a small portion of the money you have saved by having free GIS tools: http://www.mapwindow.org/pages/donate.php What’s New in 4.8.6 (Final release) · A few minor issues have been fixed Wha...Kinect Mouse Cursor: Kinect Mouse Cursor 1.1: Updated for Kinect for Windows SDK v1.0 Beta 2!Coding4Fun Kinect Toolkit: Coding4Fun Kinect Toolkit 1.1: Updated for Kinect for Windows SDK v1.0 Beta 2!Async Executor: 1.0: Source code of the AsyncExecutorMedia Companion: MC 3.421b Weekly: Ensure .NET 4.0 Full Framework is installed. (Available from http://www.microsoft.com/download/en/details.aspx?id=17718) Ensure the NFO ID fix is applied when transitioning from versions prior to 3.416b. (Details here) TV Show Resolutions... Fix to show the season-specials.tbn when selecting an episode from season 00. Before, MC would try & load season00.tbn Fix for issue #197 - new show added by 'Manually Add Path' not being picked up. Also made non-visible the same thing in Root Folders...Nearforums - ASP.NET MVC forum engine: Nearforums v7.0: Version 7.0 of Nearforums, the ASP.NET MVC Forum Engine, containing new features: UI: Flexible layout to handle both list and table-like template layouts. Theming - Visual choice of themes: Deliver some templates on installation, export/import functionality, preview. Allow site owners to choose default list sort order for the forums. Forum latest activity. Visit the project Roadmap for more details. Webdeploy packages sha1 checksum: e6bb913e591543ab292a753d1a16cdb779488c10?????????? - ????????: All-In-One Code Framework ??? 2011-11-02: http://download.codeplex.com/Project/Download/FileDownload.aspx?ProjectName=1codechs&DownloadId=216140 ??????，11??，?????20????Microsoft OneCode Sample，????6?Program Language Sample，2?Windows Base Sample，2?GDI+ Sample，4?Internet Explorer Sample?6?ASP.NET Sample。?????????????。 ????，?????。http://i3.codeplex.com/Project/Download/FileDownload.aspx?ProjectName=1code&DownloadId=128165 Program Language CSImageFullScreenSlideShow VBImageFullScreenSlideShow CSDynamicallyBuildLambdaExpressionWithFie...Python Tools for Visual Studio: 1.1 Alpha: We’re pleased to announce the release of Python Tools for Visual Studio 1.1 Alpha. Python Tools for Visual Studio (PTVS) is an open-source plug-in for Visual Studio which supports programming with the Python programming language. This release includes new core IDE features, a couple of new sample libraries for interacting with Kinect and Excel, and many bug fixes for issues reported since the release of 1.0. For the core IDE features we’ve added many new features which improve the basic edit...BExplorer (Better Explorer): Better Explorer 2.0.0.631 Alpha: Changelog: Added: Some new functions in ribbon Added: Possibility to choose displayed columns Added: Basic Search Fixed: Some bugs after navigation Fixed: Attempt to fix slow navigation and slow start Known issues: - BreadcrumbBar fails on some situations - Basic search not work quite well in some situations Please if anyone find bugs be kind and report them at the Issue Tracker! Thanks!DotNetNuke® Community Edition: 05.06.04: Major Highlights Fixed issue with upgrades on systems that had upgraded the Telerik library to 6.0.0 Fixed issue with Razor Host upgrade to 5.6.3 The logic for module administration checks contains incorrect logic in 1 place, opening the possibility of a user with edit permissions gaining access to functionality they should not have through a particularly crafted url Security FixesBrowsers support the ability to remember common strings such as usernames/addresses etc. Code was adde...Terminals: Version 2.0 - Beta 3 Release: Beta 3 Refresh Dont forget to backup your config files BEFORE upgrading! The team has finally put the nail into the official release date for version 2.0. As bugs are winding down on the 2.0 Roadmap we decided to push out another build - the first 2.0 Beta build. Please take time to use and abuse this release. We left logging in place, and this is a debug build so be sure to submit your logs on each bug reported, and please do report all bugs! Check the source code page on the site, th...iTuner - The iTunes Companion: iTuner 1.4.4322: Added German (unverified, apologies if incorrect) Properly source invariant resources with correct resIDs Replaced obsolete lyric providers with working providers Fix Pseudolater to correctly morph every third char Fix null reference in CatalogBaseTumbleDeck: TumbleDeck 1.0.1 Alpha: New version of TumbleDeck is out! Check it out, it's great, we will be testing it and releasing more stable versions all the time. If you spot any unwanted bugs or features you want added please, please, please email us at tumbledeck@mail.com or contact us on the Discussions tab! If you can see your old version of TumbleDeck, please uninstall it and install this version again. Thanks.VidCoder: 1.2.1: Fixed a couple regressions: video encoder was blank in queue and crashes with the High Profile preset when opening the Settings window. Fixed problem with auto-update introduced in 1.2.0. If you have 1.2.0 you will need to update manually to get this.AssaultCube Reloaded: Release 2.3: THE RELEASE YOU'VE ALL BEEN WAITING FOR! IT CAN NOW BE CONSIDERED STABLE Linux has Debian 64-bit precompiled binaries, but you can compile your own as it also contains the source. If you are using Mac or other operating systems, download the Linux package. The server pack is ready for both Windows and Linux, but you might need to compile your own for linux (source included) If you are using Windows and require the source code, download the source package!New ProjectsApploft: Apploft is a new App Platform for windows allowing you to run apps based on powerful code which can pull content from Online.Bugshooting Output for Microsoft Dynamics CRM: Provides an output DLL to use with Bugshooting.Bulk Copy Test Cases Tool for Microsoft Test Manager & TFS: A while ago I had written a blog post Microsoft Test Manager Test Case Versioning on how to manage Test Cases over multiple releases which required you to manually copy test cases individually. I have created a tool to help with the bulk copying of Test Cases that updates the ItDiagnostics Tool for Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011: Diagnostics Tool for Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 helps CRM developers and administrators to enable trace and devErrors on CRM server. It also generates an HTML report file with information about the CRM deployment.Ege University Renewable Energy Society: Ege University Renewable Energy Society Open Source Projectsfirst use of tfs: first project. connection to tfsFlagFtp: FlagFtp is a FTP library for .NET which supports various operations, such as retrieving file lists, write and read from/to files, retrieving file and directory infos, etc...LJCommon: LJCommonnwrole: .Net Worker RoleOrchard Mango Theme: Orchard Mango Theme is a simple inspired Microsoft Windows Phone OS. Original creator and designer Marco Siniscalco (http://www.marcosiniscalco.com)Project Rainbow: This is a school project from KAHO-SL in Belgium, ghent. although this is an open source site, we wish to ask not to copy or steal any of our code if you are related to our school and/or project.Rawler　-The Web scraping Framework using XAML: This is the Web scraping Framework using XAML .This framework makes Web scraping possible by only XAML. TenneySoftware Graphing Calculator: A 2D and 3D graphing calculator inspired by Analog's ZPlotter, utilizing my very own libraries to manage the 2D and 3D plotting. The article from Analog, an 8-bit Atari computer magazine from the 80's, can be located here: http://www.cyberroach.com/analog/an30/ZpltAn30.htmThe GINA bot: under constructionTime To Go: A little handy app that shows you how long you've got left until stuff.Windows Azure WordPress Accelerator: Accelerator to deploy WordPress in Windows AzureWP7 App site template: The WP7 App Site Template is intended to make it easier for Windows Phone 7 developers to market their apps. It's currently a simple one page site template, but any contributions/suggestions welcome.ZViewTV.NET: ZViewTV.NET est un programme de visualisation de flux audio-vidéo. Il a été créé par l'equipe qui à fait ZGuideTV.NET

Read the article
Why does an error appear every time I try to open the Ubuntu Software Center? [duplicate]

- by askubuntu7639

This question already has an answer here: How do I remove a broken software source? 3 answers There is a glitch on the Ubuntu Software Center and whenever I open it an error appears and it keeps loading and never opens. Why does this happen? I have installed Ubuntu 13.04 on a disk and partitioned it. Please help me and ask for excess information if you need it. If you know of any duplicates please show me them!! This is the output of a question someone asked me. SystemError: E:Type '<!DOCTYPE' is not known on line 1 in source list /etc/apt/sources.list.d/medibuntu.list This next output is the output of cat /etc/apt/sources.list.d/medibuntu.list </div> <div style="float:left;"> <div class="textwidget"><script type="text/javascript"> </div> Unixmen Archive Select Month September 2013 August 2013 July 2013 June 2013 May 2013 April 2013 March 2013 February 2013 January 2013 December 2012 November 2012 October 2012 September 2012 August 2012 July 2012 June 2012 May 2012 April 2012 March 2012 February 2012 January 2012 December 2011 November 2011 October 2011 September 2011 August 2011 July 2011 June 2011 May 2011 April 2011 March 2011 February 2011 January 2011 December 2010 November 2010 October 2010 September 2010 August 2010 July 2010 June 2010 May 2010 April 2010 March 2010 February 2010 January 2010 December 2009 November 2009 October 2009 September 2009 August 2009 July 2009 June 2009 May 2009 April 2009 March 2009 February 2009 January 2009 December 2008 Tags Cloudandroid apache browser Centos chrome command line Debian eyecandy Fedora firefox games gaming gnome google karmic koala kde libreoffice Linux linux distribution LinuxMint lucid lynx maverick meerkat mysql news oneiric ocelot openoffice opensource opensuse oracle ppa Precise Pangolin release RHEL security server software themes tools ubuntu unix upgrade virtualbox vlc windows wine Unixmen Twitts Firefox 16, a treat for developers http://t.co/cnd27CzT Ubuntu 12.10 ‘Quantal Quetzal’: Beta 2 Sneak Peek http://t.co/hd4LwDOy Top 5 security Myths about Linux; and their realities http://t.co/zO1LgHST About Us Advertising Sitemap Privacy Contact Us Hire Us Copyright © 2008-2013 Unixmen.com . Maintained by Unixmen . /* */ jQuery(document).on('ready post-load', easy_fancybox_handler ); http://www.w3-edge.com/wordpress-plugins/ Page Caching using apc Database Caching 3/186 queries in 0.035 seconds using apc Content Delivery Network via 180016988.r.cdn77.net Served from: www.unixmen.com @ 2013-09-25 01:38:14 by W3 Total Cache

Read the article
JFrame not working correctly

- by Nick Gibson

This is making me very angry, I have worked on this for 2 days, have 2 books open and have looked through them, and STILL can't get this program to run the way I want it run. I'm getting to the point where if this doesn't help, I quit. I want a SIMPLE Frame application. It has a JComboBox centered at the top. Next to it is a text field big enough to show numeric digits such as "$49.99" Below it is a spot for a Text area showing terms of service Below that is the checkbox agreeing to the terms of service Below that is 2 buttons "Accept" and "Decline" I Have worked on this for 2 days, here is the coding: public class Bar extends JFrame implements ActionListener { public Bar(final JFrame frame) { String[] tests = { "A+ Certification", "Network+ Certification", "Security+ Certification", "CIT Full Test Package" }; JButton button = new JButton("Click Meh"); add(new JLabel("Welcome to the CIT Test Program ")); add(new JLabel("Please select which Test Package from the list below.")); frame.setVisible(true); frame.setSize(250,250); JPanel pane1 = new JPanel(new FlowLayout()); JPanel pane2 = new JPanel(new FlowLayout()); JMenuBar menuBar = new JMenuBar(); JMenu fileMenu = new JMenu("File"); JMenu editMenu = new JMenu("Edit"); JMenu helpMenu = new JMenu("Help"); menuBar.add(fileMenu); menuBar.add(editMenu); menuBar.add(helpMenu); JMenuItem newMenu = new JMenuItem("New (Ctrl+N)"); JMenuItem openMenu = new JMenuItem("Open (Ctrl+O)"); JMenuItem saveMenu = new JMenuItem("Save (Ctrl+S)"); saveMenu.addActionListener(this); JMenuItem exitMenu = new JMenuItem("Exit (Ctrl+W)"); JMenuItem cutMenu = new JMenuItem("Cut (Ctrl+X)"); JMenuItem copyMenu = new JMenuItem("Copy (Ctrl+C)"); JMenuItem pasteMenu = new JMenuItem("Paste (Ctrl+V)"); JMenuItem infoMenu = new JMenuItem("Help (Ctrl+H)"); fileMenu.add(newMenu); fileMenu.add(openMenu); fileMenu.add(saveMenu); fileMenu.add(exitMenu); editMenu.add(cutMenu); editMenu.add(copyMenu); editMenu.add(pasteMenu); helpMenu.add(infoMenu); frame.setJMenuBar(menuBar); JComboBox packageChoice = new JComboBox(tests); frame.add(packageChoice); } public void actionPerformed(ActionEvent e) { Object source = e.getSource(); { } } EDIT: Forgot to add the second program public class JFrameWithPanel { public static void main(String[] args) { JPanel panel = new Bar(new JFrame("CIT Test Program")); } } How do I get this to have everything where I want it and show up? I'm very confused because of this and now barely even get how Frames work.

Read the article
CodePlex Daily Summary for Wednesday, November 07, 2012

CodePlex Daily Summary for Wednesday, November 07, 2012Popular ReleasesMetodología General Ajustada - MGA: 03.04.03: Cambios Parmenio: Ajustes al formato F02 de programación para que la sincronización de las grillas no afecte el guardado de los datos. Cambios John: Integración de código con cambios enviados por Parmenio. Generación de instaladores. Soporte técnico por correo electrónico, telefónico y en sitio.nAPI for Windows Phone: Naver Open API Library Assemblies and Source Codes: nAPI (Naver Open API Library) for Windows Family Tested on - Windows 8 (Windows Store App) - Windows Phone 7 - Windows Phone 8 (Emulator)X-tee.NET: Xtee.NET 1.0: Generaator ja teegidFiskalizacija za developere: FiskalizacijaDev 1.2: Verzija 1.2. je, prije svega, odgovor na novu verziju Tehnicke specifikacije (v1.1.) koja je objavljena prije nekoliko dana. Pored novosti vezanih uz (sitne) izmjene u spomenutoj novoj verziji Tehnicke dokumentacije, projekt smo prošili sa nekim dodatnim feature-ima od kojih je vecina proizašla iz vaših prijedloga - hvala :) Novosti u v1.2. su: - Neusuglašenost zahtjeva (http://fiskalizacija.codeplex.com/workitem/645) - Sample projekt - iznosi se množe sa 100 (http://fiskalizacija.codeplex.c...PowerComboBox: PowerComboBox VB v1.0: Visual Basic source code class file.Edi: Themable Edi: Completed ExpressionDark theme Improved Error Handling and Reporting feature Refactored all views to be look-less controlsMFCMAPI: October 2012 Release: Build: 15.0.0.1036 Full release notes at SGriffin's blog. If you just want to run the MFCMAPI or MrMAPI, get the executables. If you want to debug them, get the symbol files and the source. The 64 bit builds will only work on a machine with Outlook 2010 64 bit installed. All other machines should use the 32 bit builds, regardless of the operating system. Facebook BadgeJayData - The cross-platform HTML5 data-management library for JavaScript: JayData 1.2.3: JayData is a unified data access library for JavaScript to CRUD + Query data from different sources like OData, MongoDB, WebSQL, SqLite, HTML5 localStorage, Facebook or YQL. The library can be integrated with Knockout.js or Sencha Touch 2 and can be used on Node.js as well. See it in action in this 6 minutes video Sencha Touch 2 example app using JayData: Netflix browser. What's new in JayData 1.2.3 For detailed release notes check the release notes. TypeScript supportWrite your code in a ...SSIS Expression Editor & Tester: Expression Editor and Tester v1.0.8.0: Getting Started Download and extract the files, no install required. The ExpressionEditor.zip download contains a folder for each SQL Server version. ExpressionEditor2005 ExpressionEditor2008 ExpressionEditor2012 Changes Fixed issues 32868 and 33291 raised by BIDS Helper users. No functional changes from previous release. Versions There are three versions included, all built from the same code with the same functionality, but each targeting a different release of SQL Server. The downlo...MCEBuddy 2.x: MCEBuddy 2.3.7: Changelog for 2.3.7 (32bit and 64bit) 1. Improved performance of MP4 Fast and M4V Fast Profiles (no deinterlacing, removed --decomb) 2. Improved priority handling 3. Added support for Pausing and Resume conversions 4. Added support for fallback to source directory if network destination directory is unavailable 5. MCEBuddy now installs ShowAnalyzer during installation 6. Added support for long description atom in iTunesFoxyXLS: FoxyXLS Releases: Source code and samplesDyanamic Reports (RDLC) - SharePoint 2010 Visual WebPart: Initial Release: This is a Initial Release.HTML Renderer: HTML Renderer 1.0.0.0 (3): Major performance improvement (http://theartofdev.wordpress.com/2012/10/25/how-i-optimized-html-renderer-and-fell-in-love-with-vs-profiler/) Minor fixes raised in issue tracker and discussions.ProDinner - ASP.NET MVC Sample (EF4.4, N-Tier, jQuery): 8: update to ASP.net MVC Awesome 3.0 udpate to EntityFramework 4.4 update to MVC 4 added dinners grid on homepageASP.net MVC Awesome - jQuery Ajax Helpers: 3.0: added Grid helper added XML Documentation added textbox helper added Client Side API for AjaxList removed .SearchButton from AjaxList AjaxForm and Confirm helpers have been merged into the Form helper optimized html output for AjaxDropdown, AjaxList, Autocomplete works on MVC 3 and 4BlogEngine.NET: BlogEngine.NET 2.7: Cheap ASP.NET Hosting - $4.95/Month - Click Here!! Click Here for More Info Cheap ASP.NET Hosting - $4.95/Month - Click Here! If you want to set up and start using BlogEngine.NET right away, you should download the Web project. If you want to extend or modify BlogEngine.NET, you should download the source code. If you are upgrading from a previous version of BlogEngine.NET, please take a look at the Upgrading to BlogEngine.NET 2.7 instructions. If you looking for Web Application Project, ...Launchbar: Launchbar 4.2.2.0: This release is the first step in cleaning up the code and using all the latest features of .NET 4.5 Changes 4.2.2 (2012-11-02) Improved handling of left clicks 4.1.0 (2012-10-17) Removed tray icon Assembly renamed and signed with strong name Note When you upgrade, Launchbar will start with the default settings. You can import your previous settings by following these steps: Run Launchbar and just save the settings without configuring anything Shutdown Launchbar Go to the folder %LOCA...Mouse Jiggler: MouseJiggle-1.3: This adds the much-requested minimize-to-tray feature to Mouse Jiggler.Umbraco CMS: Umbraco 4.10.0 Release Candidate: This is a Release Candidate, which means that if we do not find any major issues in the next week, we will release this version as the final release of 4.10.0 on November 9th, 2012. The documentation for the MVC bits still lives in the Github version of the docs for now and will be updated on our.umbraco.org with the final release of 4.10.0. Browse the documentation here: https://github.com/umbraco/Umbraco4Docs/tree/4.8.0/Documentation/Reference/Mvc If you want to do only MVC then make sur...Skype Auto Recorder: SkypeAutoRecorder 1.3.4: New icon and images. Reworked settings window. Implemented high-quality sound encoding. Implemented a possibility to produce stereo records. Added buttons with system-wide hot keys for manual starting and canceling of recording. Added buttons for opening folder with records. Added Help button. Fixed an issue when recording is continuing after call end. Fixed an issue when recording doesn't start. Fixed several bugs and improved stability. Major refactoring and optimization...New Projects"On the Fly Zip and Attach" Windows Live Writer Plugin: This is a windows live writer zipping plug-in that allows you to select files/folders and zip them on the fly that will appear as attachment inserts, while you are writing blogs. Find details @ my Blogs Site: [url: Blogs: http://www.geekscafe.net|http://www.geekscafe.net].NET Micro Framework Tools: Collection of tools usefull for creating Netduino and .NET Micro Framework applications.Aktina: Aktina is a game engine written in DirectX 11.AppHub: AppHub??????AppStore???，???????，?????????，?????????，????????????，??，???????，???????????、??、??、??????????????，???????。 ??????????，????。Calcula Calles: Calcula CallesCRM 2011 ASP.NET Membership Provider: The CRM 2011 ASP.NET Membership provider Contains a Membership and Role provider, which can be used in ASP.NET Applications and/or ASP.NET based CMS systems.CSharp Executor: Dynamically execute C# script files in the same way that you might use VB scripts.Deque (by Stephen Cleary): A simple double-ended queue (deque) in C#. Unit tested.DirST: Allows one to replicate a DIRectory STructure without copying files. Written in C#.DNNTaskManager69: Testing DNN Module DevelopmentEchelon OS: an Sister Project to Aza DOS and this one is meant to be as minimilistic as it can with a filesystem and text editorGeek Reader: Lector de noticias para windows 8. Se trata de un template que permite rápidamente construir una aplicación windows 8 store GIII_P2: projekt 2katas-gpa: Codigo de los coding dojo acerca de patrones de diseñoKendoUI: Demonstrations using Kendo UI Complete for ASP.NET MVCLTorrent: C# BitTorrent and peer-to-peer protocol implementation MECopter: A real summary will follow soon...Migrate AD Group Permissions in Sharepoint/WSS: Sharepoint AD Group Migration tool, allows conversion of AD security principals used in Sharepoint ACLs from source domain to destination domainNetSend Manager: NetSend Manager is an Asp.Net console which enables you to send windows popup messages over a domain network. Messages can be send to a single user or to a grouNONAME0: ?? ? ???????-?????? ??? ?????? ???? ?????? ???? ??? ?? ???????????????? ??? ? ?????? ??? ??????????npr2012: Projekt testowy Personal News Assistant: Vision: The Personal News Assistant is an application which collects information from different sources and informs the user either on demand or preventive.PGIrony - Tookit & Examples for AST Generation with Irony: A tool-kit to ease AST generation,, and further ease grammr construction, with Irony.Proboscis: A query provider to work against HBase. Will be developed against HBase on Windows Azure.Project13251106: papaProject13271106: sdgProjet IMA: rtjRenderCraft: This is an editor like a AMD's RenderMonkey. But this supports Direct3D 11.Rx (Reactive Extensions): The Reactive Extensions (Rx) is a library for composing asynchronous and event-based programs using observable sequences and LINQ-style query operators. Sanle: sanle project with c++Screener: Screen sharing software.SemantEx: Adds a validation wrapper around regular expressions, allowing you to automatically apply conditional logic to capture groups.SharePoint CAML Extensions: SharePoint CAML ExtensionsSilentPlace: Turn on silence mode when you are in a silence placeSmartMacros: SmartMacros allows developers to define macros in C# and use them inside other source code. These macros are much stronger and safer than C/C++ macros, therefore they're called "Smart" :-)SoundArea link grabber: Soundarea link grabber the script put a list of links in your clipboard.Time Tracker Kickstart: This project is currently a work-in-progress.TransparentImage: TransparentImage is a console application that converts BMPS into PNG files. TransparentImage is written in VB and supports drop n drag.Travis7: A Travis-CI client for Windows PhoneWindows 8 Accelerator: A set of components and controls to accelerate your Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8 application development.Windows and Windows Phone DNS Library: Simple DNS lookup library for Windows and Windows Phone applicationsWinJS Toolkit - JavaScript Toolkit for Windows 8: The WinJS Toolkit is a set of classes, helper functions and tools that help creating Windows Store applications in HTML5, CSS3 and JavaScript.WPF TB: Study WPF????????: ZJU software project homework,One part of the total stocktrade system.

Read the article
What's New in Database Lifecycle Management in Enterprise Manager 12c Release 3

- by HariSrinivasan

Enterprise Manager 12c Release 3 includes improvements and enhancements across every area of the product. This blog provides an overview of the new and enhanced features in the Database Lifecycle Management area. I will deep dive into specific features more in depth in subsequent posts. "What's New?" In this release, we focused on four things: 1. Lifecycle Management Support for new Database12c - Pluggable Databases 2. Management of long running processes, such as a security patch cycle (Change Activity Planner) 3. Management of large number of systems by · Leveraging new framework capabilities for lifecycle operations, such as the new advanced ‘emcli’ script option · Refining features such as configuration search and compliance 4. Minor improvements and quality fixes to existing features · Rollback support for Single instance databases · Improved "OFFLINE" Patching experience · Faster collection of ORACLE_HOME configurations Lifecycle Management Support for new Database 12c - Pluggable Databases Database 12c introduces Pluggable Databases (PDBs), the brand new addition to help you achieve your consolidation goals. Pluggable databases offer unprecedented consolidation at database level and native lifecycle verbs for creating, plugging and unplugging the databases on a container database (CDB). Enterprise Manager can supplement the capabilities of pluggable databases by offering workflows for migrating, provisioning and cloning them using the software library and the deployment procedures. For example, Enterprise Manager can migrate an existing database to a PDB or clone a PDB by storing a versioned copy in the software library. One can also manage the planned downtime related to patching by migrating the PDBs to a new CDB. While pluggable databases offer these exciting features, it can also pose configuration management and compliance challenges if not managed properly. Enterprise Manager features like inventory management, topology associations and configuration search can mitigate the sprawl of PDBs and also lock them to predefined golden standards using configuration comparison and compliance rules. Learn More ... Management of Long Running datacenter processes - Change Activity Planner (CAP) Currently, customers resort to cumbersome methods to create, execute, track and monitor change activities within their data center. Some customers use traditional tools such as spreadsheets, project planners and in-house custom built solutions. Customers often have weekly sync up meetings across stake holders to collect status and updates. Some of the change activities, for example the quarterly patch set update (PSU) patch rollouts are not single tasks but processes with multiple tasks. Some of those tasks are performed within Enterprise Manager Cloud Control (for example Patch) and some are performed outside of Enterprise Manager Cloud Control. These tasks often run for a longer period of time and involve multiple people or teams. Enterprise Manger Cloud Control supports core data center operations such as configuration management, compliance management, and automation. Enterprise Manager Cloud Control release 12.1.0.3 leverages these capabilities and introduces the Change Activity Planner (CAP). CAP provides the ability to plan, execute, and track change activities in real time. It covers the typical datacenter activities that are spread over a long period of time, across multiple people and multiple targets (even target types). Here are some examples of Change Activity Process in a datacenter: · Patching large environments (PSU/CPU Patching cycles) · Upgrading large number of database environments · Rolling out Compliance Rules · Database Consolidation to Exadata environments CAP provides user flows for Compliance Officers/Managers (incl. lead administrators) and Operators (DBAs and admins). Managers can create change activity plans for various projects, allocate resources, targets, and groups affected. Upon activation of the plan, tasks are created and automatically assigned to individual administrators based on target ownership. Administrators (DBAs) can identify their tasks and understand the context, schedules, and priorities. They can complete tasks using Enterprise Manager Cloud Control automation features such as patch plans (or in some cases outside Enterprise Manager). Upon completion, compliance is evaluated for validations and updates the status of the tasks and the plans. Learn More about CAP ... Improved Configuration & Compliance Management of a large number of systems Improved Configuration Comparison: Get to the configuration comparison results faster for simple ad-hoc comparisons. When performing a 1 to 1 comparison, Enterprise Manager will perform the comparison immediately and take the user directly to the results without having to wait for a job to be submitted and executed. Flattened system comparisons reduce comparison setup time and reduce complexity. In addition to the previously existing topological comparison, users now have an option to compare using a “flattened” methodology. Flattening means to remove duplicate target instances within the systems and remove the hierarchy of member targets. The result are much easier to spot differences particularly for specific use cases like comparing patch levels between complex systems like RAC and Fusion Apps. Improved Configuration Search & Advanced EMCLI Script option for Mass Automation Enterprise manager 12c introduces a new framework level capability to be able to script and stitch together multiple tasks using EMCLI. This powerful capability can be leveraged for lifecycle operations, especially when executing a task over a large number of targets. Specific usages of this include, retrieving a qualified list of targets using Configuration Search and then using the resultset for automation. Another example would be executing a patching operation and then re-executing on targets where it may have failed. This is complemented by other enhancements, such as a better usability for designing reusable configuration searches. IN EM 12c Rel 3, a simplified UI makes building adhoc searches even easier. Searching for missing patches is a common use of configuration search. This required the use of the advanced options which are now clearly defined and easy to use. Perform “Configuration Search” using the EMCLI. Users can find and execute Configuration Searches from the EMCLI which can be extremely useful for building sophisticated automation scripts. For an example, Run the Search named “Oracle Databases on Exadata” which finds all Database targets running on top of Exadata. Further filter the results by refining by options like name, host, etc.. emcli get_targets -config_search="Databases on Exadata" –target_name="exa%“ Use this in powerful mass automation operations using the new emcli script option. For example, to solve the use case of – Finding all DBs running on Exadata and housing E-Biz and Patch them. Create a Python script with emcli functions and invoke it in the new EMCLI script option shell. Invoke the script in the new EMCLI with script option directly: $<path to emcli>/emcli @myPSU_Patch.py Richer compliance content: Now over 50 Oracle Provided Compliance Standards including new standards for Pluggable Database, Fusion Applications, Oracle Identity Manager, Oracle VM and Internet Directory. 9 Oracle provided Real Time Monitoring Standards containing over 900 Compliance Rules across 500 Facets. These new Real time Compliance Standards covers both Exadata Compute nodes and Linux servers. The result is increased Oracle software coverage and faster time to compliance monitoring on Exadata. Enhancements to Patch Management: Overhauled "OFFLINE" Patching experience: Simplified Patch uploads UI to improve the offline experience of patching. There is now a single step process to get the patches into software library. Customers often maintain local repositories of patches, sometimes called software depots, where they host the patches downloaded from My Oracle Support. In the past, you had to move these patches to your desktop then upload them to the Enterprise Manager's Software library through the Enterprise Manager Cloud Control user interface. You can now use the following EMCLI command to upload multiple patches directly from a remote location within the data center: $emcli upload_patches -location <Path to Patch directory> -from_host <HOSTNAME> The upload process filters all of the new patches, automatically selects the relevant metadata files from the location, and uploads the patches to software library. Other Improvements: Patch rollback for single instance databases, new option in the Patch Plan to rollback the patches added to the patch plans. Upon execution, the procedure would rollback the patch and the SQL applied to the single instance Databases. Improved and faster configuration collection of Oracle Home targets can enable more reliable automation at higher level functions like Provisioning, Patching or Database as a Service. Just to recap, here is a list of database lifecycle management features: * Red highlights mark – New or Enhanced in the Release 3. • Discovery, inventory tracking and reporting • Database provisioning including o Migration to Pluggable databases o Plugging and unplugging of pluggable databases o Gold image based cloning o Scaling of RAC nodes •Schema and data change management •End-to-end patch management in online and offline modes, including o Patch advisories in online (connected with My Oracle Support) and offline mode o Patch pre-deployment analysis, deployment and rollback (currently only for single instance databases) o Reporting • Upgrade planning and execution of the upgrade process • Configuration management including • Compliance management with out-of-box content • Change Activity Planner for planning, designing and tracking long running processes For more information on Enterprise Manager’s database lifecycle management capabilities, visit http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/oem/lifecycle-mgmt/index.html

Read the article
CodePlex Daily Summary for Sunday, July 28, 2013

CodePlex Daily Summary for Sunday, July 28, 2013Popular ReleasesMedia Companion: Media Companion MC3.574b: Some good bug fixes been going on with the new XBMC-Link function. Thanks to all who were able to do testing and gave feedback. New:* Added some adhoc extra General movie filters, one of which is Plot = Outline (see fixes above). To see the filters, add the following line to your config.xml: <ShowExtraMovieFilters>True</ShowExtraMovieFilters>. The others are: Imdb in folder name, Imdb in not folder name & Imdb not in folder name & year mismatch. * Movie - display <tag> list on browser tab ...Outlook 2013 Backup Add-In: Outlook Backup Add-In 1.0: Users who don't care about compiling the sources on his/her own can download the compiled version. Requirements: - .Net Framework 4.5 - Visual Studio 2010 Tools for Office Runtime see: http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=39290 - Installed Outlook 2013OfflineBrowser: Preview Release with Search: I've added search to this release.Dynamics CRM 2011 EasyPlugins: EasyPlugins-1.2.3.0-managed: v1.2.3.0 - Bug Fix : Twice plugins execution. - New Abort action - Depth Plugin Execution management on each action - Turn On/Off EasyPlugins feature (can be useful in some cases of imports) ----------------------------- v1.2.0.0 Associate / Disassociate actions are now available Import / Export features Better management of Lookups Trigger NamingMemory Teaser Game: Full Release 1.1.0: -> Fixed Memory leak issue. -> Restart game button issue. -> Added Splash screen. -> Changed Release Icon. This is the version 1.1.0.0VG-Ripper & PG-Ripper: VG-Ripper 2.9.46: changes FIXED LoginFIM 2010 GoogleApps MA: GoogleAppsMA1.1.2: Fixed bug during import. - Fixed following bug. - In some condition, 'dn is missing' error occur.Install Verify Tool: Install Verify Tool V 1.0 With Client: Use a windows service to do a remote validation work. QA can use this tool to verify daily build installation.C# Intellisense for Notepad++: 'Namespace resolution' release: Auto-Completion from "empty spot" Add missing "using" statementsOpen Source SAAS Job board: Version X3: Full version of job board, didn't have monies to fund it so it's free.DSeX DragonSpeak eXtended Editor: Version 1.0.116.0726: Cleaned up Wizard Interface Added Functionality for RTF UndoRedo IE Inserting Text from Wizard output to the Tabbed Editor Added Sanity Checks to Search/Replace Dialog to prevent crashes Fixed Template and Paste undoredo Fix Undoredo Blank spots Added New_FileTag Const = "(New FIle)" Added Filename to Modified FileClose queries (Thanks Lothus Marque)Math.NET Numerics: Math.NET Numerics v2.6.0: What's New in Math.NET Numerics 2.6 - Announcement, Explanations and Sample Code. New: Linear Curve Fitting Linear least-squares fitting (regression) to lines, polynomials and linear combinations of arbitrary functions. Multi-dimensional fitting. Also works well in F# with the F# extensions. New: Root Finding Brent's method. ~Candy Chiu, Alexander Täschner Bisection method. ~Scott Stephens, Alexander Täschner Broyden's method, for multi-dimensional functions. ~Alexander Täschner ...AJAX Control Toolkit: July 2013 Release: AJAX Control Toolkit Release Notes - July 2013 Release Version 7.0725July 2013 release of the AJAX Control Toolkit. AJAX Control Toolkit .NET 4.5 – AJAX Control Toolkit for .NET 4.5 and sample site (Recommended). AJAX Control Toolkit .NET 4 – AJAX Control Toolkit for .NET 4 and sample site (Recommended). AJAX Control Toolkit .NET 3.5 – AJAX Control Toolkit for .NET 3.5 and sample site (Recommended). Notes: - Instructions for using the AJAX Control Toolkit with ASP.NET 4.5 can be found at...MJP's DirectX 11 Samples: Specular Antialiasing Sample: Sample code to complement my presentation that's part of the Physically Based Shading in Theory and Practice course at SIGGRAPH 2013, entitled "Crafting a Next-Gen Material Pipeline for The Order: 1886". Demonstrates various methods of preventing aliasing from specular BRDF's when using high-frequency normal maps. The zip file contains source code as well as a pre-compiled x64 binary.Kartris E-commerce: Kartris v2.5003: This fixes an issue where search engines appear to identify as IE and so trigger the noIE page if there is not a non-responsive skin specified.GoAgent GUI: GoAgent GUI 1.3.5 Alpha (20130723): ????????Alpha?，???????????，?????????????。 ??????????GoAgent???（???phus lu?GitHub??????GoAgent??????，??????????????????） ????????????????????????Bug ?????????。??????????????。 ????issue????，????????，????????????????。LogicCircuit: LogicCircuit 2.13.07.22: Logic Circuit - is educational software for designing and simulating logic circuits. Intuitive graphical user interface, allows you to create unrestricted circuit hierarchy with multi bit buses, debug circuits behavior with oscilloscope, and navigate running circuits hierarchy. Changes of this versionYou can make visual elements of the circuit been visible on its symbols. This way you can build composite displays, keyboards and reuse them. Please read about displays for more details http://ww...Microsoft .NET SDK For Hadoop: v 0.9.4951.25594: Bug fixesLINQ to Twitter: LINQ to Twitter v2.1.08: Supports .NET 3.5, .NET 4.0, .NET 4.5, Silverlight 4.0, Windows Phone 7.1, Windows Phone 8, Client Profile, Windows 8, and Windows Azure. 100% Twitter API coverage. Also supports Twitter API v1.1! Also on NuGet.AcDown?????: AcDown????? v4.4.3: ??●AcDown??????????、??、??、???????。????，????，?????????????????????????。???????????Acfun、????(Bilibili)、??、??、YouTube、??、???、??????、SF????、????????????。 ●??????AcPlay?????，??????、????????????????。 ● AcDown???????C#??，????.NET Framework 2.0??。?????"Acfun?????"。 ??v4.4.3 ?? ??Bilibili????????????? ???????????? ????32??64? Windows XP/Vista/7/8 ???? 32??64? ???Linux ????(1)????????Windows XP???，????????.NET Framework 2.0???(x86)，?????"?????????"??? (2)???????????Linux???，????????Mono?? ??2.10?...New ProjectsAM2013: Unexpected GameChekad: This is a simple small project.DataBaseSchema: DataBase Schema Management!edirAuth: edirAuth is a .NET library for LDAP authentication to NetIQ (formerly Novell©) eDirectory. If you are a NetIQ Identity Management user you are probably using Gimme Rainbows: This is a simple project that can be used to generate Rainbow table from a given dictionary and given salt file. Hashes of various formats can be generated.Heavy Bomber: Heavy Bomber XNA GameIRIS Toolbox [I Rest, IRIS Solves...]: IRIS is a Matlab toolbox for macroeconomic modeling.OpenZapper: OpenZapper is an open source Zapper project. It is mainly a Frequency generator.Sponge - SharePoint Framework: Sponge is a SharePoint Frameworks that contains centralized logging and configuration, as well as other useful Controls, Web Parts and Application Pages.wangyexin: ?????wupantest: atwelltestYemek Menusu: Yemek Menusu

Read the article
Combined Likelihood Models

- by Lukas Vermeer

In a series of posts on this blog we have already described a flexible approach to recording events, a technique to create analytical models for reporting, a method that uses the same principles to generate extremely powerful facet based predictions and a waterfall strategy that can be used to blend multiple (possibly facet based) models for increased accuracy. This latest, and also last, addition to this sequence of increasing modeling complexity will illustrate an advanced approach to amalgamate models, taking us to a whole new level of predictive modeling and analytical insights; combination models predicting likelihoods using multiple child models. The method described here is far from trivial. We therefore would not recommend you apply these techniques in an initial implementation of Oracle Real-Time Decisions. In most cases, basic RTD models or the approaches described before will provide more than enough predictive accuracy and analytical insight. The following is intended as an example of how more advanced models could be constructed if implementation results warrant the increased implementation and design effort. Keep implemented statistics simple! Combining likelihoods Because facet based predictions are based on metadata attributes of the choices selected, it is possible to generate such predictions for more than one attribute of a choice. We can predict the likelihood of acceptance for a particular product based on the product category (e.g. ‘toys’), as well as based on the color of the product (e.g. ‘pink’). Of course, these two predictions may be completely different (the customer may well prefer toys, but dislike pink products) and we will have to somehow combine these two separate predictions to determine an overall likelihood of acceptance for the choice. Perhaps the simplest way to combine multiple predicted likelihoods into one is to calculate the average (or perhaps maximum or minimum) likelihood. However, this would completely forgo the fact that some facets may have a far more pronounced effect on the overall likelihood than others (e.g. customers may consider the product category more important than its color). We could opt for calculating some sort of weighted average, but this would require us to specify up front the relative importance of the different facets involved. This approach would also be unresponsive to changing consumer behavior in these preferences (e.g. product price bracket may become more important to consumers as a result of economic shifts). Preferably, we would want Oracle Real-Time Decisions to learn, act upon and tell us about, the correlations between the different facet models and the overall likelihood of acceptance. This additional level of predictive modeling, where a single supermodel (no pun intended) combines the output of several (facet based) models into a single prediction, is what we call a combined likelihood model. Facet Based Scores As an example, we have implemented three different facet based models (as described earlier) in a simple RTD inline service. These models will allow us to generate predictions for likelihood of acceptance for each product based on three different metadata fields: Category, Price Bracket and Product Color. We will use an Analytical Scores entity to store these different scores so we can easily pass them between different functions. A simple function, creatively named Compute Analytical Scores, will compute for each choice the different facet scores and return an Analytical Scores entity that is stored on the choice itself. For each score, a choice attribute referring to this entity is also added to be returned to the client to facilitate testing. One Offer To Predict Them All In order to combine the different facet based predictions into one single likelihood for each product, we will need a supermodel which can predict the likelihood of acceptance, based on the outcomes of the facet models. This model will not need to consider any of the attributes of the session, because they are already represented in the outcomes of the underlying facet models. For the same reason, the supermodel will not need to learn separately for each product, because the specific combination of facets for this product are also already represented in the output of the underlying models. In other words, instead of learning how session attributes influence acceptance of a particular product, we will learn how the outcomes of facet based models for a particular product influence acceptance at a higher level. We will therefore be using a single All Offers choice to represent all offers in our combined likelihood predictions. This choice has no attribute values configured, no scores and not a single eligibility rule; nor is it ever intended to be returned to a client. The All Offers choice is to be used exclusively by the Combined Likelihood Acceptance model to predict the likelihood of acceptance for all choices; based solely on the output of the facet based models defined earlier. The Switcheroo In Oracle Real-Time Decisions, models can only learn based on attributes stored on the session. Therefore, just before generating a combined prediction for a given choice, we will temporarily copy the facet based scores—stored on the choice earlier as an Analytical Scores entity—to the session. The code for the Predict Combined Likelihood Event function is outlined below. // set session attribute to contain facet based scores. // (this is the only input for the combined model) session().setAnalyticalScores(choice.getAnalyticalScores); // predict likelihood of acceptance for All Offers choice. CombinedLikelihoodChoice c = CombinedLikelihood.getChoice("AllOffers"); Double la = CombinedLikelihoodAcceptance.getChoiceEventLikelihoods(c, "Accepted"); // clear session attribute of facet based scores. session().setAnalyticalScores(null); // return likelihood. return la; This sleight of hand will allow the Combined Likelihood Acceptance model to predict the likelihood of acceptance for the All Offers choice using these choice specific scores. After the prediction is made, we will clear the Analytical Scores session attribute to ensure it does not pollute any of the other (facet) models. To guarantee our combined likelihood model will learn based on the facet based scores—and is not distracted by the other session attributes—we will configure the model to exclude any other inputs, save for the instance of the Analytical Scores session attribute, on the model attributes tab. Recording Events In order for the combined likelihood model to learn correctly, we must ensure that the Analytical Scores session attribute is set correctly at the moment RTD records any events related to a particular choice. We apply essentially the same switching technique as before in a Record Combined Likelihood Event function. // set session attribute to contain facet based scores // (this is the only input for the combined model). session().setAnalyticalScores(choice.getAnalyticalScores); // record input event against All Offers choice. CombinedLikelihood.getChoice("AllOffers").recordEvent(event); // force learn at this moment using the Internal Dock entry point. Application.getPredictor().learn(InternalLearn.modelArray, session(), session(), Application.currentTimeMillis()); // clear session attribute of facet based scores. session().setAnalyticalScores(null); In this example, Internal Learn is a special informant configured as the learn location for the combined likelihood model. The informant itself has no particular configuration and does nothing in itself; it is used only to force the model to learn at the exact instant we have set the Analytical Scores session attribute to the correct values. Reporting Results After running a few thousand (artificially skewed) simulated sessions on our ILS, the Decision Center reporting shows some interesting results. In this case, these results reflect perfectly the bias we ourselves had introduced in our tests. In practice, we would obviously use a wider range of customer attributes and expect to see some more unexpected outcomes. The facetted model for categories has clearly picked up on the that fact our simulated youngsters have little interest in purchasing the one red-hot vehicle our ILS had on offer. Also, it would seem that customer age is an excellent predictor for the acceptance of pink products. Looking at the key drivers for the All Offers choice we can see the relative importance of the different facets to the prediction of overall likelihood. The comparative importance of the category facet for overall prediction might, in part, be explained by the clear preference of younger customers for toys over other product types; as evident from the report on the predictiveness of customer age for offer category acceptance. Conclusion Oracle Real-Time Decisions' flexible decisioning framework allows for the construction of exceptionally elaborate prediction models that facilitate powerful targeting, but nonetheless provide insightful reporting. Although few customers will have a direct need for such a sophisticated solution architecture, it is encouraging to see that this lies within the realm of the possible with RTD; and this with limited configuration and customization required. There are obviously numerous other ways in which the predictive and reporting capabilities of Oracle Real-Time Decisions can be expanded upon to tailor to individual customers needs. We will not be able to elaborate on them all on this blog; and finding the right approach for any given problem is often more difficult than implementing the solution. Nevertheless, we hope that these last few posts have given you enough of an understanding of the power of the RTD framework and its models; so that you can take some of these ideas and improve upon your own strategy. As always, if you have any questions about the above—or any Oracle Real-Time Decisions design challenges you might face—please do not hesitate to contact us; via the comments below, social media or directly at Oracle. We are completely multi-channel and would be more than glad to help. :-)

Read the article
Getting an invalidoperationexception when deserialising XML

- by Paul Johnson

Hi, I'm writing a simple proof of concept application to load up an XML file and depending on the very simple code, create a window and put something into it (it's for a much larger project). Due to limitations in Mono, I'm having to run in this way. The code I currently have looks like this using System; using System.Collections.Generic; using System.ComponentModel; using System.Data; using System.Drawing; using System.Windows.Forms; using System.IO; using System.Collections; using System.Xml; using System.Xml.Serialization; namespace form_from_xml { public class xmlhandler : Form { public void loaddesign() { FormData f; f = null; try { string path_env = Path.GetDirectoryName(Application.ExecutablePath) + Path.DirectorySeparatorChar; // code dies on the line below XmlSerializer s = new XmlSerializer(typeof(FormData)); TextReader r = new StreamReader(path_env + "designer-test.xml"); f = (FormData)s.Deserialize(r); r.Close(); } catch (System.IO.FileNotFoundException) { MessageBox.Show("Unable to find the form file", "File not found", MessageBoxButtons.OK); } } } [XmlRoot("Forms")] public class FormData { private ArrayList formData; public FormData() { formData = new ArrayList(); } [XmlElement("Element")] public Elements[] elements { get { Elements[] elements = new Elements[formData.Count]; formData.CopyTo(elements); return elements; } set { if (value == null) return; Elements[] elements = (Elements[])value; formData.Clear(); foreach (Elements element in elements) formData.Add(element); } } public int AddItem(Elements element) { return formData.Add(element); } } public class Elements { [XmlAttribute("formname")] public string name; [XmlAttribute("winxsize")] public int winxs; [XmlAttribute("winysize")] public int winys; [XmlAttribute("type")] public object type; [XmlAttribute("xpos")] public int xpos; [XmlAttribute("ypos")] public int ypos; [XmlAttribute("externaldata")] public bool external; [XmlAttribute("externalplace")] public string externalplace; [XmlAttribute("text")] public string text; [XmlAttribute("questions")] public bool questions; [XmlAttribute("questiontype")] public object qtype; [XmlAttribute("numberqs")] public int numberqs; [XmlAttribute("answerfile")] public string ansfile; [XmlAttribute("backlink")] public int backlink; [XmlAttribute("forwardlink")] public int forwardlink; public Elements() { } public Elements(string fn, int wx, int wy, object t, int x, int y, bool ext, string extpl, string te, bool q, object qt, int num, string ans, int back, int end) { name = fn; winxs = wx; winys = wy; type = t; xpos = x; ypos = y; external = ext; externalplace = extpl; text = te; questions = q; qtype = qt; numberqs = num; ansfile = ans; backlink = back; forwardlink = end; } } } With a very simple xmlhandler xml = new xmlhander(); xml.loaddesign(); attached to a winform button. Everything is in the same namespace and the xml file actually exists. This is annoying me now - can anyone spot the error of my ways? Paul

Read the article
CodePlex Daily Summary for Thursday, November 08, 2012

CodePlex Daily Summary for Thursday, November 08, 2012Popular ReleasesPlayer Framework by Microsoft: Player Framework for Windows 8 (v1.0): IMPORTANT: List of breaking changes from preview 7 Ability to move control panel or individual elements outside media player. more info... New Entertainment app theme for out of the box support for Windows 8 Entertainment app guidelines. more info... VSIX reference names shortened. Allows seeing plugin name from "Add Reference" dialog without resizing. FreeWheel SmartXML now supports new "Standard" event callback type. Other minor misc fixes and improvements ADDITIONAL DOWNLOADSSmo...P1 & S0 Port monitoring with Netduino Plus: V0.6.1 Beta Netduino Plus Monitoring: Sixth public version V0.6.1 Bugfix in the temperature module (wrong calculation)WebSearch.Net: WebSearch.Net 3.1: WebSearch.Net is an open-source research platform that provides uniform data source access, data modeling, feature calculation, data mining, etc. It facilitates the experiments of web search researchers due to its high flexibility and extensibility. The platform can be used or extended by any language compatible for .Net 2 framework, from C# (recommended), VB.Net to C++ and Java. Thanks to the large coverage of knowledge in web search research, it is necessary to model the techniques and main...SQLite for Excel: SQLite for Excel Version 0.9: Added support for sqlite3_open_v2 to allow opening of database as read-only.MySQL Tuner for Windows: 0.3: Welcome to the third beta of MySQL Tuner for Windows! This release fixes bugs in the displaying of numbers, and a crash that occurred due to the program incorrectly closing and disposing of resources, Be warned that there will be bugs in this release, so please do not use on production or critical systems. Do post details of issues found to the issue tracker, and I will endeavour to fix them, when I can. I would love to have your feedback, and if possible your support! Requirements Microso...SharePoint Manager 2013: SharePoint Manager 2013 Release ver 1.0.12.1106: SharePoint Manager 2013 Release (ver: 1.0.12.1106) is now ready for SharePoint 2013. The new version has an expanded view of the SharePoint object model and has been tested on SharePoint 2013 RTM. As a bonus, the new version is also available for SharePoint 2010 as a separate download.D3D9Client: D3D9Client R7: New release for Orbiter 2010-P1 - Added horizon/sun angle for night-lights into the configuration file (default 10deg) - Some runway lights related bugs are fixed - Added more configuration options for runway lightsFiskalizacija za developere: FiskalizacijaDev 1.2: Verzija 1.2. je, prije svega, odgovor na novu verziju Tehnicke specifikacije (v1.1.) koja je objavljena prije nekoliko dana. Pored novosti vezanih uz (sitne) izmjene u spomenutoj novoj verziji Tehnicke dokumentacije, projekt smo prošili sa nekim dodatnim feature-ima od kojih je vecina proizašla iz vaših prijedloga - hvala :) Novosti u v1.2. su: - Neusuglašenost zahtjeva (http://fiskalizacija.codeplex.com/workitem/645) - Sample projekt - iznosi se množe sa 100 (http://fiskalizacija.codeplex.c...PowerComboBox: PowerComboBox VB v1.0: Visual Basic source code class file.Edi: Themable Edi: Completed ExpressionDark theme Improved Error Handling and Reporting feature Refactored all views to be look-less controlsMFCMAPI: October 2012 Release: Build: 15.0.0.1036 Full release notes at SGriffin's blog. If you just want to run the MFCMAPI or MrMAPI, get the executables. If you want to debug them, get the symbol files and the source. The 64 bit builds will only work on a machine with Outlook 2010 64 bit installed. All other machines should use the 32 bit builds, regardless of the operating system. Facebook BadgeMCEBuddy 2.x: MCEBuddy 2.3.7: Changelog for 2.3.7 (32bit and 64bit) 1. Improved performance of MP4 Fast and M4V Fast Profiles (no deinterlacing, removed --decomb) 2. Improved priority handling 3. Added support for Pausing and Resume conversions 4. Added support for fallback to source directory if network destination directory is unavailable 5. MCEBuddy now installs ShowAnalyzer during installation 6. Added support for long description atom in iTunesFoxyXLS: FoxyXLS Releases: Source code and samplesProDinner - ASP.NET MVC Sample (EF4.4, N-Tier, jQuery): 8: update to ASP.net MVC Awesome 3.0 udpate to EntityFramework 4.4 update to MVC 4 added dinners grid on homepageASP.net MVC Awesome - jQuery Ajax Helpers: 3.0: added Grid helper added XML Documentation added textbox helper added Client Side API for AjaxList removed .SearchButton from AjaxList AjaxForm and Confirm helpers have been merged into the Form helper optimized html output for AjaxDropdown, AjaxList, Autocomplete works on MVC 3 and 4BlogEngine.NET: BlogEngine.NET 2.7: Cheap ASP.NET Hosting - $4.95/Month - Click Here!! Click Here for More Info Cheap ASP.NET Hosting - $4.95/Month - Click Here! If you want to set up and start using BlogEngine.NET right away, you should download the Web project. If you want to extend or modify BlogEngine.NET, you should download the source code. If you are upgrading from a previous version of BlogEngine.NET, please take a look at the Upgrading to BlogEngine.NET 2.7 instructions. If you looking for Web Application Project, ...Launchbar: Launchbar 4.2.2.0: This release is the first step in cleaning up the code and using all the latest features of .NET 4.5 Changes 4.2.2 (2012-11-02) Improved handling of left clicks 4.1.0 (2012-10-17) Removed tray icon Assembly renamed and signed with strong name Note When you upgrade, Launchbar will start with the default settings. You can import your previous settings by following these steps: Run Launchbar and just save the settings without configuring anything Shutdown Launchbar Go to the folder %LOCA...Mouse Jiggler: MouseJiggle-1.3: This adds the much-requested minimize-to-tray feature to Mouse Jiggler.Umbraco CMS: Umbraco 4.10.0 Release Candidate: This is a Release Candidate, which means that if we do not find any major issues in the next week, we will release this version as the final release of 4.10.0 on November 9th, 2012. The documentation for the MVC bits still lives in the Github version of the docs for now and will be updated on our.umbraco.org with the final release of 4.10.0. Browse the documentation here: https://github.com/umbraco/Umbraco4Docs/tree/4.8.0/Documentation/Reference/Mvc If you want to do only MVC then make sur...Skype Auto Recorder: SkypeAutoRecorder 1.3.4: New icon and images. Reworked settings window. Implemented high-quality sound encoding. Implemented a possibility to produce stereo records. Added buttons with system-wide hot keys for manual starting and canceling of recording. Added buttons for opening folder with records. Added Help button. Fixed an issue when recording is continuing after call end. Fixed an issue when recording doesn't start. Fixed several bugs and improved stability. Major refactoring and optimization...New Projects.Net Streamer: With .Net Streamer you can easily view and download series from watchseries.eu/gorillapod.in You can also download and display subtitles along with the video.Boards And Commissions: In accordance with Va. Code § 2.2-2822(B)(1), VITA has released the code for the CRM OASYS system and the OASYS portal to the public domain on CodePlex. The folcces: Center for Complex Engineering Systems codebase for Kail: Fornt-end code including javascript css html xsltdbSend: Simple tool for uploading large files, such as databases, to a remote SFTP server.DNN Task Manager GOR: Summary.Drive Watcher: Drive Watcher windows application in .net framework 4. watch the chosen path for any changeDSLPed: DSLPed is a framework to design & develop WPF-based projectional editors of custom Domain Specific Lanugages as add-ins into the Visual Studio 2010 designer.FAST Corner Detector: This simple demp app takes the live camera feed, detects the FAST9 corners based on the method by E. Rosten.Inkscape 9-patch extension: This is an extension to Inkscape that makes it easier to create bitmap resources for Android apps at multiple resolutions and in nine-patch format.Inmeta Visual Studio Gallery Service: An ASP.NET Web API service for implementing a Visual Studio Private Extension Gallery.IService001: IServiceissueIT.net - ”I just found the last bug”: issueIT is the best open source web-based issue tracker for .NET. It’s easy to customize to suit your organization. This project is not finished yet - it is only at a very early stageJason WP Tools: this project consists of a number of useful utilities and extensions for developing Windows Phone (both 7 and 8) apps.LeadersGenerator: make an easy way to play Hearts of Iron3MD5FolderVerifier: A project used to verify file md5s inside a folder.Media Center Commander: Media Center Commander allows you to change Live TV channels in Windows Media Center via the command-line (and thus desktop shortcuts).My Sulekha: Its a classified basic website which contains all the data of advertisers & their advertisements Pancake Sorting PANA 2012-2: A university work about the implementation of pancakes sorting.Parallel Cache Handler for Unity: Lightweight Unity Interceptor to introduce generic caching for parallel invocationsQuizzMasterStudio V.2: A software that helps users absorb new material faster through various types of quizzes. The system also includes a mechanism to more effectively learn math.RTSparse: This is a port of CSparse to WinRT runtime component.Share: Share is a new web-based content management system. For more information about this project, please visit http://blog.aphysoft.com.SpeedDial Assistent: No summary available yetspSite.pro - Investigating SharePoint and implementing it's missing parts.: Source code storage for our collective resource about SharePoint.Sql Server Stress / Load Test tool: Some time we need to stress test SQL server. This is simple and flexible Visual Studio load test which can load your SQL server with different type of load.Statuos: Statuos is a customer driven project management solution that supports subtasks.TabManager: TabManager is a simple windows control container control and supports custom tab header sizing. TabManager is written in VB and is a new project.Tagomatique: Permet la gestion de fichiers multimédia (audio, vidéo, image) sur principe des tags, chapitres, signets.Technoera.Common FW2.0: A simple repository that contains some of our "domain-unrelated" application blocks.TestDraw: This is a test project. Written out my own interest to see if it can survive into a better project.testesunnyedm: testesunnyedmTricogolWeb: Tricogol WebWA77696A-9075-44CC-A378-D42A096D5989: Project Codename : WA77696A-9075-44CC-A378-D42A096D5989WCF y Net remoting en el famoso ejemplo HOLA MUNDO: El ejemplo ideal para entender de manera muy facil los componententes implicados en una comunicación WCF y otra .NET Remoting.. En español!Web API Tools: Project enables easy communication with ASP.NET MVC Web API.Web Application Navigator for SharePoint: For SharePoint 2010-13 : Implements a web part that supports consistent navigation across an entire web application. The navigation links are provided by a listWinRDF - RDF made easy!: Welcome to the homepage of the WinRDF project.WP728DC9-1E30-468E-A4AE-5879C6CC5BD6: Project Codename : WP728DC9-1E30-468E-A4AE-5879C6CC5BD6X3D.NET: X3D.NET is a library package providing a simple and easy way handling the Extensible 3D format (X3D) for .NET FrameworkXheis's Game Development: Xheis's game dev of a persistent zombie, waved based action RPG, RTS defenceX-tee.NET: Teeme xtee-ga suhtluse lihtsamaks

Read the article
Why Are Minimized Programs Often Slow to Open Again?

- by Jason Fitzpatrick

It seems particularly counterintuitive: you minimize an application because you plan on returning to it later and wish to skip shutting the application down and restarting it later, but sometimes maximizing it takes even longer than launching it fresh. What gives? 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 Bart wants to know why he’s not saving any time with application minimization: I’m working in Photoshop CS6 and multiple browsers a lot. I’m not using them all at once, so sometimes some applications are minimized to taskbar for hours or days. The problem is, when I try to maximize them from the taskbar – it sometimes takes longer than starting them! Especially Photoshop feels really weird for many seconds after finally showing up, it’s slow, unresponsive and even sometimes totally freezes for minute or two. It’s not a hardware problem as it’s been like that since always on all on my PCs. Would I also notice it after upgrading my HDD to SDD and adding RAM (my main PC holds 4 GB currently)? Could guys with powerful pcs / macs tell me – does it also happen to you? I guess OSes somehow “focus” on active software and move all the resources away from the ones that run, but are not used. Is it possible to somehow set RAM / CPU / HDD priorities or something, for let’s say, Photoshop, so it won’t slow down after long period of inactivity? So what is the deal? Why does he find himself waiting to maximize a minimized app? The Answer SuperUser contributor Allquixotic explains why: Summary The immediate problem is that the programs that you have minimized are being paged out to the “page file” on your hard disk. This symptom can be improved by installing a Solid State Disk (SSD), adding more RAM to your system, reducing the number of programs you have open, or upgrading to a newer system architecture (for instance, Ivy Bridge or Haswell). Out of these options, adding more RAM is generally the most effective solution. Explanation The default behavior of Windows is to give active applications priority over inactive applications for having a spot in RAM. When there’s significant memory pressure (meaning the system doesn’t have a lot of free RAM if it were to let every program have all the RAM it wants), it starts putting minimized programs into the page file, which means it writes out their contents from RAM to disk, and then makes that area of RAM free. That free RAM helps programs you’re actively using — say, your web browser — run faster, because if they need to claim a new segment of RAM (like when you open a new tab), they can do so. This “free” RAM is also used as page cache, which means that when active programs attempt to read data on your hard disk, that data might be cached in RAM, which prevents your hard disk from being accessed to get that data. By using the majority of your RAM for page cache, and swapping out unused programs to disk, Windows is trying to improve responsiveness of the program(s) you are actively using, by making RAM available to them, and caching the files they access in RAM instead of the hard disk. The downside of this behavior is that minimized programs can take a while to have their contents copied from the page file, on disk, back into RAM. The time increases the larger the program’s footprint in memory. This is why you experience that delay when maximizing Photoshop. RAM is many times faster than a hard disk (depending on the specific hardware, it can be up to several orders of magnitude). An SSD is considerably faster than a hard disk, but it is still slower than RAM by orders of magnitude. Having your page file on an SSD will help, but it will also wear out the SSD more quickly than usual if your page file is heavily utilized due to RAM pressure. Remedies Here is an explanation of the available remedies, and their general effectiveness: Installing more RAM: This is the recommended path. If your system does not support more RAM than you already have installed, you will need to upgrade more of your system: possibly your motherboard, CPU, chassis, power supply, etc. depending on how old it is. If it’s a laptop, chances are you’ll have to buy an entire new laptop that supports more installed RAM. When you install more RAM, you reduce memory pressure, which reduces use of the page file, which is a good thing all around. You also make available more RAM for page cache, which will make all programs that access the hard disk run faster. As of Q4 2013, my personal recommendation is that you have at least 8 GB of RAM for a desktop or laptop whose purpose is anything more complex than web browsing and email. That means photo editing, video editing/viewing, playing computer games, audio editing or recording, programming / development, etc. all should have at least 8 GB of RAM, if not more. Run fewer programs at a time: This will only work if the programs you are running do not use a lot of memory on their own. Unfortunately, Adobe Creative Suite products such as Photoshop CS6 are known for using an enormous amount of memory. This also limits your multitasking ability. It’s a temporary, free remedy, but it can be an inconvenience to close down your web browser or Word every time you start Photoshop, for instance. This also wouldn’t stop Photoshop from being swapped when minimizing it, so it really isn’t a very effective solution. It only helps in some specific situations. Install an SSD: If your page file is on an SSD, the SSD’s improved speed compared to a hard disk will result in generally improved performance when the page file has to be read from or written to. Be aware that SSDs are not designed to withstand a very frequent and constant random stream of writes; they can only be written over a limited number of times before they start to break down. Heavy use of a page file is not a particularly good workload for an SSD. You should install an SSD in combination with a large amount of RAM if you want maximum performance while preserving the longevity of the SSD. Use a newer system architecture: Depending on the age of your system, you may be using an out of date system architecture. The “system architecture” is generally defined as the “generation” (think generations like children, parents, grandparents, etc.) of the motherboard and CPU. Newer generations generally support faster I/O (input/output), better memory bandwidth, lower latency, and less contention over shared resources, instead providing dedicated links between components. For example, starting with the “Nehalem” generation (around 2009), the Front-Side Bus (FSB) was eliminated, which removed a common bottleneck, because almost all system components had to share the same FSB for transmitting data. This was replaced with a “point to point” architecture, meaning that each component gets its own dedicated “lane” to the CPU, which continues to be improved every few years with new generations. You will generally see a more significant improvement in overall system performance depending on the “gap” between your computer’s architecture and the latest one available. For example, a Pentium 4 architecture from 2004 is going to see a much more significant improvement upgrading to “Haswell” (the latest as of Q4 2013) than a “Sandy Bridge” architecture from ~2010. Links Related questions: How to reduce disk thrashing (paging)? Windows Swap (Page File): Enable or Disable? Also, just in case you’re considering it, you really shouldn’t disable the page file, as this will only make matters worse; see here. And, in case you needed extra convincing to leave the Windows Page File alone, see here and here. 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.

Read the article
Key ATG architecture principles

- by Glen Borkowski

Overview The purpose of this article is to describe some of the important foundational concepts of ATG. This is not intended to cover all areas of the ATG platform, just the most important subset - the ones that allow ATG to be extremely flexible, configurable, high performance, etc. For more information on these topics, please see the online product manuals. Modules The first concept is called the 'ATG Module'. Simply put, you can think of modules as the building blocks for ATG applications. The ATG development team builds the out of the box product using modules (these are the 'out of the box' modules). Then, when a customer is implementing their site, they build their own modules that sit 'on top' of the out of the box ATG modules. Modules can be very simple - containing minimal definition, and perhaps a small amount of configuration. Alternatively, a module can be rather complex - containing custom logic, database schema definitions, configuration, one or more web applications, etc. Modules generally will have dependencies on other modules (the modules beneath it). For example, the Commerce Reference Store module (CRS) requires the DCS (out of the box commerce) module. Modules have a ton of value because they provide a way to decouple a customers implementation from the out of the box ATG modules. This allows for a much easier job when it comes time to upgrade the ATG platform. Modules are also a very useful way to group functionality into a single package which can be leveraged across multiple ATG applications. One very important thing to understand about modules, or more accurately, ATG as a whole, is that when you start ATG, you tell it what module(s) you want to start. One of the first things ATG does is to look through all the modules you specified, and for each one, determine a list of modules that are also required to start (based on each modules dependencies). Once this final, ordered list is determined, ATG continues to boot up. One of the outputs from the ordered list of modules is that each module can contain it's own classes and configuration. During boot, the ordered list of modules drives the unified classpath and configpath. This is what determines which classes override others, and which configuration overrides other configuration. Think of it as a layered approach. The structure of a module is well defined. It simply looks like a folder in a filesystem that has certain other folders and files within it. Here is a list of items that can appear in a module: MyModule: META-INF - this is required, along with a file called MANIFEST.MF which describes certain properties of the module. One important property is what other modules this module depends on. config - this is typically present in most modules. It defines a tree structure (folders containing properties files, XML, etc) that maps to ATG components (these are described below). lib - this contains the classes (typically in jarred format) for any code defined in this module j2ee - this is where any web-apps would be stored. src - in case you want to include the source code for this module, it's standard practice to put it here sql - if your module requires any additions to the database schema, you should place that schema here Here's a screenshots of a module: Modules can also contain sub-modules. A dot-notation is used when referring to these sub-modules (i.e. MyModule.Versioned, where Versioned is a sub-module of MyModule). Finally, it is important to completely understand how modules work if you are going to be able to leverage them effectively. There are many different ways to design modules you want to create, some approaches are better than others, especially if you plan to share functionality between multiple different ATG applications. Components A component in ATG can be thought of as a single item that performs a certain set of related tasks. An example could be a ProductViews component - used to store information about what products the current customer has viewed. Components have properties (also called attributes). The ProductViews component could have properties like lastProductViewed (stores the ID of the last product viewed) or productViewList (stores the ID's of products viewed in order of their being viewed). The previous examples of component properties would typically also offer get and set methods used to retrieve and store the property values. Components typically will also offer other types of useful methods aside from get and set. In the ProductViewed component, we might want to offer a hasViewed method which will tell you if the customer has viewed a certain product or not. Components are organized in a tree like hierarchy called 'nucleus'. Nucleus is used to locate and instantiate ATG Components. So, when you create a new ATG component, it will be able to be found 'within' nucleus. Nucleus allows ATG components to reference one another - this is how components are strung together to perform meaningful work. It's also a mechanism to prevent redundant configuration - define it once and refer to it from everywhere. Here is a screenshot of a component in nucleus: Components can be extremely simple (i.e. a single property with a get method), or can be rather complex offering many properties and methods. To be an ATG component, a few things are required: a class - you can reference an existing out of the box class or you could write your own a properties file - this is used to define your component the above items must be located 'within' nucleus by placing them in the correct spot in your module's config folder Within the properties file, you will need to point to the class you want to use: $class=com.mycompany.myclass You may also want to define the scope of the class (request, session, or global): $scope=session In summary, ATG Components live in nucleus, generally have links to other components, and provide some meaningful type of work. You can configure components as well as extend their functionality by writing code. Repositories Repositories (a.k.a. Data Anywhere Architecture) is the mechanism that ATG uses to access data primarily stored in relational databases, but also LDAP or other backend systems. ATG applications are required to be very high performance, and data access is critical in that if not handled properly, it could create a bottleneck. ATG's repository functionality has been around for a long time - it's proven to be extremely scalable. Developers new to ATG need to understand how repositories work as this is a critical aspect of the ATG architecture. Repositories essentially map relational tables to objects in ATG, as well as handle caching. ATG defines many repositories out of the box (i.e. user profile, catalog, orders, etc), and this is comprised of both the underlying database schema along with the associated repository definition files (XML). It is fully expected that implementations will extend / change the out of the box repository definitions, so there is a prescribed approach to doing this. The first thing to be sure of is to encapsulate your repository definition additions / changes within your own module (as described above). The other important best practice is to never modify the out of the box schema - in other words, don't add columns to existing ATG tables, just create your own new tables. These will help ensure you can easily upgrade your application at a later date. xml-combination As mentioned earlier, when you start ATG, the order of the modules will determine the final configpath. Files within this configpath are 'layered' such that modules on top can override configuration of modules below it. This is the same concept for repository definition files. If you want to add a few properties to the out of the box user profile, you simply need to create an XML file containing only your additions, and place it in the correct location in your module. At boot time, your definition will be combined (hence the term xml-combination) with the lower, out of the box modules, with the result being a user profile that contains everything (out of the box, plus your additions). Aside from just adding properties, there are also ways to remove and change properties. types of properties Aside from the normal 'database backed' properties, there are a few other interesting types: transient properties - these are properties that are in memory, but not backed by any database column. These are useful for temporary storage. java-backed properties - by nature, these are transient, but in addition, when you access this property (by called the get method) instead of looking up a piece of data, it performs some logic and returns the results. 'Age' is a good example - if you're storing a birth date on the profile, but your business rules are defined in terms of someones age, you could create a simple java-backed property to look at the birth date and compare it to the current date, and return the persons age. derived properties - this is what allows for inheritance within the repository structure. You could define a property at the category level, and have the product inherit it's value as well as override it. This is useful for setting defaults, with the ability to override. caching There are a number of different caching modes which are useful at different times depending on the nature of the data being cached. For example, the simple cache mode is useful for things like user profiles. This is because the user profile will typically only be used on a single instance of ATG at one time. Simple cache mode is also useful for read-only types of data such as the product catalog. Locked cache mode is useful when you need to ensure that only one ATG instance writes to a particular item at a time - an example would be a customers order. There are many options in terms of configuring caching which are outside the scope of this article - please refer to the product manuals for more details. Other important concepts - out of scope for this article There are a whole host of concepts that are very important pieces to the ATG platform, but are out of scope for this article. Here's a brief description of some of them: formhandlers - these are ATG components that handle form submissions by users. pipelines - these are configurable chains of logic that are used for things like handling a request (request pipeline) or checking out an order. special kinds of repositories (versioned, files, secure, ...) - there are a couple different types of repositories that are used in various situations. See the manuals for more information. web development - JSP/ DSP tag library - ATG provides a traditional approach to developing web applications by providing a tag library called the DSP library. This library is used throughout your JSP pages to interact with all the ATG components. messaging - a message sub-system used as another way for components to interact. personalization - ability for business users to define a personalized user experience for customers. See the other blog posts related to personalization.

Read the article
Forcing a transaction to rollback on validation errors in Seam

- by Chris Williams

Quick version: We're looking for a way to force a transaction to rollback when specific situations occur during the execution of a method on a backing bean but we'd like the rollback to happen without having to show the user a generic 500 error page. Instead, we'd like the user to see the form she just submitted and a FacesMessage that indicates what the problem was. Long version: We've got a few backing beans that use components to perform a few related operations in the database (using JPA/Hibernate). During the process, an error can occur after some of the database operations have happened. This could be for a few different reasons but for this question, let's assume there's been a validation error that is detected after some DB writes have happened that weren't detectible before the writes occurred. When this happens, we'd like to make sure all of the db changes up to this point will be rolled back. Seam can deal with this because if you throw a RuntimeException out of the current FacesRequest, Seam will rollback the current transaction. The problem with this is that the user is shown a generic error page. In our case, we'd actually like the user to be shown the page she was on with a descriptive message about what went wrong, and have the opportunity to correct the bad input that caused the problem. The solution we've come up with is to throw an Exception from the component that discovers the validation problem with the annotation: @ApplicationException( rollback = true ) Then our backing bean can catch this exception, assume the component that threw it has published the appropriate FacesMessage, and simply return null to take the user back to the input page with the error displayed. The ApplicationException annotation tells Seam to rollback the transaction and we're not showing the user a generic error page. This worked well for the first place we used it that happened to only be doing inserts. The second place we tried to use it, we have to delete something during the process. In this second case, everything works if there's no validation error. If a validation error does happen, the rollback Exception is thrown and the transaction is marked for rollback. Even if no database modifications have happened to be rolled back, when the user fixes the bad data and re-submits the page, we're getting: java.lang.IllegalArgumentException: Removing a detached instance The detached instance is lazily loaded from another object (there's a many to one relationship). That parent object is loaded when the backing bean is instantiated. Because the transaction was rolled back after the validation error, the object is now detached. Our next step was to change this page from conversation scope to page scope. When we did this, Seam can't even render the page after the validation error because our page has to hit the DB to render and the transaction has been marked for rollback. So my question is: how are other people dealing with handling errors cleanly and properly managing transactions at the same time? Better yet, I'd love to be able to use everything we have now if someone can spot something I'm doing wrong that would be relatively easy to fix. I've read the Seam Framework article on Unified error page and exception handling but this is geared more towards more generic errors your application might encounter.

Read the article
CodePlex Daily Summary for Monday, November 05, 2012

CodePlex Daily Summary for Monday, November 05, 2012Popular ReleasesCatel ReSharper plugin: Catel.Resharper 1.3 RC 1: (+) Added support for R# 7.1 (+) Added support to Catel 3.4 for to convert auto properties into catel properties from ModelBase. (*) PropertyConverter now generates a the members name (property and notification method) to avoid the usage of existing member name. (x) Fixed reference to Actions.xml resource file.Dyanamic Reports (RDLC) - SharePoint 2010 Visual WebPart: Initial Release: This is a Initial Release.HTML Renderer: HTML Renderer 1.0.0.0 (3): Major performance improvement (http://theartofdev.wordpress.com/2012/10/25/how-i-optimized-html-renderer-and-fell-in-love-with-vs-profiler/) Minor fixes raised in issue tracker and discussions.ZXMAK2: Version 2.7.0.1: fix Spectrum+3 ULA timing if Direct3D is not available, draw warning on black background add Keyboard Help window fix kempston mouse (swap left/right buttons) add Pentagon 1024 memory module add shadow rom support for Pentagon 512/1024 fix to avoid NMI conflict between memory/BDI (Scorpion, Pentagon 512/1024) project structure and namespace refactoring NOTE: this version uses new device namespaces, so if you have VMZ file from previous version, please delete it!CodeGen Code Generator: CodeGen 4.2.2: IMPORTANT: This release replaces the previous 4.2.1 release from 28th October 2012, which has been removed. There was an error in the setup program for 4.2.1 which caused some dependent assemblies (for example the Synergy .NET runtime and other Synergy .NET assemblies) to be distributed as part of the CodeGen installation. This can cause problems when attempting to upgrade to later versions of Synergy. IT IS VERY IMPORTANT THAT ALL 4.2.1 INSTALLATIONS BE UNINSTALLED AND UPGRADED TO 4.2.2 AS ...ProDinner - ASP.NET MVC Sample (EF4.4, N-Tier, jQuery): 8: update to ASP.net MVC Awesome 3.0 udpate to EntityFramework 4.4 update to MVC 4 added dinners grid on homepageASP.net MVC Awesome - jQuery Ajax Helpers: 3.0: added Grid helper added XML Documentation added textbox helper added Client Side API for AjaxList removed .SearchButton from AjaxList AjaxForm and Confirm helpers have been merged into the Form helper optimized html output for AjaxDropdown, AjaxList, Autocomplete works on MVC 3 and 4BlogEngine.NET: BlogEngine.NET 2.7: Cheap ASP.NET Hosting - $4.95/Month - Click Here!! Click Here for More Info Cheap ASP.NET Hosting - $4.95/Month - Click Here! If you want to set up and start using BlogEngine.NET right away, you should download the Web project. If you want to extend or modify BlogEngine.NET, you should download the source code. If you are upgrading from a previous version of BlogEngine.NET, please take a look at the Upgrading to BlogEngine.NET 2.7 instructions. If you looking for Web Application Project, ...Launchbar: Launchbar 4.2.2.0: This release is the first step in cleaning up the code and using all the latest features of .NET 4.5 Changes 4.2.2 (2012-11-02) Improved handling of left clicks 4.1.0 (2012-10-17) Removed tray icon Assembly renamed and signed with strong name Note When you upgrade, Launchbar will start with the default settings. You can import your previous settings by following these steps: Run Launchbar and just save the settings without configuring anything Shutdown Launchbar Go to the folder %LOCA...CommonLibrary.NET: CommonLibrary.NET 0.9.8.8: Releases notes for FluentScript located at http://fluentscript.codeplex.com/wikipage?title=Release%20Notes&referringTitle=Documentation Fluentscript - 0.9.8.8 - Final ReleaseApplication: FluentScript Version: 0.9.8.8 Build: 0.9.8.8 Changeset: 77368 ( CommonLibrary.NET ) Release date: November 2nd, 2012 Binaries: CommonLibrary.dll Namespace: ComLib.Lang Project site: http://fluentscript.codeplex.com/ Download: http://commonlibrarynet.codeplex.com/releases/view/90426 Source code: http://common...Mouse Jiggler: MouseJiggle-1.3: This adds the much-requested minimize-to-tray feature to Mouse Jiggler.Piwik for Microsoft Silverlight Analytics Framework: WP7 and WP8: First release with basic Piwik support. Supported Systems: WP7 and WP8PCAPMerger: 2.1.0.0: Archive contains three folders: x86 - 32-bit version of application x64 - 64-bit version of application test - two testing PCAP files to be merged (both contain scrambled order of packets)Umbraco CMS: Umbraco 4.10.0 Release Candidate: This is a Release Candidate, which means that if we do not find any major issues in the next week, we will release this version as the final release of 4.10.0 on November 9th, 2012. The documentation for the MVC bits still lives in the Github version of the docs for now and will be updated on our.umbraco.org with the final release of 4.10.0. Browse the documentation here: https://github.com/umbraco/Umbraco4Docs/tree/4.8.0/Documentation/Reference/Mvc If you want to do only MVC then make sur...Skype Auto Recorder: SkypeAutoRecorder 1.3.4: New icon and images. Reworked settings window. Implemented high-quality sound encoding. Implemented a possibility to produce stereo records. Added buttons with system-wide hot keys for manual starting and canceling of recording. Added buttons for opening folder with records. Added Help button. Fixed an issue when recording is continuing after call end. Fixed an issue when recording doesn't start. Fixed several bugs and improved stability. Major refactoring and optimization...Python Tools for Visual Studio: Python Tools for Visual Studio 1.5: We’re pleased to announce the release of Python Tools for Visual Studio 1.5 RTM. Python Tools for Visual Studio (PTVS) is an open-source plug-in for Visual Studio which supports programming with the Python language. PTVS supports a broad range of features including CPython/IronPython, Edit/Intellisense/Debug/Profile, Cloud, HPC, IPython, etc. support. For a quick overview of the general IDE experience, please watch this video There are a number of exciting improvement in this release comp...AssaultCube Reloaded: 2.5.5: Linux has Ubuntu 11.10 32-bit precompiled binaries and Ubuntu 10.10 64-bit precompiled binaries, but you can compile your own as it also contains the source. If you are using Mac or other operating systems, please wait while we try to package for those OSes. Try to compile it. If it fails, download a virtual machine. The server pack is ready for both Windows and Linux, but you might need to compile your own for Linux (source included) Changelog: Fixed potential bot bugs: Map change, OpenAL...DirectX Tool Kit: October 30, 2012 (add WP8 support): October 30, 2012 Added project files for Windows Phone 8MCEBuddy 2.x: MCEBuddy 2.3.6: Changelog for 2.3.6 (32bit and 64bit) 1. Fixed a bug in multichannel audio conversion failure. AAC does not support 6 channel audio, MCEBuddy now checks for it and force the output to 2 channel if AAC codec is specified 2. Fixed a bug in Original Broadcast Date and Time. Original Broadcast Date and Time is reported in UTC timezone in WTV metadata. TVDB and MovieDB dates are reported in network timezone. It is assumed the video is recorded and converted on the same machine, i.e. local timezone...MVVM Light Toolkit: MVVM Light Toolkit V4.1 for Visual Studio 2012: This version only supports Visual Studio 2012 (and all Express editions too). If you use Visual Studio 2010, please stay tuned, we will publish an update in a few days with support for VS10. V4.1 supports: Windows Phone 8 Windows 8 (Windows RT) Silverlight 5 Silverlight 4 WPF 4.5 WPF 4 WPF 3.5 And the following development environments: Visual Studio 2012 (Pro, Premium, Ultimate) Visual Studio 2012 Express for Windows 8 Visual Studio 2012 Express for Windows Phone 8 Visual...New Projects3dTalk: Web 2.0 site for 3d projection mapping artists, to have a forum for showing work, getting advice or comments, and giving details of forthcoming shows/exhibition8media: a student project for Windows 8ActiveWorlds Managed Wrapper: HeyAsyncLoggers: AsyncLoggers strives to provide high-quality asynchronous wrappers for all well-known logging frameworks.CapsBeep: CapsBeep is a Windows utility application that causes an audible beep and a notification to appear whenever a key is pressed while the Caps Lock is active.CUDA Tuning with CUDAfy: A step-by-step guide to tuning performance of a CUDA- and CUDAfy-enabled GPU algorithm, using a brute-force Travelling Salesman algorithm as example.DDarkSEngine: New 2D game engine for .netFoxyXLS: Visual FoxPro class to geneate pure XLS files using the BIFF3 file format.JsApi: The purpose of this project is to demonstrate aspects of both the DialectSoftware.Web.UI.CustomControls and the DialectSoftware.Web.JsAPI LF Spec: Add simple test extensions to your MS Test projects for BDD-style unit tests.Liubaobao Website Starter Kit: When it comes to developing a new website - big or small, we all need something to start with. We are putting together a bunch of frequently used system parts.metropress: A feature-rich and easy to customize framework for developer/designer who want to turn any wordpress site into Windows 8 AppMobile Device: Include this in your .NET applications to allow them to easily get information from a connected iDevice.Mouse Trapper: Mouse Trapper is a program that will keep your mouse pointer inside one display, unless the chosen key is being pressed.My WCF Project: Learning projectNetworkFileWatcher: Watch changes to Files and Folders on a remote computer using NetworkFileWatcher. Overcomes the network-path limitation of System.IO.FileSystemWatcher.Quentin: Blog de QuentinQuickbooks Repair Pro: QuickBooks Repair ProSAIN: SAIN es un sistema administrativo integral basado en web que permite la administración de pequeños negocios.SQLCE with Windows Phone 7.1: This project is create on Initial understanding of SQL CE with windows phone. You will get more useful code with this codeplex link in fututre. SSDD Campero: kikhjuiojolipompmlkmlkmTileTool: Work in progress 2D tile based editor.Time Limiter: Set of Windows services used to limit times per day and per session of computer users. Meant for child computer use control. C# WCF Windows Services WMI.Window Manager: Position windows easilyYet Another Regex Tester: Write a regular expression (regex) and test it on real text.

Read the article
Toon shader with Texture. Can this be optimized?

- by Alex

I am quite new to OpenGL, I have managed after long trial and error to integrate Nehe's Cel-Shading rendering with my Model loaders, and have them drawn using the Toon shade and outline AND their original texture at the same time. The result is actually a very nice Cel Shading effect of the model texture, but it is havling the speed of the program, it's quite very slow even with just 3 models on screen... Since the result was kind of hacked together, I am thinking that maybe I am performing some extra steps or extra rendering tasks that maybe are not needed, and are slowing down the game? Something unnecessary that maybe you guys could spot? Both MD2 and 3DS loader have an InitToon() function called upon creation to load the shader initToon(){ int i; // Looping Variable ( NEW ) char Line[255]; // Storage For 255 Characters ( NEW ) float shaderData[32][3]; // Storate For The 96 Shader Values ( NEW ) FILE *In = fopen ("Shader.txt", "r"); // Open The Shader File ( NEW ) if (In) // Check To See If The File Opened ( NEW ) { for (i = 0; i < 32; i++) // Loop Though The 32 Greyscale Values ( NEW ) { if (feof (In)) // Check For The End Of The File ( NEW ) break; fgets (Line, 255, In); // Get The Current Line ( NEW ) shaderData[i][0] = shaderData[i][1] = shaderData[i][2] = float(atof (Line)); // Copy Over The Value ( NEW ) } fclose (In); // Close The File ( NEW ) } else return false; // It Went Horribly Horribly Wrong ( NEW ) glGenTextures (1, &shaderTexture[0]); // Get A Free Texture ID ( NEW ) glBindTexture (GL_TEXTURE_1D, shaderTexture[0]); // Bind This Texture. From Now On It Will Be 1D ( NEW ) // For Crying Out Loud Don't Let OpenGL Use Bi/Trilinear Filtering! ( NEW ) glTexParameteri (GL_TEXTURE_1D, GL_TEXTURE_MAG_FILTER, GL_NEAREST); glTexParameteri (GL_TEXTURE_1D, GL_TEXTURE_MIN_FILTER, GL_NEAREST); glTexImage1D (GL_TEXTURE_1D, 0, GL_RGB, 32, 0, GL_RGB , GL_FLOAT, shaderData); // Upload ( NEW ) } This is the drawing for the animated MD2 model: void MD2Model::drawToon() { float outlineWidth = 3.0f; // Width Of The Lines ( NEW ) float outlineColor[3] = { 0.0f, 0.0f, 0.0f }; // Color Of The Lines ( NEW ) // ORIGINAL PART OF THE FUNCTION //Figure out the two frames between which we are interpolating int frameIndex1 = (int)(time * (endFrame - startFrame + 1)) + startFrame; if (frameIndex1 > endFrame) { frameIndex1 = startFrame; } int frameIndex2; if (frameIndex1 < endFrame) { frameIndex2 = frameIndex1 + 1; } else { frameIndex2 = startFrame; } MD2Frame* frame1 = frames + frameIndex1; MD2Frame* frame2 = frames + frameIndex2; //Figure out the fraction that we are between the two frames float frac = (time - (float)(frameIndex1 - startFrame) / (float)(endFrame - startFrame + 1)) * (endFrame - startFrame + 1); // I ADDED THESE FROM NEHE'S TUTORIAL FOR FIRST PASS (TOON SHADE) glHint (GL_LINE_SMOOTH_HINT, GL_NICEST); // Use The Good Calculations ( NEW ) glEnable (GL_LINE_SMOOTH); // Cel-Shading Code // glEnable (GL_TEXTURE_1D); // Enable 1D Texturing ( NEW ) glBindTexture (GL_TEXTURE_1D, shaderTexture[0]); // Bind Our Texture ( NEW ) glColor3f (1.0f, 1.0f, 1.0f); // Set The Color Of The Model ( NEW ) // ORIGINAL DRAWING CODE //Draw the model as an interpolation between the two frames glBegin(GL_TRIANGLES); for(int i = 0; i < numTriangles; i++) { MD2Triangle* triangle = triangles + i; for(int j = 0; j < 3; j++) { MD2Vertex* v1 = frame1->vertices + triangle->vertices[j]; MD2Vertex* v2 = frame2->vertices + triangle->vertices[j]; Vec3f pos = v1->pos * (1 - frac) + v2->pos * frac; Vec3f normal = v1->normal * (1 - frac) + v2->normal * frac; if (normal[0] == 0 && normal[1] == 0 && normal[2] == 0) { normal = Vec3f(0, 0, 1); } glNormal3f(normal[0], normal[1], normal[2]); MD2TexCoord* texCoord = texCoords + triangle->texCoords[j]; glTexCoord2f(texCoord->texCoordX, texCoord->texCoordY); glVertex3f(pos[0], pos[1], pos[2]); } } glEnd(); // ADDED THESE FROM NEHE'S FOR SECOND PASS (OUTLINE) glDisable (GL_TEXTURE_1D); // Disable 1D Textures ( NEW ) glEnable (GL_BLEND); // Enable Blending ( NEW ) glBlendFunc(GL_SRC_ALPHA,GL_ONE_MINUS_SRC_ALPHA); // Set The Blend Mode ( NEW ) glPolygonMode (GL_BACK, GL_LINE); // Draw Backfacing Polygons As Wireframes ( NEW ) glLineWidth (outlineWidth); // Set The Line Width ( NEW ) glCullFace (GL_FRONT); // Don't Draw Any Front-Facing Polygons ( NEW ) glDepthFunc (GL_LEQUAL); // Change The Depth Mode ( NEW ) glColor3fv (&outlineColor[0]); // Set The Outline Color ( NEW ) // HERE I AM PARSING THE VERTICES AGAIN (NOT IN THE ORIGINAL FUNCTION) FOR THE OUTLINE AS PER NEHE'S TUT glBegin (GL_TRIANGLES); // Tell OpenGL What We Want To Draw for(int i = 0; i < numTriangles; i++) { MD2Triangle* triangle = triangles + i; for(int j = 0; j < 3; j++) { MD2Vertex* v1 = frame1->vertices + triangle->vertices[j]; MD2Vertex* v2 = frame2->vertices + triangle->vertices[j]; Vec3f pos = v1->pos * (1 - frac) + v2->pos * frac; Vec3f normal = v1->normal * (1 - frac) + v2->normal * frac; if (normal[0] == 0 && normal[1] == 0 && normal[2] == 0) { normal = Vec3f(0, 0, 1); } glNormal3f(normal[0], normal[1], normal[2]); MD2TexCoord* texCoord = texCoords + triangle->texCoords[j]; glTexCoord2f(texCoord->texCoordX, texCoord->texCoordY); glVertex3f(pos[0], pos[1], pos[2]); } } glEnd (); // Tell OpenGL We've Finished glDepthFunc (GL_LESS); // Reset The Depth-Testing Mode ( NEW ) glCullFace (GL_BACK); // Reset The Face To Be Culled ( NEW ) glPolygonMode (GL_BACK, GL_FILL); // Reset Back-Facing Polygon Drawing Mode ( NEW ) glDisable (GL_BLEND); } Whereas this is the drawToon function in the 3DS loader void Model_3DS::drawToon() { float outlineWidth = 3.0f; // Width Of The Lines ( NEW ) float outlineColor[3] = { 0.0f, 0.0f, 0.0f }; // Color Of The Lines ( NEW ) //ORIGINAL CODE if (visible) { glPushMatrix(); // Move the model glTranslatef(pos.x, pos.y, pos.z); // Rotate the model glRotatef(rot.x, 1.0f, 0.0f, 0.0f); glRotatef(rot.y, 0.0f, 1.0f, 0.0f); glRotatef(rot.z, 0.0f, 0.0f, 1.0f); glScalef(scale, scale, scale); // Loop through the objects for (int i = 0; i < numObjects; i++) { // Enable texture coordiantes, normals, and vertices arrays if (Objects[i].textured) glEnableClientState(GL_TEXTURE_COORD_ARRAY); if (lit) glEnableClientState(GL_NORMAL_ARRAY); glEnableClientState(GL_VERTEX_ARRAY); // Point them to the objects arrays if (Objects[i].textured) glTexCoordPointer(2, GL_FLOAT, 0, Objects[i].TexCoords); if (lit) glNormalPointer(GL_FLOAT, 0, Objects[i].Normals); glVertexPointer(3, GL_FLOAT, 0, Objects[i].Vertexes); // Loop through the faces as sorted by material and draw them for (int j = 0; j < Objects[i].numMatFaces; j ++) { // Use the material's texture Materials[Objects[i].MatFaces[j].MatIndex].tex.Use(); // AFTER THE TEXTURE IS APPLIED I INSERT THE TOON FUNCTIONS HERE (FIRST PASS) glHint (GL_LINE_SMOOTH_HINT, GL_NICEST); // Use The Good Calculations ( NEW ) glEnable (GL_LINE_SMOOTH); // Cel-Shading Code // glEnable (GL_TEXTURE_1D); // Enable 1D Texturing ( NEW ) glBindTexture (GL_TEXTURE_1D, shaderTexture[0]); // Bind Our Texture ( NEW ) glColor3f (1.0f, 1.0f, 1.0f); // Set The Color Of The Model ( NEW ) glPushMatrix(); // Move the model glTranslatef(Objects[i].pos.x, Objects[i].pos.y, Objects[i].pos.z); // Rotate the model glRotatef(Objects[i].rot.z, 0.0f, 0.0f, 1.0f); glRotatef(Objects[i].rot.y, 0.0f, 1.0f, 0.0f); glRotatef(Objects[i].rot.x, 1.0f, 0.0f, 0.0f); // Draw the faces using an index to the vertex array glDrawElements(GL_TRIANGLES, Objects[i].MatFaces[j].numSubFaces, GL_UNSIGNED_SHORT, Objects[i].MatFaces[j].subFaces); glPopMatrix(); } glDisable (GL_TEXTURE_1D); // Disable 1D Textures ( NEW ) // THIS IS AN ADDED SECOND PASS AT THE VERTICES FOR THE OUTLINE glEnable (GL_BLEND); // Enable Blending ( NEW ) glBlendFunc(GL_SRC_ALPHA,GL_ONE_MINUS_SRC_ALPHA); // Set The Blend Mode ( NEW ) glPolygonMode (GL_BACK, GL_LINE); // Draw Backfacing Polygons As Wireframes ( NEW ) glLineWidth (outlineWidth); // Set The Line Width ( NEW ) glCullFace (GL_FRONT); // Don't Draw Any Front-Facing Polygons ( NEW ) glDepthFunc (GL_LEQUAL); // Change The Depth Mode ( NEW ) glColor3fv (&outlineColor[0]); // Set The Outline Color ( NEW ) for (int j = 0; j < Objects[i].numMatFaces; j ++) { glPushMatrix(); // Move the model glTranslatef(Objects[i].pos.x, Objects[i].pos.y, Objects[i].pos.z); // Rotate the model glRotatef(Objects[i].rot.z, 0.0f, 0.0f, 1.0f); glRotatef(Objects[i].rot.y, 0.0f, 1.0f, 0.0f); glRotatef(Objects[i].rot.x, 1.0f, 0.0f, 0.0f); // Draw the faces using an index to the vertex array glDrawElements(GL_TRIANGLES, Objects[i].MatFaces[j].numSubFaces, GL_UNSIGNED_SHORT, Objects[i].MatFaces[j].subFaces); glPopMatrix(); } glDepthFunc (GL_LESS); // Reset The Depth-Testing Mode ( NEW ) glCullFace (GL_BACK); // Reset The Face To Be Culled ( NEW ) glPolygonMode (GL_BACK, GL_FILL); // Reset Back-Facing Polygon Drawing Mode ( NEW ) glDisable (GL_BLEND); glPopMatrix(); } Finally this is the tex.Use() function that loads a BMP texture and somehow gets blended perfectly with the Toon shading void GLTexture::Use() { glEnable(GL_TEXTURE_2D); // Enable texture mapping glBindTexture(GL_TEXTURE_2D, texture[0]); // Bind the texture as the current one }

Read the article
CodePlex Daily Summary for Tuesday, July 30, 2013

CodePlex Daily Summary for Tuesday, July 30, 2013Popular ReleasesnopCommerce. Open source shopping cart (ASP.NET MVC): nopCommerce 3.10: Highlight features & improvements: • Performance optimization. • New more user-friendly product/product-variant logic. Now we'll have only products (simple and grouped). • Bundle products support added. • Allow a store owner to associate product image for product variant attribute values. To see the full list of fixes and changes please visit the release notes page (http://www.nopCommerce.com/releasenotes.aspx).Small Tools: Helpers 1.01: Fix params count issue Fix STAThread issue Add support for exe.config filesExtJS based ASP.NET Controls: FineUI v3.3.1: ??FineUI ?? ExtJS ??? ASP.NET ???。 FineUI??? ?? No JavaScript，No CSS，No UpdatePanel，No ViewState，No WebServices ???????。 ?????? IE 7.0、Firefox 3.6、Chrome 3.0、Opera 10.5、Safari 3.0+ ???? Apache License v2.0 ?：ExtJS ?? GPL v3 ?????(http://www.sencha.com/license)。 ???? ??：http://fineui.com/bbs/ ??：http://fineui.com/demo/ ??：http://fineui.com/doc/ ??：http://fineui.codeplex.com/ FineUI ???? ExtJS ????????，???? ExtJS ?，???????????ExtJS?： 1. ????? FineUI ? ExtJS ?：http://fineui.com/bbs/fo...AutoNLayered - Domain Oriented N-Layered .NET 4.5: AutoNLayered v1.0.5: - Fix Dtos. Abstract collections replaced by concrete (correct serialization WCF). - OrderBy in navigation properties. - Unit Test with Fakes. - Map of entities/dto moved to application services. - Libraries updated. Warning using Fakes: http://connect.microsoft.com/VisualStudio/feedback/details/782031/visual-studio-2012-add-fakes-assembly-does-not-add-all-needed-referencesPath Copy Copy: 11.1: Minor release with two new features: Submenu's contextual menu item now has an icon next to it Added reference to JavaScript regular expression format in Settings application Since this release does not have any glaring bug fixes, it is more of an optional update for existing users. It depends on whether you want to be able to spot the Path Copy Copy submenu more easily. I recommend you install it to see if the icon makes sense. As always, please don't hesitate to leave feedback via Discus...CMake Tools for Visual Studio: CMake Tools for Visual Studio 1.0 RC3: This is the third release candidate of CMake Tools for Visual Studio 1.0, which contains the following bug fixes: Opening a CMake file from Windows Explorer while Visual Studio is already open will no start a new instance of Visual Studio. Typing a symbol while the IntelliSense list box is visible and the text typed so far does not match any item in the list will dismiss the list box and insert the symbol typed.R.NET: R.NET 1.5: The major changes in v1.5 are: Initialize method must be called before using R. Settings should be passed to the method. EagerEvaluate method renamed to Evaluate (use Defer method when you want old version of Evaluate).Media Companion: Media Companion MC3.574b: Some good bug fixes been going on with the new XBMC-Link function. Thanks to all who were able to do testing and gave feedback. New:* Added some adhoc extra General movie filters, one of which is Plot = Outline (see fixes above). To see the filters, add the following line to your config.xml: <ShowExtraMovieFilters>True</ShowExtraMovieFilters>. The others are: Imdb in folder name, Imdb in not folder name & Imdb not in folder name & year mismatch. * Movie - display <tag> list on browser tab ...OfflineBrowser: Preview Release with Search: I've added search to this release.VG-Ripper & PG-Ripper: VG-Ripper 2.9.46: changes FIXED LoginMath.NET Numerics: Math.NET Numerics v2.6.0: What's New in Math.NET Numerics 2.6 - Announcement, Explanations and Sample Code. New: Linear Curve Fitting Linear least-squares fitting (regression) to lines, polynomials and linear combinations of arbitrary functions. Multi-dimensional fitting. Also works well in F# with the F# extensions. New: Root Finding Brent's method. ~Candy Chiu, Alexander Täschner Bisection method. ~Scott Stephens, Alexander Täschner Broyden's method, for multi-dimensional functions. ~Alexander Täschner ...AJAX Control Toolkit: July 2013 Release: AJAX Control Toolkit Release Notes - July 2013 Release Version 7.0725July 2013 release of the AJAX Control Toolkit. AJAX Control Toolkit .NET 4.5 – AJAX Control Toolkit for .NET 4.5 and sample site (Recommended). AJAX Control Toolkit .NET 4 – AJAX Control Toolkit for .NET 4 and sample site (Recommended). AJAX Control Toolkit .NET 3.5 – AJAX Control Toolkit for .NET 3.5 and sample site (Recommended). Notes: - Instructions for using the AJAX Control Toolkit with ASP.NET 4.5 can be found at...MJP's DirectX 11 Samples: Specular Antialiasing Sample: Sample code to complement my presentation that's part of the Physically Based Shading in Theory and Practice course at SIGGRAPH 2013, entitled "Crafting a Next-Gen Material Pipeline for The Order: 1886". Demonstrates various methods of preventing aliasing from specular BRDF's when using high-frequency normal maps. The zip file contains source code as well as a pre-compiled x64 binary.EXCEL??、??、????????：DataPie（??MSSQL 2008、ORACLE、ACCESS 2007）: DataPieV3.6.1: ????csv????，???sql??，??csv????Qibla Compass for Windows Phone: Qibla Compass for Windows Phone: This release is in open beta version. You can always download and provide your feedback. Since it was just developed to give users an idea of Qibla Direction and its mapping therefore you might not see major releases in future.Event Scavenger: Version 5: I've decided to do a full (recommended) release of version 5. I've been running it myself for months and did not have any issues with it yet. This release just contains the installs. The web site's documentation has not been updated yet and reflects the previous version details. If you have an issue with this version then you can happily switch back to 4.x. Version 5 can run side-by-side with earlier versions (service) as it has a new service and database.wpadk: WPadk_WP8???: ???：V1.1 ??wp???????????????wp8???????StockSharp: StockSharp 4.1.16: ?????? ????????? - http://stocksharp.com/forum/yaf_postsm28239_S--API-4-1.aspx#post28239GeoTransformer: GeoTransformer 4.5: Extensions can now be installed and uninstalled from the application. The extensions update the same way as the application - silently and automatically. Added ability to search for caches by pressing CTRL+F in the table views. (Thanks to JanisU for implementing this request) Added ability to remove edited customizations for multiple caches at once (use SHIFT or CTRL to select multiple lines in the table). A new experimental version for Windows 8 RT (on ARM processor) is also made availa...Kartris E-commerce: Kartris v2.5003: This fixes an issue where search engines appear to identify as IE and so trigger the noIE page if there is not a non-responsive skin specified.New ProjectsBus Booking System: Bus Booking systemC#??????: ????C#??????????????。Cotizav 2.0: Este proyecto es para el soporte de Cotizaciones.DeferredShading: deferred shading rendererIVR Junction: IVR Junction connects an Interactive Voice Response (IVR) system to cloud services such as YouTube, Facebook and other social media.Mac Address Changer: It's a quite and easy tool to change your mac addressmotokraft user control: user control for motokraftSingle Reference JavaScript Pattern: This is very simple pattern. In here you need to only refer one script in a page. I'm sure it is saving your development time as well as maintenance timeSocial_Life_Time: This is social network that people can communicate with each otherThe Ironic Text Based MMORPG: Modern MMORPGs have become highly interactive, complex systems of skills, stats, and action combat. This game introduces a new level of text based immersion!Timeline Year Control: Timeline Year Control An ASP.Net year indicator timeline control.winrtsock: winsock façade for Windows Runtime for porting bsd socket code to Windows RuntimeZker: No summary?????: C#?????

Read the article
Negamax implementation doesn't appear to work with tic-tac-toe

- by George Jiglau

I've implemented Negamax as it can be found on wikipedia, which includes alpha/beta pruning. However, it seems to favor a losing move, which should be an invalid result. The game is Tic-Tac-Toe, I've abstracted most of the game play so it should be rather easy to spot an error within the algorithm. Here is the code, nextMove, negamax or evaluate are probably the functions that contain the fault: #include <list> #include <climits> #include <iostream> //#define DEBUG 1 using namespace std; struct Move { int row, col; Move(int row, int col) : row(row), col(col) { } Move(const Move& m) { row = m.row; col = m.col; } }; struct Board { char player; char opponent; char board[3][3]; Board() { } void read(istream& stream) { stream >> player; opponent = player == 'X' ? 'O' : 'X'; for(int row = 0; row < 3; row++) { for(int col = 0; col < 3; col++) { char playa; stream >> playa; board[row][col] = playa == '_' ? 0 : playa == player ? 1 : -1; } } } void print(ostream& stream) { for(int row = 0; row < 3; row++) { for(int col = 0; col < 3; col++) { switch(board[row][col]) { case -1: stream << opponent; break; case 0: stream << '_'; break; case 1: stream << player; break; } } stream << endl; } } void do_move(const Move& move, int player) { board[move.row][move.col] = player; } void undo_move(const Move& move) { board[move.row][move.col] = 0; } bool isWon() { if (board[0][0] != 0) { if (board[0][0] == board[0][1] && board[0][1] == board[0][2]) return true; if (board[0][0] == board[1][0] && board[1][0] == board[2][0]) return true; } if (board[2][2] != 0) { if (board[2][0] == board[2][1] && board[2][1] == board[2][2]) return true; if (board[0][2] == board[1][2] && board[1][2] == board[2][2]) return true; } if (board[1][1] != 0) { if (board[0][1] == board[1][1] && board[1][1] == board[2][1]) return true; if (board[1][0] == board[1][1] && board[1][1] == board[1][2]) return true; if (board[0][0] == board[1][1] && board[1][1] == board[2][2]) return true; if (board[0][2] == board [1][1] && board[1][1] == board[2][0]) return true; } return false; } list<Move> getMoves() { list<Move> moveList; for(int row = 0; row < 3; row++) for(int col = 0; col < 3; col++) if (board[row][col] == 0) moveList.push_back(Move(row, col)); return moveList; } }; ostream& operator<< (ostream& stream, Board& board) { board.print(stream); return stream; } istream& operator>> (istream& stream, Board& board) { board.read(stream); return stream; } int evaluate(Board& board) { int score = board.isWon() ? 100 : 0; for(int row = 0; row < 3; row++) for(int col = 0; col < 3; col++) if (board.board[row][col] == 0) score += 1; return score; } int negamax(Board& board, int depth, int player, int alpha, int beta) { if (board.isWon() || depth <= 0) { #if DEBUG > 1 cout << "Found winner board at depth " << depth << endl; cout << board << endl; #endif return player * evaluate(board); } list<Move> allMoves = board.getMoves(); if (allMoves.size() == 0) return player * evaluate(board); for(list<Move>::iterator it = allMoves.begin(); it != allMoves.end(); it++) { board.do_move(*it, -player); int val = -negamax(board, depth - 1, -player, -beta, -alpha); board.undo_move(*it); if (val >= beta) return val; if (val > alpha) alpha = val; } return alpha; } void nextMove(Board& board) { list<Move> allMoves = board.getMoves(); Move* bestMove = NULL; int bestScore = INT_MIN; for(list<Move>::iterator it = allMoves.begin(); it != allMoves.end(); it++) { board.do_move(*it, 1); int score = -negamax(board, 100, 1, INT_MIN + 1, INT_MAX); board.undo_move(*it); #if DEBUG cout << it->row << ' ' << it->col << " = " << score << endl; #endif if (score > bestScore) { bestMove = &*it; bestScore = score; } } if (!bestMove) return; cout << bestMove->row << ' ' << bestMove->col << endl; #if DEBUG board.do_move(*bestMove, 1); cout << board; #endif } int main() { Board board; cin >> board; #if DEBUG cout << "Starting board:" << endl; cout << board; #endif nextMove(board); return 0; } Giving this input: O X__ ___ ___ The algorithm chooses to place a piece at 0, 1, causing a guaranteed loss, do to this trap(nothing can be done to win or end in a draw): XO_ X__ ___ Perhaps it has something to do with the evaluation function? If so, how could I fix it?

Read the article
CodePlex Daily Summary for Wednesday, August 20, 2014

CodePlex Daily Summary for Wednesday, August 20, 2014Popular ReleasesMolGridCal & MolCal: MolGridCal tutorial v1.1: Update the contents for grid computing virtual screening.SharePoint 2013 Search Query Tool: SharePoint 2013 Search Query Tool v2.1: Layout improvements Bug fixes Stores auth method and user name Moved experimental settings to Advanced boxCtrlAltStudio Viewer: CtrlAltStudio Viewer 1.2.2.41183 Alpha: This alpha of the CtrlAltStudio Viewer provides some preliminary Oculus Rift DK2 support. For more details, see the release notes linked to below. Release notes: http://ctrlaltstudio.com/viewer/release-notes/1-2-2-41183-alpha Support info: http://ctrlaltstudio.com/viewer/support Privacy policy: http://ctrlaltstudio.com/viewer/privacy Disclaimer: This software is not provided or supported by Linden Lab, the makers of Second Life.SQL Scripts to Improve DNN Performance: Turbo Scripts 0.9.1 for DNN 7.1.2 - 7.3.2: Support for DNN 7.3.2 added Fixed a typo in GetVendor procedure New goodies TurboDbConfig and TurboDNNSettings added (re-uploaded with fixed file name)The IRIS Toolbox Project: IRIS Toolbox Release 20140819: Regular Updates Issue 66 (66) closed, bug fixed. Calls to irisstartup and iriscleanup occasionally crashed when older IRIS versions were on the search path. Issue 65 (65) closed, bug fixed. The function tseries/convert crashed when called with 'method=' 'first' or 'last'.ConEmu - Windows console with tabs: ConEmu 140819 [Alpha]: ConEmu - developer build x86 and x64 versions. Written in C++, no additional packages required. Run "ConEmu.exe" or "ConEmu64.exe". Some useful information you may found: http://superuser.com/questions/tagged/conemu http://code.google.com/p/conemu-maximus5/wiki/ConEmuFAQ http://code.google.com/p/conemu-maximus5/wiki/TableOfContents If you want to use ConEmu in portable mode, just create empty "ConEmu.xml" file near to "ConEmu.exe" HDD Guardian: HDD Guardian 0.6.1: New: package now include smartctl 6.3; Removed: standard notification e-mail. Now you have to set your mail server to send e-mail alerts; Bugfix: USB detection error; custom e-mail server settings issue; bottom panel displays a wrong ATA error count.VG-Ripper & PG-Ripper: VG-Ripper 2.9.62: changes NEW: Added Support for 'MadImage.org' links NEW: Added Support for 'ImgSpot.org' links NEW: Added Support for 'ImgClick.net' links NEW: Added Support for 'Imaaage.com' links NEW: Added Support for 'Image-Bugs.com' links NEW: Added Support for 'Pictomania.org' links NEW: Added Support for 'ImgDap.com' links NEW: Added Support for 'FileSpit.com' links FIXED: 'ImgSee.me' linksLinq 4 Javascript: Version 2.4: Minor Changes Made Added Count() and Count(with where clause) Distinct will now use a dictionary instead of a custom dictionary object Organize the unit tests. The variable names will actually make sense and won't be 2 letters. SelectMany will now use the queryable logic.Magick.NET: Magick.NET 7.0.0.0001: Magick.NET linked with ImageMagick 7-Beta.CMake Tools for Visual Studio: CMake Tools for Visual Studio 1.2: This release adds the following new features and bug fixes from CMake Tools for Visual Studio 1.1: Added support for CMake 3.0. Added support for word completion. Added IntelliSense support for the CMAKEHOSTSYSTEM_INFORMATION command. Fixed syntax highlighting for tokens beginning with escape sequences. Fixed issue uninstalling CMake Tools for Visual Studio after Visual Studio has been uninstalled.GW2 Personal Assistant Overlay: GW2 Personal Assistant Overlay 1.1: Overview1.1 is the second 'stable' release of the GW2 Personal Assistant Overlay. This version includes just a couple of very minor features and some minor bug fixes. For details regarding installation, setup, and general use, see Documentation. Note: If you were using a previous version, you will probably want to copy over the following user settings files: GW2PAO.DungeonSettings.xml GW2PAO.EventSettings.xml GW2PAO.WvWSettings.xml GW2PAO.ZoneCompletionSettings.xml New FeaturesAdded new "No...Fluentx: Fluentx v1.5.3: Added few more extension methods.fastJSON: v2.1.2: 2.1.2 - bug fix circular referencesJPush.NET: JPush Server SDK 1.2.1 (For JPush V3): Assembly: 1.2.1.24728 JPush REST API Version: v3 JPush Documentation Reference .NET framework: v4.0 or above. Sample: class: JPushClientV3 2014 Augest 15th.SEToolbox: SEToolbox 01.043.008 Release 1: Changed ship/station names to use new DisplayName instead of Beacon/Antenna. Fixed issue with updated SE binaries 01.043.018 using new Voxel Material definitions.Google .Net API: Drive.Sample: Google .NET Client API – Drive.SampleInstructions for the Google .NET Client API – Drive.Sample</h2> http://code.google.com/p/google-api-dotnet-client/source/browse/?repo=samples#hg%2FDrive.SampleBrowse Source, or main file http://code.google.com/p/google-api-dotnet-client/source/browse/Drive.Sample/Program.cs?repo=samplesProgram.cs <h3>1. Checkout Instructions</h3> <p><b>Prerequisites:</b> Install Visual Studio, and <a href="http://mercurial.selenic.com/">Mercurial</a>.</p> ...FineUI - jQuery / ExtJS based ASP.NET Controls: FineUI v4.1.1: -??Form??????????????（???-5929）。 -?TemplateField??ExpandOnDoubleClick、ExpandOnEnter、ExpandToSelectRow????（LZOM-5932）。 -BodyPadding???????，??“5”“5 10”，???????????“5px”“5px 10px”。 -??TriggerBox?EnableEdit=false????，??????????????（Jango_Jing-5450）。 -???????????DataKeyNames???????????（yygy-6002）。 -????????????????????????（Gnid-6018）。 -??PageManager???AutoSizePanelID????，??????????????????（yygy-6008）。 -?FState???????????????，????????????????（????-5925）。 -??????OnClientClick???return?????????（FineU...DNN CMS Platform: 07.03.02: Major Highlights Fixed backwards compatibility issue with 3rd party control panels Fixed issue in the drag and drop functionality of the File Uploader in IE 11 and Safari Fixed issue where users were able to create pages with the same name Fixed issue that affected older versions of DNN that do not include the maxAllowedContentLength during upgrade Fixed issue that stopped some skins from being upgraded to newer versions Fixed issue that randomly showed an unexpected error during us...WordMat: WordMat for Mac: WordMat for Mac has a few limitations compared to the Windows version - Graph is not supported (Gnuplot, GeoGebra and Excel works) - Units are not supported yet (Coming up) The Mac version is yet as tested as the windows version.New ProjectsCryptography Enumerations JavaScript Shell: Javascript shell for CAPICOM enumsFamiglia Information Server: Famiglia ProjectHustle: Hustle is a small utility that can be used to manage threads when executing command line tools. The tool was built to take advantage parallel loading in TM1.LuckyDraw: an lucky drawer for 2nd Sudoku Competition Powered by PythonMachina Aurum WebDriver Powershell: Powershell commands to the http://www.w3.org/TR/webdriver/ specification (works on Internet Explorer 11 and Chrome)ODBC Connect: ODBC Connect is a Windows user interface for 32bit and 64bit ODBC data sources. Generate SQL statements, export to file, run from the command line to automate.Post Publisher: Post Publisher is a post publishing platform. This is a work-in-progress.Samurai Framework: Samurai is a game framework written in C# using OpenGL for graphics. It aims to be a higher level abstraction rather than just a simple OpenGL binding.SharePoint 2013 tokenizing user/group autocomplete: SharePoint 2013 tokenizing user/group autocomplete plugin allow user to search/select users/groups.SharePoint 2013 User Lync Presence using jQuery: SharePoint 2013 User Lync Presence jQuery plugin renders the presence for particular user with or without picture.SharePoint Search Box User/Group AutoComplete: SharePoint Search box User/Group autocomplete is a jQuery plugin to quick search the user/group from OOB search input control.TI Helper: TI Helper is an Auto Hot Key script that can be used to enhance the options in the IBM Cognos TM1 Turbo Integrator (TI) process editor.trade-software: for trading educationWPF Graphing: CUSTOME GRAPHING SOLUTIONYoutubeChannelDownloader: I love to see video on my favorite channel,and I want to download videos on this channel to watch later. So I made this app.

Read the article

Search Results

Search found 2166 results on 87 pages for 'hot spot'.

Page 83/87 | < Previous Page | 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 | Next Page >

- by alanc

- by dapostolov

- by Saif Bechan

- by zarzych

- by Shawn

- by NiKo

- by Steven Robbins

- by askubuntu7639

- by Nick Gibson

- by HariSrinivasan

- by Lukas Vermeer

- by Paul Johnson

- by Jason Fitzpatrick

- by Glen Borkowski

- by Chris Williams

- by Alex

- by George Jiglau

< Previous Page | 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 | Next Page >