Search Results

Search found 13313 results on 533 pages for 'hit count'.

Page 396/533 | < Previous Page | 392 393 394 395 396 397 398 399 400 401 402 403  | Next Page >

• The Internet Key Wave MW833UP is not recognized in Ubuntu

  - by gio900

  I can't use my Onda MW833UP... :( Any advice? Here is something that someone else may understand: ~$: lsb_release -a No LSB modules are available. Distributor ID: Ubuntu Description: Ubuntu 11.10 Release: 11.10 Codename: oneiric ~$: lsusb Bus 001 Device 005: ID 1ee8:0012 ~$: dmesg [ 22.709475] cdc_acm 1-1:1.0: ttyACM0: USB ACM device [ 22.714856] usbcore: registered new interface driver cdc_acm [ 22.714866] cdc_acm: USB Abstract Control Model driver for USB modems and ISDN adapters [ 23.520490] ieee80211 phy0: wl_ops_bss_info_changed: arp filtering: enabled true, count 1 (implement) [ 24.244530] usbcore: registered new interface driver usbserial [ 24.244575] USB Serial support registered for generic [ 24.244673] usbcore: registered new interface driver usbserial_generic [ 24.244681] usbserial: USB Serial Driver core [ 24.265879] USB Serial support registered for GSM modem (1-port) [ 24.285680] usbcore: registered new interface driver option [ 24.285691] option: v0.7.2:USB Driver for GSM modems [ 24.425878] EXT4-fs (sda9): re-mounted. Opts: errors=remount-ro,commit=600 [ 24.736540] EXT4-fs (sda8): re-mounted. Opts: commit=600 [ 35.705796] Easy slow down manager: checking for SABI support. [ 35.706002] Easy slow down manager: SABI is supported (f5189) [ 36.060099] usbcore: deregistering interface driver uvcvideo [ 139.508061] CE: hpet increased min_delta_ns to 20113 nsec [ 6798.378917] usb 1-1: USB disconnect, device number 5 [ 6809.108232] usb 1-1: new high speed USB device number 6 using ehci_hcd [ 6809.242692] scsi5 : usb-storage 1-1:1.0 [ 6810.241257] scsi 5:0:0:0: CD-ROM Onda Datacard CD-ROM 0001 PQ: 0 ANSI: 0 [ 6810.241841] scsi 5:0:0:1: Direct-Access Onda Storage 0001 PQ: 0 ANSI: 0 [ 6810.271410] sr0: scsi3-mmc drive: 0x/0x caddy [ 6810.272099] sr 5:0:0:0: Attached scsi CD-ROM sr0 [ 6810.272852] sr 5:0:0:0: Attached scsi generic sg1 type 5 [ 6810.279954] sd 5:0:0:1: [sdb] Attached SCSI removable disk [ 6810.281210] sd 5:0:0:1: Attached scsi generic sg2 type 0 [ 6810.380591] sr0: CDROM (ioctl) error, command: Xpwrite, Read disk info 51 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 02 00 [ 6810.380617] sr: Sense Key : Hardware Error [current] [ 6810.380625] sr: Add. Sense: No additional sense information [ 6810.613937] sr0: CDROM (ioctl) error, command: Xpwrite, Read disk info 51 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 02 00 [ 6810.613972] sr: Sense Key : Hardware Error [current] [ 6810.613984] sr: Add. Sense: No additional sense information [ 6810.673716] usb 1-1: USB disconnect, device number 6 [ 6815.572142] usb 1-1: new high speed USB device number 7 using ehci_hcd [ 6815.706828] cdc_acm 1-1:1.0: ttyACM0: USB ACM device The last 3 lines are where I inserted the Internet key, then reconnected it. usb-device T: Bus=01 Lev=01 Prnt=01 Port=00 Cnt=01 Dev#= 7 Spd=480 MxCh= 0 D: Ver= 2.00 Cls=ef(misc ) Sub=02 Prot=01 MxPS=64 #Cfgs= 1 P: Vendor=1ee8 ProdID=0012 Rev=00.01 S: Manufacturer=Onda S: Product=MW833UP S: SerialNumber=9230B35D870F9CB7AE684EACC5C12BE5EC33B26E C: #Ifs= 2 Cfg#= 1 Atr=a0 MxPwr=500mA I: If#= 0 Alt= 0 #EPs= 1 Cls=02(commc) Sub=02 Prot=01 Driver=cdc_acm I: If#= 1 Alt= 0 #EPs= 2 Cls=0a(data ) Sub=00 Prot=00 Driver=cdc_acm Then there is /dev/ttyACM0. When the key is connected to the USB port, everything that will meant...

  Read the article

• SQL Saturday and Exploring Data Privacy

  - by Johnm

  I have been highly impressed with the growth of the SQL Saturday phenomenon. It seems that an announcement for a new wonderful event finds its way to my inbox on a daily basis. I have had the opportunity to attend the first of the SQL Saturday's for Tampa, Chicago, Louisville and recently my home town of Indianapolis. It is my hope that there will be many more in my future. This past weekend I had the honor of being selected to speak amid a great line up of speakers at SQL Saturday #82 in Indianapolis. My session topic/title was "Exploring Data Privacy". Below is a brief synopsis of my session: Data Privacy in a Nutshell        - Definition of data privacy        - Examples of personally identifiable data        - Examples of Sensitive data Laws and Stuff        - Various examples of laws, regulations and policies that influence the definition of data privacy        - General rules of thumb that encompasses most laws Your Data Footprint        - Who has personal information about you?        - What are you exchanging data privacy for?        - The amazing resilience of data        - The cost of data loss Weapons of Mass Protection       - Data classification       - Extended properties       - Database Object Schemas       - An extraordinarily brief introduction of encryption       - The amazing data professional  <-the most important point of the entire session! The subject of data privacy is one that is quickly making its way to the forefront of the mind of many data professionals. Somewhere out there someone is storing personally identifiable and other sensitive data about you. In some cases it is kept reasonably secure. In other cases it is kept in total exposure without the consideration of its potential of damage to you. Who has access to it and how is it being used? Are we being unnecessarily required to supply sensitive data in exchange for products and services? These are just a few questions on everyone's mind. As data loss events of grand scale hit the headlines in a more frequent succession, the level of frustration and urgency for a solution increases. I assembled this session with the intent to raise awareness of sensitive data and remind us all that we, data professionals, are the ones who have the greatest impact and influence on how sensitive data is regarded and protected. Mahatma Gandhi once said "Be the change you want to see in the world." This is guidance that I keep near to my heart as I approached this topic of data privacy.

  Read the article

• Delay command execution over sockets

  - by David

  I've been trying to fix the game loop in a real time (tick delay) MUD. I realized using Thread.Sleep would seem clunky when the user spammed commands through their choice of client (Zmud, etc) e.g. east;south;southwest would wait three move ticks and then output everything from the past couple rooms. The game loop basically calls a Flush and Fill method for each socket during each tick (50ms) private void DoLoop() { Stopwatch stopWatch = new Stopwatch(); stopWatch.Start(); while (running) { // for each socket, flush and fill ConnectionMonitor.Update(); stopWatch.Stop(); WaitIfNeeded(stopWatch.ElapsedMilliseconds); stopWatch.Reset(); } } The Fill method fires the command events, but as mentioned before, they currently block using Thread.Sleep. I tried adding a "ready" flag to the state object that attempts to execute the command along with a queue of spammed commands, but it ends up executing one command and queuing up the rest i.e. each subsequent command executes something that got queued up that should've been executed before. I must be missing something about the timer. private readonly Queue<SpammedCommand> queuedCommands = new Queue<SpammedCommand>(); private bool ready = true; private void TryExecuteCommand(string input) { var commandContext = CommandContext.Create(input); var player = Server.Current.Database.Get<Player>(Session.Player.Key); var commandInfo = Server.Current.CommandLookup .FindCommand(commandContext.CommandName, player.IsAdmin); if (commandInfo != null) { if (!ready) { // queue command queuedCommands.Enqueue(new SpammedCommand() { Context = commandContext, Info = commandInfo }); return; } if (queuedCommands.Count > 0) { // queue the incoming command queuedCommands.Enqueue(new SpammedCommand() { Context = commandContext, Info = commandInfo, }); // dequeue and execute var command = queuedCommands.Dequeue(); command.Info.Command.Execute(Session, command.Context); setTimeout(command.Info.TickLength); return; } commandInfo.Command.Execute(Session, commandContext); setTimeout(commandInfo.TickLength); } else { Session.WriteLine("Command not recognized"); } } Finally, setTimeout was supposed to set the execution delay (TickLength) for that command, and makeReady just sets the ready flag on the state object to true. private void setTimeout(TickDelay tickDelay) { ready = false; var t = new System.Timers.Timer() { Interval = (long) tickDelay, AutoReset = false, }; t.Elapsed += makeReady; t.Start(); // fire this in tickDelay ms } // MAKE READYYYYY!!!! private void makeReady(object sender, System.Timers.ElapsedEventArgs e) { ready = true; } Am I missing something about the System.Timers.Timer created in setTimeout? How can I execute (and output) spammed commands per TickLength without using Thread.Sleep?

  Read the article

• Profiling Startup Of VS2012 &ndash; Ants Profiler

  - by Alois Kraus

  I just downloaded ANTS Profiler 7.4 to check how fast it is and how deep I can analyze the startup of Visual Studio 2012. The Pro version which is useful does cost 445€ which is ok. To measure a complex system I decided to simply profile VS2012 (Update 1) on my older Intel 6600 2,4GHz with 3 GB RAM and a 32 bit Windows 7. Ants Profiler is really easy to use. So lets try it out. The Ants Profiler does want to start the profiled application by its own which seems to be rather common. I did choose Method Level timing of all managed methods. In the configuration menu I did want to get all call stacks to get full details. Once this is configured you are ready to go.   After that you can select the Method Grid to view Wall Clock Time in ms. I hate percentages which are on by default because I do want to look where absolute time is spent and not something else.   From the Method Grid I can drill down to see where time is spent in a nice and I can look at the decompiled methods where the time is spent. This does really look nice. But did you see the size of the scroll bar in the method grid? Although I wanted all call stacks I do get only about 4 pages of methods to drill down. From the scroll bar count I would guess that the profiler does show me about 150 methods for the complete VS startup. This is nonsense. I will never find a bottleneck in VS when I am presented only a fraction of the methods that were actually executed. I have also tried in the configuration window to also profile the extremely trivial functions but there was no noticeable difference. It seems that the Ants Profiler does filter away way too many details to be useful for bigger systems. If you want to optimize a CPU bound operation inside NUnit then Ants Profiler is with its line level timings a very nice tool to work with. But for bigger stuff it is certainly not usable. I also do not like that I must start the profiled application from the profiler UI. This makes it hard to profile processes which are started by some other process. Next: JetBrains dotTrace

  Read the article

• Microsoft Certifications &ndash; how to prep? and why?

  - by Kelly Jones

  I often get asked by my colleagues, “how do you prepare for Microsoft exams?” Well, the answer for me is a little complicated, so I thought I’d write up here what I do. The first thing I do is go to Microsoft’s website to find the exam that I need to take.  If you’re looking to get a particular certification, then their site lists the exam or exams that you’ll need to pass.  If you’ve already taken an exam, you can log onto the MCP website and use their certification planner.  This little tool tells you what tests you need, based on the exams you’ve already passed.  It is very helpful with the certifications that are multiple tests and especially ones that have electives. Once you’ve identified the test, you can use Microsoft’s website to see the topics that it covers.  This is a good outline to follow when you study.  I’ll keep this handy to reference back throughout my studying to make sure that I’m covering all the topics I need to know. The next step is probably where I am a little different from others.  IF the exam outline covers material that I’ve already been working with, then I’ll skip a lot of the studying and go directly to the practice tests.  However, if I’m looking at the outline and wondering how in the world do you do that? – then it’s time to hit the books. So, where to find study materials?  Try typing in the exam number into any search engine.  You’ll typically find a ton of resources.  If you’re lucky, you’ll find books that others recommend based on their studying and exam experience.  As a Sogeti employee, I have access to three really good resources: an internal company list of all of the consultants who have passed particular tests (on our Connex website), Books 24x7, and Transcender practice exams. Once my studying is done (either through books or experience), I’ll go through the practice exams.  I find them really helpful in getting my knowledge lined up to the thinking process that the exam writers use.  If I’m relying on my experience, then this really helps me to identify gaps in my knowledge that I’ll need to fill. That’s about it.  If I’m doing ok on the practice exams, then I’ll take the real thing.  I’ve found that the practice exams are usually more difficult than then real thing. Oh – one other thing I do related to Microsoft exams – I try to take any beta exams that Microsoft makes available that fall into my skill set.  Microsoft has started a blog to announce these and the seats usually fill up really quick.  The blog is at http://blogs.technet.com/betaexams/ . You don’t get your results instantly, like a normal exam, instead you have to wait for everyone to finish taking the beta exams and for Microsoft to determine which questions they are using and which they are dropping.  So, be prepared to wait six to eight weeks for your results.

  Read the article

• More useful Sql Server Serivce Broker Queries

  - by ChrisD

  SELECT 'Checking Broker Service Status...' IF (select Top 1 is_broker_enabled from sys.databases where name = 'NWMESSAGE')=1     SELECT ' Broker Service IS Enabled'  -- Should return a 1. ELSE     SELECT '** Broker Service IS DISABLED ***' /* If Is_Broker_enabled returns 0, uncomment and run this code ALTER DATABASE NWMESSAGE SET SINGLE_USER WITH ROLLBACK IMMEDIATE GO Alter Database NWMESSAGE Set enable_broker GO ALTER DATABASE NWDataChannel SET MULTI_USER GO */ SELECT 'Checking For Disabled Queues....' -- ensure the queues are enabled --  0 indicates the queue is disabled. Select '** Receive Queue Disabled: '+name from sys.service_queues where is_receive_enabled = 0 --select [name], is_receive_enabled from sys.service_queues; /*If the queue is disabled, to enable it alter queue QUEUENAME with status=on; – replace QUEUENAME with the name of your queue */ -- Get General information about the queues --select * from sys.service_queues -- Get the message counts in each queue SELECT 'Checking Message Count for each Queue...' select q.name, p.rows from sys.objects as o join sys.partitions as p on p.object_id = o.object_id join sys.objects as q on o.parent_object_id = q.object_id join sys.service_queues sq on sq.name = q.name where p.index_id = 1 -- Ensure all the queue activiation sprocs are present SELECT 'Checking for Activation Stored Procedures....' SELECT  '** Missing Procedure:  '+q.name  From sys.service_queues q Where NOT Exists(Select * from sysobjects where xtype='p' and name='activation_'+q.name) and q.activation_procedure is not null DECLARE @sprocs Table (Name Varchar(2000)) Insert into @sprocs Values ('Echo') Insert into @sprocs Values ('HTTP_POST') Insert into @sprocs Values ('InitializeRecipients') Insert into @sprocs Values ('sp_EnableRecipient') Insert into @sprocs Values ('sp_ProcessReceivedMessage') Insert into @sprocs Values ('sp_SendXmlMessage') SELECT 'Checking for required stored procedures...' SELECT  '** Missing Procedure:  '+s.name  From @sprocs s Where NOT Exists(Select * from sysobjects where xtype='p' and name=s.name) GO -- Check the services Select 'Checking Recipient Message Services...' Select '** Missing Message Service:' + r.RecipientName +'MessageService' From Recipient r Where not exists (Select * from sys.services s where  s.name  COLLATE SQL_Latin1_General_CP1_CI_AS= r.RecipientName+'MessageService') DECLARE @svcs Table (Name Varchar(2000)) Insert into @svcs Values ('XmlMessageSendingService') SELECT  '** Missing Service:  '+s.name  From @svcs s Where NOT Exists(Select * from sys.services where name=s.name COLLATE SQL_Latin1_General_CP1_CI_AS) GO /*** To Test a message send Run: sp_SendXmlMessage  'TSQLTEST', 'CommerceEngine','<Root><Text>Test</Text></Root>' */ Select CAST(message_body as XML) as xml, * From XmlMessageSendingQueue /*** clean out all queues declare @handle uniqueidentifier declare conv cursor for   select conversation_handle from sys.conversation_endpoints open conv fetch next from conv into @handle while @@FETCH_STATUS = 0 Begin    END Conversation @handle with cleanup    fetch next from conv into @handle End close conv deallocate conv ***********************

  Read the article

• Brazil is Hot for Social Media

  - by Mike Stiles

  Today’s guest blog is from Oracle SVP Product Development Reggie Bradford, fresh off a visit to Sao Paulo, Brazil where he spoke at the Dachis Social Business Summit and spent some time getting a personal taste for the astonishing growth of social in Brazil, both in terms of usage and engagement. I knew it was big, but I now have an all-new appreciation for why the Wall Street Journal branded Brazil the “social media capital of the universe.” Brazil has the world’s 5th largest economy, an expanding middle class, an active younger demo market, a connected & outgoing culture, and an ongoing embrace of the social media platforms. According to comScore's 2012 Brazil Digital Future in Focus report, 97% are using social media, and that’s not even taking mobile-only users into account. There were 65 million Facebook users in 2012, spending an average 535 minutes there, up 208%. It’s one of Twitter’s fastest growing markets and the 2nd biggest market for YouTube. Instagram usage has grown over 300% since last year. That by itself is exciting, but look at the opportunity for social marketing brands. 74% of Brazilian social users follow brands on Facebook, and 59% have praised a company on either Twitter or Facebook. A 2011 Oh! Panel study found 81% of social networkers there used social to research new products and 75% went there looking for discounts. B2C eCommerce sales in Brazil is projected to hit $26.9 billion by 2015. I bet I’m not the only one who sees great things ahead, and I was fortunate enough give a keynote ABRADI, an association of leading digital agencies in Brazil with 53 execs from 35 agencies attending. I was also afforded the opportunity to give my impressions of what’s going on in Brazil to Jornal Propoganda & Marketing, one of the most popular publications in Latin America for marketers. I conveyed that especially in an environment like Brazil, where social users are so willing to connect and engage brands, marketers need to back away from the heavy-handed, one-way messaging of old school advertising and move toward genuine relationships and trust-building. To aide in this, organizational and operation changes must be embraced inside the enterprise. We've talked often about the new, tighter partnership forming between the CIO and CMO. If this partnership is not encouraged, fostered and resourced, the increasing amount of time consumers spend on mobile and digital, and the efficiencies and integrations offered by cloud-based software cannot be exploited. These are the kinds of changes that can yield social data that, when combined with enterprise data, helps you come to know your social audiences intimately and predict their needs. Consumers are always connected and need your brand to be accessible at any time, be it for information or customer service. And, of course, all of this is happening quite publicly. The holistic, socially-enable enterprise connects social to customer service systems and all other customer touch points, facilitating the kind of immediate, real-time, gratifying response customers are coming to expect. Social users in Brazil are highly active and clearly willing to meet us as brands more than halfway. Empowering yourself with a social management technology platform will have you set up to maximize this booming social market…from listening & monitoring to engagement to analytics to workflow & automation to globalization & language support. Brands, it’s time to be as social as the great people of Brazil are. Obrigado! @reggiebradfordPhoto: Gualberto107, freedigitalphotos.net

  Read the article

• how to keep display tick rate steady when using continuous collision detection?

  - by nas Ns

  (I've just found about this forum). I hope it is ok to repost my question again here. I posted this question at stackoverflow, but it looks like I might get better help here. Here is the question: I've implemented basic particles motion simulation with continuous collision detection. But there is small issue in display. Assume simple case of circles moving inside square. All elastic collisions. no firction. All motion is constant speed. No forces are involved, no gravity. So when a particle is moving, it is always moving at constant speed (in between collisions) What I do now is this: Let the simulation time step be 1 second (for example). This is the time step simulation is advanced before displaying the new state (unless there is a collision sooner than this). At start of each time step, time for the next collision between any particles or a particle with a wall is determined. Call this the TOC time; let’s say TOC was .5 seconds in this case. Since TOC is smaller than the standard time step, then the system is moved by TOC and the new system is displayed so that the new display shows any collisions as just taking place (say 2 circles just touched each other’s, or a circle just touched a wall) Next, the collision(s) are resolved (i.e. speeds updated, changed directions etc..). A new step is started. The same thing happens. Now assume there is no collision detected within the next 1 second (those 2 circles above will not be in collision any more, even though they are still touching, due to their speeds showing they are moving apart now), Hence, simulation time is advanced now by the full one second, the standard time step, and particles are moved on the screen using 1 second simulation time and new display is shown. You see what has just happened: One frame ran for .5 seconds, but the next frame runs for 1 second, may be the 3rd frame is displayed after 2 seconds, may be the 4th frame is displayed after 2.8 seconds (because TOC was .8 seconds then) and so on. What happens is that the motion of a particle on the screen appears to speed up or slow down, even though it is moving at constant speed and was not even involved in a collision. i.e. Looking at one particle on its own, I see it suddenly speeding up or slowing down, becuase another particle had hit a wall. This is because the display tick is not uniform. i.e. the frame rate update is changing, giving the false illusion that a particle is moving at non-constant speed while in fact it is moving at constant speed. The motion on the screen is not smooth, since the screen is not updating at constant rate. I am not able to figure how to fix this. If I want to show 2 particles at the moment of the collision, I must draw the screen at different times. Drawing the screen always at the same tick interval, results in seeing 2 particles before the collision, and then after the collision, and not just when they colliding, which looked bad when I tried it. So, how do real games handle this issue? How to display things in order to show collisions when it happen, yet keep the display tick constant? These 2 requirements seem to contradict each other’s.

  Read the article

• What Counts For a DBA – Depth

  - by Louis Davidson

  SQL Server offers very simple interfaces to many of its features. Most people could open up SSMS, connect to a server, write a simple query and see the results. Even several of the core DBA tasks are deceptively straightforward. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to perform a basic database backup or run a trace (even using the newfangled Extended Events!). However, appearances can be deceptive, and often times it is really important that a DBA understands not just the basics of how to perform a task, but why we do a task, and how that task works. As an analogy, consider a child walking into a darkened room. Most would know that they need to turn on the light, and how to do it, so they flick the switch. But what happens if light fails to shine forth. Most would immediately tell you that you need to consider changing the light bulb. So you hop in the car and take them to the local home store and instruct them to buy a replacement. Confronted with a 40 foot display of light bulbs, how will they decide which of the hundreds of types of bulbs, of different types, fittings, shapes, colors, power and efficiency ratings, is the right choice? Obviously the main lesson the child is going to learn this day is how to use their cell phone as a flashlight so they don’t have to ask for help the next time. Likewise, when the metaphorical toddlers who use your database server have issues, they will instinctively know something is wrong, and may even have some idea what caused it, but will have no depth of knowledge to figure out the right solution. That is where the DBA comes in and attempts to save the day. However, when one looks beneath the shiny UI, SQL Server has its own “40 foot display of light bulbs”, in the form of the tremendous number of tools and the often-bewildering amount of information they can present to the DBA, to help us find issues. Unfortunately, resorting to guesswork, to trying different “bulbs” over and over, hoping to stumble on the answer. This is where the right depth of knowledge goes a long way. If we need to write a SELECT statement, then knowing the syntax and where to find the data is not enough. Knowledge of indexes and query plans is essential. Without it, we might hit on a query that “works”, but we are basically still a user, not a programmer, because we have no real control over our platform. Is that level of knowledge deep enough? Probably not, since knowledge of the underlying metadata and structures would be very useful in helping us make sense of any query plan. Understanding the structure of an index makes the “key lookup” operator not sound like what you do when someone tapes your car key to the ceiling. So is even this level of understanding deep enough? Do we need to understand the memory architecture used to process the query? It might be a comforting level of knowledge, and will doubtless come in handy at some point, but is not strictly necessary in most cases. Beyond that lies (more or less) full knowledge of SQL language and the intricacies of every step the SQL Server engine takes to process our query. My personal theory is that, as a professional, our knowledge of a given task should extend, at a minimum, one level deeper than is strictly necessary to perform the task. Anything deeper can be left to the ridiculously smart, or obsessive, or both. As an example. tasked with storing an integer value between 0 and 99999999, it’s essential that I know that choosing an Integer over Decimal(8,0) will likely offer performance benefits. It is then useful that I also understand the value of adding a CHECK constraint, to make sure the values are valid to the desired range; and comforting that I know a little about the underlying processors, registers and computer math. Anything further, I leave to the likes of Joe Chang, whose recent blog post on the topic offers depth by the bucketful!  

  Read the article

• Does it make the game more fun when the user is forced to progress thru the levels sequentially rather than letting them pick and play?

  - by BeachRunnerJoe

  Hello. For the first time in my game, I'm stuck with a real design dilemma. I guess that's a good thing ;) I'm building a word puzzle game that has five levels, each with 30 puzzles. Currently, the user has to solve one puzzle at a time before moving to the next. However, I'm finding the user occasionally gets stuck on a puzzle, at which point they can no longer play until they solve it. This is obviously bad because many people will just quit playing the game and delete the app since they get frustrated and can't play any other puzzles until the current puzzle is solved. The only elegant solution I can find to helping the player get unstuck is changing the design of the game to allow the users to pick any puzzle to play at any time. This way, if they get stuck, they can come back to it later and at least they have other puzzles to play in the meantime. It's my opinion, however, that this new flow design doesn't make the game as fun as the original flow design where the player has to complete a puzzle before moving to the next. To me, it's like anything else, when you only have one of something, it's more enjoyable, but when you have 30 of something, it's far less enjoyable. In fact, when I present the user with 30 puzzles to choose from that they need to solve before unlocking the next level, it almost seems as tho I'm making them feel like it's work they have to do. I even had a tester voluntarily tell me that being forced to complete a puzzle before moving to the next is more motivating. My questions are... Do you agree/disagree? Do you have any suggestions for how I can help the player get unstuck? Thanks so much in advance for your thoughts! EDIT: I should mention that I've already considered a few other solutions to helping the user get unstuck, but none of them seem like good ideas. They are... Add more hints: Currently, the user gets two hints per puzzle. If I increase the hint count, it only makes the game more easy and still leaves the possibility of the user getting stuck. Add a "Show Solution" button: This seems like a bad idea because it's my opinion this takes the fun out of the game for many people who would probably otherwise solve the puzzle if they didn't have the quick option to see the solution.

  Read the article

• Pinterest and the Rising Power of Imagery

  - by Mike Stiles

  If images keep you glued to a screen, you’re hardly alone. Countless social users are letting their eyes do the walking, waiting for that special photo to grab their attention. And perhaps more than any other social network, Pinterest has been giving those eyes plenty of room to walk. Pinterest came along in 2010. Its play was that users could simply create topic boards and pin pictures to the appropriate boards for sharing. Yes there are some words, captions mostly, but not many. The speed of its growth raised eyebrows. Traffic quadrupled in the last quarter of 2011, with 7.51 million unique visitors in December alone. It now gets 1.9 billion monthly page views. And it was sticky. In the US, the average time a user spends strolling through boards and photos on Pinterest is 15 minutes, 50 seconds. Proving the concept of browsing a catalogue is not dead, it became a top 5 referrer for several apparel retailers like Land’s End, Nordstrom, and Bergdorfs. Now a survey of online shoppers by BizRate Insights says that Pinterest is responsible for more purchases online than Facebook. Over 70% of its users are going there specifically to keep up with trends and get shopping ideas. And when they buy, the average order value is $179. Pinterest is also scoring better in terms of user engagement. 66% of pinners regularly follow and repin retailers, whereas 17% of Facebook fans turn to that platform for purchase ideas. (Facebook still wins when it comes to reach and driving traffic to 3rd-party sites by the way). Social posting best practices have consistently shown that posts with photos are rewarded with higher engagement levels. You may be downright Shakespearean in your writing, but what makes images in the digital world so much more powerful than prose? 1. They transcend language barriers. 2. They’re fun and addictive to look at. 3. They can be consumed in fractions of a second, important considering how fast users move through their social content (admit it, you do too). 4. They’re efficient gateways. A good picture might get them to the headline. A good headline might then get them to the written content. 5. The audience for them surpasses demographic limitations. 6. They can effectively communicate and trigger an emotion. 7. With mobile use soaring, photos are created on those devices and easily consumed and shared on them. Pinterest’s iPad app hit #1 in the Apple store in 1 day. Even as far back as 2009, over 2.5 billion devices with cameras were on the streets generating in just 1 year, 10% of the number of photos taken…ever. But let’s say you’re not a retailer. What if you’re a B2B whose products or services aren’t visual? Should you worry about your presence on Pinterest? As with all things, you need a keen awareness of who your audience is, where they reside online, and what they want to do there. If it doesn’t make sense to put a tent stake in Pinterest, fine. But ignore the power of pictures at your own peril. If not visually, how are you going to attention-grab social users scrolling down their News Feeds at top speed? You’re competing with every other cool image out there from countless content sources. Bore us and we’ll fly right past you.

  Read the article

• Weird appearance for a 3D XNA ground

  - by Belos

  I wanted to add a ground so I can know the position of a helicopter in the world. But the ground appeared in a weird way: http://i.stack.imgur.com/yTSuW.jpg The ground had the following texture: http://i.stack.imgur.com/pdpxB.png EDIT: Sorry, I forgot to post the code: public class ImportModel { public Vector3 Position { get; set; } public Vector3 Rotation { get; set; } public Vector3 Scale { get; set; } Model Model; Matrix[] modeltransforms; GraphicsDevice GraphicDevice; ContentManager Content; BoundingSphere sphere; bool boundingimplemented = false; public ImportModel(string model, GraphicsDevice gd, ContentManager cm, Vector3 position, Vector3 rot, Vector3 sca) { GraphicDevice = gd; Content = cm; Position = position; Rotation = rot; Scale = sca; Model = Content.Load<Model>(model); modeltransforms = new Matrix[Model.Bones.Count]; Model.CopyAbsoluteBoneTransformsTo(modeltransforms); } public void Draw(Camera camera) { Matrix baseworld = Matrix.CreateScale(Scale) * Matrix.CreateFromYawPitchRoll(Rotation.Y, Rotation.X, Rotation.Z) * Matrix.CreateTranslation(Position); foreach (ModelMesh mesh in Model.Meshes) { Matrix localworld = modeltransforms[mesh.ParentBone.Index] * baseworld; foreach (ModelMeshPart meshpart in mesh.MeshParts) { BasicEffect effect = (BasicEffect)meshpart.Effect; effect.World = localworld; effect.View = camera.View; effect.Projection = camera.Projection; effect.EnableDefaultLighting(); } mesh.Draw(); } } public BoundingSphere BoundingSphere { get { if (!boundingimplemented) { foreach (ModelMesh mesh in Model.Meshes) { BoundingSphere transformed = mesh.BoundingSphere.Transform( modeltransforms[mesh.ParentBone.Index]); sphere = BoundingSphere.CreateMerged(sphere, transformed); } Matrix worldTransform = Matrix.CreateScale(Scale) * Matrix.CreateTranslation(Position); BoundingSphere transforme = sphere; transforme = transforme.Transform(worldTransform); return transforme; } else { Matrix worldTransform = Matrix.CreateScale(Scale) * Matrix.CreateTranslation(Position); BoundingSphere transformed = sphere; transformed = transformed.Transform(worldTransform); return transformed; } } } } Then I call the class from the Game1 class: ImportModel ground = new ImportModel("ground", GraphicsDevice, Content, Vector3.Zero, Vector3.Zero, new Vector3(20f)); EDIT2:This is how the scene looks from top: i.stack.imgur.com/Hs983.jpg

  Read the article

• (CanvsEngine) Collission problem ( TypeError: this._polygon[this._frame] is undefined) [on hold]

  - by user2127102

  How can i fix this error TypeError: this._polygon[this._frame] is undefined Heres my code: html: <!DOCTYPE Html> <head> <meta charset="utf-8"> <title>Project</title> <link href="css/style.css" rel="stylesheet"> <script src="http://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jquery/1.7.1/jquery.min.js" type="text/javascript"></script> <script src="js/canvasengine-1.3.0.all.min.js"></script> <script src="js/extends/Input.js"></script> <script src="main.js"></script> </head> <body> <canvas id="window"></canvas> </body> main.js: var canvas = CE.defines("window"). extend(Input). ready(function() { canvas.Scene.call("Game"); }); canvas.Scene.new({ name: "Game", materials: { images: { player: "img/character.png", Wall: "img/TestWall.png" } }, ready: function(stage) { var _canvas = this.getCanvas(); _canvas.setSize("browser", "strech"); this.Player = Class.new("Entity", [stage]); this.Player.el.drawImage("player"); stage.append(this.Player.el); this.Wall = Class.new("Entity", [stage]); this.Wall.el.drawImage("Wall"); this.Wall.position(300, 0); stage.append(this.Wall.el); }, render: function(stage) { //Controls ====== //Control calculations var self = this; this.Mover_A; this.Mover_D; this.Mover_W; this.Mover_S; canvas.Input.keyDown(Input.A, function(e) { self.Mover_A = true; }); canvas.Input.keyDown(Input.D, function(e) { self.Mover_D = true; }); canvas.Input.keyDown(Input.W, function(e) { self.Mover_W = true; }); canvas.Input.keyDown(Input.S, function(e) { self.Mover_S = true; console.log(self.Mover_S); }); canvas.Input.keyUp(Input.A, function(e) { self.Mover_A = false; }); canvas.Input.keyUp(Input.D, function(e) { self.Mover_D = false; }); canvas.Input.keyUp(Input.W, function(e) { self.Mover_W = false; }); canvas.Input.keyUp(Input.S, function(e) { self.Mover_S = false; }); x = 0; y = 0; if(this.Mover_A)x -= 1.5; //A if(this.Mover_D)x += 1.5;//D if(this.Mover_W)y -= 1.5;//W if(this.Mover_S)y += 1.5; //S this.Player.move(x, y); this.Player.hit("over", [this.Wall], function(state, el) { this.Player.move(x * -1, y * -1); }); //End Controls ===== stage.refresh(); } });

  Read the article

• What Counts for a DBA: Skill

  - by drsql

  “Practice makes perfect:” right? Well, not exactly. The reality of it all is that this saying is an untrustworthy aphorism. I discovered this in my “younger” days when I was a passionate tennis player, practicing and playing 20+ hours a week. No matter what my passion level was, without some serious coaching (and perhaps a change in dietary habits), my skill level was never going to rise to a level where I could make any money at the sport that involved something other than selling tennis balls at a sporting goods store. My game may have improved with all that practice but I had too many bad practices to overcome. Practice by itself merely reinforces what we know and what we can figure out naturally. The truth is actually closer to the expression used by Vince Lombardi: “Perfect practice makes perfect.” So how do you get to become skilled as a DBA if practice alone isn’t sufficient? Hit the Internet and start searching for SQL training and you can find 100 different sites. There are also hundreds of blogs, magazines, books, conferences both onsite and virtual. But then how do you know who is good? Unfortunately often the worst guide can be to find out the experience level of the writer. Some of the best DBAs are frighteningly young, and some got their start back when databases were stored on stacks of paper with little holes in it. As a programmer, is it really so hard to understand normalization? Set based theory? Query optimization? Indexing and performance tuning? The biggest barrier often is previous knowledge, particularly programming skills cultivated before you get started with SQL. In the world of technology, it is pretty rare that a fresh programmer will gravitate to database programming. Database programming is very unsexy work, because without a UI all you have are a bunch of text strings that you could never impress anyone with. Newbies spend most of their time building UIs or apps with procedural code in C# or VB scoring obvious interesting wins. Making matters worse is that SQL programming requires mastery of a much different toolset than most any mainstream programming skill. Instead of controlling everything yourself, most of the really difficult work is done by the internals of the engine (written by other non-relational programmers…we just can’t get away from them.) So is there a golden road to achieving a high skill level? Sadly, with tennis, I am pretty sure I’ll never discover it. However, with programming it seems to boil down to practice in applying the appropriate techniques for whatever type of programming you are doing. Can a C# programmer build a great database? As long as they don’t treat SQL like C#, absolutely. Same goes for a DBA writing C# code. None of this stuff is rocket science, as long as you learn to understand that different types of programming require different skill sets and you as a programmer must recognize the difference between one of the procedural languages and SQL and treat them differently. Skill comes from practicing doing things the right way and making “right” a habit.

  Read the article

• Profiling Startup Of VS2012 &ndash; JustTrace Profiler

  - by Alois Kraus

  JustTrace is made by Telerik which is mainly known for its collection of UI controls. The current version (2012.3.1127.0) does include a performance and memory profiler which does cost 614€ and is currently with a special offer for 306€ on sale. It does include one year of free upgrades. The uneven € numbers are calculated from the 799€ and 50% dicsount price. The UI is already in Metro style and simple to use. Multi process, attach, method recording filter are not supported. It looks like JustTrace is like Ants a Just My Code profiler. For stuff where you do not have the pdbs or you want to dig deeper into the BCL code you will not get far. After getting the profile data you get in the All Methods grid a plain list with hit count and own time. The method list for all methods is also suspiciously short which is a clear sign that you will not get far during the analysis of foreign code. But at least there is also a memory profiler included. For this I have to choose in the first window for Profiling Type “Memory Profiler” to check the memory consumption of VS.  There are some interesting number to see but I do really miss from YourKit the thread stack window. How am I supposed to get a clue when much memory is allocated and the CPU consumption is high in which places I should look? The Snapshot summary gives a rough overview which is ok for a first impression. Next is Assemblies? This gives you a list of all loaded assemblies. Not terribly useful.   The By Type view gives you exactly what it is supposed to do. You have to keep in mind that this list is filtered by the types you did check in the Assemblies list. The By Type instance list does only show types from assemblies which do not originate from Microsoft. By default mscorlib and System are not checked. That is the reason why for the first time my By Type window looked like The idea behind this feature is to show only your instances because you are ultimately responsible for the overall memory consumption. I am not sure if I do like this feature because by default it does hide too much. I do want to see at least how many strings and arrays are allocated. A simple namespace filter would also do it in my opinion. Now you can examine all string instances and look who in the object graph does keep a reference on them. That is nice but YourKit has the big plus that you can also look into the string contents.  I am also not sure how in the graph cycles are visualized and what will happen if you have thousands of objects referencing you. That's pretty much it about JustTrace. It can help the average developer to pinpoint performance and memory issues by just looking at his own code and instances. Showing them more will not help them because the sheer amount of information will overwhelm them. And you need to have a pretty good understanding how the GC and the CLR does work. When you have a performance issue at a customer machine it is sometimes very helpful to be able a bring a profiler onto the machine (no pdbs, …) and to get a full snapshot of all processes which are in the problematic use case involved. For these more advanced use cased JustTrace is certainly the wrong tool. Next: SpeedTrace

  Read the article

• Framework for Everything - Where to begin? [Longer post]

  - by SquaredSoft

  Back story of this question, feel free to skip down for the specific question Hello, I've been very interested in the idea of abstract programming the last few years. I've made about 30 attempts at creating a piece of software that is capable of almost anything you throw at it. I've undertook some attempts at this that have taken upwards of a year, while getting close, never releasing it beyond my compiler. This has been something I've always tried wrapping my head around, and something is always missing. With the title, I'm sure you're assuming, "Yes of course you noob! You can't account for everything!" To which I have to reply, "Why not?" To give you some background into what I'm talking about, this all started with doing maybe a shade of gray hat SEO software. I found myself constantly having to create similar, but slightly different sets of code. I've gone through as many iterations of way to communicate on http as the universe has particles. "How many times am I going to have to write this multi-threaded class?" is something I found myself asking a lot. Sure, I could create a class library, and just work with that, but I always felt I could optimize what I had, which often was a large undertaking and typically involved frequent use of the CRTL+A keyboard shortcut, mixed with the delete button. It dawned on me that it was time to invest in a plugin system. This would allow me to simply add snippets of code. as time went on, and I could subversion stuff out, and distribute small chunks of code, rather than something that encompasses only a specific function or design. This comes with its own complexity, of course, and by the time I had finished the software scope for this addition, it hit me that I would want to add to everything in the software, not just a new http method, or automation code for a specific website. Great, we're getting more abstract. However, the software that I have in my mind comes down to a quite a few questions regarding its execution. I have to have some parameters to what I am going to do. After writing what the perfect software would do in my mind, I came up with this as a list of requirements: Should be able to use networking A "Macro" or "Expression system" which would allow people to do something like : =First(=ParseToList(=GetUrl("http://www.google.com?q=helloworld!"), Template.Google)) Multithreaded Able to add UI elements through some type of XML -- People can make their own addons etc. Can use third party API through the plugins, such as Microsoft CRM, Exchange, etc. This would allow the software to essentially be used for everything. Really, any task you wish to automate, in a simple way. Making the UI was as also extremely hard. How do you do all of this? Its very difficult. So my question: With so many attempts at this, I'm out of ideas how to successfully complete this. I have a very specific idea in my mind, but I keep failing to execute it. I'm a self taught programmer. I've been doing it for years, and work professionally in it, but I've never encountered something that would be as complex and in-depth as a system which essentially does everything. Where would you start? What are the best practices for design? How can I avoid constantly having to go back and optimize my software. What can I do to generalize this and draw everything out to completion. These are things I struggle with. P.s., I'm using c# as my main language. I feel like in this example, I might be hitting the outer limit of the language, although, I don't know if that is the case, or if I'm just a bad programmer. Thanks for your time.

  Read the article

• Extreme Makeover, Phone Edition: Comcasts xfinity

  Mobile Makeover For many companies the first foray into Windows Phone 7 (WP7) may be in porting their existing mobile apps. It is tempting to simply transfer existing functionality, avoiding the additional design costs. Readdressing business needs and taking advantage of the WP7 platform can reduce cost and is essential to a successful re-launch. To better understand the advantage of new development lets examine a conceptual upgrade of Comcasts existing mobile app. Before Comcast has a great mobile app that provides several key features. The ability to browse the lineup using a guide, a client for Comcast email accounts, On Demand gallery, and much more. We will leverage these and build on them using some of the incredible WP7 features.   After With the proliferation of DVRs (Digital Video Recorders) and a variety of media devices (TV, PC, Mobile) content providers are challenged to find creative ways to build their brands. Every client touch point must provide both value added services as well as opportunities for marketing and up-sale; WP7 makes it easy to focus on those opportunities. The new app is an excellent vehicle for presenting Comcasts newly rebranded TV, Voice, and Internet services. These services now fly under the banner of xfinity and have been expanded to provide the best experience for Comcast customers. The Windows Phone 7 app will increase the surface area of this service revolution.   The home menu is simplified and highlights Comcasts Triple Play: Voice, TV, and Internet. The inbox has been replaced with a messages view, and message management is handled by a WP7 hub. The hub presents emails, tweets, and IMs from Comcast and other viewers the user follows on Twitter.  The popular view orders shows based on the users viewing history and current cable package. The first show Glee is both popular and participating in a conceptual co-marketing effort, so it receives prime positioning. The second spot goes to a hit show on a premium channel, in this example HBOs The Pacific, encouraging viewers to upgrade for this premium content. The remaining spots are ordered based on viewing history and popularity. Tapping the play button moves the user to the theatre where they can watch previews or full episodes streaming from Fancast. Tapping an extra presents the user with show details as well as interactive content that may be included as part of co-marketing efforts. Co-Marketing with Dynamic Content The success of Comcasts services are tied to the success of the networks and shows it purveys, making co-marketing efforts essential. In this concept FOX is co-marketing its popular show Glee. A customized panorama is updated with the latest gleeks tweets, streaming HD episodes, and extras featuring photos and video of the cast. If WP7 apps can be dynamically extended with web hosted .xap files, including sandboxed partner experiences would enable interactive features such as the Gleek Peek, in which a viewer can select a character from a panorama to view the actors profile. This dynamic inline experience has a tailored appeal to aspiring creatives and is technically possible with Windows Phone 7.   Summary The conceptual Comcast mobile app for Windows Phone 7 highlights just a few of the incredible experiences and business opportunities that can be unlocked with this latest mobile solution. It is critical that organizations recognize and take full advantage of these new capabilities. Simply porting existing mobile applications does not leverage these powerful tools; re-examining existing applications and upgrading them to Windows Phone 7 will prove essential to the continued growth and success of your brand.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.

  Read the article

• Squibbly: LibreOffice Integration Framework for the Java Desktop

  - by Geertjan

  Squibbly is a new framework for Java desktop applications that need to integrate with LibreOffice, or more generally, need office features as part of a Java desktop solution that could include, for example, JavaFX components. Here's what it looks like, right now, on Ubuntu 13.04: Why is the framework called Squibbly? Because I needed a unique-ish name, because "squibble" sounds a bit like "scribble" (which is what one does with text documents, etc), and because of the many absurd definitions in the Urban Dictionary for the apparently real word "squibble", e.g., "A name for someone who is squibblish in nature." And, another e.g., "A squibble is a small squabble. A squabble is a little skirmish." But the real reason is the first definition (and definitely not the fourth definition): "Taking a small portion of another persons something, such as a small hit off of a pipe, a bite of food, a sip of a drink, or drag of a cigarette." In other words, I took (or "squibbled") a small portion of LibreOffice, i.e., OfficeBean, and integrated it into a NetBeans Platform application. Now anyone can add new features to it, to do anything they need, such as create a legislative software system as Propylon has done with their own solution on the NetBeans Platform: For me, the starting point was Chuk Munn Lee's similar solution from some years ago. However, he uses reflection a lot in that solution, because he didn't want to bundle the related JARs with the application. I understand that benefit but I find it even more beneficial to not need to require the user to specify the location of the LibreOffice location, since all the necessary JARs and native libraries (currently 32-bit Linux only, by the way) are bundled with the application. Plus, hundreds of lines of reflection code, as in Chuk's solution, is not fun to work with at all. Switching between applications is done like this: It's a work in progress, a proof of concept only. Just the result of a few hours of work to get the basic integration to work. Several problems remain, some of them potentially unsolvable, starting with these, but others will be added here as I identify them: Window management problems. I'd like to let the user have multiple LibreOffice applications and documents open at the same time, each in a new TopComponent. However, I haven't figured out how to do that. Right now, each application is opened into the same TopComponent, replacing the currently open application. I don't know the OfficeBean API well enough, e.g., should a single OfficeBean be shared among multiple TopComponents or should each of them have their own instance of it? Focus problems. When putting the application behind other applications and then switching back to the application, typing text becomes impossible. When closing a TopComponent and reopening it, the content is lost completely. Somehow the loss of focus, and then the return of focus, disables something. No idea how to fix that. The project is checked into this location, which isn't public yet, so you can't access it yet. Once it's publicly available, it would be great to get some code contributions and tweaks, etc. https://java.net/projects/squibbly Here's the source structure, showing especially how the OfficeBean JARs and native libraries (currently for Linux 32-bit only) fit in: Ultimately, would be cool to integrate or share code with http://joeffice.com!

  Read the article

• LINQ to Twitter v2.1.09 Released

  - by Joe Mayo

  Originally posted on: http://geekswithblogs.net/WinAZ/archive/2013/10/15/linq-to-twitter-v2.1.09-released.aspxToday, I released LINQ to Twitter v2.1.09. Here are important new changes. Bug Fixes This is primarily a bug fix release. Most notably, there were authentication problems in WinRT apps. This is now fixed. New Features One new feature is the addition of ApplicationOnlyAuthentication for WinRT. It is fully async.  Here’s how it works: var auth = new WinRtApplicationOnlyAuthorizer { Credentials = new InMemoryCredentials { ConsumerKey = "", ConsumerSecret = "" } }; if (auth == null || !auth.IsAuthorized) { await auth.AuthorizeAsync(); } var twitterCtx = new TwitterContext(auth); (from search in twitterCtx.Search where search.Type == SearchType.Search && search.Query == SearchTextBox.Text select search) .MaterializedAsyncCallback( async response => await Dispatcher.RunAsync( CoreDispatcherPriority.Normal, async () => { Search searchResponse = response.State.Single(); string message = string.Format( "Search returned {0} statuses", searchResponse.Statuses.Count); await new MessageDialog(message, "Search Complete").ShowAsync(); })); It’s called the WinRtApplicationOnlyAuthorizer. You only need two tokens, ConsumerKey and ConsumerSecret, which come from your Twitter API application settings page. Note: You need a Twitter Application, which you can create at https://dev.twitter.com/. The MaterializedAsyncCallback materializes your query and handles the response. I put everything together in a lambda for demonstration purposes, but you can always replace the callback with a handler of type Action<TwitterAsyncResponse<IEnumerable<T>>>, where T is Search for this example. On the Horizon The next version of LINQ to Twitter is in development. I discussed it at LINQ to Twitter Async. This isn’t complete, but you can download the source code at the LINQ to Twitter site on CodePlex. I’ve competed all the spikes for what I thought would be the hard parts and now have prototypes of queries and commands working. This would be a good time to provide feedback if there are features in the current version that you think could be improved. The current driving forces for the next version will be async and PCL.   @JoeMayo

  Read the article

• Gnome-shell fails to load on 12.10

  - by Githlar

  I'm usually the one answering questions, but in this I'm throughly stumped! My Setup: Ubuntu 12.10 (Dist upgrade form 12.04) ATI M96 [Mobility Radeon HD 4650] Upon the first installation of 12.10 I had all kinds of issues getting the Legacy ATI drivers to install (I guess the source for the drivers isn't kosher with kernel 3.5). So, I added the repository ppa:makson96/fglrx - which has a version of the ATI source patched to work with kernel 3.5. After installation of fglrx-legacy from that PPA, gnome-shell and all my graphics work fine... until today. The Problem I unsuspended my computer today and the screen was black (not off, the black from the gnome lock screen). I'd move my mouse/hit a key and the background would flash and then it'd go back to black. Restarted via VT1 Logged into Gnome (gnome-shell) session, but no gnome-shell! Investigation: First, I went to VT1 and tried export DISPLAY=:0;gnome-shell --replace. It appeared to work fine, switch back to X and nothing. Went back to VT1 and saw this error message: JS ERROR: !!! Exception was: TypeError: Object 0x7fc748129c30 is not a subclass of (null), it's a xO JS ERROR: !!! message = '"Object 0x7fc748129c30 is not a subclass of (null), it's a xO"' JS ERROR: !!! fileName = '"/usr/share/gnome-shell/js/ui/tweener.js"' JS ERROR: !!! lineNumber = '218' JS ERROR: !!! stack = '"()@/usr/share/gnome-shell/js/ui/tweener.js:218 wrapper()@/usr/share/gjs-1.0/lang.js:204 ()@/usr/share/gjs-1.0/lang.js:145 ()@/usr/share/gjs-1.0/lang.js:239 init()@/usr/share/gnome-shell/js/ui/tweener.js:49 init()@/usr/share/gnome-shell/js/ui/environment.js:96 @<main>:1 "' Window manager warning: Log level 32: Execution of main.js threw exception: TypeError: Object 0x7fc748129c30 is not a subclass of (null), it's a xO Note: Everywhere it says "it's a xO", xO is actually garbled and changes every time (I'm thinking memory corruption?) This error is thrown by line 96 of /usr/share/gnome-shell/js/ui/environment.js: tweener.Init() Did a purge of fglrx-legacy, reboot, reinstall fglrx-legacy, reboot... same thing. Did a ppa-purge of ppa:gnome3-team/gnome3, and reinstalled gnome-shell and ubuntu-desktop from the standard repositores... same thing. I'm really at a loss here. I love gnome-shell and after using it for nearly a year now gnome classic just seems so archaic. Additional Information Apt log from the day I first suspended my machine (these are upgrades from the gnome3-team/gnome3 ppa and ubuntu-wine/ppa ppa): Start-Date: 2012-11-24 17:30:28 Commandline: aptdaemon role='role-commit-packages' sender=':1.618' Install: gkbd-capplet:amd64 (3.6.0-0ubuntu1), gnome-control-center-unity:amd64 (1.0-0ubuntu1~ubuntu12.10.1) Upgrade: nautilus:amd64 (3.6.2-0ubuntu0.1~quantal1, 3.6.3-0ubuntu2~ubuntu12.10.1), libgnome-control-center1:amd64 (3.4.2-0ubuntu19, 3.6.3-0ubuntu6~ubuntu12.10.1), wine1.5-i386:i386 (1.5.17-0ubuntu4, 1.5.18-0ubuntu1), wine1.5:amd64 (1.5.17-0ubuntu4, 1.5.18-0ubuntu1), gnome-settings-daemon:amd64 (3.4.2-0ubuntu14, 3.6.3-0ubuntu1~ubuntu12.10.1), gnome-control-center-data:amd64 (3.4.2-0ubuntu19, 3.6.3-0ubuntu6~ubuntu12.10.1), gnome-accessibility-themes:amd64 (3.6.0.2-0ubuntu1, 3.6.2-0ubuntu2~ubuntu12.10.1), gnome-themes-standard:amd64 (3.6.0.2-0ubuntu1, 3.6.2-0ubuntu2~ubuntu12.10.1), wine1.5-amd64:amd64 (1.5.17-0ubuntu4, 1.5.18-0ubuntu1), nautilus-data:amd64 (3.6.2-0ubuntu0.1~quantal1, 3.6.3-0ubuntu2~ubuntu12.10.1), gnome-control-center:amd64 (3.4.2-0ubuntu19, 3.6.3-0ubuntu6~ubuntu12.10.1), libnautilus-extension1a:amd64 (3.6.2-0ubuntu0.1~quantal1, 3.6.3-0ubuntu2~ubuntu12.10.1) End-Date: 2012-11-24 17:31:32 fglrxinfo (driver appears to be working): display: :0 screen: 0 OpenGL vendor string: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. OpenGL renderer string: ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4650 OpenGL version string: 3.3.11653 Compatibility Profile Context Does anybody have any further ideas?

  Read the article

• How do you make a bullet ricochet off a vertical wall?

  - by Bagofsheep

  First things first. I am using C# with XNA. My game is top-down and the player can shoot bullets. I've managed to get the bullets to ricochet correctly off horizontal walls. Yet, despite using similar methods (e.g. http://stackoverflow.com/questions/3203952/mirroring-an-angle) and reading other answered questions about this subject I have not been able to get the bullets to ricochet off a vertical wall correctly. Any method I've tried has failed and sometimes made ricocheting off a horizontal wall buggy. Here is the collision code that calls the ricochet method: //Loop through returned tile rectangles from quad tree to test for wall collision. If a collision occurs perform collision logic. for (int r = 0; r < returnObjects.Count; r++) if (Bullets[i].BoundingRectangle.Intersects(returnObjects[r])) Bullets[i].doCollision(returnObjects[r]); Now here is the code for the doCollision method. public void doCollision(Rectangle surface) { if (Ricochet) doRicochet(surface); else Trash = true; } Finally, here is the code for the doRicochet method. public void doRicochet(Rectangle surface) { if (Position.X > surface.Left && Position.X < surface.Right) { //Mirror the bullet's angle. Rotation = -1 * Rotation; //Moves the bullet in the direction of its rotation by given amount. moveFaceDirection(Sprite.Width * BulletScale.X); } else if (Position.Y > surface.Top && Position.Y < surface.Bottom) { } } Since I am only dealing with vertical and horizontal walls at the moment, the if statements simply determine if the object is colliding from the right or left, or from the top or bottom. If the object's X position is within the boundaries of the tile's X boundaries (left and right sides), it must be colliding from the top, and vice verse. As you can see, the else if statement is empty and is where the correct code needs to go.

  Read the article

• Why are my scene's depth values not being written to my DepthStencilView?

  - by dotminic

  I'm rendering to a depth map in order to use it as a shader resource view, but when I sample the depth map in my shader, the red component has a value of 1 while all other channels have a value of 0. The Texture2D I use to create the DepthStencilView is bound with the D3D11_BIND_DEPTH_STENCIL | D3D11_BIND_SHADER_RESOURCE flags, the DepthStencilView has the DXGI_FORMAT_D32_FLOAT format, and the ShaderResourceView's format is D3D11_SRV_DIMENSION_TEXTURE2D. I'm setting the depth map render target, then i'm drawing my scene, and once that is done, I'm the back buffer render target and depth stencil are set on the output merger, and I'm using the depth map shader resource view as a texture in my shader, but the depth value in the red channel is constantly 1. I'm not getting any runtime errors from D3D, and no compile time warning or anything. I'm not sure what I'm missing here at all. I have the impression the depth value is always being set to 1. I have not set any depth/stencil states, and AFAICT depth writing is enabled by default. The geometry is being rendered correctly so I'm pretty sure depth writing is enabled. The device is created with the appropriate debug flags; #if defined(DEBUG) || defined(_DEBUG) deviceFlags |= D3D11_CREATE_DEVICE_DEBUG | D3D11_RLDO_DETAIL; #endif This is how I create my depth map. I've omitted error checking for the sake of brevity D3D11_TEXTURE2D_DESC td; td.Width = width; td.Height = height; td.MipLevels = 1; td.ArraySize = 1; td.Format = DXGI_FORMAT_R32_TYPELESS; td.SampleDesc.Count = 1; td.SampleDesc.Quality = 0; td.Usage = D3D11_USAGE_DEFAULT; td.BindFlags = D3D11_BIND_DEPTH_STENCIL | D3D11_BIND_SHADER_RESOURCE; td.CPUAccessFlags = 0; td.MiscFlags = 0; _device->CreateTexture2D(&texDesc, 0, &this->_depthMap); D3D11_DEPTH_STENCIL_VIEW_DESC dsvd; ZeroMemory(&dsvd, sizeof(dsvd)); dsvd.Format = DXGI_FORMAT_D32_FLOAT; dsvd.ViewDimension = D3D11_DSV_DIMENSION_TEXTURE2D; dsvd.Texture2D.MipSlice = 0; _device->CreateDepthStencilView(this->_depthMap, &dsvd, &this->_dmapDSV); D3D11_SHADER_RESOURCE_VIEW_DESC srvd; srvd.Format = DXGI_FORMAT_R32_FLOAT; srvd.ViewDimension = D3D11_SRV_DIMENSION_TEXTURE2D; srvd.Texture2D.MipLevels = texDesc.MipLevels; srvd.Texture2D.MostDetailedMip = 0; _device->CreateShaderResourceView(this->_depthMap, &srvd, &this->_dmapSRV);

  Read the article

• Does it make the game more fun when the user is forced to progress through the levels sequentially rather than letting them pick and play?

  - by BeachRunnerJoe

  Hello. For the first time in my game, I'm stuck with a real design dilemma. I guess that's a good thing ;) I'm building a word puzzle game that has five levels, each with 30 puzzles. Currently, the user has to solve one puzzle at a time before moving to the next. However, I'm finding the user occasionally gets stuck on a puzzle, at which point they can no longer play until they solve it. This is obviously bad because many people will probably just quit playing the game and delete the app. The only elegant solution I can find to helping the player get unstuck is changing the design of the game to allow the users to pick any puzzle to play at any time. This way, if they get stuck, they can come back to it later and at least they have other puzzles to play in the meantime. It's my opinion, however, that this new flow design doesn't make the game as fun as the original flow design where the player has to complete a puzzle before moving to the next. To me, it's like anything else, when you only have one of something, it's more enjoyable, but when you have 30 of something, it's far less enjoyable. In fact, when I present the user with 30 puzzles to choose from, I'm concerned I might be making them feel like it's a lot of work they have to do and that's bad. I even had a tester voluntarily tell me that being forced to complete a puzzle before moving to the next is actually motivating. My questions are... Do you agree/disagree? Do you have any suggestions for how I can help the player get unstuck? Thanks so much in advance for your thoughts! EDIT: I should mention that I've already considered a few other solutions to helping the user get unstuck, but none of them seem like good ideas. They are... Add more hints: Currently, the user gets two hints per puzzle. If I increase the hint count, it only makes the game more easy and still leaves the possibility of the user getting stuck. Add a "Show Solution" button: This seems like a bad idea because it's my opinion this takes the fun out of the game for many people who would probably otherwise solve the puzzle if they didn't have the quick option to see the solution.

  Read the article

• Red Meat's Music is Rare - and Well Done

  - by Oracle OpenWorld Blog Team

  By Karen Shamban The blogger has questions; San Francisco-based country band Red Meat has answers. Although we forgot to ask how they got their band name, dang it. Read on and enjoy the honesty and insight. Q. What do you like best about performing in front of a live audience?A. Probably just having fun and entertaining the audience. We've been together for almost two decades, and in that time we've played for crowds of five people, and for crowds of more than 15,000. Both are equally important to us, and just as fun. We turn Jill and Smelley loose on the between-songs repartee, and let the songs shine through. On the best night, we feed on the audience's love and vice-versa. It's emotional vampirism of the best sort. [Blogger's note: now that whole "red meat" thing is starting to make sense ...] Q. Do you prefer smaller, intimate venues or larger, louder ones? Why?A. We love both. Whether it's a chance to connect with a small room or huge audience, we always try to hit 'em between the eyes! Q. What about your fans surprises you?A. Since we've been together for so long, we're pretty much on our third generation of fans now. We're excited that the Bakersfield sound has that same effect on the new, younger fans as it did on the punk rockers that we played to 20 years ago. And we still see them at our shows too! Q. What about your live act surprises your fans?A. For people who haven't seen Red Meat before, they may be dragged to a show thinking they don't like country music. But they're surprised to hear it done in a way that excites them so much. We get a lot of first-timers coming up to us after a performance and asking, "Wait, THAT'S what country music can sound like?" Q. There are going to be a lot of technical people (you could call them geeks) in the Oracle crowd - what are they going to love about your performance?A. Just what everyone loves about a Red Meat show - the chance to drink beer, dance, get rowdy, and have a great time. Q. Have you been on tour recently? If so, what do you like about touring, and what do you dislike?A. Actually, we're going to be coming off the road immediately into the Oracle OpenWorld Music Festival, having just played some Texas dates. On tour, we love playing for fans who don't get to see us as often as our California fans do. And food. Most of our conversations in the van center around food. Q. Ever think about playing another kind of music? If so, what, and why?A. Our tastes and influences in the band run all over the place. Obviously we love the Bakersfield artists - Buck Owens, Merle Haggard, Dwight Yoakam - but we love other types of roots music as well, along with the Beatles, NRBQ, MC5, punk/new wave, and countless bar bands that we've had the privilege of playing with through the years. But as far as playing a different kind of music as Red Meat? Nah. We love what we're doing. Q. What are the top three things people should know about your music?A1. Country music, done right, has unlimited soul.A2. Red Meat is a modern band, playing original material, with a great debt to the Bakersfield sound of Buck Owens and Merle Haggard.A3. It's FUN. More details on the Festival and the band: Oracle OpenWorld Music Festival Red Meat

  Read the article

• How to cleanly add after-the-fact commits from the same feature into git tree

  - by Dennis

  I am one of two developers on a system. I make most of the commits at this time period. My current git workflow is as such: there is master branch only (no develop/release) I make a new branch when I want to do a feature, do lots of commits, and then when I'm done, I merge that branch back into master, and usually push it to remote. ...except, I am usually not done. I often come back to alter one thing or another and every time I think it is done, but it can be 3-4 commits before I am really done and move onto something else. Problem The problem I have now is that .. my feature branch tree is merged and pushed into master and remote master, and then I realize that I am not really done with that feature, as in I have finishing touches I want to add, where finishing touches may be cosmetic only, or may be significant, but they still belong to that one feature I just worked on. What I do now Currently, when I have extra after-the-fact commits like this, I solve this problem by rolling back my merge, and re-merging my feature branch into master with my new commits, and I do that so that git tree looks clean. One clean feature branch branched out of master and merged back into it. I then push --force my changes to origin, since my origin doesn't see much traffic at the moment, so I can almost count that things will be safe, or I can even talk to other dev if I have to coordinate. But I know it is not a good way to do this in general, as it rewrites what others may have already pulled, causing potential issues. And it did happen even with my dev, where git had to do an extra weird merge when our trees diverged. Other ways to solve this which I deem to be not so great Next best way is to just make those extra commits to the master branch directly, be it fast-forward merge, or not. It doesn't make the tree look as pretty as in my current way I'm solving this, but then it's not rewriting history. Yet another way is to wait. Maybe wait 24 hours and not push things to origin. That way I can rewrite things as I see fit. The con of this approach is time wasted waiting, when people may be waiting for a fix now. Yet another way is to make a "new" feature branch every time I realize I need to fix something extra. I may end up with things like feature-branch feature-branch-html-fix, feature-branch-checkbox-fix, and so on, kind of polluting the git tree somewhat. Is there a way to manage what I am trying to do without the drawbacks I described? I'm going for clean-looking history here, but maybe I need to drop this goal, if technically it is not a possibility.

  Read the article

< Previous Page | 392 393 394 395 396 397 398 399 400 401 402 403  | Next Page >