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• Webcast Replay : SANS Institute Product Review of Oracle Identity Manager

  - by B Shashikumar

  Thanks to everyone who attended the SANS Institute webinar covering the product review of Oracle Identity Manager. And a special thanks to our guest speakers from SuperValu - Phillip Black and Patrick Abreo. If you missed the webcast, you can catch a replay here  And here are the slides that were used in the webcast.  There were many questions that we could not answer as we ran out of time. We have captured some of the questions with responses below. Is Oracle Identity Analytics still offered as a separate product or is it part of Oracle Identity Manager? Oracle Identity Manager and Oracle Identity Analytics are now offered as part of Oracle Identity Governance Suite. OIA and OIM share a common UI architecture, common data model and common support for connected and disconnected resources.  When requesting new access/entitlements is there an approval process? Yes. We leverage SOA BPEL-based workflows for approvals  Are the identity self service capabilities based on Oracle ADF? Yes they are completely based on Oracle ADF  Can you give some examples of personalization and customization with Oracle Identity Manager 11gR2? With the new UI config framework we can enable different levels of UI customization. Customers now have the ability to Point & click to customize; or drag and drop customization without any need for coding. So users can easily personalize the interface of their application within the browser. For example, they can change the logo, Rearrange, hide Home Page regions; regularly searched items can be saved and re-used; Searchable & search results columns can be configured; Sorting preferences are remembered and so on. For more sophisticated customization, Customers can also edit the standard JSF within the page to alter business rules, modify page flows, page layouts and other items. Can you explain the role of sandboxes in customization? Customers can make their custom changes within a sandbox so that it doesn’t impact their production environment. They can make their changes, validate those changes, stage and then commit those changes without affecting production users. This is similar to how source code control systems like perforce work To watch a replay of the webcast, click here

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• Recovering an Ubuntu installation - Ubuntu eats itself after 'sudo apt-get install -f'

  - by Tony Martin

  Updater (I assume) put a no entry style alert icon on the panel which informed me that certain package dependencies were not up to snuff. Upgrades were thereafter only partial. The dialogue advised that I sudo apt-get install -f. I did this hoping that app-get would fulfil dependencies and replace corrupted files and watched it systematically remove every component of linux, both the stuff I had installed and the core ubuntu packages. I could only assume at this stage that this was in preparation for a fresh install but, of course, I know better now - if you find yourself with apt-get warning you that you are about to remove several hundred packages and asking you to type an involved confirmation string seek advice before proceeding. I digress. This was a 64 bit install of 12.04. All that is left is grub pointing to a couple of windows recovery partitions on the hard drive. Thankfully the Ext4 partition is reachable from a stick boot. EDIT: I've logged onto the machine with a 64 bit stick and can see the file structure left behind by apt-get after {ahem} fixing. My first instinct was to run install from the stick but it seemed to want to do another install rather than a repair. My question then: is there a way to recover the current installation so that if I reinstall the packages I had they will pick up the original settings? I'm particularly worried about losing email from evolution - the rest I could probably lash back together. As for the use of PPA I'm not sure what you're driving at. I generally use Ubuntu Software Centre to install software, though I have used terminal scripts to add new repositories and software successfully following guidance on various websites. The most recent change I made was a downgrade of Wine in an attempt to install and run excel2007 (a necessity, I think, as I have VBA work to do). The installer had stalled and had to be killed. I wonder if that corrupted whatever database holds a model of the package installation structure. I would also be interested to know how this disaster came about. I see people in the know recommending the sudo apt-get install -f as a fairly innocuous cure in similar circumstances. Thanks for your attention, Tony Martin p.s. Do please forgive the rant aspects of the original post. It's hard to write rationally with a large hole in the pit of your stomach.

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

  - by Archelon

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

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• Oracle went back to school !....

  - by Cristina Ciocoiu

  I am Georgiana, Contracts Manager for Oracle University and Advanced Customer Services in Romania. I started working for Oracle for 4 years ago as a Contracts Specialist. Two years ago I became a manager of a team of 9 Contracts Specialists. On a sunny day in March some members of my team visited the students of the Academy of Economic Studies, accompanied by Recruitment colleagues. This was part of a new initiative to raise awareness on career opportunities at Oracle. We spent approximately 2 hours illustrating and explaining different aspects of the day-to-day activities of an Oracle Contracts Specialist to the future graduates of the Academy. Role Play Since a role play is worth 1000 job descriptions, the audience witnessed an entertaining performance on the contracting process from the phase of the negotiation with the customer to actual signing of the contract. The main focus was on the role of Contracts Specialist liaising with all the groups involved and ensuring that the contract is compliant with Oracle policies while generating the expected revenue. However, the team took other roles as well i.e. Sales Representative, Customer, Business Approver and Lawyer to demonstrate their role in the process. As each of these roles only have a small slice of the big pie, it is vital to understand what happens before and after you come on stage as a Contract Specialist. Contracts Specialist Being a Contracts Specialist goes beyond simply knowing what policies apply, it means understanding Oracle’s core business model, understanding customers’ requests and addressing them in the most effective way. The job also involves connecting smaller teams that are often geographically dispersed across multiple regions so that they become a bigger, stronger and successful team. You are the expert in this key position that can facilitate the closing of a deal or stop it from happening if the risk is too high. The role play provided insights on both. Why I love this job Events of this kind are sometimes just as useful for the “recruiters” as for the “recruits”. For me, as a presenter, it was an excellent opportunity to think about the many reasons why I love what I do in the Contracts department every day and to share this with the students. I wanted to explain to the audience, who are still considering education and career possibilities, that what we do in Contracts DOES make a difference. You have the power to achieve targets that you did not think reachable before. Working in the dynamic Oracle environment shapes you as a person and there is a lot to take away from this experience. Looking back to my years in the Academy (I graduated from the Academy myself), I wish I could have listened to more people talking about their great jobs and about how I could get there. If those were Oracle people I might have been writing this article sooner. J If you are interested to join the Contracts team please click here for more information or contact lavinia.protopopescu-AT-oracle-DOT-com. You can find all openings in Romania via http://campus.oracle.com

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• Memories about Tadeusz Golonka

  - by Damian

  Today at 10:55 AM, Tadeusz Golonka - my greatest  Mentor and Teacher  passed away. I had te opportunity to met Tadek in person several times last years. It was always a great experience to see how he shared his energy and passion. I was always impressed and had a lot of new ideas after such meeting or lecture. I can remember the meeting  in early 2009 and his briliant speech he did for us, the MVP community in Poland. We spent two days together and he talked to us all the time. He gave us examples how to share IT passion to other people and how to be better person for others. He was the greates Mentor I have ever met - I realized this during that meeting. My greates dream was and still is to be "like Tadek". Many Times I just went to events to see / hear him on stage ("in action"). I always wanted to have his energy, empathy and passion. Now I have to live without his good words and advices....Let me put here the words that Adam Cogan wrote on Tadek's profile on Facebook. I just can't write about that fatal accident. "The circumstances of Tadeusz Golonka death are too tragic. Tad stood up to offer his seat to an elderly lady, he lost his balance and then he slipped and hit the tram door hard. He then fell out of the tram and hit the metal barriers that separate the tram rails from the street. It was a severe accident...... So horrible.  At first it was a miracle is that he survived... he fought for several days.  My thoughts are with his lovely family. The family have asked for blood donations as a symbolic gift. Tad received a lot of blood.  Thank you Tad, you were a wonderful person. I will remember you as a kind man, a gentleman. "RIP Tadeusz- You will never ever be forgotten. You are with us all the time  

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• Java EE 8 update

  - by delabassee

  Planning for Java EE 8 is now well underway. As you know, a few weeks ago, we conducted a three part Java EE 8 Community Survey (you can find the final summary here). The data gathered have been very influential for the next steps. You can now expect over the coming weeks and months to see updates on the various specifications that compose the Java EE platform. Some Specification Leads are busy gathering additional feedback regarding what they should focus their efforts on (e.g. CDI 2 survey). Other Specification Leads have already publicly exposed what they think should be one of the focus for the evolution of the specification they lead.  For example, adding Server-Senet Events (SSE) support in JAX-RS is being discussed here and adding MVC support is being discussed here. Please remember that the fact we are now discussing any feature does not insure that it will be included in the proposal, nor in any particular update to Java EE. We can expect additional enhancements, changes and evolutions as we get closer to the finalisation of the different specifications... and there is still a long way to go with these specification proposals! Linda DeMichiel, Java EE Co-Specification Lead, has recently posted a draft proposal for the Java EE 8 Platform specification. Linda's goal is to recruit people and companies supporting this proposal before submitting it to the JCP.  This draft proposal is very interesting reading as it contains relevant information on the plans for Java EE 8 such as : The themes: Support for the latest web standards (eg. HTTP 2.0)  Continue to work on ease of development Improve the infrastructure for cloud support Alignment with Java SE 8 New JSRs to be added to the platform: J-Cache Java API for JSON Binding Java Configuration Plans for the Web Profile Plans on technologies to prune in Java EE 8, ... So if you haven't done it yet, I really encourage you to read the Java EE 8 draft proposal! Our goal for the Java EE 8 specification is for it to be finalized in the second half of 2016. It is important to note that we are in the early days of Java EE 8 and at this stage everything (themes, content, timing, etc.) is preliminary. Everything still needs to be discussed, challenged and agreed within the different Java Community Process (JCP) Experts Groups (EGs). Some EGs that still need to be formed! It could also means that the roadmap will have to be adjusted to follow the progress being made in the different EGs. This is also a good occasion to remind you that participation within those upcoming JCP Experts Groups is encouraged. Contributing in an EG is an effective lever to influence what Java EE 8 will become! Finally, as things get more concrete, we will share details on how to engage in the different Java EE 8 related Adopt-a-JSR initiatives, another way to contribute. You can also read other posts related to Java EE 8, here at The Aquarium blog. Just look for articles with the 'javaee8' tag.

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• Is Cygwin or Windows Command Prompt preferable for getting a consistent terminal experience for development?

  - by Paul Hazen

  The question: Which is better, installing cygwin or one of its cousins on all my windows machines to have a consistent terminal experience across all my development machines, or becoming well trained in the skill of mentally switching from linux terminal to windows command prompt? Systems I use: OSX Lion on a Macbook Air Windows 8 on a desktop Windows 7 on the same desktop Fedora 16 on the same desktop What I'm trying to accomplish Configure an entirely consistent (or consistent enough) terminal experience across all my machines. "enough" in this context is clearly subjective. Please be clear in your answer why the configuration you suggest is consistent enough. One more thing to keep in mind: While I do write a lot of code intended to run on Windows (actually code that runs on Windows Phone which necessitates a windows machine), I also write a lot of Java code, and prefer to do so in vim. I test a local repo in Java on my windows machine, and push to another test machine running ubuntu later in the development stage. When I push to the ubuntu machine, I'm exclusively in terminal, since I'm accessing it via SSH. Summary, with more accurate question: Is there a good way to accomplish what I'm trying to do, or is it better to get accustomed to remembering different commands based on the system I'm on? Which (if either) is considered "best practice" by the development community? Alternatively, for a consistent development experience, would it be better to write all my code SSHed into another machine, and move things to windows for compile / build only when I needed to? That seems like too much work... but could be a solution. Update: While there are insightful responses below, I have yet to hear an answer that talks about why any given solution is superior. Cygwin/GnuWin32 is certainly a way to accomplish a similar experience on all platforms, but since I'm just learning all things command line, I don't want to set myself up to do a lot of relearning/unlearning in the future. Cygwin/GnuWin32 has its peculiarities I would imagine, and being aware of how that set up works on Windows is a learning curve. Additionally, using Cygwin/GnuWin32 robs me of learning the benefits of PowerShell. As a newcomer to working in a command line, which path should I choose to minimize having to relearn/unlearn things in the future? or as my first paragraph poses: [is it better to use Cygwin] ...or [become] well trained in the skill of mentally switching from linux terminal to windows command prompt?

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• Creating a frozen bubble clone

  - by Vaughan Hilts

  This photo illustrates the environment: http://i.imgur.com/V4wbp.png I'll shoot the cannon, it'll bounce off the wall and it's SUPPOSED to stick to the bubble. It does at pretty much every other angle. The problem is always reproduced here, when hit off the wall into those bubbles. It also exists in other cases, but I'm not sure what triggers it. What actually happens: The ball will sometimes set to the wrong cell, and my "dropping" code will detect it as a loner and drop it off the stage. *There are many implementations of "Frozen Bubble" on the web, but I can't for the life of me find a good explanation as to how the algorithm for the "Bubble Sticking" works. * I see this: http://www.wikiflashed.com/wiki/BubbleBobble https://frozenbubblexna.svn.codeplex.com/svn/FrozenBubble/ But I can't figure out the algorithims... could anyone explain possibly the general idea behind getting the balls to stick? Code in question: //Counstruct our bounding rectangle for use var nX = currentBall.x + ballvX * gameTime; var nY = currentBall.y - ballvY * gameTime; var movingRect = new BoundingRectangle(nX, nY, 32, 32); var able = false; //Iterate over the cells and draw our bubbles for (var x = 0; x < 8; x++) { for (var y = 0; y < 12; y++) { //Get the bubble at this layout var bubble = bubbleLayout[x][y]; var rowHeight = 27; //If this slot isn't empty, draw if (bubble != null) { var bx = 0, by = 0; if (y % 2 == 0) { bx = x * 32 + 270; by = y * 32 + 45; } else { bx = x * 32 + 270 + 16; by = y * 32 + 45; } //Check var targetBox = new BoundingRectangle(bx, by, 32, 32); if (targetBox.intersects(movingRect)) { able = true; } } } } cellY = Math.round((currentBall.y - 45) / 32); if (cellY % 2 == 0) cellX = Math.round((currentBall.x - 270) / 32); else cellX = Math.round((currentBall.x - 270 - 16) / 32); Any ideas are very much welcome. Things I've tried: Flooring and Ceiling values Changing the wall bounce to a lower value Slowing down the ball None of these seem to affect it. Is there something in my math I'm not getting?

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• OpenWorld in Small Bites

  - by Kathryn Perry

  Fifty thousand attendees -- that's bigger than the cities some of us live in. Monday morning it took 20 minutes to get from Hall D in Moscone North to a conference room in Moscone South -- the crowds were crushing! A great start to a great week! Larry is as big a name as ever on the program schedule and on the Moscone stage. People were packed in Hall D and clustered around every big screen TV. He stayed on script as he laid out Oracle's SaaS, PaaS, and IaaS strategies. Every seat in Chris Leone's Fusion Apps Cloud Overview was filled on Monday morning. Oracle employees who wanted to get in were turned away. And the same thing happened in the repeat session on Wednesday. Our newest suite of apps is hot! Speaking of hot, the weather was made to order. Then it turned very San Francisco-like on Wednesday afternoon. Downright cold for those who trusted SF temps to hold in the 80's. Who did you follow on Twitter during the conference? So many voices, opinions, and convos! Great combo of social media and sharp minds. Be sure to follow @larryellison, @stevenrmiranda, and @Oracle for updates and MyPOVs. Keywords for the Apps customers at the conference were cloud, mobile, and social. Every day, every session, every speaker. Wednesday afternoon, 4 pm at the Four Seasons hotel. A large roomful of analysts and influencers firing questions at a panel of eight Fusion customers. Steve Miranda moderating. Good energy and a great exchange of information and confidence. Word on the street is that OpenWorld has outgrown San Francisco -- but moving it seems unthinkable. The city isn't just a backdrop for an industry conference - it's a headliner right up there with Larry Ellison and Pearl Jam. As you can imagine, electrical outlets were in high demand at every venue. The most popular hotels and bars near Moscone designed their interiors around accessible electrical power strips. People are plenty willing to buy a drink while they grab a charge. Wednesday afternoon, 4 pm at the Four Seasons hotel. A large roomful of analysts and influencers firing questions at a panel of eight Fusion customers. Steve Miranda moderating. Good energy and a great exchange of information and confidence. Treasure Island in the dark. Eddy Vedder has an amazing voice! And Kings of Leon over delivered on people's expectations. It was cold. It was windy. It was very fun. One analyst said it's the best customer appreciation party in the industry. 

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• One Year Oracle SocialChat - The Movie

  - by mprove

  Tweet | Like | Watch on Vimeo You’ve just watched – hopefully – my first short movie. Thank you! Here is a bit of the back stage story. About 6 weeks ago colleagues from SNBC (Social Network and Business Collaboration) announced a Social Use Case Competition. It was expected to submit a video of 2 to 5 minutes duration on the Social Enterprise (our internal phrase for Enterprise 2.0). Hmm – I had a few vague ideas, but no script – no actors – no experience in film making. Really the best conditions to try something! I chose our weekly SocialChats as my main topic. But if you don’t do Danish Dogma cinema, you still need a script. Hence I played around with the SocialChat’s archive, and all of a sudden a script and even the actors appeared in front of me. The words that you have just seen are weekly topics. Slightly abridged and rearranged to form a story. Exciting, next phase. How to get it on digital celluloid? I have to confess I am still impressed by epic. (Keep in mind, epic was done in 2004.) And my actors – words – call for a typographic style already. The main part was done over a weekend with Apple Keynote. And I even found a wonderful matching soundtrack among my albums: Didge Goes World by Delago. I picked parts of Second Day and Seventh Day. Literally, the rhythm was set, and I "just" had to complete the movie. Tools used – apart from trial and error: Keynote, Pixelmator, GarageBand, iMovie. Finally I want to mention that I am extremely thankful to BSC Music for granting permissions to use the tracks for this short film! Without this sound it would have been just an ordinary slide show. – Internal note: The next SocialChat is on Death by PowerPoint vs. Presentation Zen. CU this Friday 3pm Greenwich / 7am Pacific.

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• MatheMagics - Guess My Age Method 1

  - by PointsToShare

  © 2011 By: Dov Trietsch. All rights reserved MatheMagic – Guess My Age – Method 1 The Mathemagician stands on the stage and asks an adult to do the following: ·         Do the next few steps on your calculator, or the calculator in your phone, or even on a piece of paper. ·         Do it silently! Don’t tell me the results until I ask for them directly ·         Compute a single digit multiple of 9 – any one of 9, 18, 27, … all the way to 81, will do. ·         Now multiply your age by 10 ·         Subtract the 9 multiple from this number. ·         Tell me the result. Notice that I don’t know which multiple of 9 you subtracted from 10 times your age. I will nonetheless immediately tell you what your age is. How do I do this? Let’s do the algebra. 10X – 9Y = 10X – 10Y + Y = 10(X – Y) + Y Now remember, you asked an adult, so his/her age is a two digit number (maybe even 3 digits), thus reducing it by the single digit multiplied by nine is still positive – the lowest is can be is 100 – 81 which yields 19. Now make two numbers out of the result. The last digit and the number before it. This number is X – Y or the age minus the single digit you selected. The last digit is this very single digit. This is always so regardless of the digit you selected. So… Add tis digit to the other number and you get back the age! Q.E.D Example: I am 76 years old and here is what happens when I do the steps 76 x 10 = 760 760 – 18 = 742 made of 74 and 2. My age is 74 + 2 760 – 81 = 679 made of 67 and 9. My age is 67 + 9 A note to the socially aware mathemagician – it is safer to do it with a man. The chances of a veracious answer are much, much higher! The trick may be accomplished on any 2 or 3 digit number, not just one’s age, but if you want to know your date’s age, it’s a good way to elicit it. That’s All Folks PS for more Ageless “Age” mathemagics go to www.mgsltns.com/games.htm and also here: http://geekswithblogs.net/PointsToShare/archive/2011/11/15/mathemagics---guess-my-age---method-2.aspx

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• Inline template efficiency

  - by Darryl Gove

  I like inline templates, and use them quite extensively. Whenever I write code with them I'm always careful to check the disassembly to see that the resulting output is efficient. Here's a potential cause of inefficiency. Suppose we want to use the mis-named Leading Zero Detect (LZD) instruction on T4 (this instruction does a count of the number of leading zero bits in an integer register - so it should really be called leading zero count). So we put together an inline template called lzd.il looking like: .inline lzd lzd %o0,%o0 .end And we throw together some code that uses it: int lzd(int); int a; int c=0; int main() { for(a=0; a<1000; a++) { c=lzd(c); } return 0; } We compile the code with some amount of optimisation, and look at the resulting code: $ cc -O -xtarget=T4 -S lzd.c lzd.il $ more lzd.s .L77000018: /* 0x001c 11 */ lzd %o0,%o0 /* 0x0020 9 */ ld [%i1],%i3 /* 0x0024 11 */ st %o0,[%i2] /* 0x0028 9 */ add %i3,1,%i0 /* 0x002c */ cmp %i0,999 /* 0x0030 */ ble,pt %icc,.L77000018 /* 0x0034 */ st %i0,[%i1] What is surprising is that we're seeing a number of loads and stores in the code. Everything could be held in registers, so why is this happening? The problem is that the code is only inlined at the code generation stage - when the actual instructions are generated. Earlier compiler phases see a function call. The called functions can do all kinds of nastiness to global variables (like 'a' in this code) so we need to load them from memory after the function call, and store them to memory before the function call. Fortunately we can use a #pragma directive to tell the compiler that the routine lzd() has no side effects - meaning that it does not read or write to memory. The directive to do that is #pragma no_side_effect(<routine name), and it needs to be placed after the declaration of the function. The new code looks like: int lzd(int); #pragma no_side_effect(lzd) int a; int c=0; int main() { for(a=0; a<1000; a++) { c=lzd(c); } return 0; } Now the loop looks much neater: /* 0x0014 10 */ add %i1,1,%i1 ! 11 ! { ! 12 ! c=lzd(c); /* 0x0018 12 */ lzd %o0,%o0 /* 0x001c 10 */ cmp %i1,999 /* 0x0020 */ ble,pt %icc,.L77000018 /* 0x0024 */ nop

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• Dadaism and Agility

  - by alexhildyard

  We all have our little bugbears, and something that has given me particular pause over the years is the place of Agility in the software development life cycle. While I have seen it used successfully on both small and Enterprise-level projects, I have also seen many instances in which long-standing technical debt has also originated under its watch. Ironically the problem in such cases seems to me not that the practitioners in question have failed to follow due process (Test, Develop, Refactor -- a common "what" of Agile), but basically that they have missed the point (the "why" of Agile). It's probably a sign of my age that I'm much more interested in the "why" than the "what", since I feel that the latter falls out naturally from the former, but that this is not a reciprocal relationship.Consider Dadaism, precursor to the Surrealist movement in the early part of the twentieth century. Anyone could stand up and proclaim he or she was Dada; anyone could write cut-ups, or pull words out a hat, or produce gibberish on duelling typewriters under the inspiration of Dada. And all that took place at such performances was a manifestation of Dada, and all the artefacts that resulted were also Dada. Hence one commentator's engimatic observation that 'when one speaks of Dada, then one speaks of Dada. But when one does not speak of Dada, one still speaks of Dada.'What is Dada? Literally, Dada is what you say it is. But that's also missing the point. Dada is about erecting a framework within which utterances like this are valid; Dada is about preparing a stage for itself. Dadaism exemplifies the purity of a process-driven ideology -- in fact an ideology that is almost pure process, with nothing extraneous in the way of formal method, and while perhaps Agile delivery should not embrace the liberties of Dadaism too literally, some of the similarities nevertheless are salutary.Agile -- like Dada -- is an attitude; it is about *being* agile; it is not really about doing a specific set of things that are somehow *part* of being Agile. It is an abstract base rather than an implementation, a characteristic rather than a factor. It is the pragmatic response to the need for change in the face of partial information, ephemeral requirements and a healthy dose of systematic uncertainty. In practice this will usually mean repeatedly making the smallest useful changes to a system, recognising that systems evolve, and that all change carries risk. It will usually mean that instead of investing effort in future-proofing a system against a known technology roadmap, one instead invests one's energies in the daily repetition and incremental development of processes best designed to accommodate change quickly. But though it may mean these things in practice, it isn't actually *about* either of these things; it's about the mindset, the attitude that conceives of such responses as sensible solutions given the larger and ultimately unclassifiable thing that constitutes the development lifecycle of a specific project.

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• Creating a shared library that might be used with desktop applications and web projects

  - by dreza

  I have been involved in a number of MVC.NET and c# desktop projects in our company over the last year or so while also managing to kept my nose poked into other projects (in a read-only learning capacity of course). From this I've noticed that across the various projects and teams there is a-lot of functionality that has been well designed against good interfaces and abstractions. Because we tend to like our own work at times, I noticed a couple of projects had the exact same class, method copied into it as it had obviously worked on one and so was easily moved to a new project (probably by the same developer who originally wrote it) I mentioned this fact in one of our programmer meetings we have occasionally and suggested we pull some of this functionality into a core company library that we can build up over time and use across multiple projects. Everyone agreed and I started looking into this possibility. However, I've come across a stumbling block pretty early on. Our team primarily focuses on MVC at the moment and we have projects mainly in 2.0 but are starting to branch to 3.0. We also have a number of desktop applications that might benefit from some shared classes and basic helper methods. Initially when creating this DLL I included some shared classes that could be used across any project type (Web, Client etc) but then I started looking at adding some shared modules that would be useful in our MVC applications only. However this meant I had to include a reference to some Microsoft Web DLL's in order to leverage some of the classes I was creating (at this stage MVC 2.0). Now my issue is that we have a shared DLL that has references to web specific libraries that could also possibly be used in a client application. Not only that, our DLL referenced initially MVC 2.0 and we will eventually move onto MVC 3.0 for all projects. But alot of the classes in this library I expect to still be relevant to MVC 3 etc Our code within this DLL is separated into it's own namespaces such as: CompanyDLL.Primitives CompanyDLL.Web.Mvc CompanyDLL.Helpers etc etc So, my questions are: Is it OK to do a shared library like this, or if we have web specific features in it should we create a separate web DLL only targeted at a specific framework or MVC version? If it's OK, what kind of issues might we face when using the library that references MVC 2 in a MVC 3 project for example. I would be thinking that we might run into some sort of compatibility issue, or even issues where the developers using the library doesn't realize they need MVC 2.0 libraries. They might only want to use some of the generic classes etc The concept seemed like a good idea at the time, but I'm starting to think maybe it's not really a practical solution. But the number of times I've seen copied classes and methods across projects because they are proven tested code is a bit unnerving to be perfectly honest!

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• How do I maintain a really poorly written code base?

  - by onlineapplab.com

  Recently I got hired to work on existing web application because of NDA I'm not at liberty to disclose any details but this application is working online in sort of a beta testing stage before official launch. We have a few hundred users right now but this number is supposed to significantly increase after official launch. The application is written in PHP (but it is irrelevant to my question) and is running on a dual xeon processor standalone server with severe performance problems. I have seen a lot of bad PHP code but this really sets new standards, especially knowing how much time and money was invested in developing it. it is as badly coded as possible there is PHP, HTML, SQL mixed together and code is repeated whenever it is necessary (especially SQL queries). there are not any functions used, not mentioning any OOP there are four versions of the app (desktop, iPhone, Android + other mobile) each version has pretty much the same functionality but was created by copying the whole code base, so now there are some differences between each version and it is really hard to maintain the database is really badly designed, which is causing severe performance problems also for fixing some errors in PHP code there is a lot of database triggers used which are updating data on SELECT and on INSERT so any testing is a nightmare Basically, any sin of a bad programming you can imagine is there for example it is not only possible to use SQL injections in literally every place but you can log into app if you use a login which doesn't exist and an empty password. The team which created this app is not working on it any more and there is an outsourced team which suggested that there are some problems but was never willing to deal with the elephant in the room partially because they've got a very comfortable contract and partially due to lack of skills (just my opinion). My job was supposed to be fixing some performance problems and extending existing functionality but first thing I was asked to do was a review of the existing code base. I've made my review and it was quite a shock for the management but my conclusions were after some time finally confirmed by other programmers. Management made it clear that it is not possible to start rewriting this app from scratch (which in my opinion should be done). We have to maintain its operable state and at the same time fix performance errors and extend the functionality. My question is, as I don't want just to patch the existing code, how to transform this into properly written app while keeping the existing code working at the same time? My plan is: Unify four existing versions into common code base (fixing only most obvious errors). Redesign db and use triggers to populate it with data (so data will be maintained in two formats at the same time) All new functionality will be written as separate project. Step by step transfer existing functionality into the new project After some time everything will be in the new project Some explanation about #2, right now it is practically impossible to make any updates in existing db any change requires reviewing whole code and making changes in many places. Is such plan feasible at all? Another solution is to walk away and leave the headache to someone else.

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• Avoiding the Black Hole of Leads

  - by Charles Knapp

  Sales says, "Marketing doesn’t deliver enough qualified leads. So, we generate 90% of our own leads." Meanwhile, Marketing says, "We generate most of the leads. But, Sales doesn’t contact them quickly enough, while the lead is still interested." According to Sirius Decisions: Up to 90% of leads never make it to closure Sales works on only 11% of the leads supplied by Marketing Only 18% of the leads Sales accepts convert to opportunities Yet, 45% of prospects typically buy a product from someone within 12 months The root cause of these commonplace complaints is a disconnect between the funnels of marketing and sales. Unfortunately, we often see companies with an assortment of poorly integrated marketing tools. It takes too long and too many people to move the data around, scrub it, upload it from one system to another, and get it routed to the right sales teams. As a result, leads fall through the cracks, contextual information is lost, and by the time sales actually contacts a customer it may be too late. Sales automation alone is not enough. Marketing automation (including social) is not enough. Sales and Marketing must work together. It’s time to connect the silos of marketing and sales pipelines and analytics. It’s time for integrated Sales and Marketing automation. Integrated pipelines improve lead quality and timeliness. Marketing systems can track a rich set of contextual information about a prospect–self-disclosed information about interests, content viewed, and so on. This insight can equip the sales rep with rich information to make a face-to-face conversation more relevant and more likely to convert to the next stage in the sales process. Integrated lead to revenue (LTR) management provides end-to-end visibility, enabling the company to measure what is working. Marketing can measure its impact on revenue and other business outcomes, and sales can harness and redirect marketing investments to areas where they most help achieve sales objectives. It’s a win-win play. Marketing delivers more leads that are qualified, cuts cost per lead, and demonstrates a strong Return on Marketing Investment (ROMI). Sales spends more time with warm leads and less time on cold calls, achieves higher close rates, and delivers more revenue. Learn more by attending our Integrated Sales and Marketing session at the upcoming CloudWorld conferences. Or, visit our Sales and Marketing Cloud Service site for videos and other learning resources.

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• Investment scheme for a PC game the project

  - by Alex Kamen

  Good day everyone, I am working on a PC game project that has 3 phases planned, micro, macro and mmo versions [if confused, see a brief description at the bottom]. I have found a potential investor for the micro version of the game, but naturally, he requested a detailed plan of how the game will pay back. And the problem is that micro version itself is not supposed to be monetized much, other than some ads and limited in-game currency utilization. The idea is that with this combat demo already at hand, it should be possible to get a really large enough investment (millions of dollars) and use it to pay back the initial small one (thousands of dollars) and take the project into macro phase, which will really make profit. This way, everybody is going to win, provided that I can deliver the end-product. Yet while I am confident of that both the conception of the macro and the real game-play of the micro versions are going to be appealing, I don’t know how to obtain any guarantee of that I will be able to get funded once I have the prototype ready. And without that, I won’t receive the funds for the prototype in the first place! To summarize, my question is: how to figure out my future possibilities of getting funded once I have combat demo out, basically “whom to write to and what”. Ideally, I would like some sort of a preliminary agreement with a game publisher, something that would basically state “If the developer provides the product in time and in quality corresponding to the specifications given, the publisher guarantees to allocate funds for distribution and further development, thereby acquiring the right to X part of all future profits”. Does this sound sane? It’s just that I don’t want to sell all of my rights out straight away by taking a big outside investment while the project is in such early stage. I would appreciate if you would share your thoughts on this kind of scheme, and be sure to ask questions as I am sure I must have forgotten to mention a ton of important things, like the fact that initial funds are going to be spent on outsourcing (living in Siberia is really just great). [here’s a brief outline of what each version will feature] [micro] 1) turn based tactical combat rules 2) character development 3) arena/tournament system [macro] 4) ai-ruled dynamic interactive worlds 5) global map adventuring 6) strategic rpg + god simulator gameplay [mmo] 7) Persistent worlds system 8) Social structures system (“guilds/clans”) 9) god-simulation on the mmo scale P.S. Obviously, these features are incremental, so that mmo version has all 9.

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• Getting a virus is *very* annoying

  - by bconlon

  I spent most of yesterday removing an annoying virus from my PC. I feel slightly foolish for getting one in the first place, but after so many years I guess I was always going to eventually succumb. I was also a little surprised at the failure of various tools at removing it. The virus would redirect the browser to websites including ‘licosearch’, ‘hugosearch’ and ‘facebook’, and the disk would be thrashing away infecting dlls in some way. I had the full up to date version of McAfee installed. This identified that there was an issue in some dlls on the system and was able to ‘fix’ them. But they kept getting re-infected. So I installed Microsoft Security Essentials and this too was able to identify and ‘fix’ the infected dlls. The system scans take forever and I really expected better results. I also tried Malwarebytes, Hitman Pro, AVG and Sophos to no avail. Eventually I thought I’d investigate myself. It turned out that on reboot, the virus would start 3 instances of Firefox.exe which I’m guessing would do bad things including infecting as many dlls on the system as possible. I removed Firefox and the virus cleverly then launched 3 instances of Chrome! So I uninstalled Chrome and yes, it then started to launch 3 instances of iexplore.exe. If I’m honest, by this stage I was just seeing if it would be able to use any of the browsers! As it was starting these on reboot, I looked in my User Startup folder and there was a <randomly named>.exe and several log files. I deleted these and rebooted. When I looked they had been recreated. So I then looked in the registry Run and RunOnce entries: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run. Sure enough there were entries to run a file in C:\Program Files\<random name folder>\<random name file>.exe. I deleted this and rebooted and it was fixed. I also looked in the event log and found a warning that Winlogon had failed to start the file C:\Program Files\<random name folder>\<random name file>.exe So I also checked HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon and this entry had also been changed. Finally I ran a full system scan to clean up any infected dlls. I hope it’s gone for good!  #

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• Analysing SQLBits Feedback

  - by jamiet

  Earlier this week I received all the feedback that people offered on my session at SQLBits 7 in York – “SSIS Dataflow Performance Tuning” (the video is available online if you wish to see it). As you may have gathered from previous posts on this blog and my less-SQLy-focused Wordpress blog I am a big fan of collecting and tracking both personal and public data and session feedback lends itself very well to tracking because it is quantitative rather than qualitative; by that I mean attendees are invited to provide marks out of ten rather than (or, in the case of SQLBits, as well as) written comments. The SQLBits feedback is also useful because they use a consistent format – the same questions are asked each time – this means it is particularly easy to to track whether the scores that people give are trending up or down. I suspect that somewhere the SQLBits organisers have a big Analysis Services cube (ok, perhaps its an Excel pivot table) that allows them to analyse these scores per conference, speaker, track etc.… and there’s no reason that we as session speakers cannot do the same thing. To that end I have started to store my feedback in an Excel spreadsheet of my own which in the interests of transparency is available for public viewing (only a web browser required) on SkyDrive at http://cid-550f681dad532637.office.live.com/view.aspx/Public/Misc/Personal%20SQLBits%20Session%20Feedback.xlsx. I have used a pivot table to aggregate all that feedback and here is a screenshot: I am hereby making a public plea to the SQLBits organisers (on the off-chance that they are reading) to please continue to keep the feedback format consistent in the future and I encourage them to publish all of the feedback in an anonymised form. I would also encourage anyone doing conference speaking to track their conference feedback in the same way that I am doing so that you get an insight into whether or not you are improving over time. It is not difficult to setup and maintaining it as you do more sessions takes very little effort. Storing feedback data like this leads me to wider thoughts about well-known conventions and data format standardisation. Let’s imagine a utopia where there were a standard set of questions for capturing session feedback that were leveraged at every conference regardless of subject matter, location or culture; that would give rise to immense cross-conference and cross-discipline analysis – the data analyst in me goes giddy at the thought of it. It is scenarios like this that drive my interest both in data formats such as iCalendar, microformats and RDF, and in emerging movements such as the semantic web and linked data, all things which I have written about in the past. I don’t know whether we will ever reach the stage where every piece of data has structured, descriptive metadata associated with it but I live in hope. @Jamiet

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• Brocken package manager due to incorrect Banshee package

  - by user54974

  Sup, so, I'm not familiar with linux at all so help is much appreciated. I've been trying to boot my pc up from a live CD unsuccessfully. I get to the stage at which there are the options to test without installing or install or so on where I select 'Install Ubuntu.' Here it relays through some fast DOS commands until it reaches 'end trace' and then, eventually, 'Killed.' I have already got a functional 11.10 version installed, could this be a problem? The reason I am attempting a reinstall is because the package system is damaged inside 11.10, a problem I can't seem to solve. If I try to install any new software from within the software centre it tells me that two banshee extensions must be removed. I try to remove these from inside the terminal, using apt-get remove, which results in:** You might want to run apt-get -f install to correct these: The following packages have unmet dependencies. banshee-extension-ubuntuonemusicstore : Depends: banshee (>= 2.2.1) but 2.2.0-1ubuntu2 is to be installed E: Unmet dependencies. Try 'apt-get -f install' with no packages (or specify a solution). The software centre suggests that I disable all third party repositories and run apt-get install -f I have done so but the package system remains damaged and apt-get install -fattempts to install banshee 2.2.1 but returns: Errors were encountered while processing: /var/cache/apt/archives/banshee_2.2.1-1ubuntu3_i386.deb E: Sub-process /usr/bin/dpkg returned an error code (1) I have also tried apt-get update (runs fine) and apt-get upgrade. The upgrade command apt-get upgrade results in: Reading package lists... Done Building dependency tree Reading state information... Done You might want to run ‘apt-get -f install’ to correct these. The following packages have unmet dependencies. banshee-extension-soundmenu : Depends: banshee (>= 2.2.1) but 2.2.0-1ubuntu2 is installed banshee-extension-ubuntuonemusicstore : Depends: banshee (>= 2.2.1) but 2.2.0-1ubuntu2 is installed E: Unmet dependencies. Try using -f. I seem to be going round and round in circles here! If only I could reinstall successfully. Only proposed updates (oneiric proposed) is not enabled.

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• The Minimalist's Approach to Content Governance

  - by Kellsey Ruppel

  This week on the blog, we want to focus on the content lifecylce and how important it is to have the tools in place to be able to properly manage all te phases of the content lifecylce. John Brunswick has some great advice when it comes to this topic, so expect to hear a lot from him this week! Originally posted by John Brunswick. Let's be honest - content governance is far from an exciting topic. BUT the potential of a very small intranet team creating and maintaining a platform that provides an organization with relevant, high value information, helping workers to get their jobs done with greater accuracy and in less time is exciting. It is easy to quickly start producing content, but the challenge is ensuring that the environment is easy to navigate and use on the third week and during the third year.   What can be done to bridge this gap? Over the next few blog entries let's take a pragmatic, minimalistic view of a process that can help any team manage a wealth of unstructured information. Based on an earlier article that I wrote around Portal Governance, I am going to focus on using technology as much as possible to support the governance of content with minimal involvement from users. The only certainty about content production is that business users are not fans of maintaining content. Maintenance is overhead and is a long-term investment thats value will possibly not be realized under the current content creator's watch. To add context to how we will use technical tools in this process, each post will highlight one section of the content lifecycle process as outlined below Content Lifecycle Stages 1. Request - Understand the education, purpose, resource and success criteria for content 2. Create - Determine access and workflow for content 3. Manage - Understand ownership and review cycles 4. Retire - Act on thresholds established during the request stage Within each state we will also elaborate as to 1. Why - why would we entertain doing this? 2. How - the steps that are needed to make it happen 3. Impact - what is the net benefit or loss based on the process Over the course of this week, we will dive deep into the stages and the minimal amount of time, effort and process within each to make some meaningful gains in the improvement of user experience and productivity in their search for information. It might be a stretch to say that we can make content governance exciting, but hopefully it can end up being painless and paying dividends. And if you'd like to hear first hand from a customer that is managing their content lifecycle with Oracle WebCenter, be sure to join us on Wednesday for this webcast "ResCare Solves Content Lifecycle Challenges with Oracle WebCenter"!

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• Learning by doing (and programming by trial and error)

  - by AlexBottoni

  How do you learn a new platform/toolkit while producing working code and keeping your codebase clean? When I know what I can do with the underlying platform and toolkit, I usually do this: I create a new branch (with GIT, in my case) I write a few unit tests (with JUnit, for example) I write my code until it passes my tests So far, so good. The problem is that very often I do not know what I can do with the toolkit because it is brand new to me. I work as a consulant so I cannot have my preferred language/platform/toolkit. I have to cope with whatever the customer uses for the task at hand. Most often, I have to deal (often in a hurry) with a large toolkit that I know very little so I'm forced to "learn by doing" (actually, programming by "trial and error") and this makes me anxious. Please note that, at some point in the learning process, usually I already have: read one or more five-stars books followed one or more web tutorials (writing working code a line at a time) created a couple of small experimental projects with my IDE (IntelliJ IDEA, at the moment. I use Eclipse, Netbeans and others, as well.) Despite all my efforts, at this point usually I can just have a coarse understanding of the platform/toolkit I have to use. I cannot yet grasp each and every detail. This means that each and every new feature that involves some data preparation and some non-trivial algorithm is a pain to implement and requires a lot of trial-and-error. Unfortunately, working by trial-and-error is neither safe nor easy. Actually, this is the phase that makes me most anxious: experimenting with a new toolkit while producing working code and keeping my codebase clean. Usually, at this stage I cannot use the Eclipse Scrapbook because the code I have to write is already too large and complex for this small tool. In the same way, I cannot use any more an indipendent small project for my experiments because I need to try the new code in place. I can just write my code in place and rely on GIT for a safe bail-out. This makes me anxious because this kind of intertwined, half-ripe code can rapidly become incredibly hard to manage. How do you face this phase of the development process? How do you learn-by-doing without making a mess of your codebase? Any tips&tricks, best practice or something like that?

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• In Technology, Ignorance is NOT Bliss

  - by Tanu Sood

  Author: Debra Lilley, ACE Director, UK Proof I’m not technical -  I’ve just finished a Latin America tour with OTN and a funny thing happened that I want to share with you; because it is quite a good analogy for how many of us use technology today and you know how I love analogies. In Costa Rica we had a really long journey up through the mountains to where our conference was to be. The road was windy and narrow and once it got dark there was no scenery to see, boredom set in. At one stage I looked at my watch to see the time, but in the dark I couldn’t make it out, so I thought I would be clever and use the torch in my smartphone! Even though as soon as I switched on the phone it showed the time, I ignored it and used the torch to read my watch. That’s us when we pay maintenance on software, ask for enhancements, and either chose not to upgrade or as I have seen so many times, upgrade but don’t use the new features. I know there are always other factors not least the upgrade costs themselves but in the later releases of all the Oracle family of applications Oracle have done a lot to make the interoperability of them with Oracle Fusion Middleware more successful and in many cases for the first time. My heritage is Oracle E Business Suite (EBS) and the availability of Oracle Weblogic for EBS is fantastic for an Oracle powered organisation that can move away from supporting multiple flavours of application server. The same release made available  - the no downtime patching that Oracle Database 11g introduced with Edition Based Redefinition. I am not saying you must use these features but you must be aware of what each release of your application brings and make a business based decision as to whether it is for you or not. I like to have a simple spreadsheet of features with no-value, nice-to-have, must-have ratings, but make the spreadsheet cumulative so that when you do upgrade you have all the features listed you previously didn’t take up. That way you can avoid the ‘using your phone to read your watch’ scenario. About the Author: Debra Lilley, Fusion Champion, UKOUG Board Member, Fusion User Experience Advocate and ACE Director. Lilley has 18 years experience with Oracle Applications, with E Business Suite since 9.4.1, moving to Business Intelligence Team Lead and Oracle Alliance Director. She has spoken at over 100 conferences worldwide and posts at debrasoraclethoughts  

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• Attaching new animations onto skeleton via props, a good idea?

  - by Cardin

  I'm thinking of coding a game with an idea of mine. I've coded 2D games before, but I'm new to 3D programming, so I'd like to ask if this idea of mine is feasible or out of my depth. I'm making a game where there are many different characters for the player to choose from (JRPG style). So to save time, I have an idea of creating many different varied characters using a completely naked body mesh and animation skeleton, standardised across all characters. For example, by placing different hair, boots, armor props on the character mesh, new characters can be formed. Kinda like playing dress-up with a barbie doll. I'm thinking this can be done by having a bone on the prop that I can programmically attach to the main mesh. Also, I plan to have some props add new animations to the base skeleton, so equipping some particular props would give it new attack, damage, idle animations. This is because I can't expect the character to have the same swinging animation if he had a big sword or an axe. I think this might be possible if the prop has its own instance of the animation skeleton with just only the new animations, and parenting the base body mesh to this new skeleton. So all the base body mesh has are just the basic animations, other animations come from the props. My concerns are, 1) the props might not attach to the mesh properly and jitter a lot, 2) since prop and body are animated differently, the props and base mesh will cause visual artefacts, like the naked thighs showing through the pants when the character walks, 3) a custom pipeline have to be developed to export skeletons without mesh, and also to attach the base body mesh to a new skeleton during runtime in the game. So my question: are these features considered 'easy' to code? Or am I trying to do something few have ever succeeded with on their own? It feels like all these can be done given enough time and I know I definitely have to do a bit of bone matrix calculations, but I really don't want to drag out the development timeline unnecessarily from coding mathematically intense things or analyzing how to parse 3D export formats. I'm currently only at the Game Design stage, so if these features aren't a good idea, I can simply change the design of the game. (Unrelated to question) I could always, as last resort, have the characters have predetermined outfit and weapon selections so as to animate everything manually.

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• Cone of Uncertainty in classic and agile projects

  - by DigiMortal

  David Starr from Scrum.org made interesting session in TechEd Europe 2012 - Implementing Scrum Using Team Foundation Server 2012. One of interesting things for me was how Cone of Uncertainty looks like in agile projects (or how agile methodologies distort the cone we know from waterfall projects). This posting illustrates two cones – one for waterfall and one for agile world. Cone of Uncertainty Cone of Uncertainty was introduced to software development community by Steve McConnell and it visualizes how accurate are our estimates over project timeline. Here is the Cone of Uncertainty when we deal with waterfall and Big Design Up-Front (BDUF). Cone of Uncertainty. Taken from MSDN Library page Estimating. The closer we are to project end the more accurate are our estimates. When project ends we know exactly how much every task took time. As we can see then cone is wide when we usually have to give our estimates – it happens somewhere between Initial Project Concept and Requirements Complete. Don’t ask me why Initial Project Concept is the stage where some companies give their best estimates – they just do it every time and doesn’t learn a thing later. This cone is inevitable for software development and agile methodologies that try to make software world better are also able to change the cone. Cone of Uncertainty in agile projects Agile methodologies usually try to avoid BDUF, waterfalls and other things that make all our mistakes highly expensive. Of course, we are not the only ones who make mistakes – don’t also forget our dear customers. Agile methodologies take development as creational work and focus on making it better. One main trick is to focus on small and short iterations. What it means? We are estimating functionalities that are easier for us to understand and implement. Therefore our estimates are more accurate. As we move from few big iterations to many small iterations we also distort and slice Cone of Uncertainty. This is how cone looks when agile methodologies are used. Cone of Uncertainty in agile projects. We have more cones to live with but they are way smaller. I don’t have any numbers to put here because I found any but still this “chart” should give you the point: more smaller iterations cause more but way smaller cones of uncertainty. We can handle these small uncertainties because steps we take to complete small tasks are more predictable and doesn’t grow very often above our heads. One more note. Consider that both of charts given in this posting describe exactly the same phase of same project – just uncertainties are different.

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