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• Reconstruct a file from a TCP stream

  - by Abhishek Chanda

  I have a client and a server and a third box which sees all packets from the server to the client (but not the other way around). Now when the client requests a file from the server (over HTTP), the third box sees the response. I am trying to reconstruct the file there. I am using libpcap to capture TCP datagrams and trying to reconstruct the file there. Here is what I did Listen for packets on an interface Group all packets which have the same ACK number Sort the group based on SEQ number Extract data from each packet and combine them and write to the disk The problem is, the file thus generated is not exactly the same as the original file. Does everything sound correct here? Some more details: I am using C++ The packet data is being stored as std::vector<char> I did change the byte order while reading the ack number and seq number from the packet using ntohl I am not sure if I need to change the byte order for the data as well. I tried to reverse the data from each packet before combining them, even that did not work. Is there something I am missing?

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• Should we encourage coding styles in favor of developer's autonomy, or discourage it in favor of consistency?

  - by Saeed Neamati

  A developer writes if/else blocks with one-line code statements like: if (condition) // Do this one-line code else // Do this one-line code Another uses curly braces for all of them: if (condition) { // Do this one-line code } else { // Do this one-line code } A developer first instantiates an object, then uses it: HelperClass helper = new HelperClass(); helper.DoSomething(); Another developer instantiates and uses the object in one line: new HelperClass().DoSomething(); A developer is more easy with arrays, and for loops: string[] ordinals = new string[] {'First', 'Second', 'Third'}; for (i = 0; i < ordinals.Length; i++) { // Do something } Another writes: List<string> ordinals = new List<string>() {'First', 'Second', 'Third'}; foreach (string ordinal in ordinals) { // Do something } I'm sure that you know what I'm talking about. I call it coding style (cause I don't know what it's called). But whatever we call it, is it good or bad? Does encouraging it have an effect of higher productivity of developers? Should we ask developers to try to write code the way we tell them, so to make the whole system become style-consistent?

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• Unicode license

  - by Eric Grange

  Unicode Terms of use (http://www.unicode.org/copyright.html) state that any software that uses their data files (or a modification of it) should carry the Unicode license references. It seems to me that most Unicode libraries have functions to check if a character is a digit, a letter, a symbol, etc. ans so will contain a modification of the Unicode Data Files (usually in the form of tables). Does that mean the license applies and all applications that use such Unicode libraries should carry the license? I've checked around, and it appears very few Unicode software do carry the license, though arguable most of those that didn't carry the license were from companies that were members of the Unicode consortium (do they get license exemption?). Some (f.i. Mozilla) are only "Liaison Members", and while their software do not carry the license (AFAICT), they do obviously rely on data derived from those data files. Is Mozilla in breach of the license? Should we carry the license in all apps that include any form of advanced Unicode support? (ie. are bound to rely on the Unicode data files) Or is there some form of broad exemption? (since very very few software out there carries the license)

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• Leveraging NuGet as a central repository for PowerShell modules

  - by cibrax

  We have been working a lot lately with PowerShell as part of our star product at Tellago Studios, “Moesion”. One of the main features we provide in Moesion is the ability to execute PowerShell commands remotely in a given server using a web mobile interface (You can read more in my previous post about Moesion). One of the things we realized in all this time is that PowerShell lacks of a central repository where IT guys or we, the developers, can easily grab and reuse commands.  All the commands or modules are basically spread across multiple places or websites, like personal blogs, TechNet or CodePlex projects to name a few making the search of them very hard. You are usually limited to use your favorite search engine and copy what you find. In addition, there is not an easy way to reuse, extend or version these commands, which also limits any contribution that you could make to the community.  My friend Jose wrote a great post the other day about the importance of reusing PowerShell modules, and what is the mechanism to reuse them. Jose, however, based his post in a custom implementation using a GIT repository for storing the modules. We have NuGet in the .NET platform for sharing and reusing existing libraries or code, so why can’t just leverage it for reusing PowerShell modules as well ?. Some teams in Microsoft are using NuGet for distributing libraries and binaries so it would be a great thing for all of us if they also distribute the scripting interfaces in PowerShell using NuGet. This applies to the .NET OS community as well. In fact, it looks like Andrew Nurse had the same idea and implemented a project for this in BitBucket, PsGet.

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• What do YOU want to see in a SharePoint jQuery Session?

  - by Mark Rackley

  Hey party people. So, as you have probably realized by now, I’ve been using quite a bit of jQuery with SharePoint. It’s pretty amazing what you can actually accomplish with a little stubbornness and some guidance from the gurus. Well, it looks like I’ll be putting together a SharePoint jQuery session that I will be presenting at a few conferences. This is such a big and broad topic I could speak on it for hours! So, I need YOUR assistance to help me narrow down what I’ll be focusing on. Some ideas I have are: How to even get started; how to set up SharePoint to work with jQuery What third party libraries exist out there that integrate well with SharePoint How to interact with default SharePoint forms and jQuery (cascading dropdowns, disabling fields, etc..) What is SPServices and how can you use it When should you NOT use jQuery What do YOU want to see though? This session is for YOU guys, not for me. Please take a moment to leave a comment below and let me know what you would like to see and learn. Thanks, and I look forward to seeing you in my sessions!! Mark

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• Make a turn based system like final fantasy in AS3

  - by Kaoru

  i wanted to make a turn based system like final fantasy tactics. I already created the map, which is 5x5 tiles grid and the characters which is each character places in the end of the tiles. I have 2 teams, which are named Red and Yellow. ------Red-------: First character is at 0,0. Second character is at 0,1. Third character is at0.2, fourth character is at0.3, and the last one is at0.4`. -----Yellow------: First character is at 5.0. Second character is at 5.1. Third character is at 5.2, fourth character is at 5.3, and the last one is at 5.4. I wanted Red team are moving first and make a decision (whether it is attack or wait), and after 5 characters of the Red team is already made a decision, the Yellow team is the one that make a decision (Yellow team is an AI) But, i don't know how to move my characters into the next grid (e.g: from 0,0 to 0,1) by clicking the left mouse button and also how do i display a grid (when select a move selection) that shows how many tiles that the character able to move. Anyone know about this? or how should i know more about this? is there any recommendations books or webs? And also, i don't know how to move the characters using mouse click.

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• Code execution time out occationally

  - by Athul k Surendran

  I am working on an e-commerce website. There is a case where I need to fetch the whole data in database through third-party API and send it to an indexing engine. This third-party API has many functions like getproducts, getproductprice, etc., and each of that functions will return the data in XML format. From there I will take charge, I will use various API calls and will handle the XML data with XSLT. And will write to a CSV file. This file will be uploaded to an Indexing engine. Right now I have details of 8000 products to feed the engine, and almost all time the this process takes about 15 min to complete, and sometimes fails. I can't find a better solution for this. I am thinking about handling the XML data in C# itself and get rid of XSLT. As I think, XSLT is far slower than C#. Is it a good Idea? Or what else I can do to solve this issue?

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• With the outcome of the Oracle vs Google trial, does that mean Mono is now safe from Microsoft [closed]

  - by Evan Plaice

  According to the an article on ArsTechnica the judge of the case ruled that APIs are not patent-able. He referred to the structure of modules/methods/classes/functions as being like libraries/books/chapters. To patent an API would be putting a patent on thought itself. It's the internal implementations that really matter. With that in mind, Mono (C# clone for Linux/Mac) has always been viewed tentatively because, even though C# and the CLI are ECMA standards, Microsoft holds a patent on the technology. Microsoft holds a covenant not to sue open source developers based on their patents but has maintained the ability to pull the plug on the Mono development team if they felt the project was a threat. With the recent ruling, is Mono finally out of the woods. A firm precedent has been established that patents can't be applied to APIs. From what I understand, none of the Mono implementation is copied verbatim, only the API structure and functionality. It's a topic I have been personally interested in for years now as I have spent a lot of time developing cross-platform C# libraries in MonoDevelop. I acknowledge that this is a controversial topic, if you have opinions that's what commenting is for. Try to keep the answers factual and based on established sources.

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• Which frontend framework/library should I learn to enhance an existing site? [on hold]

  - by Codemonkey

  I have a large site that I've coded by hand over the last couple of years. It's a sports results service, and allows users to view their results, compare themselves to others, buy photographs, that sort of thing. The code base is fairly substantial, and scarily uses no frameworks or libraries. It's a PHP backend, and a clean & compact frontend. I use the Highcharts library, but other than that all of the JS is my own. I'm not a fan of bulk, even if it is CDN-hosted and heavily cachable. Maybe I need to change my outlook on this? I'm wanting to make some significant changes to the site now, and it seems an appropriate time to enhance my skillset by learning AngularJS, or something else of that ilk. A large part of the site is tables of data, and as just one example of the sort of thing I want to achieve, I'd like to let users add/remove/sort columns better than they currently can. Are any of the various frameworks/libraries out there more suitable to shoehorning into an existing project?

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• JavaOne Countdown, Are you ready?

  - by Angela Caicedo

  This is a great time of the year!  Not only does the weather start cooling down a bit, but it's time to get ready for JavaOne 2012.  It feels so long since my last JavaOne (last year I missed it because I was on a mom duty), so this year I couldn't be happier to be this close to the action again.  Have you ever been at JavaOne?  There are a million great reasons to love JavaOne, and the most important for me is the atmosphere of the conference: The Java community is there, and Java is in the air! This year we have more than 450 sessions, and there are HOLs (Hands on labs) to get your hands dirty with code.  In addition, there will be very cool demos, an exhibition hall. and a DEMOground.  During the whole time, you will have the opportunity to interact with the speakers, discuss topics and concerns, and even have a drink! Oh yes, I almost forgot, there will be lots of fun even apart from the technology!  For example there will be a Geek Bike Ride, a Thirsty Bear party, and the Appreciation Party with Pearl Jam and Kings of Leon.  How can this get any better! So, are you ready yet?  Have you registered?  If not, just follow this "Register for JavaOne" link and we'll see you there! P.S.  Little known fact: If you are a student you can get your pass for free!!!

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• How to choose a server side language / framework

  - by pllee

  I am trying to come up with a list / ranking system on determining which server language to choose for a particular website. Assume that familiarity with a certain language is not important and the implementation can be done in any language. Here are some things that might be important but I am not sure how to rank them : Maintainability. Libraries. For example, Memcached and NoSql support right out the box would be really nice addition to a particular framework. 3rd party SDK's. For example, if I need Paypal on my site they openly provide SDK's for all senarios in Java, PHP and .Net. If I choose Django I would have to rely on 3rd party libraries that are don't support everything and are not officially maintained. Would that be dealbreaker for Django? Performance This one is tricky to put on a generic list because it can be a deal breaker but for many websites performance will not be an issue that the language/framework is responsible for. Cost (hosting, open source). edit - Any reason for the votes to close? I didn't see any duplicates mentioned and the question should not drum up a flame war.

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• Static pages for large photo album

  - by Phil P

  I'm looking for advice on software for managing a largish photo album for a website. 2000+ pictures, one-time drop (probably). I normally use MarginalHack's album, which does what I want: pre-generate thumbnails and HTML for the pictures, so I can serve without needing a dynamic run-time, so there's less attack surface to worry about. However, it doesn't handle pagination or the like, so it's unwieldy for this case. This is a one-time drop for pictures from a wedding, with a shared usercode/password for distribution to the guests; I don't wish to put the pictures in a third-party hosting environment. I don't wish to use PHP, simply because that's another run-time to worry about, I might relent and use something dynamic if it's Python or Perl based (as I can maintain things written in those). I currently have: Apache serving static files, Album-generated, some sub-directories to divide up the content to be a little more manageable. Something like Album but with pagination already handled would be great, but I'm willing to have something a little more dynamic, if it lets people comment or caption and store the extra data in something like an sqlite DB. I'd want something light-weight, not a full-blown CMS with security updates every three months. I don't want to upload pictures of other peoples' children into a third-party free service where I don't know what the revenue model is. (For my site: revenue is none, costs out of pocket). Existing server hosting is *nix, Apache, some WSGI. Client-side I have MacOS. Any advice?

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• Deploying my first website!

  - by test

  I have built a data driven website - an asp.net website, using the entity framework. In my solution I have 4 projects - the web application PresentationLayer, and 3 class libraries - Data Layer, Business and Common Layer. In one of these libraries, Common Layer I have my Model (MyModel.edmx). I have always tested my application on Cassini - Asp.Net Development Server. I have never touched IIS in my life. I bought a domain and hosting on go daddy. My logic tells me to grab my four folders (1 for each layer) and simply move them to the root folder. But I know I'm wrong since then the home page would be mywebsite.org/presentationlayer/default.aspx and second of all I start getting a bunch of errors where files do not load or they are not found. I also know that I need to manage the web.config but I don't have any experience where to start. I'm not sure if this is a problem but I also have a web service included in my presentation layer.

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• Depending on fixed version of a library and ignore its updates

  - by Moataz Elmasry

  I was talking to a technical boss yesterday. Its about a project in C++ that depends on opencv and he wanted to include a specific opencv version into the svn and keep using this version ignoring any updates which I disagreed with.We had a heated discussion about that. His arguments: Everything has to be delivered into one package and we can't ask the client to install external libraries. We depend on a fixed version so that new updates of opencv won't screw our code. We can't guarantee that within a version update, ex from 3.2.buildx to 3.2.buildy. Buildy the function signatures won't change. My arguments: True everything has to be delivered to the client as one package,but that's what build scripts are for. They download the external libraries and create a bundle. Within updates of the same version 3.2.buildx to 3.2.buildy its impossible that a signature change, unless it is a really crappy framework, which isn't the case with opencv. We deprive ourselves from new updates and features of that library. If there's a bug in the version we took, and even if there's a bug fix later, we won't be able to get that fix. Its simply ineffiecient and anti design to depend on a certain version/build of an external library as it makes our project difficult in the future to adopt to new changes. So I'd like to know what you guys think. Does it really make sense to include a specific version of external library in our svn and keep using it ignoring all updates?

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• How to convince an employer to move to VB.Net for new development?

  - by Dabblernl

  Some history:For the last six months I have been employed at a small firm with just three programmers, my employer among them. The firm maintains two programs written in VB6. I am asssigned as the lead programmer to one of these. In the last six months I did some maintenance and bug hunting, but created some new functionality too. I had an interview last december, which was favorable, and my contract was prolonged. I am very happy with this course of events as I only obtained a .Net certification a year ago and have no other qualifications (in the field of coding, that is). It is my strong opinion that, while migration of the existing program to .Net is advisable, it is paramount that from now on the new functionality should be written in VB.Net class libraries. After some study I found out how simple it is to integrate .Net class libraries into the VB6 development environment and how easy it is to add their functionality to existing installations by using application manifests. So, I have decided that now is the moment to roll up my sleeves and try and convince my employer that he should let me develop new code in VB.Net, using VB6 for maintenance only. We get along quite well, but I think I am going to need all the ammunition I can get to convince him. Any arguments, preferably backed up up ones, are very welcome, even arguments to dissuade me ;-)

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• Errors when installing updates

  - by user71613

  I am getting the following errors when installing updates. They started to appear after I upgraded my system to 12.04. Errors were encountered while processing: samba-common samba-common-bin samba grub-pc grub-gfxpayload-lists Setting up samba-common (2:3.6.3-2ubuntu2.2) ... perl: error while loading shared libraries: libperl.so.5.12: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory dpkg: error processing samba-common (--configure): subprocess installed post-installation script returned error exit status 127 dpkg: dependency problems prevent configuration of samba-common-bin: samba-common-bin depends on samba-common (>= 2:3.4.0~pre1-2); however: Package samba-common is not configured yet. dpkg: error processing samba-common-bin (--configure): dependency problems - leaving unconfigured dpkg: dependency problems prevent configuration of samba: samba depends on samba-common (= 2:3.6.3-2ubuntu2.2); however: Package samba-common is not configured yet. samba depends on samba-common-bin; however: Package samba-common-bin is not configured yet. dpkg: error processing samba (--configure): dependency problems - leaving unconfigured Setting up grub-gfxpayload-lists (0.6) ... Setting up grub-pc (1.99-21ubuntu3.1) ... perl: error while loading shared libraries: libperl.so.5.12: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory dpkg: error processing grub-pc (--configure): subprocess installed post-installation script returned error exit status 127 Any ideas how to fix this?

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• Is it viable to make a port from a C++ application to Java through LLVM

  - by Javier Mr

  how viable is it to port a C++ application to Java bytecode using LLVM (I guess LLJVM)? The thing is that we currently have a process written in C++ but a new client has made mandatory to been able to run the program in a multiplatform way, using the Java Virtual Machine with obviously no native code (no JNI). The idea is to be able to take the generated jar and copy then to different systems (Linux, Win, 32 bits - 64 bits) and it should just work. Looking around looks like it is possible to compile C++ to LLVM IR code and then that code to java bytecode. There is no need of the generated code to be readable. I have test a bit with similar things using emscripten, this takes C++ code and compile it to JavaScript. The result is valid JS but totally unreadable (looks like assambler). Does anybody done a port of an application from C++ to Java bytecode using this tecnique? What problems could we face? Is a valid approach for production code? Note: I am aware that currently we have some non standard C++ and close source libraries, we are looking to removing this non standard code and all close source libraries and use Free Libre Open Source Software, so lets suppose all code is standard C++ code with all code available at compile time. Note: It is not an option to write portable C++ code and then compile it to the desired target platform, the compiled program must be mltiplatform thus the use of JVM (right now we are not looking in similar solutions but Python or other language base, but i would also like to heard about it)

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• Ternary and Artificial Intelligence

  - by user2957844

  Not much of a programmer myself, however I have been thinking about the future of AI. If a fully functional AI is programmed in a binary environment as is used in current computing, would that create a bit of a black and white personality? As in just yes/no, on/off, 1/0? I will use the Skynet computer from the Terminator series as a bad analogy; it is brought online and comes to the conclusion that humanity should just be destroyed so the problem is resolved, basically its only options were; fire the missiles or not. (The films do not really go into what its moves would be after doing such a thing, but that goes into the realms of AI evolution so does not really fit with this question.) It may also have been badly programmed. Now, the human mind has been akin to a ternary system which allows our "out of the box" thinking along with all the other wonderful things our minds can do. So, would it not be more prudent to create a functional ternary system and program an AI using it so the resulting personality would be able to benefit from the third "maybe" (so to speak) option? I understand that in binary there are ways to get around the whole yes/no etc. way of things, however the basic operations are still just 1's and 0's. Again with using the above bad Skynet analogy; if it could have had that third "maybe" option as part of its core system, it may have decided to not launch due to being able to make sense of the intricacies of human nature and the politics of such a move etc. In effect, my question is; Would an AI benefit more from ternary computing as opposed to binary due to the inclusion of -1, or 2, dependent on the system ("maybe," as I call it)?

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• How can I test linkable/executable files that require re-hosting or retargeting?

  - by hagubear

  Due to data protection, I cannot discuss fine details of the work itself so apologies PROBLEM CASE Sometimes my software projects require merging/integration with third party (customer or other suppliers) software. these software are often in linkable executables or object code (requires that my source code is retargeted and linked with it). When I get the executables or object code, I cannot validate its operation fully without integrating it with my system. My initial idea is that executables are not meant to be unit tested, they are meant to be linkable with other system, but what is the guarantee that post-linkage and integration behaviour will be okay? There is also no sufficient documentation available (from the customer) to indicate how to go about integrating the executables or object files. I know this is philosophical question, but apparently not enough research could be found at this moment to conclude to a solution. I was hoping that people could help me go to the right direction by suggesting approaches. To start, I have found out that Avionics OEM software is often rehosted and retargeted by third parties e.g. simulator makers. I wonder how they test them. Surely, the source code will not be supplied due to IPR rgulations. UPDATE I have received reasonable and very useful suggestions regarding this area. My current struggle has shifted into testing 3rd party OBJECT code that needs to be linked with my own source code (retargeted) on my host machine. How can I even test object code? Surely, I need to link them first to even think about doing anything. Is it the post-link behaviour that needs to be determined and scripted (using perl,Tcl, etc.) so that inputs and outputs could be verified? No clue!! :( thanks,

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• Working with Git on multiple machines

  - by Tesserex

  This may sound a bit strange, but I'm wondering about a good way to work in Git from multiple machines networked together in some way. It looks to me like I have two options, and I can see benefits on both sides: Use git itself for sharing, each machine has its own repo and you have to fetch between them. You can work on either machine even if the other is offline. This by itself is pretty big I think. Use one repo that is shared over the network between machines. No need to do git pulls every time you switch machines, since your code is always up to date. Never worry that you forgot to push code from your other non-hosting machine, which is now out of reach, since you were working off a fileshare on this machine. My intuition says that everyone generally goes with the first option. But the downside I see is that you might not always be able to access code from your other machines, and I certainly don't want to push all my WIP branches to github at the end of every day. I also don't want to have to leave my computers on all the time so I can fetch from them directly. Lastly a minor point is that all the git commands to keep multiple branches up to date can get tedious. Is there a third handle on this situation? Maybe some third party tools are available that help make this process easier? If you deal with this situation regularly, what do you suggest?

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• some questions related to ubuntu app showdown

  - by user49557

  Where to ask questions related to ubuntu app developer showdown? http://askubuntu.com/questions/151148/how-do-i-participate-in-the-ubuntu-app-showdown Can I use old code by myself to build on for my entry in the Ubuntu App Showdown contest? after seeing these threads and posting a question at askubuntu where to ask questions related to ubuntu app showdown i got we can ask these questions here my questions: can i submit more than one app in the contest and tell me more about this suppose i submit 5 apps out of which one is won then will it be valid if 2 or 3 are won i think the number of t-shirts does not depends upon number of apps one per person for development i have to use quickly but can i use third party libraries for GUI or other work i think i will need it for eg. pyside the first and second winner will get laptop + mobile too right or not the mobile how the prizes will be delivered will they charge(i don't think so) i would like to use multiple libraries i can use htme right ? more details are always welcomes i have mostly all ubuntu app showdown related pages but if you find something in background than tell me note:i am not saying that i am going to win just questions don't take it in that way

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• Black Screen after installing recommended Nvidia drivers. What to do?

  - by former_Windows_user

  New to Ubuntu. Problem description: Until recently I had Windows on my computer. My hard disk is divided into two partitions. On the first one (app. 10 GB) I had my Windows XP On the second one (app. 30 GB) I have some data I tried to install Ubuntu 12.04 on the first partition (the smaller one). Since I wanted to keep the data on my second partition, I chose the third install option. During the installation process I deleted the data on partition one, created a new partition with the same size, formatted it as ext4 and mounted / on it. The installation continued fine and at the end I restarted and took the CD out when it ejected automatically (it could have been also before the restart). Ubuntu started but I noticed that my computer was slow. Then a prompt appeared telling me that I did not have the optimal NVidia drivers and recommended to install a specific one. I clicked on the recommended driver, installation went apparently just fine and at the end I had to restart the system again. I did it, Ubuntu started, asked for my password, I typed it, pressed Enter, the screen turned black and remained like that (only the cursor was there and I could move it). I restarted and the same thing happened again. Has anyone had such a problem before and was able to solve it? With Windows I always installed drivers from CDs after installing Windows. Are the same CDs going to work for Ubuntu too or I should find special drivers? P.S. During the installation I was connected to the internet and I agreed on installing updates and the third party software. In the time before I installed that problematic but recommended NVidia driver I checked that there was between 6 and 7 GB free space on the first partition where I installed Ubuntu.

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• Store scores for players and produce a high score list

  - by zrvan

  This question is derived from an interview question that I got for a job I was declined. I have asked for code review for my solution at the dedicated Stack Exchange site. But I hope this question is sufficiently rephrased and asked with a different motivation not to be a duplicate of the other question. Consider the following scenario: You should store player scores in the server back end of a game. The server is written in Java. Every score should be registered, that is, one player may have any number of scores for any number of levels. A high score list should be produced with the fifteen top scores for a given level, but only one score per user (to the effect that even if player X has the two highest scores for level Y, only the first position is counted and player Z has the second place). No information should be persisted and only Java 1.7+ standard libraries should be used. No third party libraries or frameworks are acceptable. With the number of players as the primary factor, what would be the best data structure in terms of scalability and concurrency? How would you access the structure to register a single score given a level and a player id? How would you access the structure to compile the high score list?

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• Why should you choose Oracle WebLogic 12c instead of JBoss EAP 6?

  - by Ricardo Ferreira

  In this post, I will cover some technical differences between Oracle WebLogic 12c and JBoss EAP 6, which was released a couple days ago from Red Hat. This article claims to help you in the evaluation of key points that you should consider when choosing for an Java EE application server. In the following sections, I will present to you some important aspects that most customers ask us when they are seriously evaluating for an middleware infrastructure, specially if you are considering JBoss for some reason. I would suggest that you keep the following question in mind while you are reading the points: "Why should I choose JBoss instead of WebLogic?" 1) Multi Datacenter Deployment and Clustering - D/R ("Disaster & Recovery") architecture support is embedded on the WebLogic Server 12c product. JBoss EAP 6 on the other hand has no direct D/R support included, Red Hat relies on third-part tools with higher prices. When you consider a middleware solution to host your business critical application, you should worry with every architectural aspect that are related with the solution. Fail-over support is one little aspect of a truly reliable solution. If you do not worry about D/R, your solution will not be reliable. Having said that, with Red Hat and JBoss EAP 6, you have this extra cost that will increase considerably the total cost of ownership of the solution. As we commonly hear from analysts, open-source are not so cheaper when you start seeing the big picture. - WebLogic Server 12c supports advanced LAN clustering, detection of death servers and have a common alert framework. JBoss EAP 6 on the other hand has limited LAN clustering support with no server death detection. They do not generate any alerts when servers goes down (only if you buy JBoss ON which is a separated technology, but until now does not support JBoss EAP 6) and manual intervention are required when servers goes down. In most cases, admin people must rely on "kill -9", "tail -f someFile.log" and "ps ax | grep java" commands to manage failures and clustering anomalies. - WebLogic Server 12c supports the concept of Node Manager, which is a separated process that runs on the physical | virtual servers that allows extend the administration of the cluster to WebLogic managed servers that are often distributed across multiple machines and geographic locations. JBoss EAP 6 on the other hand has no equivalent technology. Whole server instances must be managed individually. - WebLogic Server 12c Node Manager supports Coherence to boost performance when managing servers. JBoss EAP 6 on the other hand has no similar technology. There is no way to coordinate JBoss and infiniband instances provided by JBoss using high throughput and low latency protocols like InfiniBand. The Node Manager feature also allows another very important feature that JBoss EAP lacks: secure the administration. When using WebLogic Node Manager, all the administration tasks are sent to the managed servers in a secure tunel protected by a certificate, which means that the transport layer that separates the WebLogic administration console from the managed servers are secured by SSL. - WebLogic Server 12c are now integrated with OTD ("Oracle Traffic Director") which is a web server technology derived from the former Sun iPlanet Web Server. This software complements the web server support offered by OHS ("Oracle HTTP Server"). Using OTD, WebLogic instances are load-balanced by a high powerful software that knows how to handle SDP ("Socket Direct Protocol") over InfiniBand, which boost performance when used with engineered systems technologies like Oracle Exalogic Elastic Cloud. JBoss EAP 6 on the other hand only offers support to Apache Web Server with custom modules created to deal with JBoss clusters, but only across standard TCP/IP networks.  2) Application and Runtime Diagnostics - WebLogic Server 12c have diagnostics capabilities embedded on the server called WLDF ("WebLogic Diagnostic Framework") so there is no need to rely on third-part tools. JBoss EAP 6 on the other hand has no diagnostics capabilities. Their only diagnostics tool is the log generated by the application server. Admin people are encouraged to analyse thousands of log lines to find out what is going on. - WebLogic Server 12c complement WLDF with JRockit MC ("Mission Control"), which provides to administrators and developers a complete insight about the JVM performance, behavior and possible bottlenecks. WebLogic Server 12c also have an classloader analysis tool embedded, and even a log analyzer tool that enables administrators and developers to view logs of multiple servers at the same time. JBoss EAP 6 on the other hand relies on third-part tools to do something similar. Again, only log searching are offered to find out whats going on. - WebLogic Server 12c offers end-to-end traceability and monitoring available through Oracle EM ("Enterprise Manager"), including monitoring of business transactions that flows through web servers, ESBs, application servers and database servers, all of this with high deep JVM analysis and diagnostics. JBoss EAP 6 on the other hand, even using JBoss ON ("Operations Network"), which is a separated technology, does not support those features. Red Hat relies on third-part tools to provide direct Oracle database traceability across JVMs. One of those tools are Oracle EM for non-Oracle middleware that manage JBoss, Tomcat, Websphere and IIS transparently. - WebLogic Server 12c with their JRockit support offers a tool called JRockit Flight Recorder, which can give developers a complete visibility of a certain period of application production monitoring with zero extra overhead. This automatic recording allows you to deep analyse threads latency, memory leaks, thread contention, resource utilization, stack overflow damages and GC ("Garbage Collection") cycles, to observe in real time stop-the-world phenomenons, generational, reference count and parallel collects and mutator threads analysis. JBoss EAP 6 don't even dream to support something similar, even because they don't have their own JVM. 3) Application Server Administration - WebLogic Server 12c offers a complete administration console complemented with scripting and macro-like recording capabilities. A single WebLogic console can managed up to hundreds of WebLogic servers belonging to the same domain. JBoss EAP 6 on the other hand has a limited console and provides a XML centric administration. JBoss, after ten years, started the development of a rudimentary centralized administration that still leave a lot of administration tasks aside, so admin people and developers must touch scripts and XML configuration files for most advanced and even simple administration tasks. This lead applications to error prone and risky deployments. Even using JBoss ON, JBoss EAP are not able to offer decent administration features for admin people which must be high skilled in JBoss internal architecture and its managing capabilities. - Oracle EM is available to manage multiple domains, databases, application servers, operating systems and virtualization, with a complete end-to-end visibility. JBoss ON does not provide management capabilities across the complete architecture, only basic monitoring. Even deployment must be done aside JBoss ON which does no integrate well with others softwares than JBoss. Until now, JBoss ON does not supports JBoss EAP 6, so even their minimal support for JBoss are not available for JBoss EAP 6 leaving customers uncovered and subject to high skilled JBoss admin people. - WebLogic Server 12c has the same administration model whatever is the topology selected by the customer. JBoss EAP 6 on the other hand differentiates between two operational models: standalone-mode and domain-mode, that are not consistent with each other. Depending on the mode used, the administration skill is different. - WebLogic Server 12c has no point-of-failures processes, and it does not need to define any specialized server. Domain model in WebLogic is available for years (at least ten years or more) and is production proven. JBoss EAP 6 on the other hand needs special processes to garantee JBoss integrity, the PC ("Process-Controller") and the HC ("Host-Controller"). Different from WebLogic, the domain model in JBoss is quite new (one year at tops) of maturity, and need to mature considerably until start doing things like WebLogic domain model does. - WebLogic Server 12c supports parallel deployment model which enables some artifacts being deployed at the same time. JBoss EAP 6 on the other hand does not have any similar feature. Every deployment are done atomically in the containers. This means that if you have a huge EAR (an EAR of 120 MB of size for instance) and deploy onto JBoss EAP 6, this EAR will take some minutes in order to starting accept thread requests. The same EAR deployed onto WebLogic Server 12c will reduce the deployment time at least in 2X compared to JBoss. 4) Support and Upgrades - WebLogic Server 12c has patch management available. JBoss EAP 6 on the other hand has no patch management available, each JBoss EAP instance should be patched manually. To achieve such feature, you need to buy a separated technology called JBoss ON ("Operations Network") that manage this type of stuff. But until now, JBoss ON does not support JBoss EAP 6 so, in practice, JBoss EAP 6 does not have this feature. - WebLogic Server 12c supports previuous WebLogic domains without any reconfiguration since its kernel is robust and mature since its creation in 1995. JBoss EAP 6 on the other hand has a proven lack of supportability between JBoss AS 4, 5, 6 and 7. Different kernels and messaging engines were implemented in JBoss stack in the last five years reveling their incapacity to create a well architected and proven middleware technology. - WebLogic Server 12c has patch prescription based on customer configuration. JBoss EAP 6 on the other hand has no such capability. People need to create ticket supports and have their installations revised by Red Hat support guys to gain some patch prescription from them. - Oracle WebLogic Server independent of the version has 8 years of support of new patches and has lifetime release of existing patches beyond that. JBoss EAP 6 on the other hand provides patches for a specific application server version up to 5 years after the release date. JBoss EAP 4 and previous versions had only 4 years. A good question that Red Hat will argue to answer is: "what happens when you find issues after year 5"?  5) RAC ("Real Application Clusters") Support - WebLogic Server 12c ships with a specific JDBC driver to leverage Oracle RAC clustering capabilities (Fast-Application-Notification, Transaction Affinity, Fast-Connection-Failover, etc). Oracle JDBC thin driver are also available. JBoss EAP 6 on the other hand ships only the standard Oracle JDBC thin driver. Load balancing with Oracle RAC are not supported. Manual intervention in case of planned or unplanned RAC downtime are necessary. In JBoss EAP 6, situation does not reestablish automatically after downtime. - WebLogic Server 12c has a feature called Active GridLink for Oracle RAC which provides up to 3X performance on OLTP applications. This seamless integration between WebLogic and Oracle database enable more value added to critical business applications leveraging their investments in Oracle database technology and Oracle middleware. JBoss EAP 6 on the other hand has no performance gains at all, even when admin people implement some kind of connection-pooling tuning. - WebLogic Server 12c also supports transaction and web session affinity to the Oracle RAC, which provides aditional gains of performance. This is particularly interesting if you are creating a reliable solution that are distributed not only in an LAN cluster, but into a different data center. JBoss EAP 6 on the other hand has no such support. 6) Standards and Technology Support - WebLogic Server 12c is fully Java EE 6 compatible and production ready since december of 2011. JBoss EAP 6 on the other hand became fully compatible with Java EE 6 only in the community version after three months, and production ready only in a few days considering that this article was written in June of 2012. Red Hat says that they are the masters of innovation and technology proliferation, but compared with Oracle and even other proprietary vendors like IBM, they historically speaking are lazy to deliver the most newest technologies and standards adherence. - Oracle is the steward of Java, driving innovation into the platform from commercial and open-source vendors. Red Hat on the other hand does not have its own JVM and relies on third-part JVMs to complete their application server offer. 95% of Red Hat customers are using Oracle HotSpot as JVM, which means that without Oracle involvement, their support are limited exclusively to the application server layer and we all know that most problems are happens in the JVM layer. - WebLogic Server 12c supports natively JDK 7, which empower developers to explore the maximum of the Java platform productivity when writing code. This feature differentiate WebLogic from others application servers (except GlassFish that are also managed by Oracle) because the usage of JDK 7 introduce such remarkable productivity features like the "try-with-resources" enhancement, catching multiple exceptions with one try block, Strings in the switch statements, JVM improvements in terms of JDBC, I/O, networking, security, concurrency and of course, the most important feature of Java 7: native support for multiple non-Java languages. More features regarding JDK 7 can be found here. JBoss EAP 6 on the other hand does not support JDK 7 officially, they comment in their community version that "Java SE 7 can be used with JBoss 7" which does not gives you any guarantees of enterprise support for JDK 7. - Oracle WebLogic Server 12c supports integration with Spring framework allowing Spring applications to use WebLogic special transaction manager, exposing bean interfaces to WebLogic MBeans to take advantage of all WebLogic monitoring and administration advantages. JBoss EAP 6 on the other hand has no special integration with Spring. In fact, Red Hat offers a suspicious package called "JBoss Web Platform" that in theory supports Spring, but in practice this package does not offers any special integration. It is just a facility for Red Hat customers to have support from both JBoss and Spring technology using the same customer support. 7) Lightweight Development - Oracle WebLogic Server 12c and Oracle GlassFish are completely integrated and can share applications without any modifications. Starting with the 12c version, WebLogic now understands natively GlassFish deployment descriptors and specific configurations in order to offer you a truly and reliable migration path from a community Java EE application server to a enterprise middleware product like WebLogic. JBoss EAP 6 on the other hand has no support to natively reuse an existing (or still in development) application from JBoss AS community server. Users of JBoss suffer of critical issues during deployment time that includes: changing the libraries and dependencies of the application, patching the DTD or XSD deployment descriptors, refactoring of the application layers due classloading issues and anomalies, rebuilding of persistence, business and web layers due issues with "usage of the certified version of an certain dependency" or "frameworks that Red Hat potentially does not recommend" etc. If you have the culture or enterprise IT directive of developing Java EE applications using community middleware to in a certain future, transition to enterprise (supported by a vendor) middleware, Oracle WebLogic plus Oracle GlassFish offers you a more sustainable solution. - WebLogic Server 12c has a very light ZIP distribution (less than 165 MB). JBoss EAP 6 ZIP size is around 130 MB, together with JBoss ON you have more 100 MB resulting in a higher download footprint. This is particularly interesting if you plan to use automated setup of application server instances (for example, to rapidly setup a development or staging environment) using Maven or Hudson. - WebLogic Server 12c has a complete integration with Maven allowing developers to setup WebLogic domains with few commands. Tasks like downloading WebLogic, installation, domain creation, data sources deployment are completely integrated. JBoss EAP 6 on the other hand has a limited offer integration with those tools.  - WebLogic Server 12c has a startup mode called WLX that turns-off EJB, JMS and JCA containers leaving enabled only the web container with Java EE 6 web profile. JBoss EAP 6 on the other hand has no such feature, you need to disable manually the containers that you do not want to use. - WebLogic Server 12c supports fastswap, which enables you to change classes without redeployment. This is particularly interesting if you are developing patches for the application that is already deployed and you do not want to redeploy the entire application. This is the same behavior that most application servers offers to JSP pages, but with WebLogic Server 12c, you have the same feature for Java classes in general. JBoss EAP 6 on the other hand has no such support. Even JBoss EAP 5 does not support this until now. 8) JMS and Messaging - WebLogic Server 12c has a proven and high scalable JMS implementation since its initial release in 1995. JBoss EAP 6 on the other hand has a still immature technology called HornetQ, which was introduced in JBoss EAP 5 replacing everything that was implemented in the previous versions. Red Hat loves to introduce new technologies across JBoss versions, playing around with customers and their investments. And when they are asked about why they have changed the implementation and caused such a mess, their answer is always: "the previous implementation was inadequate and not aligned with the community strategy so we are creating a new a improved one". This Red Hat practice leads to uncomfortable investments that in a near future (sometimes less than a year) will be affected in someway. - WebLogic Server 12c has troubleshooting and monitoring features included on the WebLogic console and WLDF. JBoss EAP 6 on the other hand has no direct monitoring on the console, activity is reflected only on the logs, no debug logs available in case of JMS issues. - WebLogic Server 12c has extremely good performance and scalability. JBoss EAP 6 on the other hand has a JMS storage mechanism relying on Oracle database or MySQL. This means that if an issue in production happens and Red Hat affirms that an performance issue is happening due to database problems, they will not support you on the performance issue. They will orient you to call Oracle instead. - WebLogic Server 12c supports messaging enterprise features like SAF ("Store and Forward"), Distributed Queues/Topics and Foreign JMS providers support that leverage JMS implementations without compromise developer code making things completely transparent. JBoss EAP 6 on the other hand do not even dream to support such features. 9) Caching and Grid - Coherence, which is the leading and most mature data grid technology from Oracle, is available since early 2000 and was integrated with WebLogic in 2009. Coherence and WebLogic clusters can be both managed from WebLogic administrative console. Even Node Manager supports Coherence. JBoss on the other hand discontinued JBoss Cache, which was their caching implementation just like they did with the messaging implementation (JBossMQ) which was a issue for long term customers. JBoss EAP 6 ships InfiniSpan version 1.0 which is immature and lack a proven record of successful cases and reliability. - WebLogic Server 12c has a feature called ActiveCache which uses Coherence to, without any code changes, replicate HTTP sessions from both WebLogic and other application servers like JBoss, Tomcat, Websphere, GlassFish and even Microsoft IIS. JBoss EAP 6 on the other hand does have such support and even when they do in the future, they probably will support only their own application server. - Coherence can be used to manage both L1 and L2 cache levels, providing support to Oracle TopLink and others JPA compliant implementations, even Hibernate. JBoss EAP 6 and Infinispan on the other hand supports only Hibernate. And most important of all: Infinispan does not have any successful case of L1 or L2 caching level support using Hibernate, which lead us to reflect about its viability. 10) Performance - WebLogic Server 12c is certified with Oracle Exalogic Elastic Cloud and can run unchanged applications at this engineered system. This approach can benefit customers from Exalogic optimization's of both kernel and JVM layers to boost performance in terms of 10X for web, OLTP, JMS and grid applications. JBoss EAP 6 on the other hand has no investment on engineered systems: customers do not have the choice to deploy on a Java ultra fast system if their project becomes relevant and performance issues are detected. - WebLogic Server 12c maintains a performance gain across each new release: starting on WebLogic 5.1, the overall performance gain has been close to 4X, which close to a 20% gain release by release. JBoss on the other hand does not provide SPECJAppServer or SPECJEnterprise performance benchmarks. Their so called "performance gains" remains hidden in their customer environments, which lead us to think if it is true or not since we will never get access to those environments. - WebLogic Server 12c has industry performance benchmarks with submissions across platforms and configurations leading SPECJ. Oracle WebLogic leads SPECJAppServer performance in multiple categories, fitting all customer topologies like: dual-node, single-node, multi-node and multi-node with RAC. JBoss... again, does not provide any SPECJAppServer performance benchmarks. - WebLogic Server 12c has a feature called work manager which allows your application to embrace new performance levels based on critical resource utilization of the CPUs usage. Work managers prioritizes work and allocates threads based on an execution model that takes into account administrator-defined parameters and actual run-time performance and throughput. JBoss EAP 6 on the other hand has no compared feature and probably they never will. Not supporting such feature like work managers, JBoss EAP 6 forces admin people and specially developers to uncover performance gains in a intrusive way, rewriting the code and doing performance refactorings. 11) Professional Services Support - WebLogic Server 12c and any other technology sold by Oracle give customers the possibility of hire OCS ("Oracle Consulting Services") to manage critical scenarios, deployment assistance of new applications, high skilled consultancy of architecture, best practices and people allocation together with customer teams. All OCS services are available without any restrictions, having the customer bought software from Oracle or just starting their implementation before any acquisition. JBoss EAP 6 or Red Hat to be more specifically, only offers professional services if you buy subscriptions from them. If you are developing a new critical application for your business and need the help of Red Hat for a serious issue or architecture decision, they will probably say: "OK... I can help you but after you buy subscriptions from me". Red Hat also does not allows their professional services consultants to manage environments that uses community based software. They will probably force you to first buy a subscription, download their "enterprise" version and them, optionally hire their consultants. - Oracle provides you our university to educate your team into our technologies, including of course specialized trainings of WebLogic application server. At any time and location, you can hire Oracle to train your team so you get trustful knowledge according to your specific needs. Certifications for the products are also available if your technical people desire to differentiate themselves as professionals. Red Hat on the other hand have a limited pool of resources to train your team in their technologies. Basically they are selling training and certification for RHEL ("Red Hat Enterprise Linux") but if you demand more specialized training in JBoss middleware, they will probably connect you to some "certified" partner localized training since they are apparently discontinuing their education center, at least here in Brazil. They were not able to reproduce their success with RHEL education to their middleware division since they need first sell the subscriptions to after gives you specialized training. And again, they only offer you specialized training based on their enterprise version (EAP in the case of JBoss) which means that the courses will be a quite outdated. There are reports of developers that took official training's from Red Hat at this year (2012) and in a certain JBoss advanced course, Red Hat supposedly covered JBossMQ as the messaging subsystem, and even the printed material provided was based on JBossMQ since the training was created for JBoss EAP 4.3. 12) Encouraging Transparency without Ulterior Motives - WebLogic Server 12c like any other software from Oracle can be downloaded any time from anywhere, you should only possess an OTN ("Oracle Technology Network") credential and you can download any enterprise software how many times you want. And is not some kind of "trial" version. It is the official binaries that will be running for ever in your data center. Oracle does not encourages the usage of "specific versions" of our software. The binaries you buy from Oracle are the same binaries anyone in the world could download and use for testing and personal education. JBoss EAP 6 on the other hand are not available for download unless you buy a subscription and get access to the Red Hat enterprise repositories. If you need to test, learn or just start creating your application using Red Hat's middleware software, you should download it from the community website. You are not allowed to download the enterprise version that, according to Red Hat are more secure, reliable and robust. But no one of us want to start the development of a software with an unsecured, unreliable and not scalable middleware right? So what you do? You are "invited" by Red Hat to buy subscriptions from them to get access to the "cool" version of the software. - WebLogic Server 12c prices are publicly available in the Oracle website. If you want to know right now how much WebLogic will cost to your organization, just click here and get access to our price list. In the case of WebLogic, check out the "US Oracle Technology Commercial Price List". Oracle also encourages you to get in touch with a sales representative to discuss discounts that would make possible the investment into our technology. But you are not required to do this, only if you are interested in buying our technology or maybe you want to discuss some discount scenarios. JBoss EAP 6 on the other hand does not have its cost publicly available in Red Hat's website or in any other media, at least is not so easy to get such information. The only link you will possibly find in their website is a "Contact a Sales Representative" link. This is not a very good relationship between an customer and an vendor. This is not an example of transparency, mainly when the software are sold as open. In this situations, customers expects to see the software prices publicly available, so they can have the chance to decide, based on the existing features of the software, if the cost is fair or not. Conclusion Oracle WebLogic is the most mature, secure, reliable and scalable Java EE application server of the market, and have a proven record of success around the globe to prove it's majority. Don't lose the chance to discover today how WebLogic could fit your needs and sustain your global IT middleware strategy, no matter if your strategy are completely based on the Cloud or not.

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• 8 Backup Tools Explained for Windows 7 and 8

  - by Chris Hoffman

  Backups on Windows can be confusing. Whether you’re using Windows 7 or 8, you have quite a few integrated backup tools to think about. Windows 8 made quite a few changes, too. You can also use third-party backup software, whether you want to back up to an external drive or back up your files to online storage. We won’t cover third-party tools here — just the ones built into Windows. Backup and Restore on Windows 7 Windows 7 has its own Backup and Restore feature that lets you create backups manually or on a schedule. You’ll find it under Backup and Restore in the Control Panel. The original version of Windows 8 still contained this tool, and named it Windows 7 File Recovery. This allowed former Windows 7 users to restore files from those old Windows 7 backups or keep using the familiar backup tool for a little while. Windows 7 File Recovery was removed in Windows 8.1. System Restore System Restore on both Windows 7 and 8 functions as a sort of automatic system backup feature. It creates backup copies of important system and program files on a schedule or when you perform certain tasks, such as installing a hardware driver. If system files become corrupted or your computer’s software becomes unstable, you can use System Restore to restore your system and program files from a System Restore point. This isn’t a way to back up your personal files. It’s more of a troubleshooting feature that uses backups to restore your system to its previous working state. Previous Versions on Windows 7 Windows 7′s Previous Versions feature allows you to restore older versions of files — or deleted files. These files can come from backups created with Windows 7′s Backup and Restore feature, but they can also come from System Restore points. When Windows 7 creates a System Restore point, it will sometimes contain your personal files. Previous Versions allows you to extract these personal files from restore points. This only applies to Windows 7. On Windows 8, System Restore won’t create backup copies of your personal files. The Previous Versions feature was removed on Windows 8. File History Windows 8 replaced Windows 7′s backup tools with File History, although this feature isn’t enabled by default. File History is designed to be a simple, easy way to create backups of your data files on an external drive or network location. File History replaces both Windows 7′s Backup and Previous Versions features. Windows System Restore won’t create copies of personal files on Windows 8. This means you can’t actually recover older versions of files until you enable File History yourself — it isn’t enabled by default. System Image Backups Windows also allows you to create system image backups. These are backup images of your entire operating system, including your system files, installed programs, and personal files. This feature was included in both Windows 7 and Windows 8, but it was hidden in the preview versions of Windows 8.1. After many user complaints, it was restored and is still available in the final version of Windows 8.1 — click System Image Backup on the File History Control Panel. Storage Space Mirroring Windows 8′s Storage Spaces feature allows you to set up RAID-like features in software. For example, you can use Storage Space to set up two hard disks of the same size in a mirroring configuration. They’ll appear as a single drive in Windows. When you write to this virtual drive, the files will be saved to both physical drives. If one drive fails, your files will still be available on the other drive. This isn’t a good long-term backup solution, but it is a way of ensuring you won’t lose important files if a single drive fails. Microsoft Account Settings Backup Windows 8 and 8.1 allow you to back up a variety of system settings — including personalization, desktop, and input settings. If you’re signing in with a Microsoft account, OneDrive settings backup is enabled automatically. This feature can be controlled under OneDrive > Sync settings in the PC settings app. This feature only backs up a few settings. It’s really more of a way to sync settings between devices. OneDrive Cloud Storage Microsoft hasn’t been talking much about File History since Windows 8 was released. That’s because they want people to use OneDrive instead. OneDrive — formerly known as SkyDrive — was added to the Windows desktop in Windows 8.1. Save your files here and they’ll be stored online tied to your Microsoft account. You can then sign in on any other computer, smartphone, tablet, or even via the web and access your files. Microsoft wants typical PC users “backing up” their files with OneDrive so they’ll be available on any device. You don’t have to worry about all these features. Just choose a backup strategy to ensure your files are safe if your computer’s hard disk fails you. Whether it’s an integrated backup tool or a third-party backup application, be sure to back up your files.

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