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  • UML diagrams that are actually pretty?

    - by Borek
    I'm looking for a diagramming software that would produce good looking output. It doesn't need to support everything (or even much) from UML, is doesn't need to have code engineering functions or anything, it just needs to produce visually interesting output. Here is a couple of samples of products that I consider ugly / not good enough: Visio with default UML stencils (didn't find better looking ones), Enterprise Architect, Dia, ArgoUML and many other "professional" UML tools. A couple of visually compelling tools that I considered (but found issues with): Visual Studio class diagrams - just for .NET classes but the output is miles better than what UML tools typically produce NClass - similar to VS's class diagrams but I could not find the "pretty", blue skin anywhere yuml.me - very nice but lacking some advanced layout options. I have to say that I find their style almost ideal for high-level diagrams - they look sketchy which is good. Balsamiq - I think Joel used this for hginit.com and I liked it. However, it's not suited for creating software diagrams so I can imagine it would be quite a lot of work MS Word has actually quite a good graphics engine but I'd rather leave this as a choice of the last resort I'd be grateful for any good tips.

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  • jQuery Validate on form submitted by JavaScript

    - by Daniel
    My form is submitted by a link using JavaScript, but I am also trying to validate the from justing jQuery validate. The validation doesn't work when submitted by the link, but it does if I change the link to a submit button. What am I doing wrong? My form: <form id="findmatch" method="post" action="search"> <div> <label class="formlabel">Match Type <input type="text" name="matchtype" id="matchtype" class="forminput" /> </label> <label class="formlabel">Location (postcode) <input type="text" name="location" id="location" class="forminput" /> </label> <label class="formlabel">Radius (miles) <input type="text" name="Radius" id="Radius" class="forminput" /> </label> <label class="formlabel">Keywords <input type="text" onblur="javascript:usePointFromPostcode(document.getElementById('location').value, showCompleteLatLng)" onchange="javascript:usePointFromPostcode(document.getElementById('location').value, showCompleteLatLng)" name="keywords" id="keywords" class="forminput" /> </label> <input id="lat" class="hidden" name="lat" type="text" value="" /> <input id="lon" class="hidden" name="lon" type="text" value="" /> <a href="javascript:document.getElementById('findmatch').submit();" onmouseover="javascript:usePointFromPostcode(document.getElementById('location').value, showCompleteLatLng)" class="submit">Search</a> </div> </form> And my jQuery is <script type="text/javascript"> $(document).ready(function () { $("#findmatch").validate({ rules: { location: "required", Radius: { required: true, digits: true }, keywords: "required" }, messages: { location: "Please enter your postcode", Radius: { required: "Please enter a radius", digits: "Please only enter numbers" }, keywords: "Please enter the keywords you wish to search for" } }); }); </script>

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  • SSH: Connection Reset by Peer

    - by hopeless
    I have a Solaris 10 server on another network. I can ping it and telnet to it, but ssh doesn't connect. PuTTY log contains nothing of interest (they both negotiate to ssh v2) and then I get "Event Log: Network error: Software caused connection abort". ssh is defintely running: svcs -a | grep ssh online 12:12:04 svc:/network/ssh:default Here's an extract from the server's /var/adm/messages (anonymised) Jun 8 19:51:05 ******* sshd[26391]: [ID 800047 auth.crit] fatal: Read from socket failed: Connection reset by peer However, if I telnet to the box, I can login to ssh locally. I can also ssh to other (non-Solaris) machines on that network fine so I don't believe that it's a network issue (though, since I'm a few hundred miles away, I can't be sure). The server's firewall is disabled, so that shouldn't be a problem root@******** # svcs -a | grep -i ipf disabled Apr_27 svc:/network/ipfilter:default Any ideas what I should start checking? Update: Based on the feedback below, I've run sshd in debug mode. Here's the client output: $ ssh -vvv root@machine -p 32222 OpenSSH_5.0p1, OpenSSL 0.9.8h 28 May 2008 debug2: ssh_connect: needpriv 0 debug1: Connecting to machine [X.X.X.X] port 32222. debug1: Connection established. debug1: identity file /home/lawrencj/.ssh/identity type -1 debug1: identity file /home/lawrencj/.ssh/id_rsa type -1 debug1: identity file /home/lawrencj/.ssh/id_dsa type -1 debug1: Remote protocol version 2.0, remote software version Sun_SSH_1.1 debug1: no match: Sun_SSH_1.1 debug1: Enabling compatibility mode for protocol 2.0 debug1: Local version string SSH-2.0-OpenSSH_5.0 debug2: fd 3 setting O_NONBLOCK debug1: SSH2_MSG_KEXINIT sent Read from socket failed: Connection reset by peer And here's the server output: root@machine # /usr/lib/ssh/sshd -d -p 32222 debug1: sshd version Sun_SSH_1.1 debug1: read PEM private key done: type RSA debug1: private host key: #0 type 1 RSA debug1: read PEM private key done: type DSA debug1: private host key: #1 type 2 DSA debug1: Bind to port 32222 on ::. Server listening on :: port 32222. debug1: Bind to port 32222 on 0.0.0.0. Server listening on 0.0.0.0 port 32222. debug1: Server will not fork when running in debugging mode. Connection from 1.2.3.4 port 2652 debug1: Client protocol version 2.0; client software version OpenSSH_5.0 debug1: match: OpenSSH_5.0 pat OpenSSH* debug1: Enabling compatibility mode for protocol 2.0 debug1: Local version string SSH-2.0-Sun_SSH_1.1 debug1: list_hostkey_types: ssh-rsa,ssh-dss debug1: Failed to acquire GSS-API credentials for any mechanisms (No credentials were supplied, or the credentials were unavailable or inaccessible Unknown code 0 ) debug1: SSH2_MSG_KEXINIT sent Read from socket failed: Connection reset by peer debug1: Calling cleanup 0x4584c(0x0) This line seems a likely candidate: debug1: Failed to acquire GSS-API credentials for any mechanisms (No credentials were supplied, or the credentials were unavailable or inaccessible

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  • Is real-time or synchronous replication possible over WAN link?

    - by johnnyb10
    The company I work for is looking to implement truly real-time file replication with file locking over a WAN link that spans over 2000 miles. We currently have a 16-drive SAN setup in our east coast office. We also have an office out in Colorado that will have the same exact SAN setup. The idea is to have those two SANs contain the same exact data at all times, which will allow us to work with the same data pool, and which will also provide use with an offsite backup solution, should a failure occur on either end. We're running Server 2008. The objective is to enable users in the east coast office to work on files and have those changes be instantly updated on the Colorado SAN as well. We also need there to be file locking so that there will be no conflicts or overwritten changes if users attempt to work on the same file. Is this scenario even possible, at speeds that would make the files usable? And if so, what software would we need to pull this off? As I understand it, DFS-R does not provide file locking, so if we used that, we would need to go with a third-party product like Peerlock. But I don't even know if DFS-R is an option. Can it replicate quickly enough over a WAN link? Can any product? It seems that if we were to use synchronous replication, the programs would be unacceptably slow, as every write would have to wait for confirmation from the other end of the link. But if we used asynchronous replication, what kind of latency would we be looking at? There is a product from GlobalScape called WAFS that claims to provide "File coherence with real-time file locking, file release, and synchronization" and says that "As files are modified, changes are mirrored instantly using intelligent byte-level differencing to minimize the impact on network bandwidth". So this sounds like synchronous replication, but that doesn't even seem possible, given physical limitations such as the speed of light. If anyone has any experience with this kind of setup, or knows whether it's even possible, I'd appreciate your input and suggestions, including recommendations for software that we should check out.

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  • mac + parallels and https site test = router restarts

    - by Erik
    Ok I have an interesting & very frustrating problem happening. I'm going to explain it the best I can. I work as a graphic designer & web designer on a mac and have a Comcast internet connection that comes through a Comcast branded router (SMC8014) which then ties into an Airport Extreme Base Station which runs my office network. I run OS 10.5.7 and also run Parallels 4.0.3 (running Windows XP) for testing websites in Internet Explorer and so on. Ok, so that the basic background. Here's my issue. I've been collaborating an ecommerce website with another designer/developer and when testing the site on the PC side we have started to run into some sort of network problem. The site is https if that matters at all I suspect it may. Basically when I run parallels for testing I am constantly having to restart the router in order to connect to the test site (it's hosted). Funny thing is I can access the rest of the internet fine, just not this site I'm working on until I restart the router (It's sorta like the site is timing out). This never happens when just running the Mac side of things. It only becomes an issue when Parallels is open and I am doing page refreshes while making css or HTML edits via something like Coda or CSS edit (connected to the hosting server via ftp). The real problem is that once the problem starts I only get about 2 or 3 page loads before I have to restart the router again. It's absolutely crippling. I cannot get any work done when I have to restart the router every couple of minutes. So, if you think this problem is isolated to me, the answer is no. The designer/developer I'm collaborating with has an office a couple miles away and experiences very similar problems under slightly different setup. He also has Comcast as his internet provider and connects his router to an Airport and primarily works on a mac. The main difference is that rather than using a visualizer like parallels to test the website on the PC he uses a real live PC that is on his network. Once he fire up the PC to do testing he runs into the same issue described above. After a couple of page refreshes in Internet Explorer or other browser on the PC the site becomes unresponsive and the router has to get restarted. Any thoughts on what is going on here would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance.

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  • If You Could Cut Your Meeting Times in ½ Would You?

    - by Brian Dayton
                    I know it sounds like a big promise. And what I'm thinking about may not cut a :60 minute meeting into :30 minutes, but it could make meetings and interactions up to 2X more productive. How? Social Media for the Enterprise, Not Social Media In the Enterprise Bear with me. I'm not talking about whether or not workers should or shouldn't have access to Facebook on corporate networks. That topic has been discussed @ length. I'm also not talking about the direct benefits of Social Networking tools like Presence (the ability to see someone online and ask a question in real-time), blogs, RSS feeds or external tools like Twitter. The Un-Measurable Benefits Would you do something that you believe will have a positive effect--but can't be measured? It's impossible to quantify the effectiveness of a meeting. However, what I am talking about would be more of a byproduct of all of the social networking tools above. Here's the hypothesis: As I've gotten more and more busy with work, family, travel and kids--and the same has happened to my friends and family--I'm less and less connected. But by introducing Facebook to my life I've not only made connections with longtime friends whom I haven't spoken to in years--but I've increased the pace and quality of interactions, on and offline, with close friends who I see and speak to every week. In some cases it even enhances the connections and interactions with those I see or speak to every day. The same holds true in an organization. Especially a larger one with highly matrixed organizational structures. You work with people on a project, new people come in with each different project and a disproportionate amount of time is spent getting oriented and staying current. Going back to the initial value proposition--making meetings shorter/more effective--a large amount of time is spent: -          At Project Kick-off: Meeting and understanding team member's histories, goals & roles -          Ongoing: Summarizing events since the last meeting or update email In my personal, Facebook life today I know that: -          My best friend from college - has been stranded in India for 5 days because of the volcano in Iceland and is now only 250 miles from home -          One of my co-workers started conference calls at 6:30 this morning -          My wife wasn't terribly pleased with my painting skills in our new bathroom (disclosure: she told me this face to face too) Strengthening Weak Links A recent article in CIO Magazine, Three Dangerous Social Media Misconceptions (Kristen Burnham, March 12, 2010) calls out the #1 misconception as follows: 1. "Face-to-face relationships are far more valuable than virtual ones." While some level of physical interaction will always add value to relationships, Gartner says that come 2020, most relationships and teams will be based on "weak links"--that is, you may not have personally met a contact, but you'll know of or may have interacted with him via social sites like Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter. The sooner your enterprise adopts these tools, the sooner your employees will learn them, and the sooner you'll begin to cultivate these relationships-of-the-future.   I personally believe that it's not an either/or choice between face-to-face and virtual interactions. In fact, I'll be as bold as saying it doesn't matter. I can point to two extremely valuable work relationships that I've had over the past 5 years: -          I shared an office with one of them -          I met the other person, face-to-face, only once Both relationships were very productive. The dynamics were similar. The communication tactics differed immensely. What does matter is the quality, frequency and relevance of interactions. Still sound like too much? An over-promise? Stay tuned for my next post The Gap Between Facebook and LinkedIn. I'll also connect some of the dots with where Oracle Applications and technologies are headed.        

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  • SQL Developer at Oracle Open World 2012

    - by thatjeffsmith
    We have a lot going on in San Francisco this fall. One of the most personal exciting bits, for what will be my 4th or 5th Open World, is that this will be my FIRST as a member of Team Oracle. I’ve presented once before, but most years it was just me pressing flesh at the vendor booths. After 3-4 days of standing and talking, you’re ready to just go home and not do anything for a few weeks. This time I’ll have a chance to walk around and talk with our users and get a good idea of what’s working and what’s not. Of course it will be a great opportunity for you to find us and get to know your SQL Developer team! 3.4 miles across and back – thanks Ashley for signing me up for the run! This year is going to be a bit crazy. Work wise I’ll be presenting twice, working a booth, and proctoring several of our Hands-On Labs. The fun parts will be equally crazy though – running across the Bay Bridge (I don’t run), swimming the Bay (I don’t swim), having my wife fly out on Wednesday for the concert, and then our first WhiskyFest on Friday (I do drink whisky though.) But back to work – let’s talk about EVERYTHING you can expect from the SQL Developer team. Booth Hours We’ll have 2 ‘demo pods’ in the Exhibition Hall over at Moscone South. Look for the farm of Oracle booths, we’ll be there under the signs that say ‘SQL Developer.’ There will be several people on hand, mostly developers (yes, they still count as people), who can answer your questions or demo the latest features. Come by and say ‘Hi!’, and let us know what you like and what you think we can do better. Seriously. Monday 10AM – 6PM Tuesday 9:45AM – 6PM Wednesday 9:45AM – 4PM Presentations Stop by for an hour, pull up a chair, sit back and soak in all the SQL Developer goodness. You’ll only have to suffer my bad jokes for two of the presentations, so please at least try to come to the other ones. We’ll be talking about data modeling, migrations, source control, and new features in versions 3.1 and 3.2 of SQL Developer and SQL Developer Data Modeler. Day Time Event Monday 10:454:45 What’s New in SQL Developer Why Move to Oracle Application Express Listener Tueday 10:1511:455:00 Using Subversion in Oracle SQL Developer Data Modeler Oracle SQL Developer Tips & Tricks Database Design with Oracle SQL Developer Data Modeler Wednesday 11:453:30 Migrating Third-Party Databases and Applications to Oracle Exadata 11g Enterprise Options and Management Packs for Developers Hands On Labs (HOLs) The Hands On Labs allow you to come into a classroom environment, sit down at a computer, and run through some exercises. We’ll provide the hardware, software, and training materials. It’s self-paced, but we’ll have several helpers walking around to answer questions and chat up any SQL Developer or database topic that comes to mind. If your employer is sending you to Open World for all that great training, the HOLs are a great opportunity to capitalize on that. They are only 60 minutes each, so you don’t have to worry about burning out. And there’s no homework! Of course, if you do want to take the labs home with you, many are already available via the Developer Day Hands-On Database Applications Developer Lab. You will need your own computer for those, but we’ll take care of the rest. Wednesday PL/SQL Development and Unit Testing with Oracle SQL Developer 10:15 Performance Tuning with Oracle SQL Developer 11:45 Thursday The Soup to Nuts of Data Modeling with Oracle SQL Developer Data Modeler 11:15 Some Parting Advice Always wanted to meet your favorite Oracle authors, speakers, and thought-leaders? Don’t be shy, walk right up to them and introduce yourself. Normal social rules still apply, but at the conference everyone is open and up for meeting and talking with attendees. Just understand if there’s a line that you might only get a minute or two. It’s a LONG conference though, so you’ll have plenty of time to catch up with everyone. If you’re going to be around on Tuesday evening, head on over to the OTN Lounge from 4:30 to 6:30 and hang out for our Tweet Meet. That’s right, all the Oracle nerds on Twitter will be there in one place. Be sure to put your Twitter handle on your name tag so we know who you are!

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  • SQLAuthority News – Don’t Be Afraid To Fool The World – Video by John Sonmez

    - by Pinal Dave
    Sometime some words and statements grabs your attention and it is hard to stop thinking about that after a while. Something similar happened a few days ago when I read the twitter statement of my friend and Pluralsight author John Sonmez. He twitted few days ago very interesting statement. “I don’t know a single successful person, who doesn’t deep down think that have the world fooled. #fooltheworld” by John Sonmez. When I read it, I was extremely intrigued by this statement. I read it many times, I shared with my family and I just could not stop interpreting this statement. It was indeed fun to read it again and again and there are so many different meanings one can take away from the statement. I know John very well, he is a  wonderful person and have very positive energy for the life. I just had to request him to build a video around it. Right after 5 days of my request, John created a wonderful video around this subject. I watched it multiple times as it was a wonderful video. I am not going to write about what was in the video much as I suggest you to watch the video itself. Here is one of the personal stories I want to share which is absolutely relevant to this video. I think my story 100% resonant the story of John. A Real Story from My Past Three years ago, I submitted a session in one of the SharePoint conference as a SQL Server session. My session was accepted and I prepared it very well. I put more than 2 month’s time to prepare for the session and I was very excited to present the session. I reached to the event place traveling thousands of the miles and I was very much excited to present the session. However, there was a little mixed up in the session. There were multiple session which were similar to my session title. One of the other speakers also had proposed a database related session and was selected. When the material went to print the printing team got confused and by mistake swapped the sessions. The other speaker got Performance with SQL Server session and I had received Performance with SharePoint session. IT was indeed a big mixed up but now that is how it was in the event guide and it was marketed the same way everything in the event. A Big Mix Up I had to talk with the event organizer and we come to the conclusion that we all had good intention but things just got mixed up and now was the time when “The show must go on“. I had a great amount of hesitation to go and present the session as I had personally never worked with Sharepoint so close in my life and my session abstracted talked about SharePoint tricks in depth. Two hours before the session I took the help of one of my friend and installed the SharePoint on my box. He showed me a few things here and there but it was never a good enough time to learn everything which I wanted to learn. The Moments of Confidence I was very scared and nervous to go on the stage as a SharePoint was not something I felt comfortable. However, I decided to go on stage with confidence as a SharePoint expert. Though I did not know SharePoint at the best, I had confidence that whatever I know is correct and I will not misguide people. I had no intention to fool people but I had no intention to accept that I am a fool and you all wasted your time and money to dedicate your time to attend my session. I decided to be honest but at the same time decided to take the session beyond my expertise. The sixty minutes of the session went very fine and I was able to manage all the difficult question at a satisfactory level. When the session was over my feeling was that I would have not presented or talked any different if I had more knowledge of the SharePoint at that time. I think it was one of my best sessions and it was reflected in the session feedback as well. I was the best speaker across all the track and my session had highest ranking. I was delighted and I learned a very valuable lesson. I must go beyond my limits and knowledge. I must aim higher and work harder. I should not lie but I should have confidence that I have a good heart and I put 100% in my efforts.  Lessions Learned Since this incident I have learned a lot about SharePoint and I am now a regular speaker at various SharePoint conferences along with SQL Server sessions. I am motivated and I am not afraid. I know people have lots of expectation from me but I have learned not to judge myself before I do my best. I leave the judgement of my efforts to my audience. I do not take the burden of the feedback on me, even though I know my audience have expected from me. I know what I know and I put my best. I must go out, if I fail, I learn from my mistake but I must keep my progress trajectory very high. As John said in the video, sometime success is not something we can achieve 100% but we can keep on going near to it. As long as we do not lose our focus from our goal and do not deviate from our progress path, we are doing things right. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com)  Filed under: About Me, PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL, Technology

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  • Tykie

    - by Brian
    Here’s the obituary my mother wrote for Tykie, I still miss the little guy quite a bit. Anyone who’s interested in further information on hearing dogs should check out the IHDI website. I cannot begin to express how helpful a hearing dog can be for the hearing impaired. If you feel so inclined, please make a donation. In Memoriam, Tykie 1993-2010 The American Legion Post 401, South Wichita, KS, supported one of its members and commander by sponsoring a service dog for him. Unlike most service dogs this one was for the hearing impaired. Both Ocie and Betty Sims had hearing loss – Ocie more than Betty. The Post and Auxilliary had garage sales, auctions and other fund-raising endeavors to get donations for the dog. Betty made Teddy bears with growlers that were auctioned for donations to bring a hearing dog from International Hearing Dog, Henderson, Colorado. Tykie, a small wiry, salt and pepper terrier, arrived September 1, 1994 to begin his work that included attending Post 401 meetings and celebrations as well as raising more money to be donated to IHD to help others have hearing dogs. Tykie was a young dog less than a year old when he came to Wichita. He was always anxious to please and seldom barked, though he did put out a kind of cry when he was giving his urgent announcement that someone was at the door or the telephone was ringing. He also enjoyed chasing squirrels in the backyard garden that Ocie prized. In 1995, Betty almost died of a lung infection. Tykie was at the hospital with Ocie when he could visit. Several weeks after she was able to come home after a miraculous recovery, Tykie and Ocie went to a car show in downtown Wichita. Ocie’s retina tore loose in the only eye he could see out of and he almost blind was in great pain. How Ocie and Tykie got home is still a mystery, but the family legend goes that Tykie added seeing eye dog to his repertoire and helped drive him home. Health problems continued for Ocie and when he was placed in a nursing home, Tykie was moved to be Betty’s hearing dog. No problem for Tykie, he still saw his friends at the post and continued to help with visitors at the door. The night of May 3, 1999, Betty and Tykie were in the bedroom watching TV when Tykie began hitting her with both front paws as he would if something were urgent. She said later she thought he wanted to go out. As she and the dog walked down the hall towards the back of the house, Tykie hit her again with his front paws with such urgency that she fell into a small coat closet. That small 2-by-2 closet became their refuge as that very second the roof of her house went off as the f4 tornado raced through the city. Betty acquired one small wound on her hand from a piece of flying glass as she pulled Tykie into the closet with her. Tykie was a hero that day and a lot of days after. He kept Betty going as she rebuilt her home and after her husband died April 15, 2000. Tykie had to be cared for so she had to take him outside and bring him inside. He attended weddings of grandchildren and funerals of Post friends. When Betty died February 17, 2002 Tykie’s life changed again. IHD gave approval for his transfer and retirement to Betty and Ocie’s grandson, Brian Laird, who has a similar hearing loss to his grandfather. A few days after the funeral Tykie flew to his new home in Rutherford, NJ where he was able to take long walks for a couple of years before moving back to the Kansas City area. He was still full of adventure. He was written up in a book about service dogs and his story of the tornado and his picture appeared. He spent weekends at Brian’s mother’s farm to get muddy and be afraid of cats and chickens. He also took on an odyssey as he slipped from his fenced yard in Lenexa one day and walked more than seven miles in Overland Park traffic before being found by a good Samaritan who called IHD to find out where he belonged. Tykie was deaf for about the last two years of his long life and became blind as well, but he continued to strive to please. Tykie was 16 years and 4 months when he was cremated. His ashes were scattered on the graves of Betty and Ocie Sims at Greenwood Cemetery west of Wichita on the afternoon of March 21, 2010, with about a dozen family and Post 401 members. It is still the rule. Service dogs are the only dogs allowed inside the Post home. Submitted by Linda Laird, daughter of Betty and Ocie and mother of Brian Laird.

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  • Off The Beaten Path—Three Things Growing Midsize Companies are Thankful For

    - by Christine Randle
    By: Jim Lein, Senior Director, Oracle Accelerate Last Sunday I went on a walkabout.  That’s when I just step out the door of my Colorado home and hike through the mountains for hours with no predetermined destination. I favor “social trails”, the unmapped routes pioneered by both animal and human explorers.  These tracks  are usually more challenging than established, marked routes and you can’t be 100% sure of where you’re going to end up. But I’ve found the rewards to be much greater. For awhile, I pondered on how—depending upon your perspective—the current economic situation worldwide could be viewed as either a classic “the glass is half empty” or a “the glass is half full” scenario. Midsize companies buy Oracle to grow and so I’m continually amazed and fascinated by the success stories our customers relate to me.  Oracle’s successful midsize companies are growing via innovation, agility, and opportunity. For them, the glass isn’t half full—it’s overflowing. Growing Midsize Companies are Thankful for: Innovation The sun angling through the pine trees reminded me of a conversation with a European customer a year ago May.  You might not recognize the name but, chances are, your local evening weather report relies on this company’s weather observation, monitoring and measurement products.  For decades, the company was recognized in its industry for product innovation, but its recent rapid growth comes from tailoring end to end product and service solutions based on the needs of distinctly different customer groups across industrial, public sector, and defense sectors.  Hours after that phone call I was walking my dog in a local park and came upon a small white plastic box sprouting short antennas and dangling by a nylon cord from a tree branch.  I cut it down. The name of that customer’s company was stamped on the housing. “It’s a radiosonde from a high altitude weather balloon,” he told me the next day. “Keep it as a souvenir.”  It sits on my fireplace mantle and elicits many questions from guests. Growing Midsize Companies are Thankful for: Agility In July, I had another interesting discussion with the CFO of an Asia-Pacific company which owns and operates a large portfolio of leisure assets. They are best known for their epic outdoor theme parks. However, their primary growth today is coming from a chain of indoor amusement centers in the USA where billiards, bowling, and laser tag take the place of roller coasters, kiddy rides, and wave pools. With mountains and rivers right out my front door, I’m not much for theme parks, but I’ll take a spirited game of laser tag any day.  This company has grown dramatically since first implementing Oracle ERP more than a decade ago. Their profitable expansion into a completely foreign market is derived from the ability to replicate proven and efficient best business practices across diverse operating environments.  They recently went live on Oracle’s Fusion HCM and Taleo. Their CFO explained to me how, with thousands of employees in three countries, Fusion HCM and Taleo would enable them to remain incredibly agile by acting on trends linking individual employee performance to their management, establishing and maintaining those best practices. Growing Midsize Companies are Thankful for: Opportunity I have three GPS apps on my iPhone. I use them mainly to keep track of my stats—distance, time, and vertical gain. However, every once in awhile I need to find the most efficient route back home before dark from my current location (notice I didn’t use the word “lost”). In August I listened in on an interview with the CFO of another European company that designs and delivers telematics solutions—the integrated use of telecommunications and informatics—for managing the mobile workforce. These solutions enable customers to achieve evolutionary step-changes in their performance and service delivery. Forgive the overused metaphor, but this is route optimization on steroids.  The company’s executive team saw an opportunity in this emerging market and went “all in”. Consequently, they are being rewarded with tremendous growth results and market domination by providing the ability for their clients to collect and analyze performance information related to fuel consumption, service workforce safety, and asset productivity. This Thanksgiving, I’m thankful for health, family, friends, and a career with an innovative company that helps companies leverage top tier software to drive and manage growth. And I’m thankful to have learned the lesson that good things happen when you get off the beaten path—both when hiking and when forging new routes through a complex world economy. Halfway through my walkabout on Sunday, after scrambling up a long stretch of scree-covered hill, I crested a ridge with an obstructed view of 14,265 ft Mt Evans just a few miles to the west.  There, nowhere near a house or a trail, someone had placed a wooden lounge chair. Its wood was worn and faded but it was sturdy. I had lunch and a cold drink in my pack. Opportunity knocked and I seized it. Happy Thanksgiving.  

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  • HTG Explains: Why is Printer Ink So Expensive?

    - by Chris Hoffman
    Printer ink is expensive, more expensive per drop than fine champagne or even human blood. If you haven’t gone paperless, you’ll notice that you’re paying a lot for new ink cartridges — more than seems reasonable. Purchasing the cheapest inkjet printer and buying official ink cartridge replacements is the most expensive thing you can do. There are ways to save money on ink if you must continue to print documents. Cheap Printers, Expensive Ink Ink jet printers are often very cheap. That’s because they’re sold at cost, or even at a loss — the manufacturer either makes no profit from the printer itself or loses money. The manufacturer will make most of its money from the printer cartridges you buy later. Even if the company does make a bit of money from each printer sold, it makes a much larger profit margin on ink. Rather than selling you a printer that may be rather expensive, they want to sell you a cheap printer and make money on an ongoing basis by providing expensive printer ink. It’s been compared to the razor model — sell a razor cheaply and mark up the razor blades. Rather than making a one-time profit on the razor, you’ll make continuing profit as the customer keeps buying razor blade replacements — or ink, in this case. Many printer manufacturers go out of their way to make it difficult for you to use unofficial ink cartridges, building microchips into their official ink cartridges. If you use an unofficial cartridge or refill an official cartridge, the printer may refuse to use it. Lexmark once argued in court that unofficial microchips that enable third-party ink cartridges would violate their copyright and Lexmark has argued that creating an unofficial microchip to bypass this restriction on third-party ink would violate Lexmark’s copyright and be illegal under the US DMCA. Luckily, they lost this argument. What Printer Companies Say Printer companies have put forth their own arguments in the past, attempting to justify the high cost of official ink cartridges and microchips that block any competition. In a Computer World story from 2010, HP argued that they spend a billion dollars each year on “ink research and development.” They point out that printer ink “must be formulated to withstand heating to 300 degrees, vaporization, and being squirted at 30 miles per hour, at a rate of 36,000 drops per second, through a nozzle one third the size of a human hair. After all that it must dry almost instantly on the paper.” They also argue that printers have become more efficient and use less ink to print, while third-party cartridges are less reliable. Companies that use microchips in their ink cartridges argue that only the microchip has the ability to enforce an expiration date, preventing consumers from using old ink cartridges. There’s something to all these arguments, sure — but they don’t seem to justify the sky-high cost of printer ink or the restriction on using third-party or refilled cartridges. Saving Money on Printing Ultimately, the price of something is what people are willing to pay and printer companies have found that most consumers are willing to pay this much for ink cartridge replacements. Try not to fall for it: Don’t buy the cheapest inkjet printer. Consider your needs when buying a printer and do some research. You’ll save more money in the long run. Consider these basic tips to save money on printing: Buy Refilled Cartridges: Refilled cartridges from third parties are generally much cheaper. Printer companies warn us away from these, but they often work very well. Refill Your Own Cartridges: You can get do-it-yourself kits for refilling your own printer ink cartridges, but this can be messy. Your printer may refuse to accept a refilled cartridge if the cartridge contains a microchip. Switch to a Laser Printer: Laser printers use toner, not ink cartridges. If you print a lot of black and white documents, a laser printer can be cheaper. Buy XL Cartridges: If you are buying official printer ink cartridges, spend more money each time. The cheapest ink cartridges won’t contain much ink at all, while larger “XL” ink cartridges will contain much more ink for only a bit more money. It’s often cheaper to buy in bulk. Avoid Printers With Tri-Color Ink Cartridges: If you’re printing color documents, you’ll want to get a printer that uses separate ink cartridges for all its colors. For example, let’s say your printer has a “Color” cartridge that contains blue, green, and red ink. If you print a lot of blue documents and use up all your blue ink, the Color cartridge will refuse to function — now all you can do is throw away your cartridge and buy a new one, even if the green and red ink chambers are full. If you had a printer with separate color cartridges, you’d just have to replace the blue cartridge. If you’ll be buying official ink cartridges, be sure to compare the cost of cartridges when buying a printer. The cheapest printer may be more expensive in the long run. Of course, you’ll save the most money if you stop printing entirely and go paperless, keeping digital copies of your documents instead of paper ones. Image Credit: Cliva Darra on Flickr     

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  • El éxito del Customer Experience

    - by Noelia Gomez
    Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 Desde hace más de un año Oracle está apostando por soluciones que supongan un cambio en la gestión de la relación con el cliente, mejorando su experiencia para fidelizarle mientras las empresas ahorran en costes. Por otro lado, son muchas las empresas las que se han dado cuenta de esta necesidad y de que las redes sociales permiten una conexión con el cliente que antes no se había logrado, pudiendo detectar necesidades antes desconocidas. Por todo ello, el pasado 29 de Octubre Contact Center, en colaboración con Oracle, quiso invitar la los especialistas de Customer Experience de las mayores empresas de España en una jornada ejecutiva para descubrir las novedades en este área e intercambiar opiniones con otros expertos. Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0cm; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";} Fernando Rumbero, Iberia Applications Cluster Leader de Oracle, abrió las ponencias hablando de la “Tercera Revolución”, una presentación que nos abrió la perspectiva de la realidad en la que vivimos, clientes, usuarios y empresas. Por su parte, Victor Lopez, Sales Consulting Director de Oracle, nos condujo en Un recorrido por el mundo del cliente para lograr ofrecer una experiencia que este espera. Después, conocimos casos prácticos de la mano de Albert Valls, especialista en CX, que nos mostró los resultados de algunos de nuestros clientes y como han logrado alcanzar sus objetivos. Tras un breve descanso que dio lugar al networking, escuchamos a la ponencia más esperada de la jornada: ¿Por qué Linkedin tienen 249 millones de usuarios? Francesc Arbiol, Head of Iberia, Linkedin, fue el responsable de responder a esta pregunta, dándonos las claves para ofrecer un servicio de alta calidad y rentable con Oracle RightNow. En el momento para preguntas y respuestas, moderado por Guillermo San Roman, Applications Sales Director de Oracle, los asistentes estuvieron muy activos y fueron muchas las interacciones con los ponentes y entre los propios asistentes. En este espacio se pusieron de manifiesto las preguntas más latentes de este escenario: ¿Estamos preparados para dar respuesta y comprender al cliente de hoy? ¿Cómo dirigir y priorizar las actividades para alcanzar el mejor resultado?Infraestructuras y claves para aprender a liderar la experiencia de cliente. ¿Cómo integrar a todas las áreas de la empresa en el proceso de Customer Experience? Proactividad y multicanalidad: dos principios básicos en el Customer Experience La jornada se cerró con un coctel en el que el prevaleció el intercambio de opiniones y encuentros entre profesionales. Sin duda un evento de los que te hacen irte a casa con miles de ideas en la cabeza. ¿Estuviste en el encuentro? Cuéntanos, ¿qué te pareció? ¿No pudiste asistir? Ponte en contacto con nosotros y nos acercaremos a tu oficina.   /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0cm; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;}

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  • Top ten things that don't make sense in The Walking Dead

    - by iamjames
    For those of you that don't know, The Walking Dead is a popular American TV show on AMC about a group of people trying to survive in a zombie-filled world.Here's the top ten eleven things that don't make sense on the show (and have never been explained) 1)  They never visit stores.  No Walmarts, Kmarts, Targets, shopping malls, pawn shops, gas stations, etc.  You'd think that would be the first place you'd visit for supplies, but they never have.  Not once.  There was a tiny corner store they visited in a small town, and while many products were already gone they did find several useful items.  2)  They never raid houses.  Why not?  One would imagine that they would want to search houses for useful items, but they don't.3)  They don't use 2 way radios.  Modern 2-way radios have a 36-mile range.  That's probably best possible range, but even if the range is only 10% of that, 3.6 miles, that's still more than enough for most situations, for the occasional "hey zombies attacking can you give me a hand?" or "there's zombies walking by stay inside until they leave" or "remember to pick up milk at the store love mom".  And yes they would need batteries or recharging, but they have been using gas-powered generators on the show and I'm sure a car charger would work.4)  They use gas-guzzling vehicles.  Every vehicle they have is from the 80s or 90s except for the new Kia SUV there for product placement.  Why?  They should all be driving new small SUVs or hybrids.  Visit a dealership and steal more fuel-efficient vehicles, because while the Walmart's might be empty from people raiding them for supplies, I'm sure most people weren't thinking "Gee, I should go car shopping" when the infection hit5)  They drive a motorcycle.  Seriously?  Let's find the least protective vehicle and drive that.  And while motorcycles get reasonable gas mileage, 5 people in a SUV gets better gas mileage per person than 5 people all driving motorcycles so it doesn't make economical sense either.6)  They drive loud vehicles.  The motorcycle used is commonly referred to as a chopper and is about as loud as a motorcycle can get.  The zombies are attracted to loud noise, so wouldn't it make more sense to drive vehicles that makes less sound?  Because as soon as you stop the bike and get off you're surrounded by zombies that heard you coming.  And it's not just the bike, the ~1980s Chevy SUV in the show is also very loud.7)  They never run out of food.  Seems like that would be a almost daily struggle, keeping enough food available for about a dozen people, yet I've never seen them visit a grocery store or local convenience store to stock up.8)  They don't carry swords, machetes, clubs, etc.  Let's face it, biting is not a very effective means of attack.  It's good for animals because they have fangs and little else, but humans have been finding better ways of killing each other since forever.  So why doesn't everyone on the show carry a sword or machete or at least a baseball bat?  Anything is better than wasting valuable bullets all the time.  Sure, dozen zombies approaching?  Shoot them.  One zombie approaching?  Save the bullet, cut off it's head.  9)  They do not wear protective clothing.  Human teeth are not exactly the sharpest teeth in the animal kingdom.  The leather shoes your dog ripped to shreds within minutes would probably take you days to bite through.  So why do they walk around half-naked?  Yes I know it's hot in Atlanta, but you'd think they'd at least have some tough leather coats or something for protection.  Maybe put a few small vent holes in the fabric if it's really hot.  Or better:  make your own chainmail.  Chainmail was used for thousands of years for protection from swords and is still used by scuba divers for protection from sharks.  If swords and sharks can't puncture it, human teeth don't stand a chance.  10)  They don't build barricades or dig trenches around properties.  In Season 2 they stayed at a farm in the middle of no where.  While being far away from people is a great way to stay far away from zombies, it would still make sense to build some sort of defenses.  Hordes of zombies would knock down almost any fence, but what about a trench or moat?  Maybe something not too wide so it can be jumped over easily but a zombie would fall into because I haven't seen too many jumping zombies on the show.  11)  They don't live in a mall or tall office building.  A mall would be perfect.  They have large security gates designed to keep even hundreds of people from breaking in and offer lots of supplies and food.  They're usually hundreds of thousands of square feet and fully enclosed, one could probably live their entire life happily in a mall.  Tall office building with on-site cafeteria would be another good choice.  They also usually offer good security and office furniture could be pushed out of the windows to crush approaching zombies, and the cafeteria is usually stocked to provide food for hundreds or thousands of office workers so food wouldn't be a problem for a long time. So there you have it, eleven things that don't make sense in The Walking Dead.  Have any of your own you'd like to add or were one of these things covered in the show?  Let me know in the comments.

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  • Gamification = -10#/3mo

    - by erikanollwebb
    One of the purposes of gamification of anything is to see if you can modify the behavior of the user. In the enterprise, that might mean getting sales people to enter more information into a CRM system, encouraging employees to update their HR records, motivating people to participate in forums and discussions, or process invoices more quickly.  Wikipedia defines behavior modification as "the traditional term for the use of empirically demonstrated behavior change techniques to increase or decrease the frequency of behaviors, such as altering an individual's behaviors and reactions to stimuli through positive and negative reinforcement of adaptive behavior and/or the reduction of behavior through its extinction, punishment and/or satiation."  Gamification is just a way to modify someone's behavior using game mechanics. And the magic question is always whether it works. So I thought I would present my own little experiment from the last few months.  This spring, I upgraded to a Samsung Galaxy 4.  It's a pretty sweet phone in many ways, but one of the little extras I discovered was a built in app called S Health. S Health is an app that you can use to track calories, weight, exercise and it has a built in pedometer. I looked at it when I got the phone, but assumed you had to turn it on to use it so I didn't look at it much.  But sometime in July, I realized that in fact, it just ran in the background and was quietly tracking my steps, with a goal of 10,000 per day.  10,000 steps per day is this magic number recommended by the Surgeon General and the American Heart Association.  Dr. Oz pushes it as the goal for daily exercise.  It's about 5 miles of walking. I'm generally not the kind of person who always has my phone with me.  I leave it in my purse and pull it out when I need it.  But then I realized that meant I wasn't getting a good measure of my steps.  I decided to do a little experiment, and carry it with me as much as possible for a week.  That's when I discovered the gamification that changed my life over the last 3 months.  When I hit 10,000 steps, the app jingled out a little "success!" tune and I got a badge.  I was hooked.  I started carrying my phone.  I started making sure I had shoes I could walk in with me.  I started walking at lunch time, because I realized how often I sat at my desk for 8-10 hours every day without moving.  I started pestering my husband to walk with me after work because I hadn't hit my 10,000 yet, leading him at one point to say "I'm not as much a slave to that badge as you are!"  I started looking at parking lots differently.  Can't get a space up close?  No worries, just that many steps toward my 10,000.  I even tried to see if there was a second power user level at 15,000 or 20,000 (*sadly, no).  If I was close at the end of the day, I have done laps around my house until I got my badge.  I have walked around the block one more time to get my badge.  I have mentally chastised myself when I forgot to put my phone in my pocket because I don't know how many steps I got.  The badge below I got when my boss and I were in New York City and we walked around the block of our hotel just to watch the badge pop up. There are a bunch of tools out on the market now that have similar ideas for helping you to track your exercise, make it social.  There are apps (my favorite is still Zombies, Run!).  You could buy a FitBit or UP by Jawbone.   Interactive fitness makes the Expresso stationary bike with built in video games.  All designed to help you be more aware of your activity and keep you engaged and motivated.  And the idea is to help you change your behavior. I know someone who would spend extra time and work hard on the Expresso because he had built up strategies for how to kill the most dragons while he was riding to get more points.  When the machine broke down, he didn't ride a different bike because it just wasn't that interesting. But for me, just the simple jingle and badge have been all I needed.  I admit, I still giggle gleefully when I hear the tune sing out from my pocket. After a few weeks, I noticed I had dropped a few pounds.  Not a lot, just 2-3.  But then I was really hooked.  I started making a point both to eat a little less and hit 10,000 steps as much as I could.  I bemoaned that during the floods in Boulder, I wasn't hitting my 10,000 steps.  And now, a few months later, I'm almost 10 lbs lighter. All for 1 badge a day. So yes, simple gamification can increase motivation and engagement.  And that can lead to changes in behavior.  Now the job is to apply that to the enterprise space in a meaningful and engaging way. 

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  • My Feelings About Microsoft Surface

    - by Valter Minute
    Advice: read the title carefully, I’m talking about “feelings” and not about advanced technical points proved in a scientific and objective way I still haven’t had a chance to play with a MS Surface tablet (I would love to, of course) and so my ideas just came from reading different articles on the net and MS official statements. Remember also that the MVP motto begins with “Independent” (“Independent Experts. Real World Answers.”) and this is just my humble opinion about a product and a technology. I know that, being an MS MVP you can be called an “MS-fanboy”, I don’t care, I hope that people can appreciate my opinion, even if it doesn’t match theirs. The “Surface” brand can be confusing for techies that knew the “original” surface concept but I think that will be a fresh new brand name for most of the people out there. But marketing department are here to confuse people… so I can understand this “recycle” of an existing name. So Microsoft is entering the hardware arena… for me this is good news. Microsoft developed some nice hardware in the past: the xbox, zune (even if the commercial success was quite limited) and, last but not least, the two arc mices (old and new model) that I use and appreciate. In the past Microsoft worked with OEMs and that model lead to good and bad things. Good thing (for microsoft, at least) is market domination by windows-based PCs that only in the last years has been reduced by the return of the Mac and tablets. Google is also moving in the hardware business with its acquisition of Motorola, and Apple leveraged his control of both the hardware and software sides to develop innovative products. Microsoft can scare OEMs and make them fly away from windows (but where?) or just lead the pack, showing how devices should be designed to compete in the market and bring back some of the innovation that disappeared from recent PC products (look at the shelves of your favorite electronics store and try to distinguish a laptop between the huge mass of anonymous PCs on displays… only Macs shine out there…). Having to compete with MS “official” hardware will force OEMs to develop better product and bring back some real competition in a market that was ruled only by prices (the lower the better even when that means low quality) and no innovative features at all (when it was the last time that a new PC surprised you?). Moving into a new market is a big and risky move, but with Windows 8 Microsoft is playing a crucial move for its future, trying to be back in the innovation run against apple and google. MS can’t afford to fail this time. I saw the new devices (the WinRT and Pro) and the specifications are scarce, misleading and confusing. The first impression is that the device looks like an iPad with a nice keyboard cover… Using “HD” and “full HD” to define display resolution instead of using the real figures and reviving the “ClearType” brand (now dead on Win8 as reported here and missed by people who hate to read text on displays, like myself) without providing clear figures (couldn’t you count those damned pixels?) seems to imply that MS was caught by surprise by apple recent “retina” displays that brought very high definition screens on tablets.Also there are no specifications about the processors used (even if some sources report NVidia Tegra for the ARM tablet and i5 for the x86 one) and expected battery life (a critical point for tablets and the point that killed Windows7 x86 based tablets). Also nothing about the price, and this will be another critical point because other platform out there already provide lots of applications and have a good user base, if MS want to enter this market tablets pricing must be competitive. There are some expansion ports (SD and USB), so no fixed storage model (even if the specs talks about 32-64GB for RT and 128-256GB for pro). I like this and don’t like the apple model where flash memory (that it’s dirt cheap used in thumdrives or SD cards) is as expensive as gold (or cocaine to have a more accurate per gram measurement) when mounted inside a tablet/phone. For big files you’ll be able to use external media and an SD card could be used to store files that don’t require super-fast SSD-like access times, I hope. To be honest I really don’t like the marketplace model and the limitation of Windows RT APIs (no local database? from a company that based a good share of its success on VB6+Access!) and lack of desktop support on the ARM (even if the support is here and has been used to port office). It’s a step toward the consumer market (where competitors are making big money), but may impact enterprise (and embedded) users that may not appreciate Windows 8 new UI or the limitations of the new app model (if you aren’t connected you are dead ). Not having compatibility with the desktop will require brand new applications and honestly made all the CPU cycles spent to convert .NET IL into real machine code in the past like a huge waste of time… as soon as a new processor architecture is supported by Windows you still have to rewrite part of your application (and MS is pushing HTML5+JS and native code more than .NET in my perception). On the other side I believe that the development experience provided by Visual Studio is still miles (or kilometres) ahead of the competition and even the all-uppercase menu of VS2012 hasn’t changed this situation. The new metro UI got mixed reviews. On my side I should say that is very pleasant to use on a touch screen, I like the minimalist design (even if sometimes is too minimal and hides stuff that, in my opinion, should be visible) but I should also say that using it with mouse and keyboard is like trying to pick your nose with boxing gloves… Metro is also very interesting for embedded devices where touch screen usage is quite common and where having an application taking all the screen is the norm. For devices like kiosks, vending machines etc. this kind of UI can be a great selling point. I don’t need a new tablet (to be honest I’m pretty happy with my wife’s iPad and with my PC), but I may change my opinion after having a chance to play a little bit with those new devices and understand what’s hidden under all this mysterious and generic announcements and specifications!

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  • Clone a VirtualBox Machine

    I just installed VirtualBox, which I want to try out based on recommendations from peers for running a server from within my Windows 7 x64 OS.  Ive never used VirtualBox, so Im certainly no expert at it, but I did want to share my experience with it thus far.  Specifically, my intention is to create a couple of virtual machines.  One I intend to use as a build server, for which a virtual machine makes sense because I can easily move it around as needed if there are hardware issues (its worth noting my need for setting up a build server at the moment is a result of a disk failure on the old build server).  The other VM I want to set up will act as a proxy server for the issue tracking system were using at Code Project, Axosoft OnTime.  They have a Remote Server application for this purpose, and since the OnTime install is 300 miles away from my location, the Remote Server should speed up my use of the OnTime client by limiting the chattiness with the database (at least, thats the hope). So, I need two VMs, and Im lazy.  I dont want to have to install the OS and such twice.  No problem, it should be simple to clone a virtualbox machine, or clone a virtualbox hard drive, right?  Well unfortunately, if you look at the UI for VirtualBox, theres no such command.  Youre left wondering How do I clone a VirtualBox machine? or the slightly related How do I clone a VirtualBox hard drive? If youve used VirtualPC, then you know that its actually pretty easy to copy and move around those VMs.  Not quite so easy with VirtualBox.  Finding the files is easy, theyre located in your user folder within the .VirtualBox folder (possibly within a HardDisks folder).  The disks have a .vdi extension and will be pretty large if youve installed anything.  The one shown here has just Windows Server 2008 R2 installed on it nothing else. If you copy the .vdi file and rename it, you can use the Virtual Media Manager to view it and you can create a new machine and choose the new drive to attach to.  Unfortunately, if you simply make a copy of the drive, this wont work and youll get an error that says something to the effect of: Cannot register the hard disk PATH with UUID {id goes here} because a hard disk PATH2 with UUID {same id goes here} already exists in the media registry (PATH to XML file). There are command line tools you can use to do this in a way that avoids this error.  Specifically, the c:\Program File\Sun\VirtualBox\VBoxManage.exe program is used for all command line access to VirtualBox, and to copy a virtual disk (.vdi file) you would call something like this: VBoxManage clonehd Disk1.vdi Disk1_Copy.vdi However, in my case this didnt work.  I got basically the same error I showed above, along with some debug information for line 628 of VBoxManageDisk.cpp.  As my main task was not to debug the C++ code used to write VirtualBox, I continued looking for a simple way to clone a virtual drive.  I found it in this blog post. The Secret setvdiuuid Command VBoxManage has a whole bunch of commands you can use with it just pass it /? to see the list.  However, it also has a special command called internalcommands that opens up access to even more commands.  The one thats interesting for us here is the setvdiuuid command.  By calling this command and passing in the file path to your vdi file, it will reset the UUID to a new (random, apparently) UUID.  This then allows the virtual media manager to cope with the file, and lets you set up new machines that reference the newly UUIDd virtual drive.  The full command line would be: VBoxManage internalcommands setvdiuuid MyCopy.vdi The following screenshot shows the error when trying clonehd as well as the successful use of setvdiuuid. Summary Now that I can clone machines easily, its a simple matter to set up base builds of any OS I might need, and then fork from there as needed.  Hopefully the GUI for VirtualBox will be improved to include better support for copying machines/disks, as this is Im sure a very common scenario. Did you know that DotNetSlackers also publishes .net articles written by top known .net Authors? We already have over 80 articles in several categories including Silverlight. Take a look: here.

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  • Windows Phone 8 Announcement

    - by Tim Murphy
    As if the Surface announcement on Monday wasn’t exciting enough, today Microsoft announce that Windows Phone 8 will be coming this fall.  That itself is great news, but the features coming were like confetti flying in all different directions.  Given this speed I couldn’t capture every feature they covered.  A summary of what I did capture is listed below starting with their eight main features. Common Core The first thing that they covered is that Windows Phone 8 will share a core OS with Windows 8.  It will also run natively on multiple cores.  They mentioned that they have run it on up to 64 cores to this point.  The phones as you might expect will at least start as dual core.  If you remember there were metrics saying that Windows Phone 7 performed operations faster on a single core than other platforms did with dual cores.  The metrics they showed here indicate that Windows Phone 8 runs faster on comparable dual core hardware than other platforms. New Screen Resolutions Screen resolution has never been an issue for me, but it has been a criticism of Windows Phone 7 in the media.  Windows Phone 8 will supports three screen resolutions: WVGA 800 x 480, WXGA 1280 x 768, and 720 1280x720.  Hopefully this makes pixel counters a little happier. MicroSD Support This was one of my pet peeves when I got my Samsung Focus. With Windows Phone 8 the operating system will support adding MicroSD cards after initial setup.  Of course this is dependent on the hardware company on implementing it, but I think we have seen that even feature phone manufacturers have not had a problem supporting this in the past. NFC NFC has been an anticipated feature for some time.  What Microsoft showed today included the fact that they didn’t just want it to be for the phone.  There is cross platform NFC functionality between Windows Phone 8 and Windows 8.  The demos , while possibly a bit fanciful, showed would could be achieved even in a retail environment.  We are getting closer and closer to a Minority Report world with these technologies. Wallet Windows Phone 8 isn’t the first platform to have a wallet concept.  What they have done to differentiate themselves is to make it sot that it is not dependent on a SIM type chip like other platforms.  They have also expanded the concept beyond just banks to other types of credits such as airline miles. Nokia Mapping People have been envious of the Lumia phones having the Nokia mapping software.  Now all Windows Phone 8 devices will use NavTeq data and will have the capability to run in an offline fashion.  This is a major step forward from the Bing “touch for the next turn” maps. IT Administration The lack of features for enterprise administration and deployment was a complaint even before the Windows Phone 7 was released.  With the Windows Phone 8 release such features as Bitlocker and Secure boot will be baked into the OS. We will also have the ability to privately sign and distribute applications. Changing Start Screen Joe Belfiore made a big deal about this aspect of the new release.  Users will have more color themes available to them and the live tiles will be highly customizable. You will have the ability to resize and organize the tiles in a more dynamic way.  This allows for less important tiles or ones with less information to be made smaller.  And There Is More So what other tidbits came out of the presentation?  Later this summer the API for WP8 will be available.  There will be developer events coming to a city near you.  Another announcement of interest to developers is the ability to write applications at a native code level.  This is a boon for game developers and those who need highly efficient applications. As a topper on the cake there was mention of in app payment. On the consumer side we also found out that all updates will be available over the air.  Along with this came the fact that Microsoft will support all devices with updates for at least 18 month and you will be able to subscribe for early updates.  Update coming for Windows Phone 7.5 customers to WP7.8.  The main enhancement will be the new live tile features.  The big bonus is that the update will bypass the carriers.  I would assume though that you will be brought up to date with all previous patches that your carrier may not have released. There is so much more, but that is enough for one post.  Needless to say, EXCITING! del.icio.us Tags: Windows Phone 8,WP8,Windows Phone 7,WP7,Announcements,Microsoft

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  • How do I dig myself out of this DEEP hole? [closed]

    - by user74847
    I may be a bit bias in the way i word this but any opinions and suggestions are welcome. I should start by saying i have a MSc in CS and a degree in new media +6 years expereince and im probably around a middleweight developer. I started a web development company with my friend from uni a year ago, there was a 4 month gap in the middle where i went miles away work on a big project. Ive since returned and picked up where we left off. A year on though i find im still staying up til 5am and getting up at 9 sometimes 2-3 days without sleep. While i was away i was working 9-5 and struggling to keep up with doing stuff for my clients 8 hours ahead, after work, so things stagnated. We currently have about 12 active projects, with one other part time developer and a full time freelancer who is dealing with one of our major projects. I am solely responsible for concurrently developing 2 big sites similar to gumtree in functionality, at the same time as about 5-6+ small WordPress based 5-10page sites. a lot of the content isnt in yet or the client is delaying so i chop and change project every other day which does my head in. Is it reasonable to expect myself to remember the intricate details of each project when i come back to it a week later? and remember the details of a task which hasnt been written down? my business partner seems to think so. or am i just forgetful? Im particularly bad at estimating timescales which doesnt help, added to that a lot of the technologies im am using are new to me (a magento site took weeks to theme rather than days and was full of bugs, even after 1000's of google searches and hours reading forums) im still trying to learn and find the best CMS for us to use and getting my head around the likes of Bootstrap and jquery, Cpanel / Linux (we just got a blank vps for me to set up with no experience) even installing an SSL certificate caused everyone's mail clients to go down which was more stress for me to sort out. I find the pressure of the workload and timescales and trying to learn this stuff so fast is beginning to turn me against my career path. The fact that i never seem to get anything done really winds up my business partner and iv come to associate him with the stress and pain of the whole situation especially when I get berated or a look that says "oh you retard" when I forget something. Even today i spent hours learning how a particular themeforest theme worked with wordpress and how i could twist it to work for our partiuclar needs, on the surface had done no work, that triggered a 30 minute tirade of anger and stress and questioning what i had done from my business partner. had i taken too long to work on that? shoudl i have done it in 2 hours instead of 6? i told him i would take 2 hours. i was wrong. I feel like im running myself into the ground. My sleeping pattern has got so bad that when im working im half asleep and making mistakes, my eyes are constantly purple underneath, i literally fall asleep at my desk, its affecting my social life too, ive not slept more than lightly for the last year and grind through impossible code puzzles in my half sleep wich keeps me awake, when im already exhausted. plus the work is rushed and buggy when it does get done so drags on into the next project. I also procrastinate quite badly, pacing the livingroom, looking out the window when Im alone for three days straight in the flat and start to get cabin fever which means i do even less work and the negative feedback loop continues. I get told im the only one with the problem when i say that i cant work from home any more, and examples of other freelancers get brought up. an office wouldnt bring any extra cash in to the company but im convinced having that moving more than 2 meters away from my bed to go to "work" would get me working, at the moment i feel guilty like i should be working 24-7. It is important that we do all this work to raise enough cash to get our business to the next level but every month still feels like a struggle to pay the rent (there is about £20K coming in by Jan) and i have to borrow money from friends often to buy food or get a taxi to a meeting, so it is vital the money keeps coming in. (im also 20 mins late for nearly all meetings but thats a different issue) have you experienced anything similar? how can i deal with the issues ive raised? is it realistic to develop 10 sites at once? how can i improve my relationship with my business partner? do you struggle to work at home? how do you deal with that? i think if i dont get my life on track by feb i will seriously consider giving it all up, but that seems like such a waste. any ideas!!? i need help! Thanks.

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  • .NET Application broken on one PC, unhandleable exception

    - by Bobby
    Hello people. I have a .NET 2.0 application with nothing fancy in it. It worked until yesterday on every PC I installed or copied it to, no matter if 2.0, 3.0, 3.5 or 3.5 SP1 was installed, no matter if it was Win2000, XP or even Win7 (in total 100+ machines). Yesterday I did my normal installation procedure and wanted to start it one time to check if everything is working...and it wasn't. The program crashed hard leaving me with the uninformative "Do you wanna report this error?" dialog. The problem is an exception in the Main(String[] args) routine of my application. The event viewer is showing the following entry: Event Type: ErrorEvent Source: .NET Runtime 2.0 Error Reporting Event Category: None Event ID: 5000 Date: 05/05/2010 Time: 16:09:09 User: N/A Computer: myClientPC Description: EventType clr20r3, P1 apomenu.exe, P2 1.4.90.53, P3 4bdedea4, P4 system.configuration, P5 2.0.0.0, P6 4889de74, P7 1a6, P8 136, P9 ioibmurhynrxkw0zxkyrvfn0boyyufow, P10 NIL. Well...great information. After a lot of searching I finally was able to get further information about this exception (by adding a handler for UnhandledExceptions directly in My.MyApplication.New(), Application.Designer.vb): System.Configuration.ConfigurationErrorsException Configuration system failed to initialize at System.Configuration.ClientConfigurationSystem.EnsureInit(String configKey) at System.Configuration.ClientConfigurationSystem.PrepareClientConfigSystem(String sectionName) at System.Configuration.ClientConfigurationSystem.System.Configuration.Internal.IInternalConfigSystem.GetSection(String sectionName) at System.Configuration.ConfigurationManager.GetSection(String sectionName) at System.Configuration.PrivilegedConfigurationManager.GetSection(String sectionName) at System.Net.Configuration.SettingsSectionInternal.get_Section() at System.Net.Sockets.Socket.InitializeSockets() at System.Net.Sockets.Socket.get_SupportsIPv4() at Microsoft.VisualBasic.ApplicationServices.WindowsFormsApplicationBase.get_HostName() at Microsoft.VisualBasic.ApplicationServices.WindowsFormsApplicationBase.RegisterChannel(Boolean SecureChannel) at Microsoft.VisualBasic.ApplicationServices.WindowsFormsApplicationBase.Run(String[] commandLine) at MyAppNameHere.My.MyApplication.Main(String[] Args) in 17d14f5c-a337-4978-8281-53493378c1071.vb:Line 81. And at this point I'm stuck...I'm out of ideas. I'm not using any kind of configuration system from the framework (no reference to System.Configuration, and there never was a MyAppnameHere.exe.config generated or distributed, nor have I seen this error before). I also found a bug report at Microsoft (Google Cache) about this bug (in another context, though). But as it seems, they won't even look at it. Every help is greatly appreciated! Edit: I'm using Visual Studio 2008 Prof.. Crash happens in Release- and Debug-Build on the client machine. Debugging the application directly on this machine is out of question I fear, 300+ Miles and they only have two computers to work with.

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  • Mapscript queryByPoint return no results

    - by lucian.jp
    I have a dynamically generated mapfile made with c# mapscript that is defined like: MAP EXTENT 5.91828 45.63552 5.92346 45.65051 IMAGECOLOR 192 192 192 IMAGETYPE png SIZE 256 256 STATUS ON TRANSPARENT TRUE UNITS METERS NAME "GMAP_TILE" OUTPUTFORMAT NAME "png" MIMETYPE "image/png" DRIVER "GD/PNG" EXTENSION "png" IMAGEMODE "PC256" TRANSPARENT TRUE END SYMBOL NAME "circle" TYPE ELLIPSE FILLED TRUE POINTS 1 1 END END SYMBOL NAME ">" TYPE TRUETYPE ANTIALIAS TRUE CHARACTER ">" GAP -20 FONT "arial" POSITION CC END PROJECTION "proj=merc" "a=6378137" "b=6378137" "lat_ts=0.0" "lon_0=0.0" "x_0=0.0" "y_0=0" "units=m" "k=1.0" "nadgrids=@null" END LEGEND IMAGECOLOR 255 255 255 KEYSIZE 20 10 KEYSPACING 5 5 LABEL SIZE MEDIUM TYPE BITMAP BUFFER 0 COLOR 0 0 0 FORCE FALSE MINDISTANCE -1 MINFEATURESIZE -1 OFFSET 0 0 PARTIALS TRUE END POSITION LL STATUS OFF END QUERYMAP COLOR 255 255 0 SIZE -1 -1 STATUS ON STYLE HILITE END SCALEBAR ALIGN CENTER COLOR 0 0 0 IMAGECOLOR 255 255 255 INTERVALS 4 LABEL SIZE MEDIUM TYPE BITMAP BUFFER 0 COLOR 0 0 0 FORCE FALSE MINDISTANCE -1 MINFEATURESIZE -1 OFFSET 0 0 PARTIALS TRUE END POSITION LL SIZE 200 3 STATUS OFF STYLE 0 UNITS MILES END WEB IMAGEPATH "" IMAGEURL "" QUERYFORMAT text/html LEGENDFORMAT text/html BROWSEFORMAT text/html END LAYER NAME "Troncons" PROJECTION "proj=longlat" "ellps=WGS84" "datum=WGS84" END STATUS DEFAULT TEMPLATE "nofile.html" TOLERANCE 100 TOLERANCEUNITS METERS TYPE LINE UNITS METERS CLASS NAME "Troncons" STYLE ANGLE 360 COLOR 0 0 255 SIZE 5 SYMBOL "circle" WIDTH 5 END STYLE ANGLE 360 COLOR 0 0 0 SIZE 12 SYMBOL ">" WIDTH 1 END END FEATURE POINTS 5.91828 45.63552 5.91876 45.63611 5.91898 45.6364 5.91936 45.63701 5.91952 45.63731 5.91968 45.63762 5.91993 45.63825 5.92003 45.63856 5.92018 45.63919 5.92028 45.63983 5.92031 45.64014 5.92033 45.64046 5.92034 45.64077 5.92034 45.64108 5.92034 45.64171 5.92035 45.64234 5.92035 45.6428 5.92037 45.6433 5.9204 45.64394 5.92046 45.64458 5.92056 45.64522 5.92062 45.64554 5.92069 45.64586 5.92077 45.64617 5.92097 45.64679 5.92122 45.64739 5.92136 45.64769 5.92169 45.64828 5.92207 45.64886 5.92228 45.64914 5.92272 45.64969 5.92321 45.65023 5.92346 45.65051 END END END END I try to queryByPoint to retreive the index of the shape clciked near. In the code below I made a specific test function with fixed point instead of points passed by parameter so I am sure the point I use is actually part of a feature. In my case I use the first point of the only feature contained in mapfile. public string GetTronconId() { //_map is my dynamically created mapObj if (_map != null) for (int i = 0; i < _map.numlayers; i++) { layerObj layer = _map.getLayer(i); // Code never pass this point if (layer.queryByPoint(_map, new pointObj(5.91898, 45.6364, 0, 0), (int) MS_QUERY_MODE.MS_QUERY_MULTIPLE, 100) == (int) MS_RETURN_VALUE.MS_SUCCESS) { int numresults = layer.getNumResults(); if (numresults != 0) { layer.open(); for (int j = 0; j < numresults; j++) { resultCacheMemberObj resultat = layer.getResult(j); shapeObj shape = null; if (layer.getShape(shape, resultat.tileindex, resultat.shapeindex) == (int) MS_RETURN_VALUE.MS_SUCCESS) return shape.getValue(0); } } } } return null; } I have a dummy TEMPLATE set, I do not eveen have to use the tolerance since the point is derectly in a shape, but the queryByPoint keep returning me MS_FAILURE. From my searches on the web everything seem to be OK. Any idea?

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  • Need Help with Consolidating RoR Google Map Results

    - by Kevin
    I have a project that returns geocoded results within 20 miles of the user. I want these results grouped on the map by zip code, then within the info window show the individual results. The code posted below works, but for some reason it only displays the 1.png rather than looking at the results and using the correct .png icon associated with the number. When I look at the infowindows, it displays the correct png like "/images/2.png" or "/images/5.png" but the actual image is always 1. @ziptickets = Ticket.find(:all, :origin => coords, :select => 'DISTINCT zip, lat, lng', :within => @user.distance_to_travel, :conditions => "status_id = 1") for t in @ziptickets zips = Ticket.find(:all, :conditions => ["zip = ?", t.zip]) currentzip = t.zip.to_s tixinzip = zips.size.to_s imagelocation = "/images/" + tixinzip + ".png" shadowlocation = "/images/" + tixinzip + "s.png" @map.icon_global_init(GIcon.new(:image => imagelocation, :shadow => shadowlocation, :shadow_size => GSize.new(60,40), :icon_anchor => GPoint.new(20,20), :info_window_anchor => GPoint.new(9,2)), "test") newicon = Variable.new("test") new_marker = GMarker.new([t.lat, t.lng], :icon => newicon, :title => imagelocation, :info_window => currentzip) @map.overlay_init(new_marker) end I tried changing the last part of the mapicon from: :info_window_anchor => GPoint.new(9,2)), "test") newicon = Variable.new("test") to: :info_window_anchor => GPoint.new(9,2)), currentzip) newicon = Variable.new(currentzip) but the strangest thing is that any string that has numbers in it causes the map to fail to render in the view and just show a blank screen... same if I replace it with :info_window_anchor => GPoint.new(9,2)), "123") newicon = Variable.new("123") Any advice would be helpful... also it runs a bit slower than my previous code which just set up 4 standard icons and used them outside of the loop so any hints as to speed up execution would be appreciated greatly. Thanks!

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  • How do I do high quality scaling of a image?

    - by pbhogan
    I'm writing some code to scale a 32 bit RGBA image in C/C++. I have written a few attempts that have been somewhat successful, but they're slow and most importantly the quality of the sized image is not acceptable. I compared the same image scaled by OpenGL (i.e. my video card) and my routine and it's miles apart in quality. I've Google Code Searched, scoured source trees of anything I thought would shed some light (SDL, Allegro, wxWidgets, CxImage, GD, ImageMagick, etc.) but usually their code is either convoluted and scattered all over the place or riddled with assembler and little or no comments. I've also read multiple articles on Wikipedia and elsewhere, and I'm just not finding a clear explanation of what I need. I understand the basic concepts of interpolation and sampling, but I'm struggling to get the algorithm right. I do NOT want to rely on an external library for one routine and have to convert to their image format and back. Besides, I'd like to know how to do it myself anyway. :) I have seen a similar question asked on stack overflow before, but it wasn't really answered in this way, but I'm hoping there's someone out there who can help nudge me in the right direction. Maybe point me to some articles or pseudo code... anything to help me learn and do. Here's what I'm looking for: 1. No assembler (I'm writing very portable code for multiple processor types). 2. No dependencies on external libraries. 3. I am primarily concerned with scaling DOWN, but will also need to write a scale up routine later. 4. Quality of the result and clarity of the algorithm is most important (I can optimize it later). My routine essentially takes the following form: DrawScaled( uint32 *src, uint32 *dst, src_x, src_y, src_w, src_h, dst_x, dst_y, dst_w, dst_h ); Thanks! UPDATE: To clarify, I need something more advanced than a box resample for downscaling which blurs the image too much. I suspect what I want is some kind of bicubic (or other) filter that is somewhat the reverse to a bicubic upscaling algorithm (i.e. each destination pixel is computed from all contributing source pixels combined with a weighting algorithm that keeps things sharp. EXAMPLE: Here's an example of what I'm getting from the wxWidgets BoxResample algorithm vs. what I want on a 256x256 bitmap scaled to 55x55. And finally: the original 256x256 image

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  • Jquery question : maintain focus upon appending a row?

    - by PoppySeedsAndAppleJuice
    The function below checks whether the id entered is already in the database, and if it is, then it adds some html to the table. I'm not sure if it's directly related to my issue or not, but, essentially, a user will place the focus on the id input field and enters an id. Using ajax, it posts to a php script and returns data if rows are found and nothing if it doesn't. If the user then tabs over to the next input field (zipcode), or clicks in another input field, they essentially have to do so twice. The cursor "flashes" in the field briefly and then focuses out. I tried adding in a focus(), but the behavior didn't change. So, the html looks like this: <table id="tableSearchData" class="searchlist" style="width: 789px;"> <thead> <tr> <th>ID</th> <th>Zip Code</th> <th>Radius (in miles)</th> </tr> </thead> <tbody> <tr class="odd"> <!-- PROBLEM is described below --> <!-- User clicks in <input name="id[]"> and ID is checked --> <!-- User presses "tab" or clicks in <input name="zipcode[] (in the *same* row) and cursor flashes, then goes out of focus so that the user has to click in the field again --> <td class="center sorting_1"><input type="text" value="" name="id[]"></td> <td class="center"><input type="text" value="" name="zipcode[]"></td> <td class="center"><input type="text" value="" name="radius[]"></td> </tr> </tbody> </table> Here's the jquery function... Like I said, I'm not sure if it's directly related to the problem I'm having, but, thought I should include it because I suppose it's likely there is something happening there... $("#tableSearchData > tbody > tr > td > input[name=id[]]").focusout(function() { var row = $(this).closest("tr").get(0); var sData = $(this).serialize(); $.ajax({ type: "POST", url: "checkid.php", data: sData, success: function(html) { $(row).replaceWith(html); $(".preset").each(function() { $(this).attr("disabled", true); }); $(row).closest("input[name=zipcode[]]").focus(); } }); });

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  • Windows 7 inbuilt and 3rd party (de)fragmentation related queries

    - by Karan
    I have a pretty good idea of how files end up getting fragmented. That said, I just copied ~3,200 files of varying sizes (from a few KB to ~20GB) from an external USB HDD to an internal, freshly formatted (under Windows 7 x64), NTFS, 2TB, 5400RPM, WD, SATA, non-system (i.e. secondary) drive, filling it up 57%. Since it should have been very much possible for each file to have been stored in one contiguous block, I expected the drive to be fragmented not more than 1-2% at most after this rather lengthy exercise (unfortunately this older machine doesn't support USB 3.0). Windows 7's inbuilt defrag utility told me after a quick analysis that the drive was fragmented only 1% or so, which dovetailed neatly with my expectations. However, just out of curiosity I downloaded and ran the latest portable x64 version of Piriform's Defraggler, and was shocked to see the drive being reported as being ~85% fragmented! The portable version of Auslogics Disk Defrag also agreed with Defraggler, and both clearly expected to grind away for ~10 hours to completely defragment the drive. 1) How in blazes could the inbuilt and 3rd party defrag utils disagree so badly? I mean, 10-20% variance is probably understandable, but 1% and 85% are miles apart! This Engineering Windows 7 blog post states: In Windows XP, any file that is split into more than one piece is considered fragmented. Not so in Windows Vista if the fragments are large enough – the defragmentation algorithm was changed (from Windows XP) to ignore pieces of a file that are larger than 64MB. As a result, defrag in XP and defrag in Vista will report different amounts of fragmentation on a volume. ... [Please read the entire post so the quote is not taken out of context.] Could it simply be that the 3rd party defrag utils ignore this post-XP change and continue to use analysis algos similar to those XP used? 2) Assuming that the 3rd party utils aren't lying about the real extent of fragmentation (which Windows is downplaying post-XP), how could the files have even got fragmented so badly given they were just copied over afresh to an empty drive? 3) If vastly differing analysis algos explain the yawning gap, which do I believe? I'm no defrag fanatic for sure, but 85% is enough to make me seriously consider spending 10 hours defragging this drive. On the other hand, 1% reported by Windows' own defragger clearly implies that there is no cause for concern and defragging would actually have negative consequences (as per the post). Is Windows' assumption valid and should I just let it be, or will there be any noticeable performance gains after running one of the 3rd party utils for 10 hours straight? 4) I see that out of the box Windows 7 defrag is scheduled to run weekly. Does anyone know whether it defrags every single time, or only if its analysis reveals a fragmentation percentage over a set threshold? If the latter, what is this threshold and can it be changed, maybe via a Registry edit? Thanks for reading through (my first query on this wonderful site!) and for any helpful replies. Also, if you're answering question #3, please keep in mind that any speed increases post defragging with 3rd party utils vis-à-vis Windows' inbuilt program should not include pre-Vista (preferably pre-Win7) examples. Further, examples of programs that made your system boot faster won't help in this case, since this is a non-system drive (although one that'll still be used daily).

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  • Why It Is So Important to Know Your Customer

    - by Christie Flanagan
    Over the years, I endured enough delayed flights, air turbulence and misadventures in airport security clearance to watch my expectations for the air travel experience fall to abysmally low levels. The extent of my loyalty to any one carrier had more to do with the proximity of the airport parking garage to their particular gate than to any effort on the airline’s part to actually earn and retain my business. That all changed one day when I found myself at the airport hoping to catch a return flight home a few hours earlier than expected, using an airline I had flown with for the first time just that week.  When you travel regularly for business, being able to catch a return flight home that’s even an hour or two earlier than originally scheduled is a big deal. It can mean the difference between having a normal evening with your family and having to sneak in like a cat burglar after everyone is fast asleep. And so I found myself on this particular day hoping to catch an earlier flight home. I approached the gate agent and was told that I could go on standby for their next flight out. Then I asked how much it was going to cost to change the flight, knowing full well that I wouldn’t get reimbursed by my company for any change fees. “Oh, there’s no charge to fly on standby,” the gate agent told me. I made a funny look. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. This airline was going to let my fly on standby, at no additional charge, even though I was a new customer with no status or points. It had been years since I’d seen an airline pass up a short term revenue generating opportunity in favor of a long term loyalty generating one.  At that moment, this particular airline gained my loyal business. Since then, this airline has had the opportunity to learn a lot about me. They know where I live, where I fly from, where I usually fly to, and where I like to sit on the plane. In general, I’ve found their customer service to be quite good whether at the airport, via call center and even through social channels. They email me occasionally, and when they do, they demonstrate that they know me by promoting deals for flights from where I live to places that I’d be interested in visiting. And that’s part of why I’m always so puzzled when I visit their website.Does this company with the great service, customer friendly policies, and clean planes demonstrate that they know me at all when I visit their website? The answer is no. Even when I log in using my loyalty program credentials, it’s pretty obvious that they’re presenting the same old home page and same old offers to every single one of their site visitors. I mean, those promotional offers that they’re featuring so prominently  -- they’re for flights that originate thousands of miles from where I live! There’s no way I’d ever book one of those flights and I’m sure I’m not the only one of their customers to feel that way.My reason for recounting this story is not to pick on the one customer experience flaw I've noticed with this particular airline, in fact, they do so many things right that I’ll continue to fly with them. But I did want to illustrate just how glaringly obvious it is to customers today when a touch point they have with a brand is impersonal, unconnected and out of sync. As someone who’s spent a number of years in the web experience management and online marketing space, it particularly peeves me when that out of sync touch point is a brand’s website, perhaps because I know how important it is to make a customer’s online experience relevant and how many powerful tools are available for making a relevant experience a reality. The fact is, delivering a one-size-fits-all online customer experience is no longer acceptable or particularly effective in today’s world. Today’s savvy customers expect you to know who they are and to understand their preferences, behavior and relationship with your brand. Not only do they expect you to know about them, but they also expect you to demonstrate this knowledge across all of their touch points with your brand in a consistent and compelling fashion, whether it be on your traditional website, your mobile web presence or through various social channels.Delivering the kind of personalized online experiences that customers want can have tremendous business benefits. This is not just about generating feelings of goodwill and higher customer satisfaction ratings either. More relevant and personalized online experiences boost the effectiveness of online marketing initiatives and the statistics prove this out. Personalized web experiences can help increase online conversion rates by 70% -- that’s a huge number.1  And more than three quarters of consumers indicate that they’ve made additional online purchases based on personalized product recommendations.2Now if only this airline would get on board with delivering a more personalized online customer experience. I’d certainly be happier and more likely to spring for one of their promotional offers. And by targeting relevant offers on their home page to appropriate segments of their site visitors, I bet they’d be happier and generating additional revenue too. Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin-top:0in; mso-para-margin-right:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:10.0pt; mso-para-margin-left:0in; line-height:115%; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;}  ***** If you're interested in hearing more perspectives on the benefits of demonstrating that you know your customers by delivering a more personalized experience, check out this white paper on creating a successful and meaningful customer experience on the web.  Also catch the video below on the business value of CX in attracting new customers featuring Oracle's VP of Customer Experience Strategy, Brian Curran. 1 Search Engine Watch 2 Marketing Charts

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