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• SQL Authority News – FalafelCON 2014: 2 days with the Best Developers in the World

  - by Pinal Dave

  I love presenting at various forums on various technologies. I am extremely excited that I got invited to speak at Falafel Conference 2014 in San Francisco. I will present two technology sessions on SQL Server. If you are into web development or if you just want to attend a conference with the best of the industry speakers, this may be the right conference for you. What set apart this conference from other conference is technology presented as well as speakers. Usually one has to attend very expensive and high scale event when they have to hear good speakers. At this conference, you will find quite a many industry legends are available to present on the bleeding edge technology. Here are few of the reasons why I believe you should attend this conference: Choose from four tracks covering Web, Mobile development and testing, Sitefinity, and Automated Testing, or attend sessions from all four! Learn from the best developers and testers in the business in an intimate setting. Surround yourself with your peers and the opportunity to network Learn about the latest platforms and technologies including Kendo UI, AngularJS, ASP.NET MVC, WebAPI, and more! Here are the details for the sessions which I am going to present at Falafel Conference. Secrets of SQL Server: Database Worst Practices Abstract: Chances are you have heard, or even uttered, this expression. This demo-oriented session will show many examples where database professionals were dumbfounded by their own mistakes, and could even bring back memories of your own early DBA days. The goal of this session is to expose the small details that can be dangerous to the production environment and SQL Server as a whole, as well as talk about worst practices and how to avoid them. Shedding light on some of these perils and the tricks to avoid them may even save your current job. After attending this session, Developers will only need 60 seconds to improve performance of their database server in their SharePoint implementation. We will have a quiz during the session to keep the conversation alive. Developers will walk out with scripts and knowledge that can be applied to their servers, immediately post the session. Additionally, all attendees of the session will have access to learning material presented in the session. The Unsung Hero Abstract: Slow Running Queries are the most common problem that developers face while working with SQL Server. While it is easy to blame the SQL Server for unsatisfactory performance, however the issue often persists with the way queries have been written, and how Indexes has been set up. The session will focus on the ways of identifying problems that slow down SQL Server, and Indexing tricks to fix them. Developers will walk out with scripts and knowledge that can be applied to their servers, immediately post the session. Register Now! I have learned from the Falafel Team that they are running out of tickets and soon they will close the registration.  For next 10 days the price for the registration is only USD 149. Trust me, you can’t get such a world class training and networking opportunity at such a low price. Click to Register Here! Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com)Filed under: PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, SQLAuthority News, T SQL

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• Indexed view deadlocking

  - by Dave Ballantyne

  Deadlocks can be a really tricky thing to track down the root cause of.  There are lots of articles on the subject of tracking down deadlocks, but seldom do I find that in a production system that the cause is as straightforward.  That being said,  deadlocks are always caused by process A needs a resource that process B has locked and process B has a resource that process A needs.  There may be a longer chain of processes involved, but that is the basic premise. Here is one such (much simplified) scenario that was at first non-obvious to its cause: The system has two tables,  Products and Stock.  The Products table holds the description and prices of a product whilst Stock records the current stock level. USE tempdb GO CREATE TABLE Product ( ProductID INTEGER IDENTITY PRIMARY KEY, ProductName VARCHAR(255) NOT NULL, Price MONEY NOT NULL ) GO CREATE TABLE Stock ( ProductId INTEGER PRIMARY KEY, StockLevel INTEGER NOT NULL ) GO INSERT INTO Product SELECT TOP(1000) CAST(NEWID() AS VARCHAR(255)), ABS(CAST(CAST(NEWID() AS VARBINARY(255)) AS INTEGER))%100 FROM sys.columns a CROSS JOIN sys.columns b GO INSERT INTO Stock SELECT ProductID,ABS(CAST(CAST(NEWID() AS VARBINARY(255)) AS INTEGER))%100 FROM Product There is a single stored procedure of GetStock: Create Procedure GetStock as SELECT Product.ProductID,Product.ProductName FROM dbo.Product join dbo.Stock on Stock.ProductId = Product.ProductID where Stock.StockLevel <> 0 Analysis of the system showed that this procedure was causing a performance overhead and as reads of this data was many times more than writes,  an indexed view was created to lower the overhead. CREATE VIEW vwActiveStock With schemabinding AS SELECT Product.ProductID,Product.ProductName FROM dbo.Product join dbo.Stock on Stock.ProductId = Product.ProductID where Stock.StockLevel <> 0 go CREATE UNIQUE CLUSTERED INDEX PKvwActiveStock on vwActiveStock(ProductID) This worked perfectly, performance was improved, the team name was cheered to the rafters and beers all round.  Then, after a while, something else happened… The system updating the data changed,  The update pattern of both the Stock update and the Product update used to be: BEGIN TRAN UPDATE... COMMIT BEGIN TRAN UPDATE... COMMIT BEGIN TRAN UPDATE... COMMIT It changed to: BEGIN TRAN UPDATE... UPDATE... UPDATE... COMMIT Nothing that would raise an eyebrow in even the closest of code reviews.  But after this change we saw deadlocks occuring. You can reproduce this by opening two sessions. In session 1 begin transaction Update Product set ProductName ='Test' where ProductID = 998 Then in session 2 begin transaction Update Stock set Stocklevel = 5 where ProductID = 999 Update Stock set Stocklevel = 5 where ProductID = 998 Hop back to session 1 and.. Update Product set ProductName ='Test' where ProductID = 999 Looking at the deadlock graphs we could see the contention was between two processes, one updating stock and the other updating product, but we knew that all the processes do to the tables is update them.  Period.  There are separate processes that handle the update of stock and product and never the twain shall meet, no reason why one should be requiring data from the other.  Then it struck us,  AH the indexed view. Naturally, when you make an update to any table involved in a indexed view, the view has to be updated.  When this happens, the data in all the tables have to be read, so that explains our deadlocks.  The data from stock is read when you update product and vice-versa. The fix, once you understand the problem fully, is pretty simple, the apps did not guarantee the order in which data was updated.  Luckily it was a relatively simple fix to order the updates and deadlocks went away.  Note, that there is still a *slight* risk of a deadlock occurring, if both a stock update and product update occur at *exactly* the same time.

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• apt-get upgrade stuck at the same package

  - by decibyte

  Current status I've started to suspect this is not an Ubuntu issue, but related to the internet connection here at my work. Until I'm sure, Im leaving my question below: Original question I'm stuck, can't upgrade my system. Running sudo apt-get upgrade gives me the following: mmm@alalunga:~$ sudo apt-get upgrade Reading package lists... Done Building dependency tree Reading state information... Done The following packages have been kept back: ginn libgrip0 linux-generic-pae linux-headers-generic-pae linux-image-generic-pae The following packages will be upgraded: apport apport-gtk bind9-host build-essential dhcp3-client dhcp3-common dnsutils eog evince evince-common firefox firefox-branding firefox-dbg firefox-globalmenu firefox-gnome-support firefox-locale-en gimp gimp-data gir1.2-totem-1.0 glib-networking glib-networking-common glib-networking-services gnupg gpgv icedtea-6-jre-cacao icedtea-6-jre-jamvm icedtea-6-plugin icedtea-netx icedtea-netx-common icedtea-plugin isc-dhcp-client isc-dhcp-common libapache2-mod-php5 libart-2.0-2 libbind9-80 libdns81 libevince3-3 libgimp2.0 libisc83 libisccc80 libisccfg82 liblwres80 libssl-dev libssl-doc libssl1.0.0 libtotem0 linux-firmware linux-libc-dev openjdk-6-jre openjdk-6-jre-headless openjdk-6-jre-lib openssl php-pear php5-cli php5-common php5-curl php5-dev php5-gd php5-mysql php5-xsl policykit-1-gnome python-apport python-django python-gst0.10 python-problem-report resolvconf thunderbird thunderbird-globalmenu thunderbird-gnome-support totem totem-common totem-mozilla totem-plugins xserver-xorg-input-synaptics 74 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 0 to remove and 5 not upgraded. Need to get 317 MB/327 MB of archives. After this operation, 1.481 kB of additional disk space will be used. Do you want to continue [Y/n]? Get:1 http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise-updates/main openjdk-6-jre-headless i386 6b24-1.11.4-1ubuntu0.12.04.1 [27,3 MB] Get:2 http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise-updates/main openjdk-6-jre-headless i386 6b24-1.11.4-1ubuntu0.12.04.1 [27,3 MB] Get:3 http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise-updates/main openjdk-6-jre-headless i386 6b24-1.11.4-1ubuntu0.12.04.1 [27,3 MB] Get:4 http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise-updates/main openjdk-6-jre-headless i386 6b24-1.11.4-1ubuntu0.12.04.1 [27,3 MB] Get:5 http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise-updates/main openjdk-6-jre-headless i386 6b24-1.11.4-1ubuntu0.12.04.1 [27,3 MB] Get:6 http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise-updates/main openjdk-6-jre-headless i386 6b24-1.11.4-1ubuntu0.12.04.1 [27,3 MB] Get:7 http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise-updates/main openjdk-6-jre-headless i386 6b24-1.11.4-1ubuntu0.12.04.1 [27,3 MB] 9% [7 openjdk-6-jre-headless 27,3 MB/27,3 MB 100%] It keeps downloading the package openjdk-6-jre-headless, then does nothing for a while (hanging on what's the last line above), then download the package again. It's at its 13th download attempt at the moment of writing. The actual downloads seem to be done just fine, but whatever it does after downloading seems to be failing. I tried removing openjdk-6, but then it wanted to install openjdk-7 instead, with the same result, hanging at openjdk-7-jre-headless instead. I also tried changing servers from my local (Danish) to the main server. No luck. It's also keeping me from upgrading alle the other packages. What to do? Update After following instructions in the answer by @lpanebr, it is now stuck at the linux-firmware package. So, maybe it's a more general problem than being related to specific package(s)? Although it did download some packages without problems before getting stuck at linux-firmware.

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• SJS AS 9.1 U2 (GF v2 U2) - Patch 25 // GF v2.1 - Patch 19 // Sun GlassFish Enterprise Server v2.1.1 Patch 13

  - by arungupta

  SJS AS 9.1 U2 (GF v2 U2) patch 25 is a commercial (Restricted) patch (see Overview of GFv2) available as part of Oracle's Commercial Support for GlassFish. This release is also patch 19 of GlassFish 2.1 and patch 13 of GlassFish 2.1.1. The file-based patches were released onSep 1, 2011; package-based patches were released on Sep 13, 2011. Release Overview Description SJS AS 9.1 U2 (GFv2 U2) - Patch 25 - File and Package-Based Patch for Solaris SPARC, Solaris x86, Linux, Windows and AIX. GlassFish 2.1 - Patch 19 - File and Package-Based Patch for Solaris SPARC, Solaris x86, Linux, Windows and AIX. GlassFish 2.1.1 - Patch 13 - File and Package-Based Patch for Solaris SPARC, Solaris x86, Linux, Windows and AIX. Patch Ids This release comes in 3 different variants: Package-based patches with HADB • Solaris SPARC - [128640-27] • Solarix i586 - [128641-27] • Linux RPM - [128642-27] File-based patches with HADB • Solaris SPARC - [128643-27] • Solaris i586 - [128644-27] • Linux - [128645-27] • Windows - [128646-27] File based patches without HADB • Solaris SPARC - [128647-27] • Solaris i586 - [128648-27] • Linux - [128649-27] • Windows - [128650-27] • AIX - [137916-27] Update Date Nov 23, 2011 Comment Commercial (for-fee) release with regular bug fixes. This is patch 25 for SJS AS 9.1 U2; it is also patch 19 for GlassFish v2.1 and patch 13 for GlassFish v2.1.1. It contains the fixes from the previous patches plus fixes for 18 unique defects. Status CURRENT Bugs Fixed in this Patch: • [12823919]: RESPONSE BYTECHUNK FLUSH WILL GENERATE A MIMEHEADER WHEN SESSION REPLICATION ON • [12818767]: INTEGRATE NEW GRIZZLY 1.0.40 • [12807660]: BUILD, STAGE AND INTEGRATING HADB • [12807643]: INTEGRATE MQ 4.4 U2 P4 • [12802648]: GLASSFISH BUILD FAILED DUE TO METRO INTEGRATION • [12799002]: JNDI RESOURCE NOT ENABLED IF TARGETTING USING ADMIN GUI ON GF 2.1.1 PATCH 11 • [12794672]: ORG.APACHE.JASPER.RUNTIME.BODYCONTENTIMPL DOES NOT COMPACT CB BUFFER • [12772029]: BUG 12308270 - NEED HOTFIX FROM GF RUNNING OPENSSO • [12749346]: VERSION CHANGES FOR GLASSFISH V2.1.1 PATCH 13 • [12749151]: INTEGRATING METRO 1.6.1-B01 INTO GF 2.1.1 P13 • [12719221]: PORTUNIFICATION WSTCPPROTOCOLFINDER.FIND NULLPOINTEREXCEPTION THROWN • [12695620]: HADB: LOGBUFFERSIZE CALCULATED INCORRECTLY FOR VALUES 120 MB AND THE MEMORY FO • [12687345]: ENVIRONMENT VARIABLE PARSING FOR SUN_APPSVR_NOBACKUP CAN FAIL DEPENDING ENV VARS • [12547651]: GLASSFISH DISPLAY BUG • [12359965]: GEREQUESTURI RETURNS URI WITH NULL PREPENDED INTERMITTENT AFTER UPGRADE • [12308270]: SUNBT7020210 ENHANCE JAXRPC SOAP RESPONSE USE PREVIOUS CONFIGURED NAMESPACE PREF • [12308003]: SUNBT7018895 FAILURE TO DEPLOY OR RUN WEBSERVICE AFTER UPDATING TO GF 2.1.1 P07 • [12246256]: SUNBT6739013 [RN]GLASSFISH/SUN APPLICATION INSTALLER CRASHES ON LINUX Additional Notes: More details about these bugs can be found at My Oracle Support.

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• The Rise of Project Intelligence and Why It Matters

  - by Melissa Centurio Lopes

  Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin-top:0in; mso-para-margin-right:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:10.0pt; mso-para-margin-left:0in; line-height:115%; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;} By Amy DeWolf Are you doing any of these in your organization? How are you leveraging historical data to forecast projects? There’s a lot going on in government today. The economic pressures agencies feel from the uncertainty of budget cuts and sequestration effect every part of an organization, including the Project Management Office (PMO).  The PMO is responsible for monitoring and administering government IT projects. As time goes on, priorities shift, technology advances, and new regulations are imposed, all of which make planning and executing projects more difficult.  For example, think about your own projects.  How many boxes do you need to check and hoops do you need to jump through to ensure you comply with new regulations? While new regulations and technology advancements can be a good thing, they add an additional layer of complexity to already complex projects. To overcome some of these pressures, particularly new regulations, many in the PMO world are adopting a new approach- Project Intelligence (PI). According to a new Oracle Primavera white paper, The Rise of Project Intelligence: When Project Management is Just Not Enough, “PI uses Business Intelligence methods to leverage historical project data to make more informed decisions and greatly enhance project execution.” Currently, project managers plan and forecast the possible phases in an execution cycle.  However, most project managers don’t have the proper tools to do this as effectively as they would like. As the white paper noted, “The underlying deficiencies in most forecasting approaches are that 1) the PM fails in most instances to leverage historical data and 2) the PM doesn’t employ current Business Intelligence tools.” PI seeks to overturn this by combining modeling tools used in Business Intelligence for projects with the understanding of Emotional Intelligence for managing people.   Simply put, Project Intelligence is built off four main pillars: Actively use historical data to forecast project cycles Understand the intricacies of complex projects Enhance social and emotional intelligence in projects Actively use Business intelligence tools Read our complimentary whitepaper and discover the importance of emotional intelligence and best practices for improving projects, specifically in terms of communication.

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• How to Draw Lines on the Screen

  - by Geertjan

  I've seen occasional questions on mailing lists about how to use the NetBeans Visual Library to draw lines, e.g., to make graphs or diagrams of various kinds by drawing on the screen. So, rather than drag/drop causing widgets to be added, you'd want widgets to be added on mouse clicks, and you'd want to be able to connect those widgets together somehow. Via the code below, you'll be able to click on the screen, which causes a dot to appear. When you have multiple dots, you can hold down the Ctrl key and connect them together. A guiding line appears to help you position the dots exactly in line with each other. When you go to File | Print, you'll be able to preview and print the diagram you've created. A picture that speaks 1000 words: Here's the code: public final class PlotterTopComponent extends TopComponent { private final Scene scene; private final LayerWidget baseLayer; private final LayerWidget connectionLayer; private final LayerWidget interactionLayer; public PlotterTopComponent() { initComponents(); setName(Bundle.CTL_PlotterTopComponent()); setToolTipText(Bundle.HINT_PlotterTopComponent()); setLayout(new BorderLayout()); this.scene = new Scene(); this.baseLayer = new LayerWidget(scene); this.interactionLayer = new LayerWidget(scene); this.connectionLayer = new LayerWidget(scene); scene.getActions().addAction(new SceneCreateAction()); scene.addChild(baseLayer); scene.addChild(interactionLayer); scene.addChild(connectionLayer); add(scene.createView(), BorderLayout.CENTER); putClientProperty("print.printable", true); } private class SceneCreateAction extends WidgetAction.Adapter { @Override public WidgetAction.State mousePressed(Widget widget, WidgetAction.WidgetMouseEvent event) { if (event.getClickCount() == 1) { if (event.getButton() == MouseEvent.BUTTON1 || event.getButton() == MouseEvent.BUTTON2) { baseLayer.addChild(new BlackDotWidget(scene, widget, event)); repaint(); return WidgetAction.State.CONSUMED; } } return WidgetAction.State.REJECTED; } } private class BlackDotWidget extends ImageWidget { public BlackDotWidget(Scene scene, Widget widget, WidgetAction.WidgetMouseEvent event) { super(scene); setImage(ImageUtilities.loadImage("org/netbeans/plotter/blackdot.gif")); setPreferredLocation(widget.convertLocalToScene(event.getPoint())); getActions().addAction( ActionFactory.createExtendedConnectAction( connectionLayer, new BlackDotConnectProvider())); getActions().addAction( ActionFactory.createAlignWithMoveAction( baseLayer, interactionLayer, ActionFactory.createDefaultAlignWithMoveDecorator())); } } private class BlackDotConnectProvider implements ConnectProvider { @Override public boolean isSourceWidget(Widget source) { return source instanceof BlackDotWidget && source != null ? true : false; } @Override public ConnectorState isTargetWidget(Widget src, Widget trg) { return src != trg && trg instanceof BlackDotWidget ? ConnectorState.ACCEPT : ConnectorState.REJECT; } @Override public boolean hasCustomTargetWidgetResolver(Scene arg0) { return false; } @Override public Widget resolveTargetWidget(Scene arg0, Point arg1) { return null; } @Override public void createConnection(Widget source, Widget target) { ConnectionWidget conn = new ConnectionWidget(scene); conn.setTargetAnchor(AnchorFactory.createCircularAnchor(target, 10)); conn.setSourceAnchor(AnchorFactory.createCircularAnchor(source, 10)); connectionLayer.addChild(conn); } } ... ... ... Note: The code above was written based on the Visual Library tutorials on the NetBeans Platform Learning Trail, in particular via the "ConnectScene" sample in the "test.connect" package, which is part of the very long list of Visual Library samples referred to in the Visual Library tutorials on the NetBeans Platform Learning Trail. The next steps are to add a reconnect action and an action to delete a dot by double-clicking on it. Would be interesting to change the connecting line so that the length of the line were to be shown, i.e., as you draw a line from one dot to another, you'd see a constantly changing number representing the current distance of the connecting line. Also, once lines are connected to form a rectangle, would be cool to be able to write something within that rectangle. Then one could really create diagrams, which would be pretty cool.

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• Microsoft Build 2012 Day 1 Keynote Summary

  - by Tim Murphy

  So I have finally dried the tears after watching the Keynote for Build 2012.  This wasn’t because it was an emotional presentation, but because for the second year I missed the goodies.  Each on site attendee got a Surface RT, a Lumia 920 and a voucher for 100GB of SkyDrive storage. The event was opened with the announcement that in the three days since the launch of Windows 8 over 4 million upgrades have been sold.  I don’t care who you are that is an impressive stat.  Ballmer then spent a fair amount of time remaking the case for the Windows and Windows Phone platforms similar to what we have heard over the last to launch events. There were some cool, but non-essential demos.  The one that was the most fun was the Perceptive Pixel 82” slate device.  At first glance I wondered why I would ever want such a device, but then Ballmer explained it’s possible use for schools and boardrooms.  The actually made sense. Then things got strange.  Steve started explaining features that developers could leverage.  Usually this type of information is left to the product leads.  He focused on the integration with the Charms features such as Search and Share. Steve “Guggs” Guggenheim showed off an app that would appeal to my kids from Disney called “Agent P” which is base on Phineas and Ferb.  Then he got to the meat of the presentation.  We found out that you could add a tile that can be used to sell ad space.  In the same vein we also found out that you could use Microsoft’s, Paypal’s or any commerce engine of your own creation or choosing. For those who are interested in sports and especially developing sports apps you would have found the small presentation from Michael Bayle of ESPN.  He introduced the ESPN app which has tons of features.  For the developers in the crowd he also mentioned that ESPN has an API available at developer.espn.com. During the launch events we were told apps were coming.  In this presentation we were actually shown a scrolling list of logos and told about a couple of them.  Ballmer mentioned specifically Twitter, SAP and DropBox.  These are impressive names that were just a couple of the list impressive names. Steve Ballmer addressed the question of why you should develop for the Windows 8 platform.  He feels that Microsoft has the best commercial terms for developers, a better way to build apps than other platforms and a variety of form factors.  His key point though was the available volume of customers given the current Windows install base and assuming even a flat growth of the platform.  This he backed with a promise that Microsoft is going to do better at marketing and you won’t be able to avoid the ads that they are bringing out. The last section of the key note was present by Kevin Gallo from the Windows Phone team.  This was the real reason I tuned into the webcast.  He impressed upon those watching that the strength of developing for the Microsoft platform is the common programming model that now exist.  While there are difference between form factor implementations you can leverage code across them. He claimed that 90% of developer requests for Windows Phone 8 had been implemented.  These include: More controls with better performance Better live tiles including lock screen integration Speech support in custom apps Easier submission to the market place App camera integration VOIP and chat support Bluetooth and NFC support Native C++ development Direct 3D development   The quote from Kevin that stood out for me was that “Take your Dramamine and buckle your seatbelt type of games are coming to Windows Phone 8”.  He back this up by displaying a list of game development frameworks and then having Unity come out and do a demo. Ok, almost done … The last two things of note for me were the announcement that the SDK is immediately available at dev.windowsphone.com and that they were reducing the cost of an individual developer account to $8 for the next 8 days. Let the development commence. del.icio.us Tags: Build 2012,Windows 8,Windows Phone 8,Windows Phone

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• XNA RenderTarget2D Sample

  - by Michael B. McLaughlin

  I remember being scared of render targets when I first started with XNA. They seemed like weird magic and I didn’t understand them at all. There’s nothing to be frightened of, though, and they are pretty easy to learn how to use. The first thing you need to know is that when you’re drawing in XNA, you aren’t actually drawing to the screen. Instead you’re drawing to this thing called the “back buffer”. Internally, XNA maintains two sections of graphics memory. Each one is exactly the same size as the other and has all the same properties (such as surface format, whether there’s a depth buffer and/or a stencil buffer, and so on). XNA flips between these two sections of memory every update-draw cycle. So while you are drawing to one, it’s busy drawing the other one on the screen. Then the current update-draw cycle ends, it flips, and the section you were just drawing to gets drawn to the screen while the one that was being drawn to the screen before is now the one you’ll be drawing on. This is what’s meant by “double buffering”. If you drew directly to the screen, the player would see all of those draws taking place as they happened and that would look odd and not very good at all. Those two sections of graphics memory are render targets. All a render target is, is a section of graphics memory to which things can be drawn. In addition to the two that XNA maintains automatically, you can also create and set your own using RenderTarget2D and GraphicsDevice.SetRenderTarget. Using render targets lets you do all sorts of neat post-processing effects (like bloom) to make your game look cooler. It also just lets you do things like motion blur and lets you create mirrors in 3D games. There are quite a lot of things that render targets let you do. To go along with this post, I wrote up a simple sample for how to create and use a RenderTarget2D. It’s available under the terms of the Microsoft Public License and is available for download on my website here: http://www.bobtacoindustries.com/developers/utils/RenderTarget2DSample.zip . Other than the ‘using’ statements, every line is commented in detail so that it should (hopefully) be easy to follow along with and understand. If you have any questions, leave a comment here or drop me a line on Twitter. One last note. While creating the sample I came across an interesting quirk. If you start by creating a Windows Game, and then make a copy for Windows Phone 7, the drop-down that lets you choose between drawing to a WP7 device and the WP7 emulator stays grayed-out. To resolve this, you need to right click on the Windows Phone 7 version in the Solution Explorer, and choose “Set as StartUp Project”. The bar will then become active, letting you change the target you which to deploy to. If you want another version to be the one that starts up when you press F5 to start debugging, just go and right-click on that version and choose “Set as StartUp Project” for it once you’ve set the WP7 target (device or emulator) that you want.

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• How to give my user permission to add/edit files on local apache server? [duplicate]

  - by Logan

  Possible Duplicate: How to make Apache run as current user I'm setting up my local test server again, and I seem to have forgotten how to successfully set up the LAMP server. I have installed LAMP server via tasksel command and I have configured the /var/www directory according to a guide I've found: After the lamp server installation you will need write permissions to the /var/www directory. Follow these steps to configure permissions. Add your user to the www-data group sudo usermod -a -G www-data <your user name> now add the /var/www folder to the www-data group sudo chgrp -R www-data /var/www now give write permissions to the www-data group sudo chmod -R g+w /var/www So logan user is now part of www-data group and the file/folder permissions look like the output below: logan@computer:/var/www$ ls -lart total 172 -rw-r--r-- 1 www-data www-data 1997 Oct 23 2010 wp-links-opml.php -rw-r--r-- 1 www-data www-data 3177 Nov 1 2010 wp-config-sample.php -rw-r--r-- 1 www-data www-data 3700 Jan 8 2012 wp-trackback.php -rw-r--r-- 1 www-data www-data 271 Jan 8 2012 wp-blog-header.php -rw-r--r-- 1 www-data www-data 395 Jan 8 2012 index.php -rw-r--r-- 1 www-data www-data 3522 Apr 10 2012 wp-comments-post.php -rw-r--r-- 1 www-data www-data 19929 May 6 2012 license.txt -rw-r--r-- 1 www-data www-data 18219 Sep 11 08:27 wp-signup.php -rw-r--r-- 1 www-data www-data 2719 Sep 11 16:11 xmlrpc.php -rw-r--r-- 1 www-data www-data 2718 Sep 23 12:57 wp-cron.php -rw-r--r-- 1 www-data www-data 7723 Sep 25 01:26 wp-mail.php -rw-r--r-- 1 www-data www-data 2408 Oct 26 15:40 wp-load.php -rw-r--r-- 1 www-data www-data 4663 Nov 17 10:11 wp-activate.php -rw-r--r-- 1 www-data www-data 9899 Nov 22 04:52 wp-settings.php -rw-r--r-- 1 www-data www-data 9175 Nov 29 19:57 readme.html -rw-r--r-- 1 www-data www-data 29310 Nov 30 08:40 wp-login.php drwxr-xr-x 14 root root 4096 Dec 24 17:41 .. drwx------ 9 www-data www-data 4096 Dec 26 16:11 wp-admin drwx------ 9 www-data www-data 4096 Dec 26 16:11 wp-includes -rw-rw-rw- 1 www-data www-data 3448 Dec 26 16:14 wp-config.php drwxrwxr-x 5 www-data www-data 4096 Dec 26 16:14 . drwx------ 6 www-data www-data 4096 Dec 26 16:19 wp-content Things work perfectly at http://localhost, I can view the website fine. The thing with this is that I will be working on a plugin for wordpress and I don't want to deal with separate owners under www directory to create or modify files/folders. When I give my user the ownership of /var/www recursively as logan:www-data I can create/modify files but cannot view the http://localhost. I get a Forbidden error. I'm assuming that this is because of the Apache's configuration? Which one is healthier or easier considering this is just a local test website, configuring apache to give user logan to view website and chmod /var/www logan:logan so that I can create files etc. without any sudo commands; or is it easier to configure user groups to get www-data user to act like my logan user? (Idk how that's possible, maybe putting www-data user under logan group?) Please shed some light to this subject. All I want is to be able to create/modifiy files under my user, and yet to be able to successfully view http://localhost I appreciate the help!

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• ArchBeat Link-o-Rama Top 10 for October 21-27, 2012

  - by Bob Rhubart

  The Top 10 most popular items shared on the OTN ArchBeat Facebook Page for the week of October 21-27, 2012. OTN Architect Day: Los Angeles This is your brain on IT architecture. Stuff your cranium with architecture by attending Oracle Technology Network Architect Day in Los Angeles, October 25, 2012, at the Sofitel Los Angeles, 8555 Beverly Boulevard, Los Angeles, CA 90048. Technical sessions, panel Q&A, and peer roundtables—plus a free lunch. [NOTE: The event was last week, of course. Big thanks to the session presenters and especially to those Angelinos who came out for the event.] WebLogic Server 11gR1 Interactive Quick Reference"The WebLogic Server 11gR1 Administration interactive quick reference," explains Juergen Kress, "is a multimedia tool for various terms and concepts used in WebLogic Server architecture. This tool is available for administrators for online or offline use. This is built as a multimedia web page which provides descriptions of WebLogic Server Architectural components, and references to relevant documentation. This tool offers valuable reference information for any complex concept or product in an intuitive and useful manner." Podcast: Are You Future Proof? The latest OTN ArchBeat Podcast series features Oracle ACE Directors Ron Batra, Basheer Khan, and Ronald van Luttikhuizen, three practicing architects in an open discussion about how changes in enterprise IT are raising the bar for success for software architects and developers. Play Oracle Vanquisher Here's a little respite from whatever it is you normally spend your time on. Oracle Vanquisher is an online diversion that makes a game of data center optimization. According to the description: "Armed with a cool Oracle vacuum pack suit and a strategic IT roadmap, you will thwart threats and optimize your data center to increase your company’s stock price and boost your company’s position." Mainly you avoid electric shock and killer birds. The current high score belongs to someone identified as 'TEN." My score? Never mind. Advanced Oracle SOA Suite OOW 2012 PresentationsThe Oracle SOA Product Management team has compiled a complete list of all twelve of their Oracle SOA Suite presentations from Oracle OpenWorld 2012, with links to the slide decks. OAM and OIM 11g Academies Looking for technical how-to content covering Oracle Access Manager and Oracle Identity Manager? The people behind the Oracle Middleware Security blog have indexed relevant blog posts into what they call "Academies." "These indexes contain the articles we’ve written that we believe provide long lasting guidance on OAM and OIM. Posts covered in these series include articles on key aspects of OAM and OIM 11g, best practice architectural guidance, integrations, and customizations." Oracle’s Analytics, Engineered Systems, and Big Data Strategy | Mark Rittman Part 1 of 3 in Oracle ACE Director Mark Rittman's series on Oracle Exalytics, Oracle R Enterprise and Endeca. Oracle ACE Directors Nordic Tour 2012 : Venues and BI Presentations | Mark RittmanOracle ACE Director Mark Rittman shares information on the Oracle ACE Director Tour, as the community leaders make their way through the land of the midnight sun, with events in Copenhagen, Stockholm, Oslo and Helsinki. Following the Thread in OSB | Antony Reynolds Antony Reynolds recently led an Oracle Service Bus POC in which his team needed to get high throughput from an OSB pipeline. "Imagine our surprise when, on stressing the system, we saw it lock up, with large numbers of blocked threads." He shares the details of the problem and the solution in this extensive technical post. OW12: Oracle Business Process Management/Oracle ADF Integration Best Practices | Andrejus Baranovskis The Oracle OpenWorld presentations keep coming! Oracle ACE Director Andrejus Baranovskis shares the slides from "Oracle Business Process Management/Oracle ADF Integration Best Practices," co-presented with Danilo Schmiedel from Opitz Consulting. Thought for the Day "Not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted." — Albert Einstein (March 14, 1879 – April 18, 1955) Source: Quotes For Software Engineers

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• Efficiently separating Read/Compute/Write steps for concurrent processing of entities in Entity/Component systems

  - by TravisG

  Setup I have an entity-component architecture where Entities can have a set of attributes (which are pure data with no behavior) and there exist systems that run the entity logic which act on that data. Essentially, in somewhat pseudo-code: Entity { id; map<id_type, Attribute> attributes; } System { update(); vector<Entity> entities; } A system that just moves along all entities at a constant rate might be MovementSystem extends System { update() { for each entity in entities position = entity.attributes["position"]; position += vec3(1,1,1); } } Essentially, I'm trying to parallelise update() as efficiently as possible. This can be done by running entire systems in parallel, or by giving each update() of one system a couple of components so different threads can execute the update of the same system, but for a different subset of entities registered with that system. Problem In reality, these systems sometimes require that entities interact(/read/write data from/to) each other, sometimes within the same system (e.g. an AI system that reads state from other entities surrounding the current processed entity), but sometimes between different systems that depend on each other (i.e. a movement system that requires data from a system that processes user input). Now, when trying to parallelize the update phases of entity/component systems, the phases in which data (components/attributes) from Entities are read and used to compute something, and the phase where the modified data is written back to entities need to be separated in order to avoid data races. Otherwise the only way (not taking into account just "critical section"ing everything) to avoid them is to serialize parts of the update process that depend on other parts. This seems ugly. To me it would seem more elegant to be able to (ideally) have all processing running in parallel, where a system may read data from all entities as it wishes, but doesn't write modifications to that data back until some later point. The fact that this is even possible is based on the assumption that modification write-backs are usually very small in complexity, and don't require much performance, whereas computations are very expensive (relatively). So the overhead added by a delayed-write phase might be evened out by more efficient updating of entities (by having threads work more % of the time instead of waiting). A concrete example of this might be a system that updates physics. The system needs to both read and write a lot of data to and from entities. Optimally, there would be a system in place where all available threads update a subset of all entities registered with the physics system. In the case of the physics system this isn't trivially possible because of race conditions. So without a workaround, we would have to find other systems to run in parallel (which don't modify the same data as the physics system), other wise the remaining threads are waiting and wasting time. However, that has disadvantages Practically, the L3 cache is pretty much always better utilized when updating a large system with multiple threads, as opposed to multiple systems at once, which all act on different sets of data. Finding and assembling other systems to run in parallel can be extremely time consuming to design well enough to optimize performance. Sometimes, it might even not be possible at all because a system just depends on data that is touched by all other systems. Solution? In my thinking, a possible solution would be a system where reading/updating and writing of data is separated, so that in one expensive phase, systems only read data and compute what they need to compute, and then in a separate, performance-wise cheap, write phase, attributes of entities that needed to be modified are finally written back to the entities. The Question How might such a system be implemented to achieve optimal performance, as well as making programmer life easier? What are the implementation details of such a system and what might have to be changed in the existing EC-architecture to accommodate this solution?

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• How do I cap rendering of tiles in a 2D game with SDL?

  - by farmdve

  I have some boilerplate code working, I basically have a tile based map composed of just 3 colors, and some walls and render with SDL. The tiles are in a bmp file, but each tile inside it corresponds to an internal number of the type of tile(color, or wall). I have pretty basic collision detection and it works, I can also detetc continuous presses, which allows me to move pretty much anywhere I want. I also have a moving camera, which follows the object. The problem is that, the tile based map is bigger than the resolution, thus not all of the map can be displayed on the screen, but it's still rendered. I would like to cap it, but since this is new to me, I pretty much have no idea. Although I cannot post all the code, as even though I am a newbie and the code pretty basic, it's already quite a few lines, I can post what I tried to do void set_camera() { //Center the camera over the dot camera.x = ( player.box.x + DOT_WIDTH / 2 ) - SCREEN_WIDTH / 2; camera.y = ( player.box.y + DOT_HEIGHT / 2 ) - SCREEN_HEIGHT / 2; //Keep the camera in bounds. if(camera.x < 0 ) { camera.x = 0; } if(camera.y < 0 ) { camera.y = 0; } if(camera.x > LEVEL_WIDTH - camera.w ) { camera.x = LEVEL_WIDTH - camera.w; } if(camera.y > LEVEL_HEIGHT - camera.h ) { camera.y = LEVEL_HEIGHT - camera.h; } } set_camera() is the function which calculates the camera position based on the player's positions. I won't pretend I know much about it. Rectangle box = {0,0,0,0}; for(int t = 0; t < TOTAL_TILES; t++) { if(box.x < (camera.x - TILE_WIDTH) || box.y > (camera.y - TILE_HEIGHT)) apply_surface(box.x - camera.x, box.y - camera.y, surface, screen, &clips[tiles[t]]); box.x += TILE_WIDTH; //If we've gone too far if(box.x >= LEVEL_WIDTH) { //Move back box.x = 0; //Move to the next row box.y += TILE_HEIGHT; } } This is basically my render code. The for loop loops over 192 tiles stored in an int array, each with their own unique value describing the tile type(wall or one of three possible colored tiles). box is an SDL_Rect containing the current position of the tile, which is calculated on render. TILE_HEIGHT and TILE_WIDTH are of value 80. So the cap is determined by if(box.x < (camera.x - TILE_WIDTH) || box.y > (camera.y - TILE_HEIGHT)) However, this is just me playing with the values and see what doesn't break it. I pretty much have no idea how to calculate it. My screen resolution is 1024/768, and the tile map is of size 1280/960.

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• JDeveloper 11.1.2 : Command Link in Table Column Work Around

  - by Frank Nimphius

  Just figured that in Oracle JDeveloper 11.1.2, clicking on a command link in a table does not mark the table row as selected as it is the behavior in previous releases of Oracle JDeveloper. For the time being, the following work around can be used to achieve the "old" behavior: To mark the table row as selected, you need to build and queue the table selection event in the code executed by the command link action listener. To queue a selection event, you need to know about the rowKey of the row that the command link that you clicked on is located in. To get to this information, you add an f:attribute tag to the command link as shown below <af:column sortProperty="#{bindings.DepartmentsView1.hints.DepartmentId.name}" sortable="false"    headerText="#{bindings.DepartmentsView1.hints.DepartmentId.label}" id="c1">   <af:commandLink text="#{row.DepartmentId}" id="cl1" partialSubmit="true"       actionListener="#{BrowseBean.onCommandItemSelected}">     <f:attribute name="rowKey" value="#{row.rowKey}"/>   </af:commandLink>   ... </af:column> The f:attribute tag references #{row.rowKey} wich in ADF translates to JUCtrlHierNodeBinding.getRowKey(). This information can be used in the command link action listener to compose the RowKeySet you need to queue the selected row. For simplicitly reasons, I created a table "binding" reference to the managed bean that executes the command link action. The managed bean code that is referenced from the af:commandLink actionListener property is shown next: public void onCommandItemSelected(ActionEvent actionEvent) {   //get access to the clicked command link   RichCommandLink comp = (RichCommandLink)actionEvent.getComponent();   //read the added f:attribute value   Key rowKey = (Key) comp.getAttributes().get("rowKey");     //get the current selected RowKeySet from the table   RowKeySet oldSelection = table.getSelectedRowKeys();   //build an empty RowKeySet for the new selection   RowKeySetImpl newSelection = new RowKeySetImpl();     //RowKeySets contain List objects with key objects in them   ArrayList list = new ArrayList();   list.add(rowKey);   newSelection.add(list);     //create the selectionEvent and queue it   SelectionEvent selectionEvent = new SelectionEvent(oldSelection, newSelection, table);   selectionEvent.queue();     //refresh the table   AdfFacesContext.getCurrentInstance().addPartialTarget(table); }

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• How to convert pitch and yaw to x, y, z rotations?

  - by Aaron Anodide

  I'm a beginner using XNA to try and make a 3D Asteroids game. I'm really close to having my space ship drive around as if it had thrusters for pitch and yaw. The problem is I can't quite figure out how to translate the rotations, for instance, when I pitch forward 45 degrees and then start to turn - in this case there should be rotation being applied to all three directions to get the "diagonal yaw" - right? I thought I had it right with the calculations below, but they cause a partly pitched forward ship to wobble instead of turn.... :( So my quesiton is: how do you calculate the X, Y, and Z rotations for an object in terms of pitch and yaw? Here's current (almost working) calculations for the Rotation acceleration: float accel = .75f; // Thrust +Y / Forward if (currentKeyboardState.IsKeyDown(Keys.I)) { this.ship.AccelerationY += (float)Math.Cos(this.ship.RotationZ) * accel; this.ship.AccelerationX += (float)Math.Sin(this.ship.RotationZ) * -accel; this.ship.AccelerationZ += (float)Math.Sin(this.ship.RotationX) * accel; } // Rotation +Z / Yaw if (currentKeyboardState.IsKeyDown(Keys.J)) { this.ship.RotationAccelerationZ += (float)Math.Cos(this.ship.RotationX) * accel; this.ship.RotationAccelerationY += (float)Math.Sin(this.ship.RotationX) * accel; this.ship.RotationAccelerationX += (float)Math.Sin(this.ship.RotationY) * accel; } // Rotation -Z / Yaw if (currentKeyboardState.IsKeyDown(Keys.K)) { this.ship.RotationAccelerationZ += (float)Math.Cos(this.ship.RotationX) * -accel; this.ship.RotationAccelerationY += (float)Math.Sin(this.ship.RotationX) * -accel; this.ship.RotationAccelerationX += (float)Math.Sin(this.ship.RotationY) * -accel; } // Rotation +X / Pitch if (currentKeyboardState.IsKeyDown(Keys.F)) { this.ship.RotationAccelerationX += accel; } // Rotation -X / Pitch if (currentKeyboardState.IsKeyDown(Keys.D)) { this.ship.RotationAccelerationX -= accel; } I'm combining that with drawing code that does a rotation to the model: public void Draw(Matrix world, Matrix view, Matrix projection, TimeSpan elsapsedTime) { float seconds = (float)elsapsedTime.TotalSeconds; // update velocity based on acceleration this.VelocityX += this.AccelerationX * seconds; this.VelocityY += this.AccelerationY * seconds; this.VelocityZ += this.AccelerationZ * seconds; // update position based on velocity this.PositionX += this.VelocityX * seconds; this.PositionY += this.VelocityY * seconds; this.PositionZ += this.VelocityZ * seconds; // update rotational velocity based on rotational acceleration this.RotationVelocityX += this.RotationAccelerationX * seconds; this.RotationVelocityY += this.RotationAccelerationY * seconds; this.RotationVelocityZ += this.RotationAccelerationZ * seconds; // update rotation based on rotational velocity this.RotationX += this.RotationVelocityX * seconds; this.RotationY += this.RotationVelocityY * seconds; this.RotationZ += this.RotationVelocityZ * seconds; Matrix translation = Matrix.CreateTranslation(PositionX, PositionY, PositionZ); Matrix rotation = Matrix.CreateRotationX(RotationX) * Matrix.CreateRotationY(RotationY) * Matrix.CreateRotationZ(RotationZ); model.Root.Transform = rotation * translation * world; model.CopyAbsoluteBoneTransformsTo(boneTransforms); foreach (ModelMesh mesh in model.Meshes) { foreach (BasicEffect effect in mesh.Effects) { effect.World = boneTransforms[mesh.ParentBone.Index]; effect.View = view; effect.Projection = projection; effect.EnableDefaultLighting(); } mesh.Draw(); } }

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• database design help for game / user levels / progress

  - by sprugman

  Sorry this got long and all prose-y. I'm creating my first truly gamified web app and could use some help thinking about how to structure the data. The Set-up Users need to accomplish tasks in each of several categories before they can move up a level. I've got my Users, Tasks, and Categories tables, and a UserTasks table which joins the three. ("User 3 has added Task 42 in Category 8. Now they've completed it.") That's all fine and working wonderfully. The Challenge I'm not sure of the best way to track the progress in the individual categories toward each level. The "business" rules are: You have to achieve a certain number of points in each category to move up. If you get the number of points needed in Cat 8, but still have other work to do to complete the level, any new Cat 8 points count toward your overall score, but don't "roll over" into the next level. The number of Categories is small (five currently) and unlikely to change often, but by no means absolutely fixed. The number of points needed to level-up will vary per level, probably by a formula, or perhaps a lookup table. So the challenge is to track each user's progress toward the next level in each category. I've thought of a few potential approaches: Possible Solutions Add a column to the users table for each category and reset them all to zero each time a user levels-up. Have a separate UserProgress table with a row for each category for each user and the number of points they have. (Basically a Many-to-Many version of #1.) Add a userLevel column to the UserTasks table and use that to derive their progress with some kind of SUM statement. Their current level will be a simple int in the User table. Pros & Cons (1) seems like by far the most straightforward, but it's also the least flexible. Perhaps I could use a naming convention based on the category ids to help overcome some of that. (With code like "select cats; for each cat, get the value from Users.progress_{cat.id}.") It's also the one where I lose the most data -- I won't know which points counted toward leveling up. I don't have a need in mind for that, so maybe I don't care about that. (2) seems complicated: every time I add or subtract a user or a category, I have to maintain the other table. I foresee synchronization challenges. (3) Is somewhere in between -- cleaner than #2, but less intuitive than #1. In order to find out where a user is, I'd have mildly complex SQL like: SELECT categoryId, SUM(points) from UserTasks WHERE userId={user.id} & countsTowardLevel={user.level} groupBy categoryId Hmm... that doesn't seem so bad. I think I'm talking myself into #3 here, but would love any input, advice or other ideas. P.S. Sorry for the cross-post. I wrote this up on SO and then remembered that there was a game dev-focused one. Curious to see if I get different answers one place than the other....

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• Unable to Sign in to the Microsoft Online Services Signin application from Windows 7 client located behind ISA firewall

  - by Ravindra Pamidi

  A while ago i helped a customer troubleshoot authentication problem with Microsoft Online Services Signin application.  This customer was evaluating Microsoft BPOS (Business Productivity Online Services) and was having trouble using the single sign on application behind ISA 2004 firewall.The network structure is fairly simple with single Windows 2003 Active Directory domain and Windows 7 clients. On a successful logon to the Microsoft Online Services Signin application, this application provides single signon functionality to all of Microsoft online services in the BPOS package. Symptoms:When trying to signin it fails with error "The service is currently unavailable. Please try again later. If problems continue, contact your service administrator". If ISA 2004 firewall is removed from the picture the authentication succeeds.Troubleshooting: Enabled ISA Server firewall logging along with Microsoft Network Monitor tool on the Windows 7 Client while reproducing the issue. Analysis of the ISA Server Firewall logs and Microsoft Network capture revealed that the Microsoft Online Services Sign In application when sending request to ISA Server does not send the domain credentials and as a result ISA Server responds with an error code of HTTP 407 Proxy authentication required listing out the supported authentication mechanisms.  The application in question is expected to send the credentials of the domain user in response to this request. However in this case, it fails to send the logged on user's domain credentials. Bit of researching on the Internet revealed that The "Microsoft Online Services Sign In" application by default does not support Outbound Internet Proxy authentication. In order for it to send the logged on user's domain credentials we had to make  changes to its configuration file "SignIn.exe.config" located under "Program Files\Microsoft Online Services\Sign In" folder. Step by Step details to configure the configuration file are documented on Microsoft TechNet website given below.  Configure your outbound authenticating proxy serverhttp://www.microsoft.com/online/help/en-us/helphowto/cc54100d-d149-45a9-8e96-f248ecb1b596.htm After the above problem was addressed we were still not able to use the "Microsoft Online Services Sign In" application and it failed with the same error.  Analysis of another network capture revealed that the application in question is now sending the required credentials and the connection seems to terminate at a later stage. Enabled verbose logging for the "Microsoft Online Services Sign In" application and then reproduced the problem. Analysis of the logs revealed a time difference between the local client and Microsoft Online services server of around seven minutes which is above the acceptable time skew of five minutes. Excerpt from Microsoft Online Services Sign In application verbose log:  1/26/2012 1:57:51 PM Verbose SingleSignOn.GetSSOGenericInterface SSO Interface URL: https://signinservice.apac.microsoftonline.com/ssoservice/UID1/26/2012 1:57:52 PM Exception SSOSignIn.SignIn The security timestamp is invalid because its creation time ('2012-01-26T08:34:52.767Z') is in the future. Current time is '2012-01-26T08:27:52.987Z' and allowed clock skew is '00:05:00'.1/26/2012 1:57:52 PM Exception SSOSignIn.SignIn  Although the Windows 7 Clients successfully synchronized time to the domain controller for the domain, the domain controller was not configured to synchronize time with external NTP servers. This caused a gradual drift in time on the network thus resulting in the above issue. Reconfigured the domain controller holding the PDC FSMO role to synchronize time with external time source ( time.nist.gov ) and edited the system policy on the ISA server firewall to allow NTP traffic to time.nist.gov Configure the time source for the forest:Windows Time Servicehttp://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc794937(WS.10).aspx Forced synchronization of Windows time using the command w32tm /resync on the domain controller and later on the clients each of which had corrected the seven minutes difference. This resolved the problem with logon to Microsoft Online Services Sign In.

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• SQL SERVER – Curious Case of Disappearing Rows – ON UPDATE CASCADE and ON DELETE CASCADE – T-SQL Example – Part 2 of 2

  - by pinaldave

  Yesterday I wrote a real world story of how a friend who thought they have an issue with intrusion or virus whereas the issue was really in the code. I strongly suggest you read my earlier blog post Curious Case of Disappearing Rows – ON UPDATE CASCADE and ON DELETE CASCADE – Part 1 of 2 before continuing this blog post as this is second part of the first blog post. Let me reproduce the simple scenario in T-SQL. Building Sample Data USE [TestDB] GO -- Creating Table Products CREATE TABLE [dbo].[Products]( [ProductID] [int] NOT NULL, [ProductDesc] [varchar](50) NOT NULL, CONSTRAINT [PK_Products] PRIMARY KEY CLUSTERED ( [ProductID] ASC )) ON [PRIMARY] GO -- Creating Table ProductDetails CREATE TABLE [dbo].[ProductDetails]( [ProductDetailID] [int] NOT NULL, [ProductID] [int] NOT NULL, [Total] [int] NOT NULL, CONSTRAINT [PK_ProductDetails] PRIMARY KEY CLUSTERED ( [ProductDetailID] ASC )) ON [PRIMARY] GO ALTER TABLE [dbo].[ProductDetails] WITH CHECK ADD CONSTRAINT [FK_ProductDetails_Products] FOREIGN KEY([ProductID]) REFERENCES [dbo].[Products] ([ProductID]) ON UPDATE CASCADE ON DELETE CASCADE GO -- Insert Data into Table USE TestDB GO INSERT INTO Products (ProductID, ProductDesc) SELECT 1, 'Bike' UNION ALL SELECT 2, 'Car' UNION ALL SELECT 3, 'Books' GO INSERT INTO ProductDetails ([ProductDetailID],[ProductID],[Total]) SELECT 1, 1, 200 UNION ALL SELECT 2, 1, 100 UNION ALL SELECT 3, 1, 111 UNION ALL SELECT 4, 2, 200 UNION ALL SELECT 5, 3, 100 UNION ALL SELECT 6, 3, 100 UNION ALL SELECT 7, 3, 200 GO Select Data from Tables -- Selecting Data SELECT * FROM Products SELECT * FROM ProductDetails GO Delete Data from Products Table -- Deleting Data DELETE FROM Products WHERE ProductID = 1 GO Select Data from Tables Again -- Selecting Data SELECT * FROM Products SELECT * FROM ProductDetails GO Clean up Data -- Clean up DROP TABLE ProductDetails DROP TABLE Products GO My friend was confused as there was no delete was firing over ProductsDetails Table still there was a delete happening. The reason was because there is a foreign key created between Products and ProductsDetails Table with the keywords ON DELETE CASCADE. Due to ON DELETE CASCADE whenever is specified when the data from Table A is deleted and if it is referenced in another table using foreign key it will be deleted as well. Workaround 1: Design Changes – 3 Tables Change the design to have more than two tables. Create One Product Mater Table with all the products. It should historically store all the products list in it. No products should be ever removed from it. Add another table called Current Product and it should contain only the table which should be visible in the product catalogue. Another table should be called as ProductHistory table. There should be no use of CASCADE keyword among them. Workaround 2: Design Changes - Column IsVisible You can keep the same two tables. 1) Products and 2) ProductsDetails. Add a column with BIT datatype to it and name it as a IsVisible. Now change your application code to display the catalogue based on this column. There should be no need to delete anything. Workaround 3: Bad Advices (Bad advises begins here) The reason I have said bad advices because these are going to be bad advices for sure. You should make necessary design changes and not use poor workarounds which can damage the system and database integrity further. Here are the examples 1) Do not delete the data – well, this is not a real solution but can give time to implement design changes. 2) Do not have ON CASCADE DELETE – in this case, you will have entry in productsdetails which will have no corresponding product id and later on there will be lots of confusion. 3) Duplicate Data – you can have all the data of the product table move to the product details table and repeat them at each row. Now remove CASCADE code. This will let you delete the product table rows without any issue. There are so many things wrong this suggestion, that I will not even start here. (Bad advises ends here)  Well, did I miss anything? Please help me with your suggestions. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com) Filed under: PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL, Technology

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• Syntax of passing lambda

  - by Astara

  Right now, I'm working on refactoring a program that calls its parts by polling to a more event-driven structure. I've created sched and task classes with the sced to become a base class of the current main loop. The tasks will be created for each meter so they can be called off of that instead of polling. Each of the events main calls are a type of meter that gather info and display it. When the program is coming up, all enabled meters get 'constructed' by a main-sub. In that sub, I want to store off the "this" pointer associated with the meter, as well as the common name for the "action routine. void MeterMaker::Meter_n_Task (Meter * newmeter,) { push(newmeter); // handle non-timed draw events Task t = new Task(now() + 0.5L); t.period={0,1U}; t.work_meter = newmeter; t.work = [&newmeter](){newmeter.checkevent();};<<--attempt at lambda t.flags = T_Repeat; t.enable_task(); _xos->sched_insert(t); } A sample call to it: Meter_n_Task(new CPUMeter(_xos, "CPU ")); 've made the scheduler a base class of the main routine (that handles the loop), and I've tried serveral variations to get the task class to be a base of the meter class, but keep running into roadblocks. It's alot like "whack-a-mole" -- pound in something to fix something one place, and then a new probl pops out elsewhere. Part of the problem, is that the sched.h file that is trying to hold the Task Q, includes the Task header file. The task file Wants to refer to the most "base", Meter class. The meter class pulls in the main class of the parent as it passes a copy of the parent to the children so they can access the draw routines in the parent. Two references in the task file are for the 'this' pointer of the meter and the meter's update sub (to be called via this). void *this_data= NULL; void (*this_func)() = NULL; Note -- I didn't really want to store these in the class, as I wanted to use a lamdba in that meter&task routine above to store a routine+context to be used to call the meter's action routine. Couldn't figure out the syntax. But am running into other syntax problems trying to store the pointers...such as g++: COMPILE lsched.cc In file included from meter.h:13:0, from ltask.h:17, from lsched.h:13, from lsched.cc:13: xosview.h:30:47: error: expected class-name before ‘{’ token class XOSView : public XWin, public Scheduler { Like above where it asks for a class, where the classname "Scheduler" is. !?!? Huh? That IS a class name. I keep going in circles with things that don't make sense... Ideally I'd get the lamba to work right in the Meter_n_Task routine at the top. I wanted to only store 1 pointer in the 'Task' class that was a pointer to my lambda that would have already captured the "this" value ... but couldn't get that syntax to work at all when I tried to start it into a var in the 'Task' class. This project, FWIW, is my teething project on the new C++... (of course it's simple!.. ;-))... I've made quite a bit of progress in other areas in the code, but this lambda syntax has me stumped...its at times like thse that I appreciate the ease of this type of operation in perl. Sigh. Not sure the best way to ask for help here, as this isn't a simple question. But thought I'd try!... ;-) Too bad I can't attach files to this Q.

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• Child transforms problem when loading 3DS models using assimp

  - by MhdSyrwan

  I'm trying to load a textured 3d model into my scene using assimp model loader. The problem is that child meshes are not situated correctly (they don't have the correct transformations). In brief: all the mTansform matrices are identity matrices, why would that be? I'm using this code to render the model: void recursive_render (const struct aiScene *sc, const struct aiNode* nd, float scale) { unsigned int i; unsigned int n=0, t; aiMatrix4x4 m = nd->mTransformation; m.Scaling(aiVector3D(scale, scale, scale), m); // update transform m.Transpose(); glPushMatrix(); glMultMatrixf((float*)&m); // draw all meshes assigned to this node for (; n < nd->mNumMeshes; ++n) { const struct aiMesh* mesh = scene->mMeshes[nd->mMeshes[n]]; apply_material(sc->mMaterials[mesh->mMaterialIndex]); if (mesh->HasBones()){ printf("model has bones"); abort(); } if(mesh->mNormals == NULL) { glDisable(GL_LIGHTING); } else { glEnable(GL_LIGHTING); } if(mesh->mColors[0] != NULL) { glEnable(GL_COLOR_MATERIAL); } else { glDisable(GL_COLOR_MATERIAL); } for (t = 0; t < mesh->mNumFaces; ++t) { const struct aiFace* face = &mesh->mFaces[t]; GLenum face_mode; switch(face->mNumIndices) { case 1: face_mode = GL_POINTS; break; case 2: face_mode = GL_LINES; break; case 3: face_mode = GL_TRIANGLES; break; default: face_mode = GL_POLYGON; break; } glBegin(face_mode); for(i = 0; i < face->mNumIndices; i++)// go through all vertices in face { int vertexIndex = face->mIndices[i];// get group index for current index if(mesh->mColors[0] != NULL) Color4f(&mesh->mColors[0][vertexIndex]); if(mesh->mNormals != NULL) if(mesh->HasTextureCoords(0))//HasTextureCoords(texture_coordinates_set) { glTexCoord2f(mesh->mTextureCoords[0][vertexIndex].x, 1 - mesh->mTextureCoords[0][vertexIndex].y); //mTextureCoords[channel][vertex] } glNormal3fv(&mesh->mNormals[vertexIndex].x); glVertex3fv(&mesh->mVertices[vertexIndex].x); } glEnd(); } } // draw all children for (n = 0; n < nd->mNumChildren; ++n) { recursive_render(sc, nd->mChildren[n], scale); } glPopMatrix(); } What's the problem in my code ? I've added some code to abort the program if there's any bone in the meshes, but the program doesn't abort, this means : no bones, is that normal? if (mesh->HasBones()){ printf("model has bones"); abort(); } Note: I am using openGL & SFML & assimp

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• Information on upgrading Kinect Applications to MS SDK Beta 2.

  - by mbcrump

  Introduction Microsoft recently released the Kinect for Windows SDK Beta 2. It contains many enhancements and fixes that can be found here. The only problem with it is that a lot of current demo applications no longer function properly. Today, I’m going to walk you through a typical scenario of upgrading a Kinect application built with Beta 1 to Beta 2. Note: This tutorial covers WPF, but you can use the same techniques for WinForms. 1) Fix the references Let’s start with a fairly popular Kinect demo called Kinect User Interface Demo. This project uses the beta 1 version of Microsoft.Research.Kinect.dll and version 1.0.0.0 of Coding4Fun’s Kinect library. After you download the source code and extract the zip you will see the following references in Visual Studio 2010: Pay attention to the following references as these are the .dlls that you will have to update: Coding4Fun.Kinect.Wpf Microsoft.Research.Kinect If you click on Coding4Fun.Kinect.Wpf file you will see the following version information (v1.0.0.0): This needs to be upgraded to the Coding4Fun Kinect library built against Beta 2. So head over to http://c4fkinect.codeplex.com/ and hit download and you will have the following files. Go ahead and hit the delete key on your keyboard to remove the Coding4Fun.Kinect.Wpf.dll file from your project. Select “Add Reference” and navigate out to the folder where you extracted the files and select Coding4Fun.Kinect.Wpf.dll. If you click on the Coding4Fun.Kinect.Wpf.dll file and check properties it should be listed at 1.1.0.0: Fix Microsoft.Research.Kinect.dll The official SDK Beta 2 released a new .dll that you will need to reference in your application. Go ahead and select Microsoft.Research.Kinect.dll in your application and hit the Delete key on your keyboard. Go ahead and select Add Reference again and select Microsoft.Research.Kinect.dll from the .NET tab. Double check and make sure the version number is 1.0.0.45 as shown below. References fixed – Runtime needs to be updated. So we have fixed the references in a typical Kinect application that uses Microsoft’s SDK and C4F Kinect libraries. Now, we will need to update the runtime. All Beta 1 Kinect applications will instantiate the Runtime with the following code: Can you see that it is now marked with [Depreciated]? That means we need to update it before Microsoft decides to remove it from future versions of the SDK. We can fix this very easily by replacing this code: readonly Runtime _runtime = new Runtime(); with Microsoft.Research.Kinect.Nui.Runtime _nui; and adding similar code to our Loaded event as shown below public MainWindow() { InitializeComponent(); Loaded += new RoutedEventHandler(MainWindow_Loaded); } void MainWindow_Loaded(object sender, RoutedEventArgs e) { if (Runtime.Kinects.Count == 0) { txtInfo.Text = "Missing Kinect"; } else { _nui = Runtime.Kinects[0]; _nui.Initialize(RuntimeOptions.UseColor); // Video Frame Ready Event can happen now!!! //_nui.VideoFrameReady += new EventHandler<ImageFrameReadyEventArgs>(_nui_VideoFrameReady); _nui.VideoStream.Open(ImageStreamType.Video, 2, ImageResolution.Resolution640x480, ImageType.Color); } } In this sample, I am testing to see if a Kinect is detected and if it is then I initialize the runtime with my first Kinect by using the Runtime.Kinects[0]. You can also specify other Kinect devices here. The rest of the code is standard code that you simply modify however you wish (ie Skeletal, Depth, etc) depending on what type of video feed you want. Conclusion As you can see it really wasn’t that painful to upgrade your project to Beta 2. I would recommend that you go ahead and upgrade to Beta 2 as future versions of the SDK will use these methods.  Thanks for reading. Subscribe to my feed

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• your AdSense account poses a risk of generating invalid activity

  - by Karington

  i received a mail from the adsense team saying: I am not an adsense expert, im actually quite new to it. I spent a lot of time on my site http://www.media1.rs, its a news aggregator with tons of options. In the meantime i discovered the double click service that had a good option to turn on google ads when you don't have any other running so i joined up for google adsense with my company account. Everything went smooth until one day (21.Jul.2011) i got an email... Hello, After reviewing our records, we've determined that your AdSense account poses a risk of generating invalid activity. Because we have a responsibility to protect our AdWords advertisers from inflated costs due to invalid activity, we've found it necessary to disable your AdSense account. Your outstanding balance and Google's share of the revenue will both be fully refunded back to the affected advertisers. Please understand that we need to take such steps to maintain the effectiveness of Google's advertising system, particularly the advertiser-publisher relationship. We understand the inconvenience that this may cause you, and we thank you in advance for your understanding and cooperation. If you have any questions or concerns about the actions we've taken, how you can appeal this decision, or invalid activity in general, you can find more information by visiting http://www.google.com/adsense/support/bin/answer.py?answer=57153. Sincerely, The Google AdSense Team At first i didn't have any idea why... but then it came to me that it was maybe the auto refresh script we had because we publish news very very often and it would be useful for visitors... but i removed it immediately after i got the mail... Then i thought it might be my friends clicking thinking that that will help me (i didn't tell them to do it and don't know if they did) or something like that but than it couldn't be that because everyone can organize 10 people and get anyone who is a start-up banned? right? Anyway i filled out the form that was on the answers page with the previously removed script and got this from them: Hello, Thank you for your appeal. We appreciate the additional information you've provided, as well as your continued interest in the AdSense program. However, after thoroughly re-reviewing your account data and taking your feedback into consideration, our specialists have confirmed that we're unable to reinstate your AdSense account. As a reminder, if you have any questions or concerns about your account, the actions we've taken, or invalid activity in general, you can find more information by visiting http://www.google.com/adsense/support/bin/answer.py?answer=57153. I do understand them that they have to keep things secret in a way but i don't know what I'm supposed to do now? Is there a check list that i can go through and re-apply? Where do i re-apply on the same form? Please help as we are a small company and cant really have a budget for hiring a specialist + don't know any also... p.s. the current ads on the site are my own through doubleclick... Thanks in advance! Best, Karington

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• Extrapolation breaks collision detection

  - by user22241

  Before applying extrapolation to my sprite's movement, my collision worked perfectly. However, after applying extrapolation to my sprite's movement (to smooth things out), the collision no longer works. This is how things worked before extrapolation: However, after I implement my extrapolation, the collision routine breaks. I am assuming this is because it is acting upon the new coordinate that has been produced by the extrapolation routine (which is situated in my render call ). After I apply my extrapolation How to correct this behaviour? I've tried puting an extra collision check just after extrapolation - this does seem to clear up a lot of the problems but I've ruled this out because putting logic into my rendering is out of the question. I've also tried making a copy of the spritesX position, extrapolating that and drawing using that rather than the original, thus leaving the original intact for the logic to pick up on - this seems a better option, but it still produces some weird effects when colliding with walls. I'm pretty sure this also isn't the correct way to deal with this. I've found a couple of similar questions on here but the answers haven't helped me. This is my extrapolation code: public void onDrawFrame(GL10 gl) { //Set/Re-set loop back to 0 to start counting again loops=0; while(System.currentTimeMillis() > nextGameTick && loops < maxFrameskip){ SceneManager.getInstance().getCurrentScene().updateLogic(); nextGameTick+=skipTicks; timeCorrection += (1000d/ticksPerSecond) % 1; nextGameTick+=timeCorrection; timeCorrection %=1; loops++; tics++; } extrapolation = (float)(System.currentTimeMillis() + skipTicks - nextGameTick) / (float)skipTicks; render(extrapolation); } Applying extrapolation render(float extrapolation){ //This example shows extrapolation for X axis only. Y position (spriteScreenY is assumed to be valid) extrapolatedPosX = spriteGridX+(SpriteXVelocity*dt)*extrapolation; spriteScreenPosX = extrapolationPosX * screenWidth; drawSprite(spriteScreenX, spriteScreenY); } Edit As I mentioned above, I have tried making a copy of the sprite's coordinates specifically to draw with.... this has it's own problems. Firstly, regardless of the copying, when the sprite is moving, it's super-smooth, when it stops, it's wobbling slightly left/right - as it's still extrapolating it's position based on the time. Is this normal behavior and can we 'turn it off' when the sprite stops? I've tried having flags for left / right and only extrapolating if either of these is enabled. I've also tried copying the last and current positions to see if there is any difference. However, as far as collision goes, these don't help. If the user is pressing say, the right button and the sprite is moving right, when it hits a wall, if the user continues to hold the right button down, the sprite will keep animating to the right, while being stopped by the wall (therefore not actually moving), however because the right flag is still set and also because the collision routine is constantly moving the sprite out of the wall, it still appear to the code (not the player) that the sprite is still moving, and therefore extrapolation continues. So what the player would see, is the sprite 'static' (yes, it's animating, but it's not actually moving across the screen), and every now and then it shakes violently as the extrapolation attempts to do it's thing....... Hope this help

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• Olympics data available for all on Windows Azure SQL Database and Power View

  - by jamiet

  Are you looking around for some decent test data for your BI demos? Well, if so, Microsoft have provided some data about all medals won at the Olympics Games (1900 to 2008) at OlympicsData workbook - Excel, SSIS, Azure sample; it provides analysis over athletes, countries, medal type, sport, discipline and various other dimensions. The data has been provided in an Excel workbook along with instructions on how to load the data into a Windows Azure SQL Database using SQL Server Integration Services (SSIS). Frankly though, the rigmarole of standing up your own Windows Azure SQL Database ok, SQL Azure database, is both costly (SQL Azure isn’t free) and time consuming (the provided instructions aren’t exactly an idiot’s guide and getting SSIS to work properly with Excel isn’t a barrel of laughs either). To ease the pain for all you BI folks out there that simply want to party on the data I have loaded it all into the SQL Azure database that I use for hosting AdventureWorks on Azure. You can read more about AdventureWorks on Azure below however I’ll summarise here by saying it is a SQL Azure database provided for the use of the SQL Server community and which is supported by voluntary donations. To view the data the credentials you need are: Server mhknbn2kdz.database.windows.net  Database AdventureWorks2012 User sqlfamily Password sqlf@m1ly Type those into SSMS and away you go, the data is provided in four tables [olympics].[Sport], [olympics].[Discipline], [olympics].[Event] & [olympics].[Medalist]: I figured this would be a good candidate for a Power View report so I fired up Excel 2013 and built such a report to slice’n’dice through the data – here are some screenshots that should give you a flavour of what is available: A view of all the available data Where do all the gymastics medals go? Which countries do top ten all-time medal winners come from? You get the idea. There is masses of information here and if you have Excel 2013 handy Power View provides a quick and easy way of surfing through it. To save you the bother of setting up the Power View report yourself you can have the one that I took these screenshots from, it is available on my SkyDrive at OlympicsAnalysis.xlsx so just hit the link and download to play to your heart’s content. Party on, people! As I said above the data is hosted on a SQL Azure database that I use for hosting “AdventureWorks on Azure” which I first announced in March 2013 at AdventureWorks2012 now available for all on SQL Azure. I’ll repeat the pertinent parts of that blog post here: I am pleased to announce that as of today … [AdventureWorks2012] now resides on SQL Azure and is available for anyone, absolutely anyone, to connect to and use for their own means. This database is free for you to use but SQL Azure is of course not free so before I give you the credentials please lend me your ears eyes for a short while longer. AdventureWorks on Azure is being provided for the SQL Server community to use and so I am hoping that that same community will rally around to support this effort by making a voluntary donation to support the upkeep which, going on current pricing, is going to be $119.88 per year. If you would like to contribute to keep AdventureWorks on Azure up and running for that full year please donate via PayPal to [email protected] Any amount, no matter how small, will help. If those 50+ people that retweeted me beforehand all contributed $2 then that would just about be enough to keep this up for a year. If the community contributes more than we need then there are a number of additional things that could be done: Host additional databases (Northwind anyone??) Host in more datacentres (this first one is in Western Europe) Make a charitable donation That last one, a charitable donation, is something I would really like to do. The SQL Community have proved before that they can make a significant contribution to charitable orgnisations through purchasing the SQL Server MVP Deep Dives book and I harbour hopes that AdventureWorks on Azure can continue in that vein. So please, if you think AdventureWorks on Azure is something that is worth supporting please make a contribution. I’d like to emphasize that last point. If my hosting this Olympics data is useful to you please support this initiative by donating. Thanks in advance. @Jamiet

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• Blink-Data vs Instinct?

  - by Samantha.Y. Ma

  In his landmark bestseller Blink, well-known author and journalist Malcolm Gladwell explores how human beings everyday make seemingly instantaneous choices --in the blink of an eye--and how we “think without thinking.”  These situations actually aren’t as simple as they seem, he postulates; and throughout the book, Gladwell seeks answers to questions such as: 1.    What makes some people good at thinking on their feet and making quick spontaneous decisions?2.    Why do some people follow their instincts and win, while others consistently seem to stumble into error?3.    Why are some of the best decisions often those that are difficult to explain to others?In Blink, Gladwell introduces us to the psychologist who has learned to predict whether a marriage will last, based on a few minutes of observing a couple; the tennis coach who knows when a player will double-fault before the racket even makes contact with the ball; the antiquities experts who recognize a fake at a glance. Ultimately, Blink reveals that great decision makers aren't those who spend the most time deliberating or analyzing information, but those who focus on key factors among an overwhelming number of variables-- i.e., those who have perfected the art of "thin-slicing.” In Data vs. Instinct: Perfecting Global Sales Performance, a new report sponsored by Oracle, the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) explores the roles data and instinct play in decision-making by sales managers and discusses how sales executives can increase sales performance through more effective  territory planning and incentive/compensation strategies.If you are a sales executive, ask yourself this:  “Do you rely on knowledge (data) when you plan out your sales strategy?  If you rely on data, how do you ensure that your data sources are reliable, up-to-date, and complete?  With the emergence of social media and the proliferation of both structured and unstructured data, how do you know that you are applying your information/data correctly and in-context?  Three key findings in the report are:•    Six out of ten executives say they rely more on data than instinct to drive decisions. •    Nearly one half (48 percent) of incentive compensation plans do not achieve the desired results. •    Senior sales executives rely more on current and historical data than on forecast data. Strikingly similar to what Gladwell concludes in Blink, the report’s authors succinctly sum up their findings: "The best outcome is a combination of timely information, insightful predictions, and support data."Applying this insight is crucial to creating a sound sales plan that drives alignment and results.  In the area of sales performance management, “territory programs and incentive compensation continue to present particularly complex challenges in an increasingly globalized market," say the report’s authors. "It behooves companies to get a better handle on translating that data into actionable and effective plans." To help solve this challenge, CRM Oracle Fusion integrates forecasting, quotas, compensation, and territories into a single system.   For example, Oracle Fusion CRM provides a natural integration between territories, which define the sales targets (e.g., collection of accounts) for the sales force, and quotas, which quantify the sales targets. In fact, territory hierarchy is a core analytic dimension to slice and dice sales results, using sales analytics and alerts to help you identify where problems are occurring. This makes territoriesStart tapping into both data and instinct effectively today with Oracle Fusion CRM.   Here is a short video to provide you with a snapshot of how it can help you optimize your sales performance.  

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• How can I gather client's data on Google App Engine without using Datastore/Backend Instances too much?

  - by ruslan

  One of the projects I'm working on is online survey engine. It's my first big commercial project on Google App Engine. I need your advice on how to collect stats and efficiently record them in DataStore without bankrupting me. Initial requirements are: After user finishes survey client sends list of pairs [ID (int) + PercentHit (double)]. This list shows how close answers of this user match predefined answers of reference answerers (which identified by IDs). I call them "target IDs". Creator of the survey wants to see aggregated % for given IDs for last hour, particular timeframe or from the beginning of the survey. Some surveys may have thousands of target/reference answerers. So I created entity public class HitsStatsDO implements Serializable { @Id transient private Long id; transient private Long version = (long) 0; transient private Long startDate; @Parent transient private Key parent; // fake parent which contains target id @Transient int targetId; private double avgPercent; private long hitCount; } But writing HitsStatsDO for each target from each user would give a lot of data. For instance I had a survey with 3000 targets which was answered by ~4 million people within one week with 300K people taking survey in first day. Even if we assume they were answering it evenly for 24 hours it would give us ~1040 writes/second. Obviously it hits concurrent writes limit of Datastore. I decided I'll collect data for one hour and save that, that's why there are avgPercent and hitCount in HitsStatsDO. GAE instances are stateless so I had to use dynamic backend instance. There I have something like this: // Contains stats for one hour private class Shard { ReadWriteLock lock = new ReentrantReadWriteLock(); Map<Integer, HitsStatsDO> map = new HashMap<Integer, HitsStatsDO>(); // Key is target ID public void saveToDatastore(); public void updateStats(Long startDate, Map<Integer, Double> hits); } and map with shard for current hour and previous hour (which doesn't stay here for long) private HashMap<Long, Shard> shards = new HashMap<Long, Shard>(); // Key is HitsStatsDO.startDate So once per hour I dump Shard for previous hour to Datastore. Plus I have class LifetimeStats which keeps Map<Integer, HitsStatsDO> in memcached where map-key is target ID. Also in my backend shutdown hook method I dump stats for unfinished hour to Datastore. There is only one major issue here - I have only ONE backend instance :) It raises following questions on which I'd like to hear your opinion: Can I do this without using backend instance ? What if one instance is not enough ? How can I split data between multiple dynamic backend instances? It hard because I don't know how many I have because Google creates new one as load increases. I know I can launch exact number of resident backend instances. But how many ? 2, 5, 10 ? What if I have no load at all for a week. Constantly running 10 backend instances is too expensive. What do I do with data from clients while backend instance is dead/restarting?

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