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  • [Python] Tips for making a fraction calculator code more optimized (faster and using less memory)

    - by Logic Named Joe
    Hello Everyone, Basicly, what I need for the program to do is to act a as simple fraction calculator (for addition, subtraction, multiplication and division) for the a single line of input, for example: -input: 1/7 + 3/5 -output: 26/35 My initial code: import sys def euclid(numA, numB): while numB != 0: numRem = numA % numB numA = numB numB = numRem return numA for wejscie in sys.stdin: wyjscie = wejscie.split(' ') a, b = [int(x) for x in wyjscie[0].split("/")] c, d = [int(x) for x in wyjscie[2].split("/")] if wyjscie[1] == '+': licz = a * d + b * c mian= b * d nwd = euclid(licz, mian) konA = licz/nwd konB = mian/nwd wynik = str(konA) + '/' + str(konB) print(wynik) elif wyjscie[1] == '-': licz= a * d - b * c mian= b * d nwd = euclid(licz, mian) konA = licz/nwd konB = mian/nwd wynik = str(konA) + '/' + str(konB) print(wynik) elif wyjscie[1] == '*': licz= a * c mian= b * d nwd = euclid(licz, mian) konA = licz/nwd konB = mian/nwd wynik = str(konA) + '/' + str(konB) print(wynik) else: licz= a * d mian= b * c nwd = euclid(licz, mian) konA = licz/nwd konB = mian/nwd wynik = str(konA) + '/' + str(konB) print(wynik) Which I reduced to: import sys def euclid(numA, numB): while numB != 0: numRem = numA % numB numA = numB numB = numRem return numA for wejscie in sys.stdin: wyjscie = wejscie.split(' ') a, b = [int(x) for x in wyjscie[0].split("/")] c, d = [int(x) for x in wyjscie[2].split("/")] if wyjscie[1] == '+': print("/".join([str((a * d + b * c)/euclid(a * d + b * c, b * d)),str((b * d)/euclid(a * d + b * c, b * d))])) elif wyjscie[1] == '-': print("/".join([str((a * d - b * c)/euclid(a * d - b * c, b * d)),str((b * d)/euclid(a * d - b * c, b * d))])) elif wyjscie[1] == '*': print("/".join([str((a * c)/euclid(a * c, b * d)),str((b * d)/euclid(a * c, b * d))])) else: print("/".join([str((a * d)/euclid(a * d, b * c)),str((b * c)/euclid(a * d, b * c))])) Any advice on how to improve this futher is welcome. Edit: one more thing that I forgot to mention - the code can not make use of any libraries apart from sys.

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  • Parsing SQLIO Output to Excel Charts using Regex in PowerShell

    - by Jonathan Kehayias
    Today Joe Webb ( Blog | Twitter ) blogged about The Power of Regex in Powershell, and in his post he shows how to parse the SQL Server Error Log for events of interest.  At the end of his blog post Joe asked about other places where Regular Expressions have been useful in PowerShell so I thought I’d blog my script for parsing SQLIO output using Regex in PowerShell, to populate an Excel worksheet and build charts based on the results automatically. If you’ve never used SQLIO, Brent Ozar ( Blog...(read more)

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  • Parsing SQLIO Output to Excel Charts using Regex in PowerShell

    - by Jonathan Kehayias
    Today Joe Webb ( Blog | Twitter ) blogged about The Power of Regex in Powershell, and in his post he shows how to parse the SQL Server Error Log for events of interest. At the end of his blog post Joe asked about other places where Regular Expressions have been useful in PowerShell so I thought I’d blog my script for parsing SQLIO output using Regex in PowerShell, to populate an Excel worksheet and build charts based on the results automatically. If you’ve never used SQLIO, Brent Ozar ( Blog | Twitter...(read more)

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  • Programming logic to group a users activities like facebook. E.g. Chris is now friends with A, B and C

    - by Chris Dowdeswell
    So I am trying to develop an activity feed for my site, Basically If I UNION a bunch of activities into a feed I would end up with something like the following. Chris is now friends with Mark Chris is now friends with Dave What I want though is a neater way of grouping these similar posts so the feed doesn't give information overload... E.g. Chris is now friends with Mark, Dave and 4 Others Any ideas on how I can approach this logically? I am using Classic ASP on SQL server. Here is the UNION statement I have so far... SELECT U.UserID As UserID, L.UN As UN,Left(U.UID,13) As ProfilePic,U.Fname + ' ' + U.Sname As FullName, 'said ' + WP.Post AS Activity, WP.Ctime FROM Users AS U LEFT JOIN Logins L ON L.userID = U.UserID LEFT OUTER JOIN WallPosts AS WP ON WP.userID = U.userID WHERE WP.Ctime IS NOT NULL UNION SELECT U.UserID As UserID, L.UN As UN,Left(U.UID,13) As ProfilePic,U.Fname + ' ' + U.Sname As FullName, 'commented ' + C.Comment AS Activity, C.Ctime FROM Users AS U LEFT JOIN Logins L ON L.userID = U.UserID LEFT OUTER JOIN Comments AS C ON C.UserID = U.userID WHERE C.Ctime IS NOT NULL UNION SELECT U.UserID As UserID, L.UN As UN,Left(U.UID,13) As ProfilePic, U.Fname + ' ' + U.Sname As FullName, 'connected with <a href="/profile.asp?un='+(SELECT Logins.un FROM Logins WHERE Logins.userID = Cn.ToUserID)+'">' + (SELECT Users.Fname + ' ' + Users.Sname FROM Users WHERE userID = Cn.ToUserID) + '</a>' AS Activity, Cn.Ctime FROM Users AS U LEFT JOIN Logins L ON L.userID = U.UserID LEFT OUTER JOIN Connections AS Cn ON Cn.UserID = U.userID WHERE CN.Ctime IS NOT NULL

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  • The Missing Post

    - by Joe Mayo
    It’s somewhat of a mystery how the writing process can conjure up results that weren’t initially intended. Case in point is the fact that another post was planned to be in place of this one, but it never made the light of day.  This particular post started off as an introduction to a technology I had just learned, used, and wanted to share the experience with others.  The beginning was fun and demonstrated how easy it was to get started.  One of the things I’ve been pondering over time is that the Web is filled with introductions to new technologies and quick first looks, so I set out to add more depth, share lessons learned, and generally help you avoid the problems I encountered along the way; problems being a key theme of why you aren’t reading that post at this very minute.  Problems that curiously came from nowhere to thwart my good intentions. Success was sweet when using the tool for the prototypical demo scenario. The thing is, I intended the tool to accomplish a real task.  Having embarked on the path toward getting the job done, glitches began creeping into the process.  Realizing that this was all a bit new, I had patience and found a suitable work-around, but this was to be short lived. As in marching ants to a freshly laid out picnic, the problems kept coming until I had to get up and walk away.  Not to be outdone, sheer will and brute force manual intervention led to mission accomplishment.  Though I kept a positive outlook and was pleased at the final result, the process of using the tool had somewhat soured. Regardless of a less than stellar experience with the tool, I have a great deal of respect for the company that produced it and the people who built it. Perhaps I empathize for what they might feel after reading a post that details such deficiencies in their product.  Sure, if you’re in this business, you’ve got to have a thick skin; brush it off, fix the problem, and move on to greatness. But, today I feel like they’re people and are probably already aware of any issues I would seemingly reveal.  Anyone who builds a product or provides a service takes a lot of pride in what they do.  Sometimes they screw up and if their worth a dime, they make it up. I think that will happen in this case and there’s no reason why I should post information that has the potential to sound more negative than helpful.  While no one would ever notice or care either way, I’m posting something that won’t harm. Joe

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  • Replacement of Outlooksoft (SAP BPC) with Oracle EPM at Brady Corporation

    Nigel Youell, Product Marketing Director, Enterprise Performance Management Applications at Oracle discusses with Joe Bittorf, Project Manager at Brady Corporation why and how they embarked on this major project to replace SAP BPC with Oracle's Enterprise Performance Management Solution. Joe covers the outstanding improvements they have achieved in their financial close process, how they worked with Oracle Partner Emerging Solutions and the current project to further improve their planning and budgeting processes.

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  • ADF Mobile @ Oracle Open World 2012 - A Look Back...

    - by Joe Huang
    Hi, everyone: It's been a little over two weeks since the end of Oracle Open World 2012, and hope everyone has recovered sufficiently.  We have seen a tremendous amount of coverage on Oracle ADF Mobile during this Oracle Open World.  For starters, ADF Mobile demo booth was positioned in the Oracle Red Lounge in Moscone North, where all new and innovative technologies are being demonstrated.  The booth is liternally out front and the first booth in the area, and we had a lot of interested attendees talking to us.  It feels like ADF Mobile has finally arrived on the big stage. There are numerous sessions and hands on labs that covers ADF Mobile.  Details can be found in Oracle Open World page.   The Oracle Cloud: Oracle's Cloud Platofrm and Application Strategy by Thomas Kurian (Keynote) Near the beginning of the keynote, showing a great analytics application built using ADF Mobile  Oracle Fusion Middleware Strategies Driving Business Innovation by Hasan Rizvi (Keynote) The Future of Development for Oracle Fusion—From Desktop to Mobile to Cloud by Chris Tonas (General Session) Co-presented with Accenture, an ADF Mobile Beta Partner Extend Oracle Fusion Apps to Tablets/Smartphones with Oracle Mobile Technology (General Session) Extend Oracle Applications to Mobile Devices with Oracle’s Mobile Technologies (General Session) Building Mobile Applications with Oracle Cloud (General Session) Mobile-Enable Oracle Fusion Middleware and Enterprise Applications with Oracle ADF (Conference Session) Co-presented with Infosys, an ADF Mobile Beta Partner Develop On-Device iPhone and iPad Apps Without Writing Any Objective-C Code (Oracle Develop Session) Mobile Apps for Oracle E-Business Suite with Oracle ADF Mobile and Oracle SOA Suite (Conference Session) Developing Applications for Mobile iOS and Android Devices with Oracle ADF Mobile (Hands on Lab) This lab was repeated 8 (!) times Build Mobile Applications for Oracle E-business Suite (Hands on Lab) It was an extremely busy Open World for the team, and we were in the middle of trying to release ADF Mobile!   By far, the most memorable event during Open World was the ADF Meett Up at the OTN Lounge, where beers were flowing (for a little while) and familiar names are finally matched with faces.  We also appreciate the opportunity to interview the attendees from New Caledonia - sorry we probably surprised you with the video record, and many thanks for coming through for us. I also want to thank my fellow ADF Mobile and Fusion Middleware team members - from product managers, engineers, and product marketing, everyone worked extremely hard to make this Open World a great success for ADF Mobile. I really enjoyed meeting everyone at Oracle Open World, at the booth, sessions, etc.   Now it's on to release ADF Mobile - for real! Thanks, Joe Huang PS: If this thread shows up on your RSS feed, please keep watching...

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  • ASP.NET MVC for the Rest of Us Videos now available

    - by Jim Duffy
    Microsoft Senior Program Manager, Joe Stagner, has released his first 3 ASP.NET MVC for the Rest of Us Videos. I like the way he helps you learn ASP.NET MVC by building bridges between ASP.NET MVC concepts & ideas and ASP.NET WebForms concepts & ideas which you may already be comfortable working with. Good job Joe. Have a day. :-|

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  • Using Treelist Values to Query a Sitecore Item

    - by kirk.burleson
    I have an item named All Recipes that contains recipes named R1, R2, and R3. I have another item named My Recipes that has a treelist field named Recipes and it contains selected values R2 and R3 from the All Recipes item. The query I'm trying to write is for the Items field of an RSS Feed. What is the query syntax to show the items in All Recipes that appear in the Recipes field of My Recipes?

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  • `gem install mongrel` fails with ruby 1.9.1

    - by atlantis
    I initiated myself into rails development yesterday. I installed ruby 1.9.1, rubygems and rails. Running gem install mongrel worked fine and ostensibly installed mongrel too. I am slightly puzzled because: script/server starts webrick by default which mongrel returns nothing locate mongrel returns lots of entries like /Developer/SDKs/MacOSX10.5.sdk/System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/1.8/usr/lib/ruby/gems/1.8/gems/mongrel-1.0.1 /Developer/SDKs/MacOSX10.5.sdk/System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/1.8/usr/lib/ruby/gems/1.8/gems/mongrel-1.0.1/lib /Developer/SDKs/MacOSX10.5.sdk/System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/1.8/usr/lib/ruby/gems/1.8/gems/mongrel-1.0.1/lib/mongrel . . . /usr/local/bin/mongrel_rails /usr/local/lib/ruby/gems/1.9.1/cache/mongrel-1.1.5.gem /usr/local/lib/ruby/gems/1.9.1/doc/actionpack-2.3.2/rdoc/files/lib/action_controller/vendor/rack-1_0/rack/handler/evented_mongrel_rb.html /usr/local/lib/ruby/gems/1.9.1/doc/actionpack-2.3.2/rdoc/files/lib/action_controller/vendor/rack-1_0/rack/handler/mongrel_rb.html /usr/local/lib/ruby/gems/1.9.1/doc/actionpack-2.3.2/rdoc/files/lib/action_controller/vendor/rack-1_0/rack/handler/swiftiplied_mongrel_rb.html /usr/local/lib/ruby/gems/1.9.1/gems/actionpack-2.3.2/lib/action_controller/vendor/rack-1.0/rack/handler/evented_mongrel.rb /usr/local/lib/ruby/gems/1.9.1/gems/actionpack-2.3.2/lib/action_controller/vendor/rack-1.0/rack/handler/mongrel.rb /usr/local/lib/ruby/gems/1.9.1/gems/actionpack-2.3.2/lib/action_controller/vendor/rack-1.0/rack/handler/swiftiplied_mongrel.rb /usr/local/lib/ruby/gems/1.9.1/gems/mongrel-1.1.5 . . . Does look like I have mongrel installed (both the default installation and my custom install). So why doesn't which mongrel return something. Also trying to reinstall mongrel using gem install mongrel returns throws its own set of exceptions: Building native extensions. This could take a while... ERROR: Error installing mongrel: ERROR: Failed to build gem native extension. /usr/local/bin/ruby extconf.rb install mongrel checking for main() in -lc... yes creating Makefile make gcc -I. -I/usr/local/include/ruby-1.9.1/i386-darwin9.7.0 -I/usr/local/include/ruby-1.9.1/ruby/backward -I/usr/local/include/ruby-1.9.1 -I. -D_XOPEN_SOURCE -D_DARWIN_C_SOURCE -fno-common -D_XOPEN_SOURCE=1 -O2 -g -Wall -Wno-parentheses -fno-common -pipe -fno-common -o http11.o -c http11.c http11.c: In function 'http_field': http11.c:77: error: 'struct RString' has no member named 'ptr' http11.c:77: error: 'struct RString' has no member named 'len' http11.c:77: warning: left-hand operand of comma expression has no effect http11.c:77: warning: statement with no effect http11.c: In function 'header_done': http11.c:172: error: 'struct RString' has no member named 'ptr' http11.c:174: error: 'struct RString' has no member named 'ptr' http11.c:176: error: 'struct RString' has no member named 'ptr' http11.c:177: error: 'struct RString' has no member named 'len' http11.c: In function 'HttpParser_execute': http11.c:298: error: 'struct RString' has no member named 'ptr' http11.c:299: error: 'struct RString' has no member named 'len' make: *** [http11.o] Error 1

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  • gem install of mongrel

    - by atlantis
    I initiated myself into rails development yesterday. I installed ruby 1.9.1 , rubygems and rails. Running 'gem install mongrel' worked fine and ostensibly installed mongrel too. I am slightly puzzled because script/server starts webrick by default 'which mongrel' returns nothing 'locate mongrel' returns lots of entries like . /Developer/SDKs/MacOSX10.5.sdk/System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/1.8/usr/lib/ruby/gems/1.8/gems/mongrel-1.0.1 /Developer/SDKs/MacOSX10.5.sdk/System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/1.8/usr/lib/ruby/gems/1.8/gems/mongrel-1.0.1/lib /Developer/SDKs/MacOSX10.5.sdk/System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/1.8/usr/lib/ruby/gems/1.8/gems/mongrel-1.0.1/lib/mongrel . . . /usr/local/bin/mongrel_rails /usr/local/lib/ruby/gems/1.9.1/cache/mongrel-1.1.5.gem /usr/local/lib/ruby/gems/1.9.1/doc/actionpack-2.3.2/rdoc/files/lib/action_controller/vendor/rack-1_0/rack/handler/evented_mongrel_rb.html /usr/local/lib/ruby/gems/1.9.1/doc/actionpack-2.3.2/rdoc/files/lib/action_controller/vendor/rack-1_0/rack/handler/mongrel_rb.html /usr/local/lib/ruby/gems/1.9.1/doc/actionpack-2.3.2/rdoc/files/lib/action_controller/vendor/rack-1_0/rack/handler/swiftiplied_mongrel_rb.html /usr/local/lib/ruby/gems/1.9.1/gems/actionpack-2.3.2/lib/action_controller/vendor/rack-1.0/rack/handler/evented_mongrel.rb /usr/local/lib/ruby/gems/1.9.1/gems/actionpack-2.3.2/lib/action_controller/vendor/rack-1.0/rack/handler/mongrel.rb /usr/local/lib/ruby/gems/1.9.1/gems/actionpack-2.3.2/lib/action_controller/vendor/rack-1.0/rack/handler/swiftiplied_mongrel.rb /usr/local/lib/ruby/gems/1.9.1/gems/mongrel-1.1.5 . . . Does look like I have mongrel installed (both the default installation and my custom install). So why doesn't which mongrel return something. Also trying to reinstall mongrel using 'gem install mongrel' returns throws its own set of exceptions : Building native extensions. This could take a while... ERROR: Error installing mongrel: ERROR: Failed to build gem native extension. /usr/local/bin/ruby extconf.rb install mongrel checking for main() in -lc... yes creating Makefile make gcc -I. -I/usr/local/include/ruby-1.9.1/i386-darwin9.7.0 -I/usr/local/include/ruby-1.9.1/ruby/backward -I/usr/local/include/ruby-1.9.1 -I. -D_XOPEN_SOURCE -D_DARWIN_C_SOURCE -fno-common -D_XOPEN_SOURCE=1 -O2 -g -Wall -Wno-parentheses -fno-common -pipe -fno-common -o http11.o -c http11.c http11.c: In function 'http_field': http11.c:77: error: 'struct RString' has no member named 'ptr' http11.c:77: error: 'struct RString' has no member named 'len' http11.c:77: warning: left-hand operand of comma expression has no effect http11.c:77: warning: statement with no effect http11.c: In function 'header_done': http11.c:172: error: 'struct RString' has no member named 'ptr' http11.c:174: error: 'struct RString' has no member named 'ptr' http11.c:176: error: 'struct RString' has no member named 'ptr' http11.c:177: error: 'struct RString' has no member named 'len' http11.c: In function 'HttpParser_execute': http11.c:298: error: 'struct RString' has no member named 'ptr' http11.c:299: error: 'struct RString' has no member named 'len' make: *** [http11.o] Error 1

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  • RAD Visual Web Application Creator/ Builder/ Designer for PHP

    - by inhoue
    Hi all, I want to see if any of you know a (free and open source will be ideal) tool/ app that can help build a php web application very quickly without investing too much time on writing codes, preferring drag and drop/ point and click work-flow designer for logic design (see Agile from Outsystems below). Plus, visual designer for the business logic is great since it can help a developer visualize the logic better. There are a lot of GUI builders, form builders out there, but I am looking for one app for the entire web application development process. My goal is to find an application that a team of developers can use together and use the build-in code of the app as much as possible. E.g. the app will provide a modular just for handle user login or a shopping cart; a developer just need to drag and drop the modular to the logic designer and the code will be generated. This way the functionality will be in a module and code will always be standard across developers. So if a new developer get on-board, he will just need to use the system and get up and running quickly. To explain this better: there is a lot php frameworks, e.g. cakephp, CodeIgniter, etc which I can use to help coding, but still I need to create (code) the GUI, writing quite a bit of codes. I am looking for a tool/ app that is a little more high level than those frameworks. Here is 2 examples apps I found during my google search which they have visual logic designer and gui builder in one single app. Also a single click deployment (but I need it to be php apps or at least I can deploy the (php) code to a LAMP/ WAMP server): Wavemaker: for JAVA Agile from Outsystems: for JAVA or .net (This one is really good, with work-flow drag and drop logic designer!) Talend: it is just an ETL tool, but the concept is what I want to bring up. Drag and drop, point and click logic design. Custom code can be added if it is needed, but the drag and drop process already finished the structure and most of the coding of the web app one needs to build. I want to list Adobe Flex, but it is more like a GUI designer + IDE, not exactly what I want to describe here. The drag and drop/ work-flow logic designer is a key for the app. I could go for the CMS route by learning how to extend them, but it is not that flexible for me and is a long learning curve. Anybody came across this type of app before? Or any idea of how can I find those apps? I googled them for long time, I don't see any of them for php and just few (just 2) for Java. Thanks in advance!

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  • BIND9 / DNS Zone / Dedicated Server / Unique Reverse DNS

    - by user2832131
    I locate a dedicated server in a datacenter with no DNS Zone setup. Datacenter panel have 1 textfield only you can fill one Reverse DNS only. According with datacenter instructions here... [instructions]: http://www.wiki.hetzner.de/index.php/DNS-Reverse-DNS/en#How_can_I_assign_several_names_to_my_IP_address.2C_if_different_domains_are_hosted_on_my_server.3F How_can_I_assign_several_names_to_my_IP_address ...I need to install BIND9 in order to configure other records like CNAME and MX. Ok, I've installed BIND9, created a Master Zone. And following this example, I put it in the Zone File: [example]: http://wiki.hetzner.de/index.php/DNS_Zonendatei/en example $ttl 86400 @ IN SOA ns1.first-ns.de. postmaster.robot.first-ns.de. ( 1383411730 14400 1800 604800 86400 ) @ IN NS ns1.first-ns.de. @ IN NS robotns2.second-ns.de. @ IN NS robotns3.second-ns.com. localhost IN A 127.0.0.1 @ IN A 144.86.786.651 www IN A 144.86.786.651 loopback IN CNAME localhost But when I point my domain to ns1.first-ns.de, DNS Register says "time out". Am I missing something? I created a Master zone. Should it be a Slave zone? named.conf: include "/etc/bind/named.conf.options"; include "/etc/bind/named.conf.local"; include "/etc/bind/named.conf.default-zones"; named.conf.options: options { directory "/var/cache/bind"; dnssec-validation auto; auth-nxdomain no; # conform to RFC1035 listen-on-v6 { any; }; }; named.conf.local: zone "mydomain.com" { type master; file "/var/lib/bind/mydomain.com.hosts"; allow-update {any;}; allow-transfer {any;}; allow-query {any;}; }; named.conf.default-zones: zone "." { type hint; file "/etc/bind/db.root"; }; zone "localhost" { type master; file "/etc/bind/db.local"; }; zone "127.in-addr.arpa" { type master; file "/etc/bind/db.127"; }; zone "0.in-addr.arpa" { type master; file "/etc/bind/db.0"; }; zone "255.in-addr.arpa" { type master; file "/etc/bind/db.255"; }; Problem is that I'm moving my site, and can't update the new NS server due to a 'timeout' message when filling new datacenter NS. I'm filling: MASTER: ns1.first-ns.de SLAVE1: robotns2.second-ns.de SLAVE2: robotns3.second-ns.com

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  • The Sensemaking Spectrum for Business Analytics: Translating from Data to Business Through Analysis

    - by Joe Lamantia
    One of the most compelling outcomes of our strategic research efforts over the past several years is a growing vocabulary that articulates our cumulative understanding of the deep structure of the domains of discovery and business analytics. Modes are one example of the deep structure we’ve found.  After looking at discovery activities across a very wide range of industries, question types, business needs, and problem solving approaches, we've identified distinct and recurring kinds of sensemaking activity, independent of context.  We label these activities Modes: Explore, compare, and comprehend are three of the nine recognizable modes.  Modes describe *how* people go about realizing insights.  (Read more about the programmatic research and formal academic grounding and discussion of the modes here: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/235971352_A_Taxonomy_of_Enterprise_Search_and_Discovery) By analogy to languages, modes are the 'verbs' of discovery activity.  When applied to the practical questions of product strategy and development, the modes of discovery allow one to identify what kinds of analytical activity a product, platform, or solution needs to support across a spread of usage scenarios, and then make concrete and well-informed decisions about every aspect of the solution, from high-level capabilities, to which specific types of information visualizations better enable these scenarios for the types of data users will analyze. The modes are a powerful generative tool for product making, but if you've spent time with young children, or had a really bad hangover (or both at the same time...), you understand the difficult of communicating using only verbs.  So I'm happy to share that we've found traction on another facet of the deep structure of discovery and business analytics.  Continuing the language analogy, we've identified some of the ‘nouns’ in the language of discovery: specifically, the consistently recurring aspects of a business that people are looking for insight into.  We call these discovery Subjects, since they identify *what* people focus on during discovery efforts, rather than *how* they go about discovery as with the Modes. Defining the collection of Subjects people repeatedly focus on allows us to understand and articulate sense making needs and activity in more specific, consistent, and complete fashion.  In combination with the Modes, we can use Subjects to concretely identify and define scenarios that describe people’s analytical needs and goals.  For example, a scenario such as ‘Explore [a Mode] the attrition rates [a Measure, one type of Subject] of our largest customers [Entities, another type of Subject] clearly captures the nature of the activity — exploration of trends vs. deep analysis of underlying factors — and the central focus — attrition rates for customers above a certain set of size criteria — from which follow many of the specifics needed to address this scenario in terms of data, analytical tools, and methods. We can also use Subjects to translate effectively between the different perspectives that shape discovery efforts, reducing ambiguity and increasing impact on both sides the perspective divide.  For example, from the language of business, which often motivates analytical work by asking questions in business terms, to the perspective of analysis.  The question posed to a Data Scientist or analyst may be something like “Why are sales of our new kinds of potato chips to our largest customers fluctuating unexpectedly this year?” or “Where can innovate, by expanding our product portfolio to meet unmet needs?”.  Analysts translate questions and beliefs like these into one or more empirical discovery efforts that more formally and granularly indicate the plan, methods, tools, and desired outcomes of analysis.  From the perspective of analysis this second question might become, “Which customer needs of type ‘A', identified and measured in terms of ‘B’, that are not directly or indirectly addressed by any of our current products, offer 'X' potential for ‘Y' positive return on the investment ‘Z' required to launch a new offering, in time frame ‘W’?  And how do these compare to each other?”.  Translation also happens from the perspective of analysis to the perspective of data; in terms of availability, quality, completeness, format, volume, etc. By implication, we are proposing that most working organizations — small and large, for profit and non-profit, domestic and international, and in the majority of industries — can be described for analytical purposes using this collection of Subjects.  This is a bold claim, but simplified articulation of complexity is one of the primary goals of sensemaking frameworks such as this one.  (And, yes, this is in fact a framework for making sense of sensemaking as a category of activity - but we’re not considering the recursive aspects of this exercise at the moment.) Compellingly, we can place the collection of subjects on a single continuum — we call it the Sensemaking Spectrum — that simply and coherently illustrates some of the most important relationships between the different types of Subjects, and also illuminates several of the fundamental dynamics shaping business analytics as a domain.  As a corollary, the Sensemaking Spectrum also suggests innovation opportunities for products and services related to business analytics. The first illustration below shows Subjects arrayed along the Sensemaking Spectrum; the second illustration presents examples of each kind of Subject.  Subjects appear in colors ranging from blue to reddish-orange, reflecting their place along the Spectrum, which indicates whether a Subject addresses more the viewpoint of systems and data (Data centric and blue), or people (User centric and orange).  This axis is shown explicitly above the Spectrum.  Annotations suggest how Subjects align with the three significant perspectives of Data, Analysis, and Business that shape business analytics activity.  This rendering makes explicit the translation and bridging function of Analysts as a role, and analysis as an activity. Subjects are best understood as fuzzy categories [http://georgelakoff.files.wordpress.com/2011/01/hedges-a-study-in-meaning-criteria-and-the-logic-of-fuzzy-concepts-journal-of-philosophical-logic-2-lakoff-19731.pdf], rather than tightly defined buckets.  For each Subject, we suggest some of the most common examples: Entities may be physical things such as named products, or locations (a building, or a city); they could be Concepts, such as satisfaction; or they could be Relationships between entities, such as the variety of possible connections that define linkage in social networks.  Likewise, Events may indicate a time and place in the dictionary sense; or they may be Transactions involving named entities; or take the form of Signals, such as ‘some Measure had some value at some time’ - what many enterprises understand as alerts.   The central story of the Spectrum is that though consumers of analytical insights (represented here by the Business perspective) need to work in terms of Subjects that are directly meaningful to their perspective — such as Themes, Plans, and Goals — the working realities of data (condition, structure, availability, completeness, cost) and the changing nature of most discovery efforts make direct engagement with source data in this fashion impossible.  Accordingly, business analytics as a domain is structured around the fundamental assumption that sense making depends on analytical transformation of data.  Analytical activity incrementally synthesizes more complex and larger scope Subjects from data in its starting condition, accumulating insight (and value) by moving through a progression of stages in which increasingly meaningful Subjects are iteratively synthesized from the data, and recombined with other Subjects.  The end goal of  ‘laddering’ successive transformations is to enable sense making from the business perspective, rather than the analytical perspective.Synthesis through laddering is typically accomplished by specialized Analysts using dedicated tools and methods. Beginning with some motivating question such as seeking opportunities to increase the efficiency (a Theme) of fulfillment processes to reach some level of profitability by the end of the year (Plan), Analysts will iteratively wrangle and transform source data Records, Values and Attributes into recognizable Entities, such as Products, that can be combined with Measures or other data into the Events (shipment of orders) that indicate the workings of the business.  More complex Subjects (to the right of the Spectrum) are composed of or make reference to less complex Subjects: a business Process such as Fulfillment will include Activities such as confirming, packing, and then shipping orders.  These Activities occur within or are conducted by organizational units such as teams of staff or partner firms (Networks), composed of Entities which are structured via Relationships, such as supplier and buyer.  The fulfillment process will involve other types of Entities, such as the products or services the business provides.  The success of the fulfillment process overall may be judged according to a sophisticated operating efficiency Model, which includes tiered Measures of business activity and health for the transactions and activities included.  All of this may be interpreted through an understanding of the operational domain of the businesses supply chain (a Domain).   We'll discuss the Spectrum in more depth in succeeding posts.

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  • Setting Up My Server to Do DNS On OpenSuse 11.3

    - by adaykin
    Hello, I am attempting to use my server to be a DNS server. I am having trouble getting the domain setup. Here is what I have so far: /var/lib/named/master/andydaykin.com: $TTL 2d @ IN SOA andydaykin.com. root.andydaykin.com. ( 2011011000 ; serial 0 ; refresh 0 ; retry 0 ; expiry 0 ) ; minimum andydaykin.com. IN NS ns1.andydaykin.com. andydaykin.com. IN SOA ns1.andydaykin.com. hostmaster.andydaykin.com. ( @.andydaykin.com. IN NS ns1.andydaykin.com. ns1.andydaykin.com. IN A 204.12.227.33 www.andydaykin.com. IN A 204.12.227.33 /etc/resolve.conf: search andydaykin.com nameserver 204.12.227.33 /etc/named.conf: options { # The directory statement defines the name server's working directory directory "/var/lib/named"; dump-file "/var/log/named_dump.db"; statistics-file "/var/log/named.stats"; listen-on port 53 { 127.0.0.1; }; listen-on-v6 { any; }; notify no; disable-empty-zone "1.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.IP6.ARPA"; include "/etc/named.d/forwarders.conf"; }; zone "." in { type hint; file "root.hint"; }; zone "localhost" in { type master; file "localhost.zone"; }; zone "0.0.127.in-addr.arpa" in { type master; file "127.0.0.zone"; }; Include the meta include file generated by createNamedConfInclude. This includes all files as configured in NAMED_CONF_INCLUDE_FILES from /etc/sysconfig/named include "/etc/named.conf.include"; zone "andydaykin.com" in { file "master/andydaykin.com"; type master; allow-transfer { any; }; }; logging { category default { log_syslog; }; channel log_syslog { syslog; }; }; What I am doing wrong?

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  • Node.js Adventure - Storage Services and Service Runtime

    - by Shaun
    When I described on how to host a Node.js application on Windows Azure, one of questions might be raised about how to consume the vary Windows Azure services, such as the storage, service bus, access control, etc.. Interact with windows azure services is available in Node.js through the Windows Azure Node.js SDK, which is a module available in NPM. In this post I would like to describe on how to use Windows Azure Storage (a.k.a. WAS) as well as the service runtime.   Consume Windows Azure Storage Let’s firstly have a look on how to consume WAS through Node.js. As we know in the previous post we can host Node.js application on Windows Azure Web Site (a.k.a. WAWS) as well as Windows Azure Cloud Service (a.k.a. WACS). In theory, WAWS is also built on top of WACS worker roles with some more features. Hence in this post I will only demonstrate for hosting in WACS worker role. The Node.js code can be used when consuming WAS when hosted on WAWS. But since there’s no roles in WAWS, the code for consuming service runtime mentioned in the next section cannot be used for WAWS node application. We can use the solution that I created in my last post. Alternatively we can create a new windows azure project in Visual Studio with a worker role, add the “node.exe” and “index.js” and install “express” and “node-sqlserver” modules, make all files as “Copy always”. In order to use windows azure services we need to have Windows Azure Node.js SDK, as knows as a module named “azure” which can be installed through NPM. Once we downloaded and installed, we need to include them in our worker role project and make them as “Copy always”. You can use my “Copy all always” tool mentioned in my last post to update the currently worker role project file. You can also find the source code of this tool here. The source code of Windows Azure SDK for Node.js can be found in its GitHub page. It contains two parts. One is a CLI tool which provides a cross platform command line package for Mac and Linux to manage WAWS and Windows Azure Virtual Machines (a.k.a. WAVM). The other is a library for managing and consuming vary windows azure services includes tables, blobs, queues, service bus and the service runtime. I will not cover all of them but will only demonstrate on how to use tables and service runtime information in this post. You can find the full document of this SDK here. Back to Visual Studio and open the “index.js”, let’s continue our application from the last post, which was working against Windows Azure SQL Database (a.k.a. WASD). The code should looks like this. 1: var express = require("express"); 2: var sql = require("node-sqlserver"); 3:  4: var connectionString = "Driver={SQL Server Native Client 10.0};Server=tcp:ac6271ya9e.database.windows.net,1433;Database=synctile;Uid=shaunxu@ac6271ya9e;Pwd={PASSWORD};Encrypt=yes;Connection Timeout=30;"; 5: var port = 80; 6:  7: var app = express(); 8:  9: app.configure(function () { 10: app.use(express.bodyParser()); 11: }); 12:  13: app.get("/", function (req, res) { 14: sql.open(connectionString, function (err, conn) { 15: if (err) { 16: console.log(err); 17: res.send(500, "Cannot open connection."); 18: } 19: else { 20: conn.queryRaw("SELECT * FROM [Resource]", function (err, results) { 21: if (err) { 22: console.log(err); 23: res.send(500, "Cannot retrieve records."); 24: } 25: else { 26: res.json(results); 27: } 28: }); 29: } 30: }); 31: }); 32:  33: app.get("/text/:key/:culture", function (req, res) { 34: sql.open(connectionString, function (err, conn) { 35: if (err) { 36: console.log(err); 37: res.send(500, "Cannot open connection."); 38: } 39: else { 40: var key = req.params.key; 41: var culture = req.params.culture; 42: var command = "SELECT * FROM [Resource] WHERE [Key] = '" + key + "' AND [Culture] = '" + culture + "'"; 43: conn.queryRaw(command, function (err, results) { 44: if (err) { 45: console.log(err); 46: res.send(500, "Cannot retrieve records."); 47: } 48: else { 49: res.json(results); 50: } 51: }); 52: } 53: }); 54: }); 55:  56: app.get("/sproc/:key/:culture", function (req, res) { 57: sql.open(connectionString, function (err, conn) { 58: if (err) { 59: console.log(err); 60: res.send(500, "Cannot open connection."); 61: } 62: else { 63: var key = req.params.key; 64: var culture = req.params.culture; 65: var command = "EXEC GetItem '" + key + "', '" + culture + "'"; 66: conn.queryRaw(command, function (err, results) { 67: if (err) { 68: console.log(err); 69: res.send(500, "Cannot retrieve records."); 70: } 71: else { 72: res.json(results); 73: } 74: }); 75: } 76: }); 77: }); 78:  79: app.post("/new", function (req, res) { 80: var key = req.body.key; 81: var culture = req.body.culture; 82: var val = req.body.val; 83:  84: sql.open(connectionString, function (err, conn) { 85: if (err) { 86: console.log(err); 87: res.send(500, "Cannot open connection."); 88: } 89: else { 90: var command = "INSERT INTO [Resource] VALUES ('" + key + "', '" + culture + "', N'" + val + "')"; 91: conn.queryRaw(command, function (err, results) { 92: if (err) { 93: console.log(err); 94: res.send(500, "Cannot retrieve records."); 95: } 96: else { 97: res.send(200, "Inserted Successful"); 98: } 99: }); 100: } 101: }); 102: }); 103:  104: app.listen(port); Now let’s create a new function, copy the records from WASD to table service. 1. Delete the table named “resource”. 2. Create a new table named “resource”. These 2 steps ensures that we have an empty table. 3. Load all records from the “resource” table in WASD. 4. For each records loaded from WASD, insert them into the table one by one. 5. Prompt to user when finished. In order to use table service we need the storage account and key, which can be found from the developer portal. Just select the storage account and click the Manage Keys button. Then create two local variants in our Node.js application for the storage account name and key. Since we need to use WAS we need to import the azure module. Also I created another variant stored the table name. In order to work with table service I need to create the storage client for table service. This is very similar as the Windows Azure SDK for .NET. As the code below I created a new variant named “client” and use “createTableService”, specified my storage account name and key. 1: var azure = require("azure"); 2: var storageAccountName = "synctile"; 3: var storageAccountKey = "/cOy9L7xysXOgPYU9FjDvjrRAhaMX/5tnOpcjqloPNDJYucbgTy7MOrAW7CbUg6PjaDdmyl+6pkwUnKETsPVNw=="; 4: var tableName = "resource"; 5: var client = azure.createTableService(storageAccountName, storageAccountKey); Now create a new function for URL “/was/init” so that we can trigger it through browser. Then in this function we will firstly load all records from WASD. 1: app.get("/was/init", function (req, res) { 2: // load all records from windows azure sql database 3: sql.open(connectionString, function (err, conn) { 4: if (err) { 5: console.log(err); 6: res.send(500, "Cannot open connection."); 7: } 8: else { 9: conn.queryRaw("SELECT * FROM [Resource]", function (err, results) { 10: if (err) { 11: console.log(err); 12: res.send(500, "Cannot retrieve records."); 13: } 14: else { 15: if (results.rows.length > 0) { 16: // begin to transform the records into table service 17: } 18: } 19: }); 20: } 21: }); 22: }); When we succeed loaded all records we can start to transform them into table service. First I need to recreate the table in table service. This can be done by deleting and creating the table through table client I had just created previously. 1: app.get("/was/init", function (req, res) { 2: // load all records from windows azure sql database 3: sql.open(connectionString, function (err, conn) { 4: if (err) { 5: console.log(err); 6: res.send(500, "Cannot open connection."); 7: } 8: else { 9: conn.queryRaw("SELECT * FROM [Resource]", function (err, results) { 10: if (err) { 11: console.log(err); 12: res.send(500, "Cannot retrieve records."); 13: } 14: else { 15: if (results.rows.length > 0) { 16: // begin to transform the records into table service 17: // recreate the table named 'resource' 18: client.deleteTable(tableName, function (error) { 19: client.createTableIfNotExists(tableName, function (error) { 20: if (error) { 21: error["target"] = "createTableIfNotExists"; 22: res.send(500, error); 23: } 24: else { 25: // transform the records 26: } 27: }); 28: }); 29: } 30: } 31: }); 32: } 33: }); 34: }); As you can see, the azure SDK provide its methods in callback pattern. In fact, almost all modules in Node.js use the callback pattern. For example, when I deleted a table I invoked “deleteTable” method, provided the name of the table and a callback function which will be performed when the table had been deleted or failed. Underlying, the azure module will perform the table deletion operation in POSIX async threads pool asynchronously. And once it’s done the callback function will be performed. This is the reason we need to nest the table creation code inside the deletion function. If we perform the table creation code after the deletion code then they will be invoked in parallel. Next, for each records in WASD I created an entity and then insert into the table service. Finally I send the response to the browser. Can you find a bug in the code below? I will describe it later in this post. 1: app.get("/was/init", function (req, res) { 2: // load all records from windows azure sql database 3: sql.open(connectionString, function (err, conn) { 4: if (err) { 5: console.log(err); 6: res.send(500, "Cannot open connection."); 7: } 8: else { 9: conn.queryRaw("SELECT * FROM [Resource]", function (err, results) { 10: if (err) { 11: console.log(err); 12: res.send(500, "Cannot retrieve records."); 13: } 14: else { 15: if (results.rows.length > 0) { 16: // begin to transform the records into table service 17: // recreate the table named 'resource' 18: client.deleteTable(tableName, function (error) { 19: client.createTableIfNotExists(tableName, function (error) { 20: if (error) { 21: error["target"] = "createTableIfNotExists"; 22: res.send(500, error); 23: } 24: else { 25: // transform the records 26: for (var i = 0; i < results.rows.length; i++) { 27: var entity = { 28: "PartitionKey": results.rows[i][1], 29: "RowKey": results.rows[i][0], 30: "Value": results.rows[i][2] 31: }; 32: client.insertEntity(tableName, entity, function (error) { 33: if (error) { 34: error["target"] = "insertEntity"; 35: res.send(500, error); 36: } 37: else { 38: console.log("entity inserted"); 39: } 40: }); 41: } 42: // send the 43: console.log("all done"); 44: res.send(200, "All done!"); 45: } 46: }); 47: }); 48: } 49: } 50: }); 51: } 52: }); 53: }); Now we can publish it to the cloud and have a try. But normally we’d better test it at the local emulator first. In Node.js SDK there are three build-in properties which provides the account name, key and host address for local storage emulator. We can use them to initialize our table service client. We also need to change the SQL connection string to let it use my local database. The code will be changed as below. 1: // windows azure sql database 2: //var connectionString = "Driver={SQL Server Native Client 10.0};Server=tcp:ac6271ya9e.database.windows.net,1433;Database=synctile;Uid=shaunxu@ac6271ya9e;Pwd=eszqu94XZY;Encrypt=yes;Connection Timeout=30;"; 3: // sql server 4: var connectionString = "Driver={SQL Server Native Client 11.0};Server={.};Database={Caspar};Trusted_Connection={Yes};"; 5:  6: var azure = require("azure"); 7: var storageAccountName = "synctile"; 8: var storageAccountKey = "/cOy9L7xysXOgPYU9FjDvjrRAhaMX/5tnOpcjqloPNDJYucbgTy7MOrAW7CbUg6PjaDdmyl+6pkwUnKETsPVNw=="; 9: var tableName = "resource"; 10: // windows azure storage 11: //var client = azure.createTableService(storageAccountName, storageAccountKey); 12: // local storage emulator 13: var client = azure.createTableService(azure.ServiceClient.DEVSTORE_STORAGE_ACCOUNT, azure.ServiceClient.DEVSTORE_STORAGE_ACCESS_KEY, azure.ServiceClient.DEVSTORE_TABLE_HOST); Now let’s run the application and navigate to “localhost:12345/was/init” as I hosted it on port 12345. We can find it transformed the data from my local database to local table service. Everything looks fine. But there is a bug in my code. If we have a look on the Node.js command window we will find that it sent response before all records had been inserted, which is not what I expected. The reason is that, as I mentioned before, Node.js perform all IO operations in non-blocking model. When we inserted the records we executed the table service insert method in parallel, and the operation of sending response was also executed in parallel, even though I wrote it at the end of my logic. The correct logic should be, when all entities had been copied to table service with no error, then I will send response to the browser, otherwise I should send error message to the browser. To do so I need to import another module named “async”, which helps us to coordinate our asynchronous code. Install the module and import it at the beginning of the code. Then we can use its “forEach” method for the asynchronous code of inserting table entities. The first argument of “forEach” is the array that will be performed. The second argument is the operation for each items in the array. And the third argument will be invoked then all items had been performed or any errors occurred. Here we can send our response to browser. 1: app.get("/was/init", function (req, res) { 2: // load all records from windows azure sql database 3: sql.open(connectionString, function (err, conn) { 4: if (err) { 5: console.log(err); 6: res.send(500, "Cannot open connection."); 7: } 8: else { 9: conn.queryRaw("SELECT * FROM [Resource]", function (err, results) { 10: if (err) { 11: console.log(err); 12: res.send(500, "Cannot retrieve records."); 13: } 14: else { 15: if (results.rows.length > 0) { 16: // begin to transform the records into table service 17: // recreate the table named 'resource' 18: client.deleteTable(tableName, function (error) { 19: client.createTableIfNotExists(tableName, function (error) { 20: if (error) { 21: error["target"] = "createTableIfNotExists"; 22: res.send(500, error); 23: } 24: else { 25: async.forEach(results.rows, 26: // transform the records 27: function (row, callback) { 28: var entity = { 29: "PartitionKey": row[1], 30: "RowKey": row[0], 31: "Value": row[2] 32: }; 33: client.insertEntity(tableName, entity, function (error) { 34: if (error) { 35: callback(error); 36: } 37: else { 38: console.log("entity inserted."); 39: callback(null); 40: } 41: }); 42: }, 43: // send reponse 44: function (error) { 45: if (error) { 46: error["target"] = "insertEntity"; 47: res.send(500, error); 48: } 49: else { 50: console.log("all done"); 51: res.send(200, "All done!"); 52: } 53: } 54: ); 55: } 56: }); 57: }); 58: } 59: } 60: }); 61: } 62: }); 63: }); Run it locally and now we can find the response was sent after all entities had been inserted. Query entities against table service is simple as well. Just use the “queryEntity” method from the table service client and providing the partition key and row key. We can also provide a complex query criteria as well, for example the code here. In the code below I queried an entity by the partition key and row key, and return the proper localization value in response. 1: app.get("/was/:key/:culture", function (req, res) { 2: var key = req.params.key; 3: var culture = req.params.culture; 4: client.queryEntity(tableName, culture, key, function (error, entity) { 5: if (error) { 6: res.send(500, error); 7: } 8: else { 9: res.json(entity); 10: } 11: }); 12: }); And then tested it on local emulator. Finally if we want to publish this application to the cloud we should change the database connection string and storage account. For more information about how to consume blob and queue service, as well as the service bus please refer to the MSDN page.   Consume Service Runtime As I mentioned above, before we published our application to the cloud we need to change the connection string and account information in our code. But if you had played with WACS you should have known that the service runtime provides the ability to retrieve configuration settings, endpoints and local resource information at runtime. Which means we can have these values defined in CSCFG and CSDEF files and then the runtime should be able to retrieve the proper values. For example we can add some role settings though the property window of the role, specify the connection string and storage account for cloud and local. And the can also use the endpoint which defined in role environment to our Node.js application. In Node.js SDK we can get an object from “azure.RoleEnvironment”, which provides the functionalities to retrieve the configuration settings and endpoints, etc.. In the code below I defined the connection string variants and then use the SDK to retrieve and initialize the table client. 1: var connectionString = ""; 2: var storageAccountName = ""; 3: var storageAccountKey = ""; 4: var tableName = ""; 5: var client; 6:  7: azure.RoleEnvironment.getConfigurationSettings(function (error, settings) { 8: if (error) { 9: console.log("ERROR: getConfigurationSettings"); 10: console.log(JSON.stringify(error)); 11: } 12: else { 13: console.log(JSON.stringify(settings)); 14: connectionString = settings["SqlConnectionString"]; 15: storageAccountName = settings["StorageAccountName"]; 16: storageAccountKey = settings["StorageAccountKey"]; 17: tableName = settings["TableName"]; 18:  19: console.log("connectionString = %s", connectionString); 20: console.log("storageAccountName = %s", storageAccountName); 21: console.log("storageAccountKey = %s", storageAccountKey); 22: console.log("tableName = %s", tableName); 23:  24: client = azure.createTableService(storageAccountName, storageAccountKey); 25: } 26: }); In this way we don’t need to amend the code for the configurations between local and cloud environment since the service runtime will take care of it. At the end of the code we will listen the application on the port retrieved from SDK as well. 1: azure.RoleEnvironment.getCurrentRoleInstance(function (error, instance) { 2: if (error) { 3: console.log("ERROR: getCurrentRoleInstance"); 4: console.log(JSON.stringify(error)); 5: } 6: else { 7: console.log(JSON.stringify(instance)); 8: if (instance["endpoints"] && instance["endpoints"]["nodejs"]) { 9: var endpoint = instance["endpoints"]["nodejs"]; 10: app.listen(endpoint["port"]); 11: } 12: else { 13: app.listen(8080); 14: } 15: } 16: }); But if we tested the application right now we will find that it cannot retrieve any values from service runtime. This is because by default, the entry point of this role was defined to the worker role class. In windows azure environment the service runtime will open a named pipeline to the entry point instance, so that it can connect to the runtime and retrieve values. But in this case, since the entry point was worker role and the Node.js was opened inside the role, the named pipeline was established between our worker role class and service runtime, so our Node.js application cannot use it. To fix this problem we need to open the CSDEF file under the azure project, add a new element named Runtime. Then add an element named EntryPoint which specify the Node.js command line. So that the Node.js application will have the connection to service runtime, then it’s able to read the configurations. Start the Node.js at local emulator we can find it retrieved the connections, storage account for local. And if we publish our application to azure then it works with WASD and storage service through the configurations for cloud.   Summary In this post I demonstrated how to use Windows Azure SDK for Node.js to interact with storage service, especially the table service. I also demonstrated on how to use WACS service runtime, how to retrieve the configuration settings and the endpoint information. And in order to make the service runtime available to my Node.js application I need to create an entry point element in CSDEF file and set “node.exe” as the entry point. I used five posts to introduce and demonstrate on how to run a Node.js application on Windows platform, how to use Windows Azure Web Site and Windows Azure Cloud Service worker role to host our Node.js application. I also described how to work with other services provided by Windows Azure platform through Windows Azure SDK for Node.js. Node.js is a very new and young network application platform. But since it’s very simple and easy to learn and deploy, as well as, it utilizes single thread non-blocking IO model, Node.js became more and more popular on web application and web service development especially for those IO sensitive projects. And as Node.js is very good at scaling-out, it’s more useful on cloud computing platform. Use Node.js on Windows platform is new, too. The modules for SQL database and Windows Azure SDK are still under development and enhancement. It doesn’t support SQL parameter in “node-sqlserver”. It does support using storage connection string to create the storage client in “azure”. But Microsoft is working on make them easier to use, working on add more features and functionalities.   PS, you can download the source code here. You can download the source code of my “Copy all always” tool here.   Hope this helps, Shaun All documents and related graphics, codes are provided "AS IS" without warranty of any kind. Copyright © Shaun Ziyan Xu. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons License.

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  • LINQ to Twitter Queries with LINQPad

    - by Joe Mayo
    LINQPad is a popular utility for .NET developers who use LINQ a lot.  In addition to standard SQL queries, LINQPad also supports other types of LINQ providers, including LINQ to Twitter.  The following sections explain how to set up LINQPad for making queries with LINQ to Twitter. LINQPad comes in a couple versions and this example uses LINQPad4, which runs on the .NET Framework 4.0. 1. The first thing you'll need to do is set up a reference to the LinqToTwitter.dll. From the Query menu, select query properties. Click the Browse button and find the LinqToTwitter.dll binary. You should see something similar to the Query Properties window below. 2. While you have the query properties window open, add the namespace for the LINQ to Twitter types.  Click the Additional Namespace Imports tab and type in LinqToTwitter. The results are shown below: 3. The default query type, when you first start LINQPad, is C# Expression, but you'll need to change this to support multiple statements.  Change the Language dropdown, on the Main window, to C# Statements. 4. To query LINQ to Twitter, instantiate a TwitterContext, by typing the following into the LINQPad Query window: var ctx = new TwitterContext(); Note: If you're getting syntax errors, go back and make sure you did steps #2 and #3 properly. 5. Next, add a query, but don't materialize it, like this: var tweets = from tweet in ctx.Status where tweet.Type == StatusType.Public select new { tweet.Text, tweet.Geo, tweet.User }; 6. Next, you want the output to be displayed in the LINQPad grid, so do a Dump, like this: tweets.Dump(); The following image shows the final results:   That was an unauthenticated query, but you can also perform authenticated queries with LINQ to Twitter's support of OAuth.  Here's an example that uses the PinAuthorizer (type this into the LINQPad Query window): var auth = new PinAuthorizer { Credentials = new InMemoryCredentials { ConsumerKey = "", ConsumerSecret = "" }, UseCompression = true, GoToTwitterAuthorization = pageLink => Process.Start(pageLink), GetPin = () => { // this executes after user authorizes, which begins with the call to auth.Authorize() below. Console.WriteLine("\nAfter you authorize this application, Twitter will give you a 7-digit PIN Number.\n"); Console.Write("Enter the PIN number here: "); return Console.ReadLine(); } }; // start the authorization process (launches Twitter authorization page). auth.Authorize(); var ctx = new TwitterContext(auth, "https://api.twitter.com/1/", "https://search.twitter.com/"); var tweets = from tweet in ctx.Status where tweet.Type == StatusType.Public select new { tweet.Text, tweet.Geo, tweet.User }; tweets.Dump(); This code is very similar to what you'll find in the LINQ to Twitter downloadable source code solution, in the LinqToTwitterDemo project.  For obvious reasons, I changed the value assigned to ConsumerKey and ConsumerSecret, which you'll have to obtain by visiting http://dev.twitter.com and registering your application. One tip, you'll probably want to make this easier on yourself by creating your own DLL that encapsulates all of the OAuth logic and then call a method or property on you custom class that returns a fully functioning TwitterContext.  This will help avoid adding all this code every time you want to make a query. Now, you know how to set up LINQPad for LINQ to Twitter, perform unauthenticated queries, and perform queries with OAuth. Joe

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  • how to override ckeditor events [migrated]

    - by joe
    I am new to ckeditor, I have hard time figuring this issue out. due to my html design; if I try to use the link editor dialog while my ckeditor is maximized, it just doesn't show up, I understand that ckeditor is the top most object in my html page and the link dialog comes underneath it. if now I bring ckeditor to its normal state I will be able to see and use the link dialog. my idea is to slightly override the link button click event as follows: if the editor is in full screen mode, bring it back to the normal state. and keep a flag somewhere so that when I close the link dialog, I can decide whether to bring back the ckeditor to a maximized mode again. now this is easy logic except that I do not know how to override the click event of the link button and keep it work as expected. here's what I have: $().ready(function () { var editor = $('#txa').ckeditor(); CKEDITOR.plugins.registered['link']= { init : function( editor ) { var command = editor.addCommand( 'link', { modes : { wysiwyg:1, source:1 }, exec : function( editor ) { if(editor.commands.maximize.state == 1 ){ alert("maximized"); //....here bring back the editor to UN-maximized state and let the link button event click do the default behavior } else { alert("normal state"); } //2 is normal state //1 is maximized } } ); editor.ui.addButton( 'link',{label : 'YOUR LABEL',command : 'link'}); } } }); html part to make the exemple work: <div> <textarea id="txa"> </textarea> </div> TO BE SHORT: http://jsfiddle.net/Q43QP/ if the editor is maximized, bring it to normal state then show the link dialog.

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  • PASS Summit 2010 Recap

    - by AjarnMark
    Last week I attended my eighth PASS Summit in nine years, and every year it is a fantastic event!  I was fortunate my first year to have a contact (Bill Graziano (blog | Twitter) from SQLTeam) that I was expecting to meet, and who got me started on a good track of making new contacts.  Each year I have made a few more, and renewed friendships from years past.  Many of the attendees agree that the pure networking opportunities are one of the best benefits of attending the Summit.  And there’s a lot of great technical stuff, too, some of the things that stick out for me this year include… Pre-Con Monday: PowerShell with Allen White (blog | Twitter).  This was the first time that I attended a pre-con.  For those not familiar with the concept, the regular sessions for the conference are 75-90 minutes long.  For an extra fee, you can attend a full-day session on a single topic during a pre- or post-conference training day.  I had been meaning for several months to dive in and learn PowerShell, but just never seemed to find (or make) the time for it, so when I saw this was one of the all-day sessions, and I was planning to be there on Monday anyway, I decided to go for it.  And it was well worth it!  I definitely came out of there with a good foundation to build my own PowerShell scripts, plus several sample scripts that he showed which already cover the first four or five things I was planning to do with PowerShell anyway.  This looks like the right tool for me to build an automated version of our software deployment process, which right now contains many repeated steps.  Thanks Allen! Service Broker with Denny Cherry (blog | Twitter).  I remembered reading Denny’s blog post on Using Service Broker instead of Replication, and ever since then I have been thinking about using this to populate a new reporting-focused Data Repository that we will be building in the near future.  When I saw he was doing this session, I thought it would be great to get more information and be able to ask the author questions.  When I brought this idea back to my boss, he really liked it, as we had previously been discussing doing nightly data loads, with an option to manually trigger a mid-day load if up-to-the-minute data was needed for something.  If we go the Service Broker route, we can keep the Repository current in near real-time.  Hooray! DBA Mythbusters with Paul Randal (blog | Twitter).  Even though I read every one of the posts in Paul’s blog series of the same name, I had to go see the legend in person.  It was great, and I still learned something new! How to Conduct Effective Meetings with Joe Webb (blog | Twitter).  I always like to sit in on a session that Joe does.  I met Joe several years ago when both he and Bill Graziano were on the PASS Board of Directors together, and we have kept in touch.  Joe is very well-spoken and has great experience with both SQL Server and business.  And we could certainly use some pointers at my work (probably yours, too) on making our meetings more effective and to run on-time.  Of course, now that I’m the Chapter Leader for the Professional Development virtual chapter, I also had to sit in on this ProfDev session and recruit Joe to do a presentation or two for the chapter next year. Query Optimization with David DeWitt.  Anyone who has seen Dr. David DeWitt present the 3rd keynote at a PASS Summit over the last three years knows what a great time it is to sit and listen to him make some really complicated and advanced topic easy to understand (although it still makes your head hurt).  It still amazes me that the simple two-table join query from pubs that he used in his example can possibly have 22 million possible physical query plans.  Ouch! Exhibit Hall:  This year I spent more serious time in the exhibit hall than any year past.  I have talked my boss into making a significant (for us) investment in monitoring tools next year, and this was a great opportunity to talk with all the big-hitters.  Readers of mine may recall that I fell in love with the SQL Sentry Power Suite several months ago and wrote a blog entry about it just from the trial version.  Well as things turned out, short-term budget priorities shifted, and we weren’t able to make the purchase then.  I have it in the budget for next year, but since I was going to the Summit, my boss wanted me to look at the other options to see if this was really the one that we wanted.  I spent a couple of hours talking with representatives from Red-Gate, Idera, Confio, and Quest about their offerings, and giving them each the same 3 scenarios that I wanted to be able to accomplish based on the questions and issues that arise in our company.  It was interesting to discover the different approaches or “world view” that each vendor takes to the subject of performance monitoring and troubleshooting.  I may write a separate article that goes into this in more depth, but the product that best aligned with our point of view, and met the current needs we have is still the SQL Sentry Power Suite.  I’m not saying that the others are bad or wrong or anything like that, just that the way they tackled the issue did not align as well with our particular needs as does SQL Sentry’s product.  And that was something I learned too, when you go shopping for these products, you really need to know what you want to get from them.  It’s best if you have a few example scenarios from work that you can use to test out how well each tool fits your particular needs. Overall, another GREAT event.  I can’t wait to get the DVDs so I can sit in on a bunch of other sessions that I couldn’t get to because I was in one of the ones above.  And I can hardly wait until next year!

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  • Is it Hard to Write a Blog?

    - by Joe Mayo
    Responding to a tweet I received, asking if I found it hard to write a blog and keep it interesting. This is one of the situations where a 140 character response doesn’t do a question justice. There’s a lot to think about between the subjects of writing, subject matter, and entertainment.  Here’s my take on each of these three topics: There’s all types of writing you can do with various degrees of difficulty. If you’re writing a book and you have a gazillion editors bleeding over your every utterance, then the task becomes harder because you’re second-guessing yourself, not knowing whose opinion will be violated. However, if you’re communicating in a public forum, not too many people care about the grammar as much as whether what you have to say is correct.  For a blog, I would say it’s somewhere in-between.  Right now, I’m using Windows Live Writer, which gives me a few advantages to just typing into the blog editor, such as spelling correction and the ability to save my work and resume later.  Overall, writing is one of those things that you just need to get used to.  It’s an essential skill for developers because you need to document your work, depending on what your definition of proper documentation is, and communicate with other developers via various communications mediums. Not begin good (or not thinking that you’re good) shouldn’t hold you back.  Like most things in life, practice will improve your skill.  So, push away that inner voice that keeps you from moving forward and just do it. A good grasp on the subject matter you’re writing about helps.  However, don’t let a lack of knowledge stop you from writing about something. I recall reading something a while back by a developer who didn’t know a technology but wrote about their experience in learning it. They ended up learning more by expressing their thoughts in writing. If you look around out many blogs today, there are many items written by developers learning what they’re writing about.  So, whether you are sure or unsure, you can still write – just be honest with yourself and your readers about what you’re writing. Also, don’t be afraid to have a different opinion or worry if someone will disagree.  I’ll freely admit that it took a while for me to become accustomed to being criticized. Take the good with the bad and use the bad to make yourself better. Guaranteed, someone will disagree with one or more parts of what I’ve written here or think they have a better approach. No problem, more power to them, and whatever constructive comments they have will be a benefit to me in the future; Otherwise, to h*ll with them. :)  Every time you get knocked down, get right back up, dust the dirt off your backside, and keep moving forward.  You’ll learn in time how to align a subject with your own presentation of the material. Entertainment could be hard or could be natural, depending on the personality of yourself and your target audience. It’s even more challenging because you can say something you think is funny and someone will be offended. In fact, there are a lot of things that you shouldn’t say in the name of a joke, but I won’t mention any of them here for want of not offending anyone. Of course, I probably offended someone by saying that and there is probably an organization somewhere in the world out to get me now. I’m probably not the best person to be giving you advice on entertaining an audience.  I mean, every time I try to tell a joke on Twitter 10 people unfriend me. Okay, maybe 15, but you get my point. One thing you might be interested in knowing is that it’s not too hard for one technical person to entertain other technical people, especially when the subject is of interest.  It’s the excitement in each sentence and passion in each paragraph that will keep another developer entertained and interested in what you have to say. Not everyone will like what you’ve written, but the important part is to find your own voice and it’s likely that there is one person in some corner of the world that likes what you have to say, even if it’s your mom and she doesn’t understand a single word you write. :)   If I could leave you with one final thought; Just do it and don’t let anyone or anything hold you back.   Joe

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  • A Gentle Introduction to NuGet

    - by Joe Mayo
    Not too long ago, Microsoft released, NuGet, an automated package manager for Visual Studio.  NuGet makes it easy to download and install assemblies, and their references, into a Visual Studio project.  These assemblies, which I loosely refer to as packages, are often open source, and include projects such as LINQ to Twitter. In this post, I'll explain how to get started in using NuGet with your projects to include: installng NuGet, installing/uninstalling LINQ to Twitter via console command, and installing/uninstalling LINQ to Twitter via graphical reference menu. Installing NuGet The first step you'll need to take is to install NuGet.  Visit the NuGet site, at http://nuget.org/, click on the Install NuGet button, and download the NuGet.Tools.vsix installation file, shown below. Each browser is different (i.e. FireFox, Chrome, IE, etc), so you might see options to run right away, save to a location, or access to the file through the browser's download manager.  Regardless of how you receive the NuGet installer, execute the downloaded NuGet.Tools.vsix to install Nuget into visual Studio. The NuGet Footprint When you open visual Studio, observe that there is a new menu option on the Tools menu, titled Library Package Manager; This is where you use NuGet.  There are two menu options, from the Library Package Manager Menu that you can use: Package Manager Console and Package Manager Settings.  I won't discuss Package Manager Settings in this post, except to give you a general idea that, as one of a set of capabilities, it manages the path to the NuGet server, which is already set for you. Another menu, added by the NuGet installer, is Add Library Package Reference, found by opening the context menu for either a Solution Explorer project or a project's References folder or via the Project menu.  I'll discuss how to use this later in the post. The following discussion is concerned with the other menu option, Package Manager Console, which allows you to manage NuGet packages. Gettng a NuGet Package Selecting Tools -> Library Package Manager -> Package Manager Console opens the Package Manager Console.  As you can see, below, the Package Manager Console is text-based and you'll need to type in commands to work with packages. In this post, I'll explain how to use the Package Manager Console to install LINQ to Twitter, but there are many more commands, explained in the NuGet Package Manager Console Commands documentation.  To install LINQ to Twitter, open your current project where you want LINQ to Twitter installed, and type the following at the PM> prompt: Install-Package linqtotwitter If all works well, you'll receive a confirmation message, similar to the following, after a brief pause: Successfully installed 'linqtotwitter 2.0.20'. Successfully added 'linqtotwitter 2.0.20' to NuGetInstall. Also, observe that a reference to the LinqToTwitter.dll assembly was added to your current project. Uninstalling a NuGet Package I won't be so bold as to assume that you would only want to use LINQ to Twitter because there are other Twitter libraries available; I recommend Twitterizer if you don't care for LINQ to Twitter.  So, you might want to use the following command at the PM> prompt to remove LINQ to Twitter from your project: Uninstall-Package linqtotwitter After a brief pause, you'll see a confirmation message similar to the following: Successfully removed 'linqtotwitter 2.0.20' from NuGetInstall. Also, observe that the LinqToTwitter.dll assembly no longer appears in your project references list. Sometimes using the Package Manager Console is required for more sophisticated scenarios.  However, LINQ to Twitter doesn't have any dependencies and is a very simple install, so you can use another method of installing graphically, which I'll show you next. Graphical Installations As explained earlier, clicking Add Library Package Reference, from the context menu for either a Solution Explorer project or a project's References folder or via the Project menu opens the Add Library Package Reference window. This window will allow you to add a reference a NuGet package in your project. To the left of the window are a few accordian folders to help you find packages that are either on-line or already installed.  Just like the previous section, I'll assume you are installing LINQ to Twitter for the first time, so you would select the Online folder and click All.  After waiting for package descriptions to download, you'll notice that there are too many to scroll through in a short period of time, over 900 as I write this.  Therefore, use the search box located at the top right corner of the window and type LINQ to Twitter as I've done in the previous figure. You'll see LINQ to Twitter appear in the list. Click the Install button on the LINQ to Twitter entry. If the installation was successful, you'll see a message box display and disappear quickly (or maybe not if your machine is very fast or you blink at that moment). Then you'll see a reference to the LinqToTwitter.dll assembly in your project's references list. Note: While running this demo, I ran into an issue where VS had created a file lock on an installation folder without releasing it, causing an error with "packagename already exists. Skipping..." and then an error describing that it couldn't write to a destination folder.  I resolved the problem by closing and reopening VS. If you open the Add a Library Package Reference window again, you'll see LINQ to Twitter listed in the Recent packages folder. Summary You can install NuGet via the on-line home page with a click of a button.  Nuget provides two ways to work with packages, via console or graphical window.  While the graphical window is easiest, the console window is more powerful. You can now quickly add project references to many available packages via the NuGet service. Joe

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  • JustCode Provides Reflector Alternative

    - by Joe Mayo
    If you've been a loyal Reflector user, you've probably been exposed to the debacle surrounding RedGate's decision to no longer offer a free version.  Since then, the race has begun for a replacement with a provider that would stand by their promises to the community.  Mono has an ongoing free alternative, which has been available for a long time.  However, other vendors are stepping up to the plate, with their own offerings. If Not Reflector, Then What? One of these vendors is Telerik.  In their recent Q1 2011 release of JustCode, Telerik offers a decompilation utility rivaling what we've become accustomed to in Reflector.  Not only does Telerik offer a usable replacement, but they've (in my opinion), produced a product that integrates more naturally with visual Studio than any other product ever has.  Telerik's decompilation process is so easy that the accompanying demo in this post is blindingly short (except for the presence of verbose narrative). If you want to follow along with this demo, you'll need to have Telerik JustCode installed.  If you don't have JustCode yet, you can buy it or download a trial at the Telerik Web site . A Tall Tale; Prove It! With JustCode, you can view code in the .NET Framework or any other 3rd party library (that isn't well obfuscated).  This demo depends on LINQ to Twitter, which you can download from CodePlex.com and create a reference or install the package online as described in my previous post on NuGet.  Regardless of the method, you'll have a project with a reference to LINQ to Twitter.  Use a Console Project if you want to follow along with this demo. Note:  If you've created a Console project, remember to ensure that the Target Framework is set to .NET Framework 4.  The default is .NET Framework 4 Client Profile, which doesn't work with LINQ to Twitter.  You can check by double-clicking the Properties folder on the project and inspecting the Target Framework setting. Next, you'll need to add some code to your program that you want to inspect. Here, I add code to instantiate a TwitterContext, which is like a LINQ to SQL DataContext, but works with Twitter: var l2tCtx = new TwitterContext(); If you're following along add the code above to the Main method, which will look similar to this: using LinqToTwitter; namespace NuGetInstall { class Program { static void Main(string[] args) { var l2tCtx = new TwitterContext(); } } } The code above doesn't really do anything, but it does give something that I can show and demonstrate how JustCode decompilation works. Once the code is in place, click on TwitterContext and press the F12 (Go to Definition) key.  As expected, Visual Studio opens a metadata file with prototypes for the TwitterContext class.  Here's the result: Opening a metadata file is the normal way that Visual Studio works when navigating to the definition of a type where you don't have the code.  The scenario with TwitterContext happens because you don't have the source code to the file.  Visual Studio has always done this and you can experiment by selecting any .NET type, i.e. a string type, and observing that Visual Studio opens a metadata file for the .NET String type. The point I'm making here is that JustCode works the way Visual Studio works and you'll see how this can make your job easier. In the previous figure, you only saw prototypes associated with the code. i.e. Notice that the default constructor is empty.  Again, this is normal because Visual Studio doesn't have the ability to decompile code.  However, that's the purpose of this post; showing you how JustCode fills that gap. To decompile code, right click on TwitterContext in the metadata file and select JustCode Navigate -> Decompile from the context menu.  The shortcut keys are Ctrl+1.  After a brief pause, accompanied by a progress window, you'll see the metadata expand into full decompiled code. Notice below how the default constructor now has code as opposed to the empty member prototype in the original metadata: And Why is This So Different? Again, the big deal is that Telerik JustCode decompilation works in harmony with the way that Visual Studio works.  The navigate to functionality already exists and you can use that, along with a simple context menu option (or shortcut key) to transform prototypes into decompiled code. Telerik is filling the the Reflector/Red Gate gap by providing a supported alternative to decompiling code.  Many people, including myself, used Reflector to decompile code when we were stuck with buggy libraries or insufficient documentation.  Now we have an alternative that's officially supported by a company with an excellent track record for customer (developer) service, Telerik.  Not only that, JustCode has several other IDE productivity tools that make the deal even sweeter. Joe

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  • A Basic Thread

    - by Joe Mayo
    Most of the programs written are single-threaded, meaning that they run on the main execution thread. For various reasons such as performance, scalability, and/or responsiveness additional threads can be useful. .NET has extensive threading support, from the basic threads introduced in v1.0 to the Task Parallel Library (TPL) introduced in v4.0. To get started with threads, it's helpful to begin with the basics; starting a Thread. Why Do I Care? The scenario I'll use for needing to use a thread is writing to a file.  Sometimes, writing to a file takes a while and you don't want your user interface to lock up until the file write is done. In other words, you want the application to be responsive to the user. How Would I Go About It? The solution is to launch a new thread that performs the file write, allowing the main thread to return to the user right away.  Whenever the file writing thread completes, it will let the user know.  In the meantime, the user is free to interact with the program for other tasks. The following examples demonstrate how to do this. Show Me the Code? The code we'll use to work with threads is in the System.Threading namespace, so you'll need the following using directive at the top of the file: using System.Threading; When you run code on a thread, the code is specified via a method.  Here's the code that will execute on the thread: private static void WriteFile() { Thread.Sleep(1000); Console.WriteLine("File Written."); } The call to Thread.Sleep(1000) delays thread execution. The parameter is specified in milliseconds, and 1000 means that this will cause the program to sleep for approximately 1 second.  This method happens to be static, but that's just part of this example, which you'll see is launched from the static Main method.  A thread could be instance or static.  Notice that the method does not have parameters and does not have a return type. As you know, the way to refer to a method is via a delegate.  There is a delegate named ThreadStart in System.Threading that refers to a method without parameters or return type, shown below: ThreadStart fileWriterHandlerDelegate = new ThreadStart(WriteFile); I'll show you the whole program below, but the ThreadStart instance above goes in the Main method. The thread uses the ThreadStart instance, fileWriterHandlerDelegate, to specify the method to execute on the thread: Thread fileWriter = new Thread(fileWriterHandlerDelegate); As shown above, the argument type for the Thread constructor is the ThreadStart delegate type. The fileWriterHandlerDelegate argument is an instance of the ThreadStart delegate type. This creates an instance of a thread and what code will execute, but the new thread instance, fileWriter, isn't running yet. You have to explicitly start it, like this: fileWriter.Start(); Now, the code in the WriteFile method is executing on a separate thread. Meanwhile, the main thread that started the fileWriter thread continues on it's own.  You have two threads running at the same time. Okay, I'm Starting to Get Glassy Eyed. How Does it All Fit Together? The example below is the whole program, pulling all the previous bits together. It's followed by its output and an explanation. using System; using System.Threading; namespace BasicThread { class Program { static void Main() { ThreadStart fileWriterHandlerDelegate = new ThreadStart(WriteFile); Thread fileWriter = new Thread(fileWriterHandlerDelegate); Console.WriteLine("Starting FileWriter"); fileWriter.Start(); Console.WriteLine("Called FileWriter"); Console.ReadKey(); } private static void WriteFile() { Thread.Sleep(1000); Console.WriteLine("File Written"); } } } And here's the output: Starting FileWriter Called FileWriter File Written So, Why are the Printouts Backwards? The output above corresponds to Console.Writeline statements in the program, with the second and third seemingly reversed. In a single-threaded program, "File Written" would print before "Called FileWriter". However, this is a multi-threaded (2 or more threads) program.  In multi-threading, you can't make any assumptions about when a given thread will run.  In this case, I added the Sleep statement to the WriteFile method to greatly increase the chances that the message from the main thread will print first. Without the Thread.Sleep, you could run this on a system with multiple cores and/or multiple processors and potentially get different results each time. Interesting Tangent but What Should I Get Out of All This? Going back to the main point, launching the WriteFile method on a separate thread made the program more responsive.  The file writing logic ran for a while, but the main thread returned to the user, as demonstrated by the print out of "Called FileWriter".  When the file write finished, it let the user know via another print statement. This was a very efficient use of CPU resources that made for a more pleasant user experience. Joe

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  • Windows Phone 8 Launch Event Summary

    - by Tim Murphy
    Today was the official coming out party for Windows Phone 8.  Below is a summary of the launch event.  There is a lot here to stay with me. They started with a commercial staring Joe Belfiore show how his Windows Phone 8 was personal too him which highlights something I think Microsoft has done well over the last couple of event: spotlight how Windows Phone is a different experience from other smartphones.  Joe actually called iPhone and Android “tired old metaphors" and explained that the idea around Windows Phone was to “reinvent the smartphone around you” as “the most personal smartphone operating system”.  The is the message that they need to drive home in their adds. The only real technical aspect we found out was that they have optimized the operating system around the dual core Qualcomm Snapdragon chip set.  It seems like all of the other hardware goodies had already been announced.  The remainder of the event was centered around new features of the OS and app announcements. So what are we getting?  The integrated features included lock screen live tile, Data Sense, Rooms and Kids corner.  There wasn’t a lot of information about it, but Joe also talked about apps not just having live tiles, but being live apps that could integrate with wallet and the hub. The lock screen will now be able to be personalized with live tile data or even a photo slide show.  This gives the lock screen an even better ability to give you the information you want to know before you even unlock the phone. The Kids Corner allows you as a parent to setup an area on your phone that you kids can go into an use it without disturbing your apps.  They can play games or use apps that you have designated and will only see those apps.  It even has a special lock screen gesture just for the kids corner. Rooms allow you to organize your phone around the groups of people in your life.  You get a shared calendar, a room wall as well as shared notes beyond just being able to send messages to a group.  You can also invite people not on the Windows Phone platform to access an online version of the room. Data Sense is a new feature that gives you better control and understanding of your data plan usage.  You can see which applications are using data and it can automatically adjust they way your phone behaves as you get close to your data limit. Add to these features the fact that the entire Windows ecosystem is integrated with SkyDrive and you have an available anywhere experience that is unequaled by any other platform.  Your document, photos and music are available on your Windows Phone, Window 8 device and Xbox.  SkyDrive also doesn’t limit how long you can keep files like the competing cloud platforms and give more free storage. It was interesting the way they made the launch event more personal.  First Joe brought out his own kids to demo the Kids Corner.  They followed this up by bringing out Jessica Alba to discuss her experience on the Windows Phone 8.  They need to keep putting a face on the product instead of just showing features as a cold list. Then we get to apps.  We knew that the new Skype was coming, but we found out that it was created in such a way that it can receive calls without running consistently in the background which would eat up battery.  This announcement was follow by the coming Facebook app that is optimized for Windows Phone 8.  As a matter of fact they indicated that just after launch the marketplace would have 46 out of the top 50 apps used by all smartphone platforms.  In a rational world this tide with over 120,000 apps currently in the marketplace there should be no more argument about the Windows Phone ecosystem. For those of us who develop for Windows Phone and weren’t on the early adoption program will finally get access to the SDK tomorrow after an announcement at Build (more waiting).  Perhaps we will get a few new features then. In the end I wouldn’t say there were any huge surprises, but I am really excited about getting my hands on the devices next month and starting to develop.  Stay tuned. del.icio.us Tags: Windows Phone,Windows Phone 8,Winodws Phone 8 Launch,Joe Belfiore,Jessica Alba

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