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  • Productivity Tips

    - by Brian T. Jackett
    A few months ago during my first end of year review at Microsoft I was doing an assessment of my year.  One of my personal goals to come out of this reflection was to improve my personal productivity.  While I hear many people say “I wish I had more hours in the day so that I could get more done” I feel like that is the wrong approach.  There is an inherent assumption that you are being productive with your time that you already have and thus more time would allow you to be as productive given more time.    Instead of wishing I could add more hours to the day I’ve begun adopting a number of processes or behavior changes in my personal life to make better use of my time with the goal of improving productivity.  The areas of focus are as follows: Focus Processes Tools Personal health Email Note: A number of these topics have spawned from reading Scott Hanselman’s blog posts on productivity, reading of David Allen’s book Getting Things Done, and discussions with friends and coworkers who had great insights into this topic.   Focus Pre-reading / viewing: Overcome your work addiction Millennials paralyzed by choice Its Not What You Read Its What You Ignore (Scott Hanselman video)    I highly recommend Scott Hanselman’s video above and this post before continuing with this article.  It is well worth the 40+ mins price of admission for the video and couple minutes for article.  One key takeaway for me was listing out my activities in an average week and realizing which ones held little or no value to me.  We all have a finite amount of time to work each day.  Do you know how much time and effort you spend on various aspects of your life (family, friends, religion, work, personal happiness, etc.)?  Do your actions and commitments reflect your priorities?    The biggest time consumers with little value for me were time spent on social media services (Twitter and Facebook), playing an MMO video game, and watching TV.  I still check up on Facebook, Twitter, Microsoft internal chat forums, and other services to keep contact with others but I’ve reduced that time significantly.  As for TV I’ve cut the cord and no longer subscribe to cable TV.  Instead I use Netflix, RedBox, and over the air channels but again with reduced time consumption.  With the time I’ve freed up I’m back to working out 2-3 times a week and reading 4 nights a week (both of which I had been neglecting previously).  I’ll mention a few tools for helping measure your time in the Tools section.   Processes    Do not multi-task.  I’ll say it again.  Do not multi-task.  There is no such thing as multi tasking.  The human brain is optimized to work on one thing at a time.  When you are “multi-tasking” you are really doing 2 or more things at less than 100%, usually by a wide margin.  I take pride in my work and when I’m doing something less than 100% the results typically degrade rapidly.    Now there are some ways of bending the rules of physics for this one.  There is the notion of getting a double amount of work done in the same timeframe.  Some examples would be listening to podcasts / watching a movie while working out, using a treadmill as your work desk, or reading while in the bathroom.    Personally I’ve found good results in combining one task that does not require focus (making dinner, playing certain video games, working out) and one task that does (watching a movie, listening to podcasts).  I believe this is related to me being a visual and kinesthetic (using my hands or actually doing it) learner.  I’m terrible with auditory learning.  My fiance and I joke that sometimes we talk and talk to each other but never really hear each other.   Goals / Tasks    Goals can give us direction in life and a sense of accomplishment when we complete them.  Goals can also overwhelm us and give us a sense of failure when we don’t complete them.  I propose that you shift your perspective and not dwell on all of the things that you haven’t gotten done, but focus instead on regularly setting measureable goals that are within reason of accomplishing.    At the end of each time frame have a retrospective to review your progress.  Do not feel guilty about what you did not accomplish.  Feel proud of what you did accomplish and readjust your goals for the next time frame to more attainable goals.  Here is a sample schedule I’ve seen proposed by some.  I have not consistently set goals for each timeframe, but I do typically set 3 small goals a day (this blog post is #2 for today). Each day set 3 small goals Each week set 3 medium goals Each month set 1 large goal Each year set 2 very large goals   Tools    Tools are an extension of our human body.  They help us extend beyond what we can physically and mentally do.  Below are some tools I use almost daily or have found useful as of late. Disclaimer: I am not getting endorsed to promote any of these products.  I just happen to like them and find them useful. Instapaper – Save internet links for reading later.  There are many tools like this but I’ve found this to be a great one.  There is even a “read it later” JavaScript button you can add to your browser so when you navigate to a site it will then add this to your list. Stacks for Instapaper – A Windows Phone 7 app for reading my Instapaper articles on the go.  It does require a subscription to Instapaper (nominal $3 every three months) but is easily worth the cost.  Alternatively you can set up your Kindle to sync with Instapaper easily but I haven’t done so. SlapDash Podcast – Apps for Windows Phone and  Windows 8 (possibly other platforms) to sync podcast viewing / listening across multiple devices.  Now that I have my Surface RT device (which I love) this is making my consumption easier to manage. Feed Reader – Simple Windows 8 app for quickly catching up on my RSS feeds.  I used to have hundreds of unread items all the time.  Now I’m down to 20-50 regularly and it is much easier and faster to consume on my Surface RT.  There is also a free version (which I use) and I can’t see much different between the free and paid versions currently. Rescue Time – Have you ever wondered how much time you’ve spent on websites vs. email vs. “doing work”?  This service tracks your computer actions and then lets you report on them.  This can help you quantitatively identify areas where your actions are not in line with your priorities. PowerShell – Windows automation tool.  It is now built into every client and server OS.  This tool has saved me days (and I mean the full 24 hrs worth) of time and effort in the past year alone.  If you haven’t started learning PowerShell and you administrating any Windows OS or server product you need to start today. Various blogging tools – I wrote a post a couple years ago called How I Blog about my blogging process and tools used.  Almost all of it still applies today.   Personal Health    Some of these may be common sense or debatable, but I’ve found them to help prioritize my daily activities. Get plenty of sleep on a regular basis.  Sacrificing sleep too many nights a week negatively impacts your cognition, attitude, and overall health. Exercise at least three days.  Exercise could be lifting weights, taking the stairs up multiple flights of stairs, walking for 20 mins, or a number of other "non-traditional” activities.  I find that regular exercise helps with sleep and improves my overall attitude. Eat a well balanced diet.  Too much sugar, caffeine, junk food, etc. are not good for your body.  This is not a matter of losing weight but taking care of your body and helping you perform at your peak potential.   Email    Email can be one of the biggest time consumers (i.e. waster) if you aren’t careful. Time box your email usage.  Set a meeting invite for yourself if necessary to limit how much time you spend checking email. Use rules to prioritize your email.  Email from external customers, my manager, or include me directly on the To line go into my inbox.  Everything else goes a level down and I have 30+ rules to further sort it, mostly distribution lists. Use keyboard shortcuts (when available).  I use Outlook for my primary email and am constantly hitting Alt + S to send, Ctrl + 1 for my inbox, Ctrl + 2 for my calendar, Space / Tab / Shift + Tab to mark items as read, and a number of other useful commands.  Learn them and you’ll see your speed getting through emails increase. Keep emails short.  No one Few people like reading through long emails.  The first line should state exactly why you are sending the email followed by a 3-4 lines to support it.  Anything longer might be better suited as a phone call or in person discussion.   Conclusion    In this post I walked through various tips and tricks I’ve found for improving personal productivity.  It is a mix of re-focusing on the things that matter, using tools to assist in your efforts, and cutting out actions that are not aligned with your priorities.  I originally had a whole section on keyboard shortcuts, but with my recent purchase of the Surface RT I’m finding that touch gestures have replaced numerous keyboard commands that I used to need.  I see a big future in touch enabled devices.  Hopefully some of these tips help you out.  If you have any tools, tips, or ideas you would like to share feel free to add in the comments section.         -Frog Out   Links Scott Hanselman Productivity posts http://www.hanselman.com/blog/CategoryView.aspx?category=Productivity Overcome your work addiction http://blogs.hbr.org/hbsfaculty/2012/05/overcome-your-work-addiction.html?awid=5512355740280659420-3271   Millennials paralyzed by choice http://priyaparker.com/blog/millennials-paralyzed-by-choice   Its Not What You Read Its What You Ignore (video) http://www.hanselman.com/blog/ItsNotWhatYouReadItsWhatYouIgnoreVideoOfScottHanselmansPersonalProductivityTips.aspx   Cutting the cord – Jeff Blankenburg http://www.jeffblankenburg.com/2011/04/06/cutting-the-cord/   Building a sitting standing desk – Eric Harlan http://www.ericharlan.com/Everything_Else/building-a-sitting-standing-desk-a229.html   Instapaper http://www.instapaper.com/u   Stacks for Instapaper http://www.stacksforinstapaper.com/   Slapdash Podcast Windows Phone -  http://www.windowsphone.com/en-us/store/app/slapdash-podcasts/90e8b121-080b-e011-9264-00237de2db9e Windows 8 - http://apps.microsoft.com/webpdp/en-us/app/slapdash-podcasts/0c62e66a-f2e4-4403-af88-3430a821741e/m/ROW   Feed Reader http://apps.microsoft.com/webpdp/en-us/app/feed-reader/d03199c9-8e08-469a-bda1-7963099840cc/m/ROW   Rescue Time http://www.rescuetime.com/   PowerShell Script Center http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/scriptcenter/bb410849.aspx

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  • Object array updates one instance repeatedly [on hold]

    - by MGN001
    I'm making a 2D shooter, and the player object holds an array of bullets that represent how many shots the player can have on screen at once. At least, this is what I'm trying for. What's happening is that each time any of the objects in the array is called, it seems to update a single object in memory. So, if I fire and then fire again, the object "starts over" from where I shot from and moves twice as fast. I've spent weeks trying to fix this and I've managed nothing. Hopefully another pair of eyes will see something I've missed. Player.cpp #include "Player.h" const int startLives = 3; const int maxHealth = 2; const float speed = 1; const int maxVelocity = 500; const int topBound = WINDOW_HEIGHT / 5 * 3; const int slowRate = 500; const int accRate = 1000; const int maxBullets = 5; const float spriteWidth = 99; const float spriteHeight = 75; const Vector2f startPosition = { (WINDOW_WIDTH / 2) - (spriteWidth / 2), (WINDOW_HEIGHT / 4 * 3) - (spriteHeight / 2) }; Bullet bullets[maxBullets]; Bullet * bulletPointers[maxBullets]; SDL_Texture * playerHealthy; SDL_Texture * playerDamaged; SDL_Texture * currentSprite; SDL_Rect * rect; Vector2f position; Vector2f velocity; int Health; int Lives; Player::Player() { rect = new SDL_Rect(); } Player::~Player() { SDL_DestroyTexture(playerHealthy); SDL_DestroyTexture(playerDamaged); SDL_DestroyTexture(currentSprite); rect = NULL; } void Player::Initialize(SDL_Renderer * renderer) { SDL_Surface * temp; temp = IMG_Load(".\\Sprites\\player.png"); if (temp == NULL) { printf("Initialization Error: %s\n", IMG_GetError()); exit(PLAYER_INITIALIZATION_ERROR); } playerHealthy = SDL_CreateTextureFromSurface(renderer, temp); temp = IMG_Load(".\\Sprites\\playerDamaged.png"); if (temp == NULL) { printf("Initialization Error: %s\n", IMG_GetError()); exit(PLAYER_INITIALIZATION_ERROR); } playerDamaged = SDL_CreateTextureFromSurface(renderer, temp); temp = IMG_Load(".\\Sprites\\laserGreen.png"); if (temp == NULL) { printf("Initialization Error: %s\n", IMG_GetError()); exit(PLAYER_INITIALIZATION_ERROR); } SDL_Texture * bullet = SDL_CreateTextureFromSurface(renderer, temp); temp = IMG_Load(".\\Sprites\\laserGreenShot.png"); if (temp == NULL) { printf("Initialization Error: %s\n", IMG_GetError()); exit(PLAYER_INITIALIZATION_ERROR); } SDL_Texture * explosion = SDL_CreateTextureFromSurface(renderer, temp); for (int i = 0; i < maxBullets; i++) { bullets[i].Initialize(renderer, bullet, explosion); bulletPointers[i] = NULL; } temp = NULL; rect->h = spriteHeight; rect->w = spriteWidth; Reset(); } void Player::Update(Input input, float deltaTime) { if (abs(velocity.x) < slowRate * deltaTime) { velocity.x = 0; } else if (velocity.x > 0) { velocity.x -= slowRate * deltaTime; } else if (velocity.x < 0) { velocity.x += slowRate * deltaTime; } if (abs(velocity.y) < slowRate * deltaTime) { velocity.y = 0; } if (velocity.y > 0) { velocity.y -= slowRate * deltaTime; } else if (velocity.y < 0) { velocity.y += slowRate * deltaTime; } if (Health <= 0) { --Lives; Spawn(); } velocity.x += UnitVector(input.InputNew.movement).x * accRate * deltaTime; velocity.y += UnitVector(input.InputNew.movement).y * accRate * deltaTime; if (Magnitude(velocity) > maxVelocity) { velocity.x = UnitVector(velocity).x * maxVelocity; velocity.y = UnitVector(velocity).y * maxVelocity; } position.x += velocity.x * deltaTime * speed; position.y += velocity.y * deltaTime * speed; if (input.InputNew.JumpLeft && !input.InputOld.JumpLeft) { position.x -= spriteWidth; } if (input.InputNew.JumpRight && !input.InputOld.JumpRight) { position.x += spriteWidth; } Boundaries(); rect->x = position.x; rect->y = position.y; if (input.InputNew.Fire && !input.InputOld.Fire) { Fire(); } for (int i = 0; i < maxBullets; ++i) { if (bulletPointers[i] != NULL) { bullets[i].Update(deltaTime); if (bullets[i].getPosition().y < -33) { bulletPointers[i] = NULL; } } } } void Player::Draw(SDL_Renderer * renderer) { for (int i = 0; i < maxBullets; ++i) { if (bulletPointers[i] != NULL) { bullets[i].Draw(renderer); } } SDL_RenderCopy(renderer, currentSprite, NULL, rect); } void Player::Spawn() { position = startPosition; Health = maxHealth; currentSprite = playerHealthy; rect->x = position.x; rect->y = position.y; } void Player::Boundaries() { if (position.x < 0) { position.x = 0; velocity.x *= -1; } else if (position.x > WINDOW_WIDTH - spriteWidth) { position.x = WINDOW_WIDTH - spriteWidth; velocity.x *= -1; } if (position.y < topBound) { position.y = topBound; velocity.y *= -1; } else if (position.y > WINDOW_HEIGHT - spriteHeight) { position.y = WINDOW_HEIGHT - spriteHeight; velocity.y *= -1; } } int Player::getLives() { return Lives; } void Player::Reset() { Lives = startLives; Spawn(); } void Player::Fire() { for (int i = 0; i < maxBullets; ++i) { if (bulletPointers[i] == NULL) { bulletPointers[i] = &bullets[i]; bullets[i].Fire(position,velocity.x/2); break; } } } Bullet.cpp #include "Bullet.h" const int speed = 500; Vector2f bulletVelocity; float ExplosionMax = 0.5f; float ExplosionTimer; const Vector2f fireOffset = { 45.5f, 10.0f }; const Vector2f explosionOffset = { 23.5f, -27.0f }; const Vector2i bulletSize = { 9, 33 }; const Vector2i explosionSize = { 56, 54 }; Vector2f bulletPosition; SDL_Texture * bulletSprite; SDL_Texture * explosionSprite; SDL_Texture * bulletCurrentSprite; SDL_Rect * bulletRect; Bullet::Bullet() { } Bullet::~Bullet() { } void Bullet::Initialize(SDL_Renderer * renderer, SDL_Texture * bullet, SDL_Texture * explosion) { bulletSprite = bullet; explosionSprite = explosion; bulletRect = new SDL_Rect(); } void Bullet::Update(float deltaTime) { bulletPosition.y -= bulletVelocity.y * deltaTime; bulletPosition.x += bulletVelocity.x * deltaTime; bulletRect->x = static_cast<int>(bulletPosition.x); bulletRect->y = static_cast<int>(bulletPosition.y); } void Bullet::Draw(SDL_Renderer * renderer) { SDL_RenderCopy(renderer, bulletCurrentSprite, NULL, bulletRect); } void Bullet::Fire(Vector2f pos, float xSpeed) { bulletPosition.x = pos.x + fireOffset.x; bulletPosition.y = pos.y + fireOffset.y; bulletVelocity.x = xSpeed; bulletVelocity.y = speed; bulletCurrentSprite = bulletSprite; bulletRect->h = bulletSize.y; bulletRect->w = bulletSize.x; bulletRect->x = static_cast<int>(bulletPosition.x); bulletRect->y = static_cast<int>(bulletPosition.y); } Vector2f Bullet::getPosition() { return bulletPosition; } void Bullet::Hit() { bulletCurrentSprite = explosionSprite; bulletVelocity = { 0.0f, 0.0f }; ExplosionTimer = ExplosionMax; bulletPosition.x += explosionOffset.x; bulletPosition.y += explosionOffset.y; bulletRect->w = explosionSize.x; bulletRect->h = explosionSize.y; }

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  • C#: Inheritence, Overriding, and Hiding

    - by Rosarch
    I'm having difficulty with an architectural decision for my C# XNA game. The basic entity in the world, such as a tree, zombie, or the player, is represented as a GameObject. Each GameObject is composed of at least a GameObjectController, GameObjectModel, and GameObjectView. These three are enough for simple entities, like inanimate trees or rocks. However, as I try to keep the functionality as factored out as possible, the inheritance begins to feel unwieldy. Syntactically, I'm not even sure how best to accomplish my goals. Here is the GameObjectController: public class GameObjectController { protected GameObjectModel model; protected GameObjectView view; public GameObjectController(GameObjectManager gameObjectManager) { this.gameObjectManager = gameObjectManager; model = new GameObjectModel(this); view = new GameObjectView(this); } public GameObjectManager GameObjectManager { get { return gameObjectManager; } } public virtual GameObjectView View { get { return view; } } public virtual GameObjectModel Model { get { return model; } } public virtual void Update(long tick) { } } I want to specify that each subclass of GameObjectController will have accessible at least a GameObjectView and GameObjectModel. If subclasses are fine using those classes, but perhaps are overriding for a more sophisticated Update() method, I don't want them to have to duplicate the code to produce those dependencies. So, the GameObjectController constructor sets those objects up. However, some objects do want to override the model and view. This is where the trouble comes in. Some objects need to fight, so they are CombatantGameObjects: public class CombatantGameObject : GameObjectController { protected new readonly CombatantGameModel model; public new virtual CombatantGameModel Model { get { return model; } } protected readonly CombatEngine combatEngine; public CombatantGameObject(GameObjectManager gameObjectManager, CombatEngine combatEngine) : base(gameObjectManager) { model = new CombatantGameModel(this); this.combatEngine = combatEngine; } public override void Update(long tick) { if (model.Health <= 0) { gameObjectManager.RemoveFromWorld(this); } base.Update(tick); } } Still pretty simple. Is my use of new to hide instance variables correct? Note that I'm assigning CombatantObjectController.model here, even though GameObjectController.Model was already set. And, combatants don't need any special view functionality, so they leave GameObjectController.View alone. Then I get down to the PlayerController, at which a bug is found. public class PlayerController : CombatantGameObject { private readonly IInputReader inputReader; private new readonly PlayerModel model; public new PlayerModel Model { get { return model; } } private float lastInventoryIndexAt; private float lastThrowAt; public PlayerController(GameObjectManager gameObjectManager, IInputReader inputReader, CombatEngine combatEngine) : base(gameObjectManager, combatEngine) { this.inputReader = inputReader; model = new PlayerModel(this); Model.Health = Constants.PLAYER_HEALTH; } public override void Update(long tick) { if (Model.Health <= 0) { gameObjectManager.RemoveFromWorld(this); for (int i = 0; i < 10; i++) { Debug.WriteLine("YOU DEAD SON!!!"); } return; } UpdateFromInput(tick); // .... } } The first time that this line is executed, I get a null reference exception: model.Body.ApplyImpulse(movementImpulse, model.Position); model.Position looks at model.Body, which is null. This is a function that initializes GameObjects before they are deployed into the world: public void Initialize(GameObjectController controller, IDictionary<string, string> data, WorldState worldState) { controller.View.read(data); controller.View.createSpriteAnimations(data, _assets); controller.Model.read(data); SetUpPhysics(controller, worldState, controller.Model.BoundingCircleRadius, Single.Parse(data["x"]), Single.Parse(data["y"]), bool.Parse(data["isBullet"])); } Every object is passed as a GameObjectController. Does that mean that if the object is really a PlayerController, controller.Model will refer to the base's GameObjectModel and not the PlayerController's overriden PlayerObjectModel?

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  • XNA: Load and read a XML file?

    - by Rosarch
    I'm having difficulty doing this seemingly simple task. I want to load XML files with the same ease of loading art assets: content = new ContentManager(Services); content.RootDirectory = "Content"; background = content.Load<Texture2D>("images\\ice"); I'm not sure how to do this. This tutorial seems helpful, but how do I get a StorageDevice instance? I do have something working now, but it feels pretty hacky: public IDictionary<string, string> Get(string typeName) { IDictionary<String, String> result = new Dictionary<String, String>(); xmlReader.Read(); // get past the XML declaration string element = null; string text = null; while (xmlReader.Read()) { switch (xmlReader.NodeType) { case XmlNodeType.Element: element = xmlReader.Name; break; case XmlNodeType.Text: text = xmlReader.Value; break; } if (text != null && element != null) { result[element] = text; text = null; element = null; } } return result; } I apply this to the following XML file: <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?> <zombies> <zombie> <health>100</health> <positionX>23</positionX> <positionY>12</positionY> <speed>2</speed> </zombie> </zombies> And it is able to pass this unit test: internal virtual IPersistentState CreateIPersistentState(string fullpath) { IPersistentState target = new ReadWriteXML(File.Open(fullpath, FileMode.Open)); return target; } /// <summary> ///A test for Get with one zombie. ///</summary> //[TestMethod()] public void SimpleGetTest() { string fullPath = "C:\\pathTo\\Data\\SavedZombies.xml"; IPersistentState target = CreateIPersistentState(fullPath); string typeName = "zombie"; IDictionary<string, string> expected = new Dictionary<string, string>(); expected["health"] = "100"; expected["positionX"] = "23"; expected["positionY"] = "12"; expected["speed"] = "2"; IDictionary<string, string> actual = target.Get(typeName); foreach (KeyValuePair<string, string> entry in expected) { Assert.AreEqual(entry.Value, expected[entry.Key]); } } Downsides to the current approach: file loading is done poorly, and matching keys to values seems like it's way more effort than necessary. Also, I suspect this approach would fall apart with more than one entry in the XML.

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  • XNA: Best way to load and read a XML file?

    - by Rosarch
    I'm having difficulty doing this seemingly simple task. I want to load XML files with the same ease of loading art assets: content = new ContentManager(Services); content.RootDirectory = "Content"; Texture2d background = content.Load<Texture2D>("images\\ice"); I'm not sure how to do this. This tutorial seems helpful, but how do I get a StorageDevice instance? I do have something working now, but it feels pretty hacky: public IDictionary<string, string> Get(string typeName) { IDictionary<String, String> result = new Dictionary<String, String>(); xmlReader.Read(); // get past the XML declaration string element = null; string text = null; while (xmlReader.Read()) { switch (xmlReader.NodeType) { case XmlNodeType.Element: element = xmlReader.Name; break; case XmlNodeType.Text: text = xmlReader.Value; break; } if (text != null && element != null) { result[element] = text; text = null; element = null; } } return result; } I apply this to the following XML file: <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?> <zombies> <zombie> <health>100</health> <positionX>23</positionX> <positionY>12</positionY> <speed>2</speed> </zombie> </zombies> And it is able to pass this unit test: internal virtual IPersistentState CreateIPersistentState(string fullpath) { IPersistentState target = new ReadWriteXML(File.Open(fullpath, FileMode.Open)); return target; } /// <summary> ///A test for Get with one zombie. ///</summary> //[TestMethod()] public void SimpleGetTest() { string fullPath = "C:\\pathTo\\Data\\SavedZombies.xml"; IPersistentState target = CreateIPersistentState(fullPath); string typeName = "zombie"; IDictionary<string, string> expected = new Dictionary<string, string>(); expected["health"] = "100"; expected["positionX"] = "23"; expected["positionY"] = "12"; expected["speed"] = "2"; IDictionary<string, string> actual = target.Get(typeName); foreach (KeyValuePair<string, string> entry in expected) { Assert.AreEqual(entry.Value, expected[entry.Key]); } } Downsides to the current approach: file loading is done poorly, and matching keys to values seems like it's way more effort than necessary. Also, I suspect this approach would fall apart with more than one entry in the XML. I can't imagine that this is the optimal implementation.

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  • Managing Database Clusters - A Whole Lot Simpler

    - by mat.keep(at)oracle.com
    Clustered computing brings with it many benefits: high performance, high availability, scalable infrastructure, etc.  But it also brings with it more complexity.Why ?  Well, by its very nature, there are more "moving parts" to monitor and manage (from physical, virtual and logical hosts) to fault detection and failover software to redundant networking components - the list goes on.  And a cluster that isn't effectively provisioned and managed will cause more downtime than the standalone systems it is designed to improve upon.  Not so great....When it comes to the database industry, analysts already estimate that 50% of a typical database's Total Cost of Ownership is attributable to staffing and downtime costs.  These costs will only increase if a database cluster is to hard to properly administer.Over the past 9 months, monitoring and management has been a major focus in the development of the MySQL Cluster database, and on Tuesday 12th January, the product team will be presenting the output of that development in a new webinar.Even if you can't make the date, it is still worth registering so you will receive automatic notification when the on-demand replay is availableIn the webinar, the team will cover:    * NDBINFO: released with MySQL Cluster 7.1, NDBINFO presents real-time status and usage statistics, providing developers and DBAs with a simple means of pro-actively monitoring and optimizing database performance and availability.    * MySQL Cluster Manager (MCM): available as part of the commercial MySQL Cluster Carrier Grade Edition, MCM simplifies the creation and management of MySQL Cluster by automating common management tasks, delivering higher administration productivity and enhancing cluster agility. Tasks that used to take 46 commands can be reduced to just one!    * MySQL Cluster Advisors & Graphs: part of the MySQL Enterprise Monitor and available in the commercial MySQL Cluster Carrier Grade Edition, the Enterprise Advisor includes automated best practice rules that alert on key performance and availability metrics from MySQL Cluster data nodes.You'll also learn how you can get started evaluating and using all of these tools to simplify MySQL Cluster management.This session will last round an hour and will include interactive Q&A throughout. You can learn more about MySQL Cluster Manager from this whitepaper and on-line demonstration.  You can also download the packages from eDelivery (just select "MySQL Database" as the product pack, select your platform, click "Go" and then scroll down to get the software).While managing clusters will never be easy, the webinar will show hou how it just got a whole lot simpler !

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  • Today on http://endpoint.tv – AppFabric Dashboard Overview

    - by The Official Microsoft IIS Site
    AppFabric has this great new Dashboard that gives you insight into what is happening with your services and workflows. In this video, Senior Programming Writer Michael McKeown shows you what the Dashboard can do for you. Watch it now on endpoint.tv For more on the AppFabric Dashboard see the following articles on MSDN Monitoring Applications Using AppFabric Management UI Features We have more great episodes available at http://endpoint.tv so keep watching Ron Jacobs Host of endpoint.tv...( read more...(read more)

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  • Oracle Unveils Oracle Social Relationship Management Suite at Oracle OpenWorld

    - by Richard Lefebvre
    New Service Enables Companies to Listen, Engage, Create, Market and Analyze Interactions across Multiple Social Platforms in Real-Time During his keynote presentation, Oracle CEO Larry Ellison announced the Oracle Social Relationship Management (SRM) Suite.   Oracle Social Relationship Management Suite is an integrated enterprise service that enables companies to listen, engage, create, market, and analyze interactions across multiple social platforms in real-time providing a holistic view of the consumer.   Oracle Social Relationship Management Suite is integrated with Oracle’s enterprise applications, including Oracle Fusion Marketing, Oracle Fusion Sales Catalog, Oracle ATG Web Commerce, and Oracle Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP), allowing organizations to use social to transform their corporate business processes and systems.   Additionally, Oracle Social Relationship Management Suite is integrated with Oracle Platform Services, including Oracle Java Cloud Service and Oracle Database Cloud Service, enabling marketing teams to integrate social with their custom Web pages, landing pages and marketing tools. Unleashing the Power of Social • Providing a holistic view of consumer interactions, Oracle Social Relationship Management Suite includes: Oracle Social Network (OSN): Provides a secure collaboration platform that supports real-time collaboration and networking for users inside and outside the organization. Oracle Social Marketing: Enables marketers to centrally create, publish, moderate, manage, measure and report across multiple social campaigns and platforms. It also helps marketers publish social content, engage fans and customize their brand's look and feel. Oracle Social Engagement & Monitoring Cloud Service: Enables organizations to analyze social media interactions while also empowering customer service and sales teams to effectively engage with customers and prospects. It gives organizations the tools they need to understand customers and take the appropriate actions by monitoring, listening, learning, and responding to signals and trends across the social web. Oracle Social Sites: provides brands and agencies a powerful and rich editing experience that end users can leverage to dynamically develop and launch social sites. Oracle Data and Insights. A service that caters to a growing enterprise need for externally information by providing information, directory and insights about common business entities. Supporting Quote “By fundamentally changing the way organizations connect with their different stakeholders, social is changing the rules of business,” said Thomas Kurian, executive vice president, Oracle Product Development. “With the Oracle Social Relationship Management Suite we are empowering our customers to embrace this change by integrating the tools required to listen, engage, create, market and analyze social interactions into existing applications and services.”

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  • Measuring Social Media Efforts

    - by David Dorf
    So you're on the bandwagon and you've created a Facebook page, you're tweeting everyday, and maybe you've even got a YouTube channel. Now what? After you put any program in place, you need to measure, set new goals, then execute and this is no different. But how does one measure social media efforts? First, I guess we need some goals. Typical ones might be to acquire customers, engage them, then convert them. So that translates to: Increase Facebook fans and Twitter followers Increase comments/posting and retweets Increase redemption of offers via Facebook and Twitter Counting fans and followers is easy, and tracking the redemption of coupons isn't that hard either, but measuring engagement is a tough one. How do you know whether your fans are reading your posts, and whether your posts have any meaning to them? For Facebook, the fan page administrator has access to analytics called Facebook Insights. There you can check weekly metrics such as total fans, new fans, lost fans, demographics of fans, number of postings, numbers clicks, etc. Not nearly as comprehensive as Google Analytics, but well on its way. For Twitter, getting information is a little tougher. Again, its easy to track followers and you can use tools like TweetMeme to encourage and track retweets. An interesting website called WeFollow tries to measure influence for certain topics. For example, the top three influencers for the topic "retail" are retailweek, retailwire, and retailerdaily. Other notables are #10 BestBuy, #11 GapOfficial, #12 JeffPR, and #17 OracleRetail. I assume influence is calculated based on number of followers, number of retweets, frequency of tweets, and perhaps depth of dialogs. If you want to get serious about monitoring and measuring social marketing efforts, you'd be wise to invest in a strong tool. Several are listed on this wiki, including big ones like Radian6, Nielsen, Omniture, and Buzzient. Buzzient might be particularly interesting because its integrated with Oracle CRM OnDemand -- see the demo. As always, I'm interested in hearing how others approach goal setting and monitoring of social media efforts, so feel free to post comments.

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  • Oracle Enterprise Manager users present today at Oracle Users Forum

    - by Anand Akela
    Oracle Users Forum starts in a few minutes at Moscone West, Levels 2 & 3. There are more than hundreds of Oracle user sessions during the day. Many Oracle Oracle Enterprise Manager users are presenting today as well.  In addition, we will have a Twitter Chat today from 11:30 AM to 12:30 PM with IOUG leaders, Enterprise Manager SIG contributors and many speakers. You can participate in the chat using hash tag #em12c on Twitter.com or by going to  tweetchat.com/room/em12c      (Needs Twitter credential for participating).  Feel free to join IOUG and Enterprise team members at the User Group Pavilion on 2nd Floor, Moscone West. RSVP by going http://tweetvite.com/event/IOUG  . Don't miss the Oracle Open World welcome keynote by Larry Ellison this evening at 5 PM . Here is the complete list of Oracle Enterprise Manager sessions during the Oracle Users Forum : Time Session Title Speakers Location 8:00AM - 8:45AM UGF4569 - Oracle RAC Migration with Oracle Automatic Storage Management and Oracle Enterprise Manager 12c VINOD Emmanuel -Database Engineering, Dell, Inc. Wendy Chen - Sr. Systems Engineer, Dell, Inc. Moscone West - 2011 8:00AM - 8:45AM UGF10389 -  Monitoring Storage Systems for Oracle Enterprise Manager 12c Anand Ranganathan - Product Manager, NetApp Moscone West - 2016 9:00AM - 10:00AM UGF2571 - Make Oracle Enterprise Manager Sing and Dance with the Command-Line Interface Ray Smith - Senior Database Administrator, Portland General Electric Moscone West - 2011 10:30AM - 11:30AM UGF2850 - Optimal Support: Oracle Enterprise Manager 12c Cloud Control, My Oracle Support, and More April Sims - DBA, Southern Utah University Moscone West - 2011 12:30PM-2:00PM UGF5131 - Migrating from Oracle Enterprise Manager 10g Grid Control to 12c Cloud Control    Leighton Nelson - Database Administrator, Mercy Moscone West - 2011 2:15PM-3:15PM UGF6511 -  Database Performance Tuning: Get the Best out of Oracle Enterprise Manager 12c Cloud Control Mike Ault - Oracle Guru, TEXAS MEMORY SYSTEMS INC Tariq Farooq - CEO/Founder, BrainSurface Moscone West - 2011 3:30PM-4:30PM UGF4556 - Will It Blend? Verifying Capacity in Server and Database Consolidations Jeremiah Wilton - Database Technology, Blue Gecko / DatAvail Moscone West - 2018 3:30PM-4:30PM UGF10400 - Oracle Enterprise Manager 12c: Monitoring, Metric Extensions, and Configuration Best Practices Kellyn Pot'Vin - Sr. Technical Consultant, Enkitec Moscone West - 2011 Stay Connected: Twitter |  Face book |  You Tube |  Linked in |  Newsletter

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  • SQL Monitor’s data repository

    - by Chris Lambrou
    As one of the developers of SQL Monitor, I often get requests passed on by our support people from customers who are looking to dip into SQL Monitor’s own data repository, in order to pull out bits of information that they’re interested in. Since there’s clearly interest out there in playing around directly with the data repository, I thought I’d write some blog posts to start to describe how it all works. The hardest part for me is knowing where to begin, since the schema of the data repository is pretty big. Hmmm… I guess it’s tricky for anyone to write anything but the most trivial of queries against the data repository without understanding the hierarchy of monitored objects, so perhaps my first post should start there. I always imagine that whenever a customer fires up SSMS and starts to explore their SQL Monitor data repository database, they become immediately bewildered by the schema – that was certainly my experience when I did so for the first time. The following query shows the number of different object types in the data repository schema: SELECT type_desc, COUNT(*) AS [count] FROM sys.objects GROUP BY type_desc ORDER BY type_desc;  type_desccount 1DEFAULT_CONSTRAINT63 2FOREIGN_KEY_CONSTRAINT181 3INTERNAL_TABLE3 4PRIMARY_KEY_CONSTRAINT190 5SERVICE_QUEUE3 6SQL_INLINE_TABLE_VALUED_FUNCTION381 7SQL_SCALAR_FUNCTION2 8SQL_STORED_PROCEDURE100 9SYSTEM_TABLE41 10UNIQUE_CONSTRAINT54 11USER_TABLE193 12VIEW124 With 193 tables, 124 views, 100 stored procedures and 381 table valued functions, that’s quite a hefty schema, and when you browse through it using SSMS, it can be a bit daunting at first. So, where to begin? Well, let’s narrow things down a bit and only look at the tables belonging to the data schema. That’s where all of the collected monitoring data is stored by SQL Monitor. The following query gives us the names of those tables: SELECT sch.name + '.' + obj.name AS [name] FROM sys.objects obj JOIN sys.schemas sch ON sch.schema_id = obj.schema_id WHERE obj.type_desc = 'USER_TABLE' AND sch.name = 'data' ORDER BY sch.name, obj.name; This query still returns 110 tables. I won’t show them all here, but let’s have a look at the first few of them:  name 1data.Cluster_Keys 2data.Cluster_Machine_ClockSkew_UnstableSamples 3data.Cluster_Machine_Cluster_StableSamples 4data.Cluster_Machine_Keys 5data.Cluster_Machine_LogicalDisk_Capacity_StableSamples 6data.Cluster_Machine_LogicalDisk_Keys 7data.Cluster_Machine_LogicalDisk_Sightings 8data.Cluster_Machine_LogicalDisk_UnstableSamples 9data.Cluster_Machine_LogicalDisk_Volume_StableSamples 10data.Cluster_Machine_Memory_Capacity_StableSamples 11data.Cluster_Machine_Memory_UnstableSamples 12data.Cluster_Machine_Network_Capacity_StableSamples 13data.Cluster_Machine_Network_Keys 14data.Cluster_Machine_Network_Sightings 15data.Cluster_Machine_Network_UnstableSamples 16data.Cluster_Machine_OperatingSystem_StableSamples 17data.Cluster_Machine_Ping_UnstableSamples 18data.Cluster_Machine_Process_Instances 19data.Cluster_Machine_Process_Keys 20data.Cluster_Machine_Process_Owner_Instances 21data.Cluster_Machine_Process_Sightings 22data.Cluster_Machine_Process_UnstableSamples 23… There are two things I want to draw your attention to: The table names describe a hierarchy of the different types of object that are monitored by SQL Monitor (e.g. clusters, machines and disks). For each object type in the hierarchy, there are multiple tables, ending in the suffixes _Keys, _Sightings, _StableSamples and _UnstableSamples. Not every object type has a table for every suffix, but the _Keys suffix is especially important and a _Keys table does indeed exist for every object type. In fact, if we limit the query to return only those tables ending in _Keys, we reveal the full object hierarchy: SELECT sch.name + '.' + obj.name AS [name] FROM sys.objects obj JOIN sys.schemas sch ON sch.schema_id = obj.schema_id WHERE obj.type_desc = 'USER_TABLE' AND sch.name = 'data' AND obj.name LIKE '%_Keys' ORDER BY sch.name, obj.name;  name 1data.Cluster_Keys 2data.Cluster_Machine_Keys 3data.Cluster_Machine_LogicalDisk_Keys 4data.Cluster_Machine_Network_Keys 5data.Cluster_Machine_Process_Keys 6data.Cluster_Machine_Services_Keys 7data.Cluster_ResourceGroup_Keys 8data.Cluster_ResourceGroup_Resource_Keys 9data.Cluster_SqlServer_Agent_Job_History_Keys 10data.Cluster_SqlServer_Agent_Job_Keys 11data.Cluster_SqlServer_Database_BackupType_Backup_Keys 12data.Cluster_SqlServer_Database_BackupType_Keys 13data.Cluster_SqlServer_Database_CustomMetric_Keys 14data.Cluster_SqlServer_Database_File_Keys 15data.Cluster_SqlServer_Database_Keys 16data.Cluster_SqlServer_Database_Table_Index_Keys 17data.Cluster_SqlServer_Database_Table_Keys 18data.Cluster_SqlServer_Error_Keys 19data.Cluster_SqlServer_Keys 20data.Cluster_SqlServer_Services_Keys 21data.Cluster_SqlServer_SqlProcess_Keys 22data.Cluster_SqlServer_TopQueries_Keys 23data.Cluster_SqlServer_Trace_Keys 24data.Group_Keys The full object type hierarchy looks like this: Cluster Machine LogicalDisk Network Process Services ResourceGroup Resource SqlServer Agent Job History Database BackupType Backup CustomMetric File Table Index Error Services SqlProcess TopQueries Trace Group Okay, but what about the individual objects themselves represented at each level in this hierarchy? Well that’s what the _Keys tables are for. This is probably best illustrated by way of a simple example – how can I query my own data repository to find the databases on my own PC for which monitoring data has been collected? Like this: SELECT clstr._Name AS cluster_name, srvr._Name AS instance_name, db._Name AS database_name FROM data.Cluster_SqlServer_Database_Keys db JOIN data.Cluster_SqlServer_Keys srvr ON db.ParentId = srvr.Id -- Note here how the parent of a Database is a Server JOIN data.Cluster_Keys clstr ON srvr.ParentId = clstr.Id -- Note here how the parent of a Server is a Cluster WHERE clstr._Name = 'dev-chrisl2' -- This is the hostname of my own PC ORDER BY clstr._Name, srvr._Name, db._Name;  cluster_nameinstance_namedatabase_name 1dev-chrisl2SqlMonitorData 2dev-chrisl2master 3dev-chrisl2model 4dev-chrisl2msdb 5dev-chrisl2mssqlsystemresource 6dev-chrisl2tempdb 7dev-chrisl2sql2005SqlMonitorData 8dev-chrisl2sql2005TestDatabase 9dev-chrisl2sql2005master 10dev-chrisl2sql2005model 11dev-chrisl2sql2005msdb 12dev-chrisl2sql2005mssqlsystemresource 13dev-chrisl2sql2005tempdb 14dev-chrisl2sql2008SqlMonitorData 15dev-chrisl2sql2008master 16dev-chrisl2sql2008model 17dev-chrisl2sql2008msdb 18dev-chrisl2sql2008mssqlsystemresource 19dev-chrisl2sql2008tempdb These results show that I have three SQL Server instances on my machine (a default instance, one named sql2005 and one named sql2008), and each instance has the usual set of system databases, along with a database named SqlMonitorData. Basically, this is where I test SQL Monitor on different versions of SQL Server, when I’m developing. There are a few important things we can learn from this query: Each _Keys table has a column named Id. This is the primary key. Each _Keys table has a column named ParentId. A foreign key relationship is defined between each _Keys table and its parent _Keys table in the hierarchy. There are two exceptions to this, Cluster_Keys and Group_Keys, because clusters and groups live at the root level of the object hierarchy. Each _Keys table has a column named _Name. This is used to uniquely identify objects in the table within the scope of the same shared parent object. Actually, that last item isn’t always true. In some cases, the _Name column is actually called something else. For example, the data.Cluster_Machine_Services_Keys table has a column named _ServiceName instead of _Name (sorry for the inconsistency). In other cases, a name isn’t sufficient to uniquely identify an object. For example, right now my PC has multiple processes running, all sharing the same name, Chrome (one for each tab open in my web-browser). In such cases, multiple columns are used to uniquely identify an object within the scope of the same shared parent object. Well, that’s it for now. I’ve given you enough information for you to explore the _Keys tables to see how objects are stored in your own data repositories. In a future post, I’ll try to explain how monitoring data is stored for each object, using the _StableSamples and _UnstableSamples tables. If you have any questions about this post, or suggestions for future posts, just submit them in the comments section below.

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  • endpoint.tv - Troubleshooting with AppFabric

    - by The Official Microsoft IIS Site
    Troubleshooting applications in production is always a challenge. With AppFabric monitoring your workflows and services, you get great information about exactly what is happening, including notices about unhandled exceptions. In this episode, Michael McKeown will show you more about how you can use these features to troubleshoot problems with your applications. Be sure to check out the AppFabric Wiki for more great tips, and to share yours as well....( read more ) Read More......(read more)

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  • Oracle Enterprise Manager 12c Integration With Oracle Enterprise Manager Ops Center 11g

    - by Scott Elvington
    In a blog entry earlier this year, we announced the availability of the Ops Center 11g plug-in for Enterprise Manager 12c. In this article I will walk you through the process of deploying the plug-in on your existing Enterprise Manager agents and show you some of the capabilities the plug-in provides. We'll also look at the integration from the Ops Center perspective. I will show you how to set up the connection to Enterprise Manager and give an overview of the information that is available. Installing and Configuring the Ops Center Plug-in The plug-in is available for download from the Self Update page (Setup ? Extensibility ? Self Update). The plug-in name is “Ops Center Infrastructure stack”. Once you have downloaded the plug-in you can navigate to the Plug-In management page (Setup ? Extensibility ? Plug-ins) to begin deployment. The plug-in must first be deployed on the Management Server. You will need to provide the repository password of the SYS user in order to deploy the plug-in to the Management Server. There are a few pre-requisites that need to be completed on the Ops Center side before the plug-in can be deployed and configured on the desired Enterprise Manager agents. Any servers, whether physical or virtual, for which you wish to see metrics and alerts need to be managed by Ops Center. This means that the Operating System needs to have an Ops Center management agent installed as a minimum. The plug-in can provide even more value when Ops Center is also managing the other “layers of the stack”, for example the service processor, the blade chassis or the XSCF of an M-Series server. The more information that Ops Center has about the stack, the more information that will be visible within Enterprise Manager via the plug-in. In order to access the information within Ops Center, the plug-in requires a user to connect as. This user does not require any particular Ops Center permissions or roles, it simply needs to exist. You can create a specific “EMPlugin” user within Ops Center or use an existing user. Oracle recommends creating a specific, non-privileged user account within Ops Center for this purpose. From the Ops Center Administration section, select Enterprise Controller, click the Users tab and finally click the Add User icon to create the desired user account. For the purpose of this article I have discovered and managed the OS and service processor of the server where my Enterprise Manager 12c installation is hosted. With the plug-in deployed to the Management Server and the setup done within Ops Center, we're now ready to deploy the plug-in to the agents and configure the targets to communicate with the Ops Center Enterprise Controller. From the Setup menu select Add Targets then Add Targets Manually. Select the bottom radio button “Add Targets Manually by Specifying Target Monitoring Properties”, select Infrastructure Stack from the Target Type dropdown and finally, select the Monitoring Agent where you wish to deploy the plug-in. Click the Add Manually.... button and fill in the details for the new target using the appropriate hostname for your Enterprise Controller and the user and password details for the plug-in access user. After the target has been added to the agent you will need to allow a few minutes for the initial data collection to complete. Once completed you can see the new target in the All Targets list. All metric collections are enabled by default except one. To enable Infrastructure Stack Alarms collection, navigate to the newly added target and then to Target ? Monitoring ? Metric and Collection Settings. There you can click the “Disabled” link under Collection Schedule to enable collection and set your desired collection frequency. By default, a Warning level alert in Ops Center will equate to a Warning level event in Enterprise Manager and a Critical alert will equate to a Critical event. This mapping can be altered in the Metric and Collection Settings also. The default incident rules in Enterprise Manager only create incidents from Critical events so keep this in mind in case you want to see incidents generated for Warning or Info level alerts from Ops Center. Also, because Enterprise Manager already monitors the OS through it's Host target type, the plug-in does not pull OS alerts from Ops Center so as to prevent duplication. In addition to alert propagation, the plug-in also provides data for several reports detailing the topology and configuration of the stack as well as any hardware sensor data that is available. These are available from the Information Publisher Reports. Navigate there from the Enterprise ? Reports menu or directly from the Infrastructure Stack target of interest. As an example, here is a sample of the Hardware Sensors report showing some of the available sensor data. The report can also be exported to a CSV file format if desired. Connecting Ops Center to Enterprise Manager Repository For an Enterprise Manager user, the plug-in provides a deeper visibility to the state of the infrastructure underlying the databases and middleware. On the Ops Center side, there is also a greater visibility to the targets running on the infrastructure. To set up the Ops Center data collection, just navigate to the Administration section and select the Grid Control link. Select the Configure/Connect action from the right-hand menu and complete the wizard forms to enable the connection to the Enterprise Manager repository and UI. Be sure to use the sysman account when configuring the database connection. Once the job completes and the initial data synchronization is done you will see new Target tabs on your OS assets. The new tab lists all the Enterprise Manager targets and any alerts, availability and performance data specific to the selected target. It is also possible to use the GoTo icon to launch the Enterprise Manager BUI in context of the specific target or alert to drill into more detail. Hopefully this brief overview of the integration between Enterprise Manager and Ops Center has provided a jumpstart to getting a more complete view of the full stack of your enterprise systems.

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  • An XEvent a Day (27 of 31) – The Future - Tracking Page Splits in SQL Server Denali CTP1

    - by Jonathan Kehayias
    Nearly two years ago Kalen Delaney blogged about Splitting a page into multiple pages , showing how page splits occur inside of SQL Server.  Following her blog post, Michael Zilberstein wrote a post, Monitoring Page Splits with Extended Events , that showed how to see the sqlserver.page_split Events using Extended Events.  Eladio Rincón also blogged about Using XEvents (Extended Events) in SQL Server 2008 to detect which queries are causing Page Splits , but not in relation to Kalen’s blog...(read more)

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  • Google I/O 2011: Life in App Engine Production

    Google I/O 2011: Life in App Engine Production Michael Handler, Alan Green App Engine runs your application at scale, so you can focus on features and not sysadminning. But SOMEONE has to run those computers for you! Come meet them, find out what keeps them up at night, and hear hair-raising Tales of the Unexpected. Plus, a demo of new monitoring options for your application, and a dash of HRD advocacy. From: GoogleDevelopers Views: 3393 37 ratings Time: 57:05 More in Science & Technology

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  • How To Use Regular Expressions for Data Validation and Cleanup

    You need to provide data validation at the server level for complex strings like phone numbers, email addresses, etc. You may also need to do data cleanup / standardization before moving it from source to target. Although SQL Server provides a fair number of string functions, the code developed with these built-in functions can become complex and hard to maintain or reuse. The Future of SQL Server Monitoring "Being web-based, SQL Monitor 2.0 enables you to check on your servers from almost any location" Jonathan Allen.Try SQL Monitor now.

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  • Who Do You Turn To for Your Consumer Goods Sales and Marketing Needs

    - by ruth.donohue
    As a sales or marketing executive, you want the best software for managing your marketing, demand generation, trade promotion, customer/volume planning, and retail execution/monitoring activities and analysis. However, working with niche software vendors can result in a very disjointed user and support experience. It would be ideal to have just one end-to-end solution that could manage and optimize each of these processes...but is that just wishful thinking? Read this Gartner article to find out more!

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  • Silverlight Cream for December 31, 2010 -- #1019

    - by Dave Campbell
    In this Issue: Michael Washington, Thomas Martinsen, Mike Ormond, William E. Burrows(-2-), Vangos Pterneas, Jesse Liberty, Diptimaya Patra, and Jeff Blankenburg(-2-). Above the Fold: Silverlight: "Drag from Multiple Source In Silverlight 4" Diptimaya Patra WP7: "What I Learned In WP7 – Issue 12" Jeff Blankenburg Shoutouts: Paul Thurrott posted a great phone comparison chart: Great Windows Phone comparison chart Kunal Chowdhury announced his new Silverlight Site: Welcome to Silverlight-Zone - Site is Live Now ... Good Luck, Kunal! From SilverlightCream.com: MyStudioServer goes Open Source Michael Washington decided to put his "MyStudioServer" on CodePlex... I saw this last spring and it's pretty darn cool... check out the post and examples. UriMapping for WP7 Thomas Martinsen discusses UriMapping in WP7, details the steps you need to follow and has sample code to demonstrate. More Monitoring Web Requests on Windows Phone Mike Ormond revisits a post about monitoring WP7 web requests, and shows how to get the data via Fiddler. New Tutorial – Windows Phone 7 (Getting Started) William E. Burrows has 2 parts of a video tutorial series on WP7 development up. This first gets things rolling, explains what is going on, and gets far enough to display golf courses stored in the database. WP7 Tutorial – Part 2: Managing Courses William E. Burrows's 2nd video tutorial is on building out the app to provide features to manage the gold courses for this gold handicap application. Face detection in Windows Phone 7 Vangos Pterneas has a post up about a WP7 app he did using René Schulte's Facelight to do facial recognition. Source available and also on CodePlex. Windows Phone From Scratch – Navigation II Jesse Liberty has up his latest WP7 from Scratch and is the 2nd post in the Navigation series, which is combining the previous navigation with the animation from the one before to produce a better navigation experience. Drag from Multiple Source In Silverlight 4 Diptimaya Patra has a post up at dotnetslackers on dragging into a drop area from multiple sources of different data templates and contexts. What I Learned In WP7 – Issue 12 Jeff Blankenburg's number 12 is up and he's got all the RGB colors on WP7 charted out, name, HEX, RGB, and visual... looks like a good one to bookmark What I Learned In WP7 – Issue 13 Jeff Blankenburg's number 13 is the chart I have listed in the Shoutout above... a complete phone comparison chart. Stay in the 'Light! Twitter SilverlightNews | Twitter WynApse | WynApse.com | Tagged Posts | SilverlightCream Join me @ SilverlightCream | Phoenix Silverlight User Group Technorati Tags: Silverlight    Silverlight 3    Silverlight 4    Windows Phone MIX10

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  • Usergroups in london this week

    - by simonsabin
    Don’t forget there are 2 usergroup meetings in London this week. The first is on service broker (by far the best but under used feature in SQL Server IMHO) and resource governor. This one is in Victoria on Wednesday http://sqlserverfaq.com/events/216/Service-Broker-Intro-Terminology-Design-Considerations-Monitoring-and-Controlling-Resources-in-SQL-Server-Resource-Governor-Data-Collector.aspx Then on Thursday Hitatchi Consulting are hosting a BI evening on DAX in Powerpivot and a case study in high...(read more)

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  • Comparing Table Variables with Temporary Tables

    This articles brings a comparison of temporary tables with table variables from SQL Server author, Wayne Sheffield. In includes an in-depth look at the differences between them. SQL Server monitoring made easy "Keeping an eye on our many SQL Server instances is much easier with SQL Response." Mike Lile.Download a free trial of SQL Response now.

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  • Third Party Applications and Other Acts of Violence Against Your SQL Server

    - by KKline
    I just got finished reading a great blog post from my buddy, Thomas LaRock ( t | b ), in which he describes a useful personal policy he used to track changes made to his SQL Servers when installing third-party products. Note that I'm talking about line-of-business applications here - your inventory management systems and help desk ticketing apps. I'm not talking about monitoring and tuning applications since they, by their very nature, need a different sort of access to your back-end server resources....(read more)

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  • Dell Studio 1737 Overheating

    - by Sean
    I am using a Dell Studio 1737 laptop. I have been running Linux and have ran Windows recently for a very long time. I upgraded to the 10.10 distribution and since that distro, it seems that for some reason all Linuxes want to push my laptop to extremes. I have recently upgraded to Ubuntu 12.04 since I heart that it contains kernel fixes for overheating issues. 12.04 will actually eventually cool the system, but that is after the fans run to the point it sounds like a jet aircraft taking off and the laptop makes my hands sweat. In trying to combat the heat problems I have done the following: I installed the propriatery driver for my ATI Mobility HD 3600. I have tried both the one in the Additional Drivers and also tried ATI's latest greatest version. If I don't install this my laptop will overheat and shut off in minutes. Both seem to perform similarly, but the heat problem remains. I have tried limiting the CPU by installing the CPUFreq Indicator. This does help keep the machine from shutting off, but the heat is still uncomfortable to be around the machine. I usually run in power saver mode or run the cpu at 1.6 GHZ just to error on safety. I ran sensors-detect and here are the results: sean@sean-Studio-1737:~$ sudo sensors-detect # sensors-detect revision 5984 (2011-07-10 21:22:53 +0200) # System: Dell Inc. Studio 1737 (laptop) # Board: Dell Inc. 0F237N This program will help you determine which kernel modules you need to load to use lm_sensors most effectively. It is generally safe and recommended to accept the default answers to all questions, unless you know what you're doing. Some south bridges, CPUs or memory controllers contain embedded sensors. Do you want to scan for them? This is totally safe. (YES/no): y Module cpuid loaded successfully. Silicon Integrated Systems SIS5595... No VIA VT82C686 Integrated Sensors... No VIA VT8231 Integrated Sensors... No AMD K8 thermal sensors... No AMD Family 10h thermal sensors... No AMD Family 11h thermal sensors... No AMD Family 12h and 14h thermal sensors... No AMD Family 15h thermal sensors... No AMD Family 15h power sensors... No Intel digital thermal sensor... Success! (driver `coretemp') Intel AMB FB-DIMM thermal sensor... No VIA C7 thermal sensor... No VIA Nano thermal sensor... No Some Super I/O chips contain embedded sensors. We have to write to standard I/O ports to probe them. This is usually safe. Do you want to scan for Super I/O sensors? (YES/no): y Probing for Super-I/O at 0x2e/0x2f Trying family `National Semiconductor/ITE'... No Trying family `SMSC'... No Trying family `VIA/Winbond/Nuvoton/Fintek'... No Trying family `ITE'... No Probing for Super-I/O at 0x4e/0x4f Trying family `National Semiconductor/ITE'... Yes Found `ITE IT8512E/F/G Super IO' (but not activated) Some hardware monitoring chips are accessible through the ISA I/O ports. We have to write to arbitrary I/O ports to probe them. This is usually safe though. Yes, you do have ISA I/O ports even if you do not have any ISA slots! Do you want to scan the ISA I/O ports? (YES/no): y Probing for `National Semiconductor LM78' at 0x290... No Probing for `National Semiconductor LM79' at 0x290... No Probing for `Winbond W83781D' at 0x290... No Probing for `Winbond W83782D' at 0x290... No Lastly, we can probe the I2C/SMBus adapters for connected hardware monitoring devices. This is the most risky part, and while it works reasonably well on most systems, it has been reported to cause trouble on some systems. Do you want to probe the I2C/SMBus adapters now? (YES/no): y Using driver `i2c-i801' for device 0000:00:1f.3: Intel ICH9 Module i2c-i801 loaded successfully. Module i2c-dev loaded successfully. Now follows a summary of the probes I have just done. Just press ENTER to continue: Driver `coretemp': * Chip `Intel digital thermal sensor' (confidence: 9) To load everything that is needed, add this to /etc/modules: #----cut here---- # Chip drivers coretemp #----cut here---- If you have some drivers built into your kernel, the list above will contain too many modules. Skip the appropriate ones! Do you want to add these lines automatically to /etc/modules? (yes/NO)y Successful! Monitoring programs won't work until the needed modules are loaded. You may want to run 'service module-init-tools start' to load them. Unloading i2c-dev... OK Unloading i2c-i801... OK Unloading cpuid... OK sean@sean-Studio-1737:~$ sudo service module-init-tools start module-init-tools stop/waiting I also tried installing i8k but that didn't work since it didn't seem to be able to communicate with the hardware (probably for different kind of device). Also I ran acpi -V and here are the results: Battery 0: Full, 100% Battery 0: design capacity 613 mAh, last full capacity 260 mAh = 42% Adapter 0: on-line Thermal 0: ok, 49.0 degrees C Thermal 0: trip point 0 switches to mode critical at temperature 100.0 degrees C Thermal 1: ok, 48.0 degrees C Thermal 1: trip point 0 switches to mode critical at temperature 100.0 degrees C Thermal 2: ok, 51.0 degrees C Thermal 2: trip point 0 switches to mode critical at temperature 100.0 degrees C Cooling 0: LCD 0 of 15 Cooling 1: Processor 0 of 10 Cooling 2: Processor 0 of 10 I have hit a wall and don't know what to do now. Any advice is appreciated.

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  • SQL Server Trace Flags

    A comprehensive list of trace flags for SQL Server that you can use to configure your server instance. SQL Server monitoring made easy "Keeping an eye on our many SQL Server instances is much easier with SQL Response." Mike Lile.Download a free trial of SQL Response now.

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