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October 29

Assembly to C Conversion

This is some practice code my teacher gave us, and I'm trying to figure out this bit of IA32 disassembly from a C function. Each of the 3 chunks of assembly below corresponds to the 3 lines in this C function (it's a practice problem and we're supposed to figure out the 3 lines of C from the assembly. I have the solution key to it, but it makes no sense and I was hoping someone could help me figure it out):
void Blip(int x, char **y) {
// Line 1
// Line 2
// Line 3
}

Assembly:

Blip:
push %ebp
mov %esp, %ebp
sub $0x10, %esp

mov 0x8(%ebp), %eax
imul 0x8(%ebp), %eax
sub $0x7, %eax
mov %eax, -0x4(%ebp)

addl $0x8,0xc(%ebp)

mov -0x4(%ebp), %eax
mov 0xc(%ebp), %edx
mov (%edx, %eax, 4), %eax
add $0x3, %eax
movb $0x41, (%eax)

leave
ret

Could anyone please help me figure out the assembly? I'm not sure at all which of the variables it's accessing where and when in the code. Thank you for your help!

—Preceding unsigned comment added by Legolas52 (talk • contribs) 08:47, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

If I understand it correctly, then (after the first three instructions that fix the base pointer) 0x8(%ebp) refers to the stack entry that holds x, 0xc(%ebp) refers to y, and -0x4(%ebp) is presumably some temporary variable.—Emil J. 15:32, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

That is, it seems to be doing

void Blip(int x, char **y) {
  int t = x * x - 7;
  y += 2; /* but the pointer is really incremented by 8 == 2 * sizeof(*char) */
  y[t][3] = 'A'; /* == 0x41 */
}

This looks like nonsense code to me, so I may be wrong.—Emil J. 16:15, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

small, light, quad-core i7, 16GB ram 15" workstation??

Is there a workstation like Apple's MacBook 15" in form factor, but with a mobile quad-core i7 and up to 16 GB of RAM, for demanding, high-performance scientific applications, from a manufacturer such as Dell, IBM, or HP? (ie top tier) What do professionals needing this type of power typically use? Thanks. 188.174.13.38 (talk) 11:13, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

Searching "i7 quad mobile 16gb" turns up potential solutions from Lenovo (ex IBM) and HP etc eg http://www.google.co.uk/products?hl=en&q=mobile%20quad-core%20i7%2016GB&um=1&ie=UTF-8&sa=N&tab=wf http://www.amazon.co.uk/EliteBook-Mobile-Workstation-8740w-fingerprint/dp/B003NLY1IK , but I didn't find anything that had 16gb installed as standard. Most appear to be 17" though http://www.data-pro.co.uk/thinkpad-w510-52017.html?___store=default is 15.5". No idea about the rest of the question.

There seems to be a lot out there about these Dell M6500 things that you can custom order. You can get the i7 in them, and they can accommodate up to 32 GB RAM, although it's going to cost you if you have them put in that much. I would assume that most people running intensive scientific programs are still doing so on a desktop, but I could be wrong. Buddy431 (talk) 21:50, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

help

As I am a new CSE(computer science) student i am facing some problems in learning programming language.how can i learn programming quickly & easily?want to be expert in it.So i need help.So please someone help me.Will be grateful to him.my mail (removed) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Rajib rezwan (talk • contribs) 14:58, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

What programming language do you want to learn? That is a very important place to start. Actually, I would start with "what do you want your programs to do?" That will help decide which language to learn. -- kainaw™ 15:09, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

Since you are a computer science student, we should ask what computer science courses you have already taken, or are signed up to take in the future; and what language they are going to start you with. Comet Tuttle (talk) 17:12, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

The only way to learn programming languages is to use them to write programs. Looie496 (talk) 17:59, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

Re installation DVD and laptop that wont boot

I have a laptop that won't boot even into safe mode, can I use the re installation dvd to try and fix this problem without having to do a complete re install? It is windows Vista 64 bit on a Dell inspiron thanks. Mo ainm~Talk 16:55, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

This non-Microsoft site seems to list what will occur when you boot from your installation CD; there is a "Repair" option. (Don't click that website's links like "Click here to fix Vista errors", though.) Personally I would be paranoid and image copy the drive to an external USB hard disk first, but that's just me. Comet Tuttle (talk) 17:10, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

I have got it to run startup repair but this doesn't find any problems but still I can't boot? Any suggestions I could use to try and fix this? Mo ainm~Talk 17:16, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

Startup repair seems to only fix a limited set of problems. Assuming you have Windows Restore on and working, you can try restoring to an earlier configuration. Whenever I've had problems, restoring to the latest snapshot has always fixed the problem for me. 206.131.39.6 (talk) 19:08, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

There are no restore points set on the laptop. Is it possible it is a hardware failure? Mo ainm~Talk 19:38, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

Is it possible? Sure. This is a rather lame thing to suggest, but the next thing I would try (on a desktop machine, not necessarily a laptop) would be to disconnect the optical drive and any other SATA or PATA devices, and try booting the hard disk while it's the only storage device connected to the system; if it boots OK then this indicates a problem with some other device connected to the motherboard. Since you say this is a laptop, I might not do this, because personally I'm not comfortable disassembling and reassembling laptops. So, in your case I would use another machine to download Knoppix and create a boot disc, and then bring it to your laptop, boot Knoppix, and then poke around on the hard disk to see whether all your files appear to be there or not. Comet Tuttle (talk) 16:58, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

segmentation faults in fortran

I have a large piece of code (10+files, several thousand lines (well its large for what i'm use to)) that i've been given. I'm using the ifort compiler and when i compile and run without any flags i get a seg fault. Using the idb debugger (this is without any debug flags set) it appears to seg fault at a small helper function that only does some basic maths on its inputs so it seems unlikely to be it. BUT when i compile with -g (or -debug extended) the problem disappears which means i cant use the debugger to get more info (like where it crashes and what various variables where before it crashed). Anyone know how i can get more information from the debugger without using any debug flags? Thanks --81.147.84.39 (talk) 17:32, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

Enable Traceback: use the -traceback flag, to ensure you are crashing where you think you are. Also, spit out warnings (-Wall). Note that if you have optimizations enabled, your debugger may not be able to track source-code lines exactly. Nimur (talk) 18:35, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

It's been decades since I've done any Fortran, but in similar situations involving C, I find that putting a bunch of print commands into the code in the vicinity of the trouble spot is often the most effective approach. Looie496 (talk) 19:02, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

multiple video streams

I tried merging several video files with mkvtoolnix into one .mkv file. It works ok, but when I open it with VLC it tries to display all the streams at the same time in different windows. Is there any way to stop this? I tried selecting only one stream in VLCs menu but it didn't work. 82.44.55.25 (talk) 19:25, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

Google, Gmail etc.

Has something happened to Google's system, including its main site, Gmail, etc., on 29 October 2010? — Michael J 19:30, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

I've not noticed anything different. Could you elaborate on what you mean? 82.44.55.25 (talk) 19:35, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

They aren't there today. We keep getting error messages whenever we try to access them. — Michael J 19:43, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

Whatever it was, it's fixed now. But it was down for five or six hours. — Michael J 20:22, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

In the future, you can check with downforeveryoneorjustme.com. Comet Tuttle (talk) 20:56, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

Wonderful site. Thank you, I will do that in the future. — Michael J 01:40, 30 October 2010 (UTC)

Boot Camp on a Mac OS X

Hi, I am trying to set up Boot Camp on my Mac but it has come up with a message saying that I can't that 'The disk cannot be partitioned because some files cannot be moved.' and then instructs me to back up my disk (I have a Time Capsule, so already done that) and use Disk Utility to format the disk as a single Mac OS X Extended (Journaled) volume, which is to be followed by restoring my information to the disk. Problem is, I'm a bit of a technology noob and don't know what any of that means. Can someone offer me a 'for dummies' explanation? Thanks 128.232.247.49 (talk) 19:55, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

Once the disk is backed up, boot into your OS X install CD (hold the C key while starting up), choose your language, then once you can see the top menu bar with the file, edit, and apple menus, open Disk Utility from the list of available programs. Use this to reformat (erase) your main OS drive to Mac OS X Extended (Journaled). You can then restore your OS X install from a time machine backup with the appropriate utility (Utilities Menu -> Restore System from Backup). Once you've done this, all your files and information should be on one part of the drive so the Boot Camp utility will be able to add the boot camp partition. 206.131.39.6 (talk) 20:11, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

Fastest Computer

When was the fastest computer in the word of a similar speed to an average desktop pc today? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.141.156.45 (talk) 20:06, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

See Supercomputer#Timeline_of_supercomputers

Assuming we ignore the graphics card ('cos a typical graphics chip is an intel chip which typically can't be used for any useful computations) a typical desktop does about 10GFlops eg a low end intel core2duo http://www.intel.com/support/processors/sb/CS-023143.htm#4 which compares to the best from 1989, or if you think 10Gflops is too big for average and want more around 1-5Gflops then it would be equivalent of the best from 1983-5 eg Cray X-MP or a Cray-2. 77.86.42.103 (talk) 20:37, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

And as always, "fastest at doing what?" For example, no supercomputer in 1983 could compress or decompress an H.264 video at any speed, because the software (and some hardware) did not exist yet. And in terms of data-access, supercomputers today have essentially the same data latency to hard-disk and network as a moderate- to high-end desktop PC (maybe a little bit faster, but not much). So if your task is disk-heavy, the benefits of a "high performance computer" are moot. Nimur (talk) 20:56, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

How does ChatRoulette STILL know that I'm on the same laptop?

So I was banned from CR for trying to paste a message less than 5 seconds after starting a conversation with someone (because it mistook my action as spam.)

Then I decided to delete all Chatroulette's cookies and try again from another location (a different IP address.) Then I got the notice that I was still banned, now under that new IP. They were IPs for my college's network at this point.

What else should I remove/change that identifies me so I can mistake Chatroulette's system into thinking I'm someone else?

(Sorry, but there is no "appeal button," so I must try this other route.) --129.130.252.150 (talk) 20:42, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

ChatRoulette seems to use Flash. Have you also cleared your Flash cookies? Hint: The "Delete private data" function in web browsers don't generally delete Flash cookies. 125.163.227.57 (talk) 02:00, 30 October 2010 (UTC)

we have an article on this: Local Shared Object --Spoon! (talk) 21:06, 30 October 2010 (UTC)

Allowing ports through the router - with some complications, how to do this?

I'm trying to play the multiplayer online game "world of warcraft" on my computers (one laptop and one stationary computer) but it won't work on neither. I've tried everything and checked that all ports are open through my firewall and such and followed instructions by Blizzard(the makers of the game) and everything should be in order, except one thing; that the ROUTER itself isn't allowing the ports to go through. I'm pretty sure that's the problem. If u have reason to suspect another reason, please share :) but i'm positive that is the reason the game won't log in. Coz the game itself starts up just fine, but when i try to log on to the game server it fails to connect. And the thing here is that both my computers are "stealing" the net-signal from my friend's router. We both know very little about these technical things of computing and can't get our heads around it, or rather *I* can't get my head around it, coz he with his limited knowledge is of no help anyway.

The router I'm "stealing" network signal from is a : Atheros AR9285 802.11b/g/n WiFi Adapter and I'm wondering if I can adjust these things and allow the necessary ports through the router on MY computers?? or do I have to go on the computer of my friend that is directly connected to the router to adjust? My Hewlett Packard laptop has windows 7 and my stationary pc has windows vista if that is of importance. How do I do this?? How do I proceed: I need some detailed step by step instructions I suspect. And preferably I would like to go through my own computers to adjust this IF possible rather than mixing around on my friend's computer.

(just in case it is important, my stationary computer uses a small device with usb-plug that is called Siemens Gigaset usb adapter 108 to catch the signal from a distance. it's what we call wireless adapter, no? Anyway there it is, in case it is of any importance)

i hope i have given all necessary info for someone knowledgable and skilled to help me.

I really hope someone can help me, I have even subscribed long ahead on the game and at the moment it is nothing but money out of the window when I cannot log in and play.

Crossing fingers that someone can give helpful answers, thank you :)

Wikipedia-GUEST —Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.49.204.143 (talk) 21:44, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

Just a suggestion :while in Wikipedia, sign with 4 tildes (i.e. this thing : ~)

I believe you can access your router settings via a IP address I think, from any computer connected to it. However, to access it it usually requires an username and password. Check your user documentation if you (or your friend) has never used it before (It should be separate from the username and password if the router requires a password to access the internet) . And just a note, I think you should tell your friend that you are stealing their bandwidth. It's only kind to do so. General Rommel (talk) 04:43, 30 October 2010 (UTC)

Generally speaking, you need to have access to your "friend's" router system to set up port-forwarding. this is usually achieved by going to the router system page in a web browser, entering appropriate passwords for access, and enabling forwarding on the relevant ports. you may also need to set up forwarding on those ports through your own computer firewall as well, depending on how (and if) you have it set up. This means that if you're actually stealing this bandwidth you're probably SOL (and a good thing, too - stealing bandwidth with a with a bandwidth-hog like WoW is rude to the extreme. --Ludwigs2 06:29, 30 October 2010 (UTC)

Don't worry guys, my friend knows I'm "stealing" and he's fine with it, why wouldn't he be? No point for us both to subscribe on internet distribution when we can share. You're right though that he's the one paying for it :P, something which he did before I came into the picture and which he would still have done today whether I was using his net or not. A computer guy i bought my pc from helped us setting it up a long time ago, and my friend was perfectly fine with it, so no worries. Password and username is not required for me to use the net, because it is not secured or locked or what to call it. So I have set my computers to automatically track the net signals and be on net whenever i start up my computers. But how do I know which site is the system page where i can allow the ports through the router? And where to find the adress?

By the way, you say I'm proabbly SOL, i have no idea what that means...

Thanks :)

84.49.204.143 (talk) 09:53, 30 October 2010 (UTC)

see SOL at wiktionary, definition 4. even if there is no password to connect to the router, there is usually an administrative password to modify the router's information. you'll need to ask your friend for that. the IP address you go to depends on the kind of router he bought, and the admin password is something that only he will have. --Ludwigs2 16:44, 30 October 2010 (UTC)

Blizzard support has step-by-step instructions for some popular router models [here]. 84.239.160.59 (talk) 08:06, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

Microsoft Sam

Who voices Microsoft Sam? jc iindyysgvxc (my contributions) 23:19, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

The text to speech engine used entirely synthetic waveforms. No human voice was recorded to create the sounds of the individual phonemes. They are computationally-generated "syllables" (phonemes, really), and are combined and "warped" by a text-to-speech engine to mimic natural speech patterns. We have an article on Microsoft text-to-speech voices. Essentially, each "voice" is a complex set of numerical parameters that feed into the Microsoft Speech API and drive the various sound generation algorithms. Nimur (talk) 00:35, 30 October 2010 (UTC)

October 30

Khan Academy web exercise subjects besides math

At Khan Academy, in the Vision section describing the major components, it says: Automated exercises with continuous assessment (already over 70 modules mainly in math). I've done all the ones I could see in my dashboard (84) and I can say that all the exercises I saw were in math. I could supply a list to prove this, but it would make this post very long. So was whoever wrote those words "mainly in math" not using the most accurate language, or are there automated exercises in other categories that I'm not seeing? Thanks. 76.27.175.80 (talk) 00:33, 30 October 2010 (UTC)

As you admit, there may be automated exercises in other categories that you're not seeing. The section in the article seems to be referenced by a youtube video posted by the academy (although I've not checked whether the reference does in fact check out; let us assume it does). In general, we prefer article content based on reliable sources which can be verified. If you can find a reliable source backing your assertion, then please amend the article. thanks --Tagishsimon (talk) 00:43, 30 October 2010 (UTC)

Clustered Computing - Booting & Cluster Shared Volumes

Hello Everyone.

   In a cluster of computers, do each of the servers have its own boot volume, or do all servers in a cluster boot from the same volume? The Wikipedia article on clustered computing doesn't make this clear. I'm aware that all nodes in cluster store data on on the same cluster shared volume, so my question is only about where each node's operating-system is stored.

   Thank you to all respondents. Rocketshiporion♫ 03:22, 30 October 2010 (UTC)

It doesn't have to be one way or another. I have set up Beowulf clusters to use independent boot volumes per computer. I've also set them up to use network booting from a single master server. -- kainaw™ 01:14, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

I should clarify my question. Do all nodes in a cluster boot from a single LUN, sharing a single system image, or does each node have its own system image on its own LUN? Rocketshiporion♫ 02:46, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

That is the question that I answered. I have set up Beowulf clusters such that each node (computer) was completely independent. It shared no drives with any other computer. It was completely separated except for the network cable used for inter-node communications. I have also set up clusters such that the nodes (computers) all booted from a single master server image. -- kainaw™ 13:01, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

Static functions in C

Hello Sir/Madam,

I have a small doubt in c, Especially using function. That is prototype declaration of function and function declaration. static function(int *,float *);//prototype here using static declaration is

static function(int *a,float *b)
{
  my Coding....
}

and the other one is function(int *,float *);//prototype no storage class

declaration is

function(int *a,float *b)
{
  my Coding....
}

what is the difference between the above two function. (one is normal function another one is using the storage class.) why do we use static storage class while declaring function and what is the purpose?

Thanks . M.Antony prabhu —Preceding unsigned comment added by 122.164.59.55 (talk) 03:42, 30 October 2010 (UTC)

Added header and formatted spacing -- kainaw™ 03:56, 30 October 2010 (UTC)

The keyword "static" means a lot of things in C. With functions, it refers to the scope of the function. Without static, you can use "extern" to use a function from one source file in another source file. If you make the function static, you cannot use extern on it. So, "static" has limited the scope of the function. I looked for a very short/simple example and found this. -- kainaw™ 04:03, 30 October 2010 (UTC)

"You recently visited the following sites"

1) This http://www.privacy-test.info/ reveals that websites can see what other websites I visited in the past. Is there any way in Firefox to avoid revealing this information without having to clear or disable History, which I like to keep?

2) The drop down menu of the box that shows the URLs in Firefox shows a random selection of webpages that I visited months ago (and different from the above). How does Firefox decide which websites to show?

3) Is there any way to edit the information in 1) or 2) above?

4) Apart from using a proxy, what can I do to reveal as little about myself and my computer as possible when surfing? Thanks 92.15.12.85 (talk) 15:44, 30 October 2010 (UTC)

Firefox in private browsing mode and using noscript 'http://noscript.net/' is a good start at keeping a low profile. SemanticMantis (talk) 16:16, 30 October 2010 (UTC)

I thought that private browsing mode merely prevented any record being left on your computer, and not information being released to the internet? 92.15.12.85 (talk) 17:54, 30 October 2010 (UTC)

You can use an encrypted VPN or TOR to hide your IP, and CCleaner to remove cookies (browser, flash, but not all of java).Smallman12q (talk) 16:43, 30 October 2010 (UTC)

I believe the suggestionss at [1] will do it although it's not something I've tested or looked in to in depth myself. Nil Einne (talk) 01:16, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

For question 2: Firefox's algorithm for choosing websites in the URL bar dropdown is called the "Awesome Bar" (no, seriously). See here. Searching for "awesomebar options" or the like should give you some information on configuring it, but there aren't very many easily-editable checkboxes and the like. « Aaron Rotenberg « Talk « 03:25, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

I find it shocking that you are required to give any personal information at all, or have these mis-named "cookies" infesting one's computer - "Rats" would be a better name. It's like going into a shop and being required to give your full name, address, dob, previous addreses, employer, marital status, blood group, fingerprint, etc etc.; or being required to give the full spec and history of your car plus where you've been in the last couple of days when in a petrol filling station. Who's bright idea was it to request all this info? 92.15.26.46 (talk) 15:27, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

Not a Frequent Flyer then ? Sfan00 IMG (talk) 16:55, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

Wireless router requiring reboot

I fully expect this question to be far too vague as to be answerable, but just on the off-chance that someone here knows someone that tech support doesn't, I've come here again. I have a relatively new dsl modem/wireless router that I have registered my laptop and iPhone on, and after a few hiccups during installation it basically works fine, except for the fact that I need to perform some combination of modem reboot (the wireless and modem are combined in a single unit) and wireless ethernet card off/on (via the external switch on my laptop) to get it to work, every time my computer reboots. If I don't reinitiate both every single time the computer boots up (hibernating it has the same effect) I either get stuck in "unidentified network" or it just doesn't work limiting me to "local network only". Tech support brilliantly informs me to reboot the modem and turn off my machine, which of course, fixes the problem, but I'm wondering why the heck I have to do this every single time my computer starts up. I'm using Vista home, my internet service is Telus (Vancouver, Canada) and I live in an apartment, if any of that is important.

Does this situation sound familiar to anyone? Thanks! 173.183.73.136 (talk) 18:34, 30 October 2010 (UTC)

I can't answer your question, except that the situation sounds familiar because I have similar problems on my (Vista) laptop. My problem seems to occur most regularly after I've been connected to a different network. Often just manually disconnecting and reconnecting (from the network and Sharing Center) seems to resolve the problem. Dbfirs 09:26, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

Did you check your ISP settings? Generally, when you buy internet service, they provide you with a username and password to use the service. My wireless router at home has randomly deleted our ISP login information before, and this sounds very much like the same symptoms when my router lost the login. The easiest thing to do is to go into the wireless settings (open command prompt and type "ipconfig" Take the IP address, type it into your web browser, and change the last digit grouping to "1.") This should allow you to access the modem preferences. Then re-enter your username and password.

If you don't know your username or password, call your ISP and they will be happy to tell you. If you don't understand what I'm saying, feel free to leave a message on My talk and I'll try to explain a different way.Matthewrbowker (talk) 21:15, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

If the router has lost the ISP settings, then rebooting it wouldn't solve the problem would it? The problem sounds more likely to be the computer forgetting the logon to the router, or the router not listening for the computer's logon, or not transmitting its ID. Dbfirs 23:04, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

It does actually connect, it just doesn't get a response, so it doesn't seem to be a problem on the computer side (my iPhone also sometimes has trouble connecting, but not every time). I'm wondering what can possibly be done to remind the router to look for my computer, or to force it to send its ID. 173.183.73.136 (talk) 06:41, 4 November 2010 (UTC)

If you log in to your router's management, you can choose whether or not the router broadcasts its ID. I think it's the computer that searches for the router, not the other way round. The router just listens and should respond. I wonder if there is some Radio Frequency interference nearby. I had trouble with a TV wireless transmitter that seems to work on a similar frequency. You can test this out by trying to connect with a device right next to the router, then at a distance. If interference is the problem, then connection will be much more reliable near to the router. When you say "doesn't get a response", do you mean that no bytes are received from the router? (shown in wireless router status) If this is the case, then no connection has been made. If bytes are received as well as sent, then the connection has been made, and you should be able to see other devices (if permitted) on the network. If you still have no internet after a connection is made (two-way communication), then the problem is likely to be in your router/modem's connection to the internet. I'm not an expert on this, but I have shared the same sort of frustration. Dbfirs 00:27, 5 November 2010 (UTC)

October 31

Multitasking OS - program memory allocation

(if specific - Windows) In a multitasking OS such as windows there can be numerous processess and programs running (using time division multitasking amongst other things I think) - what I don't understand is how memory is allocated between these processes/programs - specifically in terms of a stack.

eg A program might need a huge stack, but the size of the stack would be unknown before runtime.. My main question is - how are program stacks handled? one shared stack, or one stack per program in program memory space? What about if the stack gets really big? Does the processor have special features to detect stacks going outside a set space? I might need a windows memory organisation 101 lesson first.. where to look? Thanks.77.86.42.103 (talk) 00:02, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

Windows Internals by Russinovich and Solomon is pretty good. There's one stack per thread (not per process); when a context switch occurs the stack-pointer is among the registers that get saved and restored. Different OSes handle allocation for the stack slightly differently (and I don't know offhand how Windows does it). Ideally a process would allocate so many pages of system memory for the stack; if a thread used more than that (e.g. it did some extensive recursive operation) then it runs off the end of the stack segment, causing a memory violation. The kernel responds by allocation more physical pages to the virtual memory space for the stack, amends its own tables marking the stack segment as having expanded, and returns control to the process. In practice this can go on for a while, but a sensible OS will limit the size to which a stack can grow (otherwise a trivial, defective program can consume all the memory by recursing itself) - a program that goes over its limit will be terminated. -- Finlay McWalter ☻ Talk 00:10, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

Note that this the case for user space processes (that is, applications and services). How stacks work for kernel level "processes" and things like interrupt handlers is a rather difficult matter. -- Finlay McWalter ☻ Talk 00:25, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

The Win32 Thread Information Block stores details about the current thread's stack size. Russinovich talks about the TIB several times, and says pages are allocated to it with a 64Kb granularity. -- Finlay McWalter ☻ Talk 00:23, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

(follow on question to first part, still reading) Thanks that's what I was looking for. Question - "runs off the end of the stack segment, causing a memory violation" - is this detected by the processor? I assume it has to be .. what would be a good search term for the x86 or x64 implementation of this?

also a minor question .. in Task Manager eg File:System idle process.png - in terms of the above answer - is each "process" shown in that windows program a "thread" or "process" - don't matter if not known - my question has been already mostly answered.77.86.42.103 (talk) 00:27, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

Yes. The Global Descriptor Table stores Task State Segments which store the addresses of virtual memory blocks allocated to the process. Accessing memory outwith that allocated to you causes a protection fault, which is handled by the kernel. Although users are familiar with protection faults as program-killing errors, OSes which run on CPUs with memory management units also (transparently) use protection faults to implement growable stacks, copy-on-write, and handling of paging data and executables to and from disk/memory. -- Finlay McWalter ☻ Talk 00:34, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

Regarding Task Manager - each thing it shows is a process, I believe. Some processes have many threads. Microsoft's Process Explorer (which Russinovich wrote) will, I think, show the threads within each process. It's a free download (and safe, given its source); if you're interested in how Windows works, it's a really interesting way to waste the rest of your evening. -- Finlay McWalter ☻ Talk 00:37, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

Regarding books: apart from Russinovich (who I think will explain this only rather tangentially) it's difficult to recommend a decent book. The underlying technology is covered at length in the Intel Software Developer's Manuals, but those are written from a pretty low-level perspective, for people who already know how conceptually to write a virtual-memory subsystem and task switch handler. Probably the best thing I've read is McKusick's The Design and Implementation of the 4.4 BSD Operating System - really all (mainstream, non embedded, single-computer) operating systems work in much the same way. -- Finlay McWalter ☻ Talk 00:56, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

Great Global Descriptor Table and Task State Segment almost certainly answer my initial question. I really didn't have a hope of finding it on my own. I agreee McKusicks book is good found it here - one of those works that makes me feel I could start writing an OS today, and probably have it finished in a couple of weeks .. :) 77.86.42.103 (talk) 01:18, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

Resolved

Wireless modem capabilities

Can wireless modems generally be used to dial "information numbers" (i.e., things like this¹) and send and receive text messages to perform an account's administrative tasks (e.g., refill balance, order services, etc.)? 125.163.228.155 (talk) 07:00, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

¹⁾ This is just an example. I am not an AT&T customer.

(answering self) Well, after reading various wireless modems' user manuals, it quickly became apparent to me that most wireless modems are only capable of the following (at least from the modem's user interface, not accounting from writing AT commands directly):

• connecting to the Internet,
• sending and receiving text messages,
• "managing" the SIM/RUIM's inbox, outbox, and other *boxes, and
• "managing" the SIM/RUIM's contact list.

So, in conclusion, unless I can do an account's maintenance tasks (activating the Internet service, checking account balance, refilling account balance, ordering data packages, etc.) solely through text, it is probably not a good idea to have a wireless modem without having a cell phone. 125.163.226.148 (talk) 00:42, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Installing Starcraft 2 On Ubuntu Using Wine

My Vista computer completely crashed on me so I decided to install Ubuntu (I downloaded 10.10). I'm not really technically proficient, and all I plan to use my computer for is Internet, Word, Netbeans, and Starcraft 2. However, after installing wine and following the instructions here, when I try to run the installer I get the error message: " No installer data could be found. If this problem persists, please contact Blizzard Technical Support.".

Does anyone have any idea how I can resolve this? Secondly, since I downloaded Ubuntu I figure I should try to use some of this amazing functionality linux should let me have. However I feel kind of overwhelmed learning it. Does anyone have any suggestions on how I should go about learning to use ubuntu?

Thanks --66.133.196.152 (talk) 09:09, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

Sorry if I sound annoying, but why not just go back to Windows? It should bring up no problems then, as most feature games are designed for Windows.General Rommel (talk) 09:48, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

You do sound annoying, and this is not a helpful response at all. We've established many times over that "switch to X" is not an appropriate response when someone is asking for help with their current OS. It should frankly be removed.. --Mr.98 (talk) 11:48, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

It's not half as annoying as when someone takes on the self-appointed role of policeman. 92.15.26.46 (talk) 15:30, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

There are no policemen here, just other citizens. My right to criticize poor responses is as enshrined as your own. --Mr.98 (talk) 18:42, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

I agree the response is poor, but one thing I would suggest is if you never actually tried Starcraft on Windows, and presuming you can relatively easily install it, consider a temporary copy. If the problem persists on Windows, you know it's probably not be Linux related and are free to contact Blizzard. Nil Einne (talk) 21:11, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

And to Mr 98, I apoligize, however I have only been here for only a few times over this year and I believe that we should consider all possibilities, which colud also include going back to Windows. However, if Mr 98 disagrees you may bring it up on my talk page. General Rommel (talk) 21:29, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

Normally I, too, condemn recommendations of "switch to Windows / Mac OS / Linux" which are almost never helpful — but in this case, the original poster is a Windows user, using Windows Vista, who is not at all familiar with Linux, and is trying to play a Windows game. I think it's a good question why he doesn't reinstall Vista from scratch, under the circumstances. Comet Tuttle (talk) 15:36, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

Some programs need a bunch of tweaks for Wine for it to play them properly. The Wine forums tend to have quite a bit on them, but that might be daunting for a new user. Instead try installing PlayOnLinux (it's in the package managment system, so you'll get it using Synaptic). It has a specific line item for Starcraft II - Wings of Liberty. In general the Wine Database is showing people are having "Gold" and "Platinum" results playing Starcraft II on Wine - see here. -- Finlay McWalter ☻ Talk 12:02, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

I should clarify this - PlayOnLinux is a wrapper around Wine, providing a tailored "wine prefix" for an impressively wide range of programs - it's not a replacement for wine at all. -- Finlay McWalter ☻ Talk 12:30, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

You might also consider Cedega which is a pay-for, closed-source, spin-off of Wine. However, I notice that their database lists the game as "works with issues", which in my experience usually means that the software runs but has some glitches that make playing the game frustratingly impossible. APL (talk) 15:58, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

Font ID

Can anyone help? :) ╟─TreasuryTag►constablewick─╢ 09:46, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

Identifont has some ideas, but none of them look right to me -- the best matches don't even have an italic version. Paul (Stansifer) 12:24, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

It looks to me like one of the standard fonts that used to be on Mac Systems 7-9, but the Fonts on Macintosh article doesn't really have on that matches up. It reminds me of Zapf Chancery but it is obviously not that. It has some resemblance to Bookman or Cheltenham, in the sense that both have sort of a "too filled, too big" look to them (to me, anyway) with similar flourishes at the ends of the letters, but neither of those are obviously the same one (they have different italic as, for example). --Mr.98 (talk) 18:40, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

For what it's worth, I google-image-searched artscroll font and this link is probably from the same source and uses what appears to be the same font. Comet Tuttle (talk) 15:39, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

I am no typographical expert, but the font really looks like ITC Benguiat® Book Italic. 125.163.226.148 (talk) 02:00, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Error (?) in unit type article

I think there may be a significant error in our unit type article, but I'm not sure, and I don't think I'd get a response on the talk page, so I'm asking here, with a really long sentence.

According to our article, the unit type is the return type of functions that return no value. But consider the following proposition: "a function which returns no value can be changed to return a value without breaking anything else". Obviously, this should be true. This statement is equivalent to "a function type which has a return type is a subtype of the function type with the same argument types but no return type". Yet, if the unit type is the static return type of functions which return no value, this isn't true. The reason is that function return values are covariant, and whatever the return type of the function is, it's not a subtype of the unit type. The static unit type provides some information (its type), even though the runtime unit type doesn't.

The only type that provides no information whatsoever is the top type. So, to be pedantic correct, it seems like the article should say that the static return type of functions that return no useful information is the top type, and the actual value returned by such functions is (presumably) the unit.

To make this more concrete: functions from void to int cannot be substituted for functions from void to void. However, they can be substituted for functions from void to object.

So... am I right, and the article needs to be changed, or am I just completely off my rocker? Also, are there any actual programming languages with these semantics? « Aaron Rotenberg « Talk « 10:11, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

I think you're mixing levels of function call. before you call a function (at least in a strictly typed language) you have to set up the receiving variable, which (if I'm understanding correctly) requires a separate 'unit type' function call. That separate function call can only return one value, and so in an 'information-theory' sense it returns no information; it just contextualizes the output of the real function. You can think of this the same way as in standard math. if you have a function like x/r^2 it makes no difference from the perspective of the function whether the unit type of x and r are 'kilograms and meters' or 'pounds and yards', and the unit types themselves don't really add any information that's of use to the function, they merely serve to contextualize the inputs and outputs for those that wish to use the function. The article's a little jargon-ish, but I don't think it's wrong. this is not really my specialty though. --Ludwigs2 18:03, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

All types are subtypes of the unit type in the sense that there's a natural surjection t → unit for any t. Of course this can be lifted to a natural surjection (u → t) → (u → unit). Possibly what's confusing you (it confuses me) is that there are at least two different kinds of subtyping in programming languages: t ≤ u can mean t ⊆ u or it can mean t ≅ u ⊗ v for some v. What they have in common is a natural mapping from t to u, but it's an injection in one case and a surjection in the other. One could try to argue that the base object type of object-oriented languages counts is really the unit type, but in most real languages instances of that type have individual identity, so it's not a very good correspondence. As for a value of type unit conveying no information, one can say that a value of type t conveys log₂ |t| bits of information (at least if |t| is finite), and it's in that sense that a unit return tells you nothing. -- BenRG (talk) 21:19, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

VLC

Resolved

I want to test VLCs stream playback feature, but I can't find any urls to test. Does anyone know of some streams (free news channels or whatever it doesn't matter) that are video and audio for me to test? Thanks. 82.44.55.25 (talk) 17:33, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

VLC will stream from YouTube. Just visit a normal YouTube playback page, copy the URL from the browser's location bar, and in VLC do media->openNetworkStream, and paste that URL in there. -- Finlay McWalter ☻ Talk 17:45, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

You can play back KQED-FM's audio stream by opening http://www.kqed.org/radio/listen/kqedradio.m3u in VLC. -- Finlay McWalter ☻ Talk 17:47, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

Thanks! 82.44.55.25 (talk) 17:52, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

Orange pop-up rectangles

What exactly is responsible for the orange pop-up rectangles when you move your cursor over things on the TV schedule page of www.radiotimes.com ? Java, Silverlight, what please? Thanks 92.24.186.230 (talk) 22:22, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

It's JavaScript, similar to the overLIB library.  ZX81  ^talk 22:40, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

(edit conflict : Same answer) - include a bit of the code

An example code piece is:

<a href="/enwiki/ListingsServlet?event=10&channelId=26&programmeId=141455338&jspLocation=/jsp/prog_details_fullpage.jsp" onmouseover="return overlib('TALK SHOW <br /><b>Piers Morgan\'s Life Stories: Rod Stewart</b> <br /><b>ITV1 London</b> <br /> (12:15am - 1:05am)', FGCOLOR, '#ff9922');" onmouseout="return nd();" class="url">Piers Morgan's<br>Life Stories: Ro...</a>

One of the key bits is the "onmouseover" event which is javascript - when the mouse goes over the thing it does a javascript function called "return overlib" which is described here http://www.bosrup.com/web/overlib/?Documentation

87.102.115.141 (talk) 22:43, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

Using the NoScript extension in Firefox

How do I adjust the options of the NoScript extension in Firefox so that it prevents things which may be intrusive, malicious, or anti-privacy; but which still allows most webpages pages to be run in a normal way? Thanks Edit: re-wording that, how can I adjust NoScript so that most webpages run normally, but inessential potentially unsafe things don't? 92.24.186.230 (talk) 22:28, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

It is not possible to know what pages have malicious scripts. So, NoScript is designed to make it easy to allow scripts on pages you trust (even if your trust is misplaced). When you visit a site that has blocked scripts, NoScript will show you an alert. Click on the alert and you can select "Allow from xxxxxxx" where xxxxxx is one of the sites supplying scripts for the page. From that point on, you won't have blocked scripts from that source. -- kainaw™ 16:56, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

It is not possible to know whether a script is malicious because the definition of "malware" is a matter of opinion. For example, I consider Google Analytics "malicious," (it steals my CPU resources to track my behaviors and report my usage statistics to an uninvolved third-party), so I disallow it from running client-side processing. Most people do not share my viewpoints. Malware is entirely subject to individual perceptions - what software do you want to permit to run on your computer? Some people choose to upload personally identifiable information to unknown third parties over unencrypted channels. Some people intentionally send their financial account information to strangers. For these people, automating the procedure with a script is not "malicious." NoScript does not attempt to differentiate amongst scripts based on "malicious intent." Instead, it blocks all scripts by default, and allows the individual to make exceptions. Nimur (talk) 20:43, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

It's also subjective what constitutes an advertisement, but products like AdBlock exist anyway. I see no reason why a community-maintained Javascript block list for NoScript couldn't exist, but as far as I know it doesn't.

NoScript can be configured to allow scripts by default instead of forbidding them by default. In that mode it still protects against cross-site scripting and clickjacking better than Firefox alone, or at least so it claims. But this would allow a lot of privacy-compromising scripts to run, so it probably isn't what you want. -- BenRG (talk) 21:22, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

Privacy browser

What browser (using Windows) preserves your privacy most, but which still allows normal internet surfing? Thanks 92.24.186.230 (talk) 22:31, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

Firefox, with flashblock and cookieculler extensions, and saved form data and saved passwords disabled in prefs. I forget if HTML5 offline data is in play yet. ¦ Reisio (talk) 00:05, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

November 1

Unallocated space

Hi, I have an asus n61j series (n61jv-x2) computer with the following disk partitions. What is the unallocated space for? Any ideas? Am I supposed to leave it as it is? Thank you in advance. Kushal (talk) 02:45, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

http://lh4.ggpht.com/_QV-sc8O9Nno/TM4pfIflXGI/AAAAAAAAAB4/g8YlD74Z5_o/Disk%20Management%20asus%20n61jv-x2%20unallocated%20space.PNG

I can't think of any reason why you couldn't create/resize partitions to use that space. There are partition types that NT won't recognize (e.g. Linux ext3), but they wouldn't show up as "unallocated". -- BenRG (talk) 04:16, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

Well, this computer has Geforce GT 325M and optimus won't work on Linux apparently. But that's for another day I guess. Kushal (talk) 14:09, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

One current fashion (of manufacturers) is to split a hard disk into 2, one part for os and general, and the other half for a file archive. ie two drives on one disk - this looks like something similar - except it's been forgotten to actually create the archive drive..? 87.102.115.141 (talk) 09:10, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

I would understand the scheme better if it was one partition for os and one for user data but what's the point of backing up on not just the same computer but on the same disk? I must be missing something... Maybe that's where the system restore data should go?

No you're not missing much - it's not a particularily intelligent scheme.. they do do it though (the manufacturers) - I suppose if people back up somewhere it's better than nothing. (I think the computers come installed with an 'own brand' backup your directorys tool as well - to help) - the flaws are obvious, obviously.Sf5xeplus (talk) 10:08, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Many computers these days have an extra, hidden partition for system recovery, but that wouldn't show up as unallocated space (unless it had been deleted, in which case you might as well reuse the space). Also it wouldn't be 100+ GB, it would be 10 GB tops. -- BenRG (talk) 21:06, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

That's what the recovery partition in the Alienware looks like. I am having networking trouble on the Asus and the computer did not come with a recovery disk (and apparently a recovery partition either). :/ Sad times Kushal (talk) 22:00, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Is this a second-hand computer? Volumes encrypted with tools such as TrueCrypt may show up as unallocated space in disk management. (In that case, you might as well treat it as such, unless you can get the previous owner to reveal the password). decltype (talk) 09:15, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

It is from warehouse deals fulfilled by amazon.com. :/ It was supposed to be in "used - mint" condition. I feel cheated. I hope the windows license sticker on the bottom of the computer will still work if I have to reinstall. Kushal (talk) 13:30, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

From the disc management screenshot you gave, it looks like you should simply be able to extend the C: partition into the unallocated space. Right click on the C: partition and click "Extend Volume" (or something to that effect), and have it fill the remaining space.206.131.39.6 (talk) 15:24, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

Note that, if memory serves, you actually have to right-click the letters "C:" and you can't right-click any of the fields off to its right (even on the same line). Comet Tuttle (talk) 15:41, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

A partition encrypted with TrueCrypt would show up as an unrecognized filesystem, not as unallocated space. TrueCrypt does support encrypting an entire volume, not just a partition, but in that case the whole volume would show up as unformatted and unpartitioned. It's theoretically possible to "disguise" an encrypted partition as unallocated space, but TrueCrypt doesn't support that and I don't know of a product that does. It strikes me as a bad idea. I would reinstall Windows in any case, because who knows what spyware the previous user left on there. You may want to backup and restore the installed Windows license instead of using the one on the bottom of the machine, to avoid phone activation, as described here for example. -- BenRG (talk) 21:06, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

Ordinarily, I would not consider going through the trouble of clean installing windows, but for the last two days, I am having networking trouble so I might have to... :/ I guess I need to start a new question for that one... Kushal (talk) 20:08, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Software

What's the best software to edit sound. I'm a transcriber n sometimes i get really bad audios that i need to remove the background noise on them or they may be mono sound. I don't need a complex software just a really good reliable software. thanks. P.s Don't tell me to Google. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 196.201.218.247 (talk) 14:46, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

The standard answer here: Audacity. Is free. Is good. --jjron (talk) 15:01, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

He asked for the best, which is Pro Tools. Not free, better than good. Comet Tuttle (talk) 15:27, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

Why don't you Google it? (Sorry... couldn't resist.) Kingsfold (Quack quack!) 16:59, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

What is the significance of the RIAA no longer suing infringers?

Does this mean that there are no (practical) legal consequences to illegal filesharing? Does anybody know of statistics of statistics showing an increase of illegal filesharing after the announcment was made? AGradman / talk / how the subject page

when I made this edit 16:22, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

For the record, that first paragraph said they're "set to drop" their lawsuit strategy; it doesn't say they have dropped it. Comet Tuttle (talk) 16:42, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

Ramifications are described in detail in the article. Instead of going through a lengthy lawsuit, they have reached agreements with many major ISPs to simply have the user's internet connection cut off. In the end, it is cheaper and probably more effective than lawsuits. -- kainaw™ 16:50, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

computer troubles

Who or what is this 'Crawler' and how has it taken over my computer? I have managed to set my homepage back to normal, but how do I get my old search engine back?

Also, how do I get the old Microsoft Works icons back, these new ones look terrible?

And, properties of my Open Office Document: Created 31/10/2010 23:56:40, last modified 01/11/2010 00:39:11, total editing time 02:11:08. How does that work? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 148.197.121.205 (talk) 16:58, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

148.197.121.205 (talk) 16:53, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

It appears that "Crawler" is a toolbar for Internet Explorer that is considered malware. It changes your default IE page, and redirects your web searches. Many editors here have recommended Malwarebytes, which is an anti-malware program that should remove it.

Microsoft Works icons: What sorts of files have the new icons? What do they look like now? Can you upload a screenshot to Flickr or the like, for us to examine?

For those properties of your document: Could you explain what exactly is your question? I think, but am not sure, that you may be getting confused because "01/11/2010" means "1st of November 2010" and not "January 11 2010"? Comet Tuttle (talk) 17:49, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

Couldn't I just reset my old search engine somehow?

All the Microsoft works word processor files do, they're really low resolution pictures, with a blue square at the top, and a stripey box in the middle.

the problem is that I only had it open less than an hour and have apparently done more than two hours work in that time, I was wondering how it worked that out. 148.197.121.205 (talk) 17:57, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

Resetting your old search engine: I don't know anything about Crawler, so you would have to ask the author(s) of the software how to change the search engine. Probably not, I will guess; because someone is probably paying them to force your search engine to be something else. If you don't know what Crawler is gaining you, I would remove it, personally.

Works icons: When you double-click a Works document that has one of these weird icons, does it still open Works, or something else? What version of Windows are you running?

The 2-hour thing: I see. This might be a bug in OpenOffice, possibly related to this bug (which I also noticed on a non-computer clock of mine at home) in which some clocks and software believed that a daylight savings time 1-hour shift occurred recently. Comet Tuttle (talk) 18:12, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

How do I get rid of it though?

They do open properly, it seems, just with annoyingly ugly icons.

There was a change recently, but it was the night before that. 148.197.121.205 (talk) 18:17, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

Malwarebytes is supposed to be one anti-malware solution that will get rid of it. Comet Tuttle (talk) 21:36, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

I've tried that, it doesn't seem to have done anything. What have I done wrong? 148.197.121.205 (talk) 21:43, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

The dates make sense if your computer thinks it's in the UK. There was a change in time in the UK from BST to GMT, but that was during the night of the 30/31st November. 92.24.185.90 (talk) 20:59, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

Need .exe file to close three processes on Windows XP

Resolved

I need an .exe file that could close three processes given their names listed in a .txt file in the same directory. The system is Windows XP. It is not possible to run .exe file with parameters in command line. Everything should be completely automated. In fact, the executable will be auto-run from a disk-on-key with U3 inserted into USB slot of a computer without monitor, keyboard or mouse. If you do not know an existing program that could cope with this task, please suggest some piece of code to achieve this. I am not a programmer but know enough to compile it if it is complete. 79.181.28.155 (talk) 16:55, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

Try this 82.44.55.25 (talk) 17:04, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

No, unfortunately it does not solve my problem. As I have said, I cannot run it from command line and PsKill requires just that - with parameters. There is a U3 USB disk-on-key with an .exe file that executes automatically (in fact, U3 thinks it's FireFox browser) - you can substitute the browser .exe with any other by changing its name to FireFox-something. So it runs by itself and that's it. I can see no way to add the command line options. 79.181.28.155 (talk) 17:32, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

Your claim "I cannot run it from command line" doesn't make much sense as you can place all the commands you like in a batch file and run the batch file as an executable. Can you further define the limitations of why batch files cannot be run? -- kainaw™ 17:36, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

There's a computer with neither monitor nor keyboard doing something. I want to be able to kill three certain processes on this computer just by inserting a U3 disk-on-key into its USB slot. My idea is to substitute auto-run FireFox executable with any "killing" .exe file (renaming it to FireFox.exe or whatever it is called). It actually works - U3 happily runs any .exe I want automatically. The only part of the plan I still did't figure out is how this can be used to kill three certain processes I intend to kill. U3 doesn't run .bat files, only .exe it thinks is a FireFox browser. 79.181.28.155 (talk) 17:53, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

You could convert a batch file to .exe with something like this 82.44.55.25 (talk) 17:51, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

Your idea of converting .bat into .exe is a good one, but I am afraid to run obscure converters written by unknown persons (as opposed to PsKill and Rousinovich whom I trust). Could you please suggest C++ code that runs a .bat file, or better still, kills Process1.exe, Process2.exe, Process.exe running on XP system? I am not a programmer, but I can compile 79.181.28.155 (talk) 18:08, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

Unless I've misunderstood, what you're trying to do is swap something in place of the (U3) firefox.exe so that it'll autorun when you plug it into another computer. Why not just use Shortcut Creator 4U3 which would allow you to add your own applications to the U3 menu (including making them autorun if you wanted) and then you can call whatever you want (either an application with command line parameters or a batch file). I've used this software myself many times to add "non-U3" apps to the menu and it sounds exactly like what you want.  ZX81  ^talk 18:01, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

Right, but he doesn't even state his name... No way I'll run anything written by Mr. Unknown Hacker on a sensitive system. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.181.28.155 (talk) 18:12, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

Well you could always download the source code for version 2 (which isn't vastly different and will do the same job) from that same page and compile it yourself. However, you don't run the shortcut creator on the targetmachine, you run it on any machine (be it real or virtual) as all it's doing is adding an icon to the U3 menu. If you're familiar with the U3 filesystem/menu structure you can verify for yourself that it hasn't done anything other than added the shortcut as you've asked and then you plug it into the remote system.  ZX81  ^talk 18:42, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

Try this:

  #include <stdlib.h>
  int main(void) {
    system("pskill process1");
    system("pskill process2");
    system("pskill process3");
    return 0;
  }

-- BenRG (talk) 22:24, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

Thank you, BenRG! I have modified your code using tskill instead, and it worked like charm. 79.181.28.155 (talk) 22:04, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Or use the WinAPI functions: EnumProcesses() to list all processes, and select the one you care about; then call TerminateProcess() to terminate it (if your program has permission to do so). See MSDN's Process and Thread reference for more. Nimur (talk) 00:44, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

How do I close one of my windows on a laptop?

I tried to save a page and it's blocked the window. I can't get the window to close. What do I do apart from turning my PC off? Thank you.--Jeanne Boleyn (talk) 17:14, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

That description is not clear at all:

• What's your operating system? Microsoft Windows, I suppose?
• What kind of page were you trying to save? A web page?
• What program did you try to save it with? Your web browser? (Internet Explorer, Firefox, Opera, ...?)
• Why can't you close the window? Is the closing button not visible on the screen? Or is it visible but doesn't react?

In general, under Windows you can press control-alt-delete to get a list of applications as well as some other options. You can use this to end a stubborn application (losing any unsaved data). A more radical option is to log out and log in again. That's more or less equivalent to a reboot, but faster. Hans Adler 17:22, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

Hold down the Alt key, then while doing so tap the Tab key. This will let you switch between applications. Comet Tuttle (talk) 17:32, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

This is the answer that Hans Adler gave, but perhaps stated more clearly: On any Windows system, the way to kill a frozen and unresponsive program is (1) Press Control-Alt-Delete to bring up Task Manager, (2) Find the offending program in the list and select it, (3) Press the "end process" button. Looie496 (talk) 17:52, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

Where do I find the delete key on an Italian Windows Vista laptop?--Jeanne Boleyn (talk) 18:28, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

My son figured it out and it worked! Thanks for your helpful answers.--Jeanne Boleyn (talk) 19:15, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

php

Resolved

In php, how could you list all files in a directory by their modified date, newest first? 82.44.55.25 (talk) 18:26, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

The following should do it. It's probably not the easiest way, but as I started learning php 28 minutes ago, it's the best I can do for now:

#!/usr/bin/php5
<?php
$store = array();
$dir = opendir(".");

while ($file = readdir($dir)){
  $stat_data = stat($file);
  $store[$stat_data['mtime']] = $file;
}

krsort($store);
foreach ($store as $foo){
  echo $foo . "\n";
}
?>

-- Finlay McWalter ☻ Talk 19:30, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

The modified time is fetched with "filemtime($file)". Using "stat($file)" returns an array - most of which you don't want. Also, more than one file can have the same modified time. So, you need a unique index for each file. You can concatenate the filename (which must be unique) to the modified time like:

// see above...
while($file = readdir(dir)){
  $mtime = filemtime($file);
  $store[$mtime.$file] = $file;
}
// see above...

Then, even if two files have the same mtime, the index in $store will be unique. -- kainaw™ 20:23, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

(More detailed discussion of file-system intricacies)

In the pathological case where new files are being added to a directory asynchronously (by another process), the while( ) loop risks entering an infinite loop. Instead, use scandir() to scan the directory exactly one time, and loop over its results:

// see above ...
 $file_list = scandir($dir);
 for ($i=0; $i < count($file_list); $i++) {
     $file = $file_list[$i] ; 
     $mtime = filemtime($file);
     $store[$mtime.$file] = $file;
     }

This is a safer way to scan a directory. Depending on your needs, you might have actually intended to re-scan the directory inside the loop to check for new updates - but I think you should handle that more properly with a separate check for updates. Nimur (talk) 20:35, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

I don't understand what you mean. Looking at the source for PHP's readdir, it's essentially a wrapper around the POSIX dirent readdir(3) call; it functions pretty much like a generator, and it doesn't reopen and rescan the directory each time you call it. So I don't see why scandir is any safer. PHP either uses the native POSIX scandir (glibc source) or its own implementation (which works pretty much the same) - both say in essence while ((entry=readdir(direntPtr))!=NULL) ... which is essentially identical to the readdir loop, above, just in C rather than PHP. So, bar timing differences, the PHP readdir loop should work just the same as the C loop inside scandir. And they have, surely, the same pathological (mis)behaviours. -- Finlay McWalter ☻ Talk 23:19, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

Hm. That seems pathological. I was under the impression that PHP scandir would guarantee a termination time, but on further inspection, I can see that the scandir documentation does not specify any such safety. I'm disinclined to dive into PHP source, but I'm in agreement with Finlay that it probably directly wraps glibc. So - followup questions - is this issue a well-known race condition? If you have a program (say, a logger) constantly writing new files into the directory, and if the timing coincides with any program that is scandir`ing that directory, doesn't this yield an infinite loop? What can be done about it? Shouldn't directory-listing be wrapped in a mutex`ed ownership of the directory? Does this vary from file-system to file-system (say, ext4 vs. NTFS)? Nimur (talk) 23:49, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

In retrospect, I think my error is assuming file-I/O operations should be "safe" - i.e. to have a guaranteed response time; but few/no direct I/O operations are ever guaranteed to have finite return times. In my scenario above, a program is writing new files to the directory... and if there are an arbitrary number of additional files being added to the directory, it makes sense that listing the directory-contents should take an arbitrarily long time. Programmers who need to guarantee response-time would need to use a timeout on any I/O operation. I'm going to hide this discussion because it may confuse the OP, and is entirely based on my earlier misconception. Nimur (talk) 00:05, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Thanks, that works. Two things; how could I display the modified date of each file next to it? And I'm seeing "." and ".." listed in addition to the files, is there a way to get rid of that? 82.44.55.25 (talk) 14:53, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

The changes are very minor. I'll skip all filenames beginning with "." for you - those are hidden files.

$store = array();
$dir = opendir(".");

while ($file = readdir($dir)){
  if($file{0}=='.') continue; // Skip filenames beginning with .
  $mtime = filemtime($file);
  $store[$mtime.$file] = $file;
}

krsort($store);
foreach ($store as $time=>$foo){ // The index has the time
  echo intval($time)."\t".$foo."\n"; // Need intval since the filename is concatenated to the time.
}

That should work. -- kainaw™ 16:50, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

I just thought that if you want an actual date, you can use date("Y-m-d", intval($time)) instead of just intval($time). -- kainaw™ 16:57, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Awesome! Thanks 82.44.55.25 (talk) 18:14, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

November 2

e-mail listserve

whats a e-mail listserve — Preceding unsigned comment added by Kj650 (talk • contribs)

LISTSERV was a specific software for electronic mailing list management. Its name was catchy, so "list serve" now is a genericized name for any email list management tool. Nimur (talk) 01:45, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Firesheep

Can someone explain how this works to me? When I learned networking in school (2003-04), we learned that packets were filtered out by NIC's on the hardware level, and as such it was impossible for software to sniff packets from other users unless one specifically purchased a NIC with built-in promiscuous mode, which our teachers told us was rare. However, everything I've been reading about this software makes it sound like this is not rare. Can someone explain this? Magog the Ogre (talk) 04:00, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Every network card I've seen, even the old cheap Realtek ones, offered a promiscuous mode. As you suspect, it's not rare at all. I even wonder if network cards without promiscuous mode exist at all, as the online FAQs of some capturing product (libpcap, Wireshark) don't seem to mention this as a possible failure cause. Unilynx (talk) 05:02, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Promiscuous network card mode is not rare - it's just rarely enabled by software drivers. Almost all hardware supports this mode. Installing a network monitor like Wireshark is the easiest way to experiment with enabling promiscuous mode. Strictly speaking, Firesheep does not have a packet sniffer; you must install pcap, a well-known software packet sniffer (that functions by replacing your network interface driver with its own driver). (See Firesheep installation procedure). Firesheep then provides a user-friendly interface, not unlike Wireshark, except that Firesheep is tuned specifically to filter for Facebook login traffic and similar sorts of things, and then display that information in an impressive way. The real meat-and-potatoes of the software is pcap - which has been around for ages and has always been capable of these sorts of data interceptions. Firesheep is just a "pretty-printer" for packet-sniffers. Nimur (talk) 05:08, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Agree with the previous comments, promiscuous mode is not rare but normally set off because it is normally thought to be not useful. Regards, SunCreator ^(talk) 15:38, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Magog the Ogre, you may be interested in Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2010-11-01/Technology report#Browsing securely.

—Wavelength (talk) 16:51, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

How do you run the add on if you add it? 84.203.243.10 (talk) 10:46, 3 November 2010 (UTC)

Video games

If a human and a computer were to play a game of Starcraft, with neither receiving any advantages or handicaps, who would win? How about in other video games, like Counterstrike, Rise of Nations, or Civilization 4? Is there any well-known real-time strategy game in which the AI has ultra-superhuman capabilities (i.e. it can easily beat the best human player)? --99.237.232.254 (talk) 04:08, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Edit: let me change Starcraft to Starcraft II, since the former was made at a time when artificial intelligence was in its infancy. --99.237.232.254 (talk) 04:11, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Historical note: The artificial intelligence seen in computer games isn't representative of the state of the art of AI research. See AI Winter for a historical overview of the rise and fall of AI research. Paul (Stansifer) 12:32, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

With RTS games it's usually down to APM (actions per minute)... the best players in the world can get (incredibly) over 300 APM if memory serves me correctly about some Starcraft 1 Pro Korean players. Actions comprise keystrokes and mouse movements and clicks. I think there was a documentary where their brain functions were monitored, and the casual gamer would get up to about 60 APM and be cognitively aware of every action, whereas the pro would get up to 300 APM and have an instinctive awareness of the whole map... different areas of the brain lit up in the monitoring. However, given your question, you would allow the computer to have as high an APM as possible for its CPU (and the computer player's APM is limited even on the toughest level)... so in my opinion any human would not stand a chance, unless the computer AI is terribly flawed or the human exploits a bug. There was a time when a computer would not have been able to beat the best humans (compare chess and the progress of computer ELO ratings) but the modern computer is way too powerful in terms of raw computational speed. Now turn-based - like Civ - that's another argument altogether... I think a top human player ( or a forum based game) would be able to beat a computer player simply because it's incredibly difficult to write AI for Civ (the highest levels in Civ employ resource cheating). For FPS I think a godlike computer player would own a human (the computer is fast enough to dodge anything at close range for example)- but I've seen humans do some incredible things in those games (hide, snipe, etc.) so I don't know. Sandman30s (talk) 11:09, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

I agree with Sandman30s, mostly. Suppose a series of games is made, each of which has one primary test that the user is continuously competing against. On one extreme the test is reflexes with no strategy (perhaps electronic whack-a-mole) and on the other extreme the test is strategy with no reflexes (perhaps chess or go). The closer you get to the "reflexes" side of this spectrum, the more obvious it is that the computer will beat any human. As you get closer to the "strategy" side, it becomes less obvious — a run-of-the-mill chess program will beat your average human chess player 99% of the time, but that's not true for go. An RTS I would place somewhere about halfway between reflexes and strategy, and one way to analyze the probable outcome is to say that the computer will completely beat the human on the reflexes component, and it's less obvious on the strategy component. Personally I think the strategy element of RTS games is pretty elementary and so it's going to be the computer in a landslide, if the developer has spent a decent amount of time writing good AI — but everything does hinge on that. Comet Tuttle (talk) 16:27, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Here's a story that was linked by Slashdot today discussing using genetic algorithms to optimize build orders for the Zerg. Comet Tuttle (talk) 17:13, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

The strategy component in most RTS's, including Starcraft, is by no means simple. A simple Google search would reveal lots of webpages, and even entire books, devoted to exploring the best strategies in Starcraft--and very few of these require a high APM. These strategies are very difficult for a human to think up or defend against, so I don't think it would be easy for a computer. --99.237.232.254 (talk) 05:40, 3 November 2010 (UTC)

I would go with what a multiple world champion Korean pro does, rather than what a random internet guide says. However, if the human and computer knew exactly the same strategies, it would come down to APM and no human can be remotely close when it comes to raw computation. Sandman30s (talk) 08:57, 3 November 2010 (UTC)

Difficulty in choosing username

Pretty much every website on the internet requires a username these days if you intend to participate. I have extreme difficulty in choosing username; I have few defining interests or hobbies to base a username on, I don't want to include any part of my real identity, I don't want to divulge my gender. I thought about just using random numbers or something, but almost every site requires a combination of letters and numbers, and some block random usernames as "confusing". Any suggestions? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 114.37.143.221 (talk) 11:07, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

How about something obvious you can see around you - eg "22inchsonytv" or "nextdoorsfordcar" ? Sf5xeplus (talk) 13:14, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

This topic comes up once every few months here. Here is a thread from last December containing some suggestions. Personally I like choosing two random nouns in a row. Comet Tuttle (talk) 16:18, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Just be sure to avoid this issue... ;-) -- 78.43.71.155 (talk) 21:53, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Try one of these. I haven't used them so not sure what they give you. Mo ainm~Talk 16:25, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

There's an obvious security problem with asking some website to decide your username and password for other websites. Comet Tuttle (talk) 16:31, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Password yes and I would never suggest anyone used one, but a username is different. Mo ainm~Talk 16:37, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Here is a page that just picks random adjectives and pairs them with random nouns. Click it a few times until you see something you find enjoyable. Of the ones I got, I liked "BourgeoisBasement" and "EverydaySubstitute" the most, personally. --Mr.98 (talk) 16:56, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

something that's quite simple is: tke your initials, and stick a random number, or a number that actually means something to you, say for example you like seven, then you could square that and add that to your initials, eg. gyd49 or take a character you like and stick your birth year behind it 70.241.22.82 (talk) 17:41, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

See Check Username Availability at Multiple Social Networking Sites.

—Wavelength (talk) 18:21, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Translate your real name into some other language and use that. Jean Aigle 22:04, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Chinese ?

click to expand - explain this

Anyone seeing chinese characters in their watchlists or contribution listings (on wikipedia), or is it just me? ok it's stopped now - but explain this (see right) I suppose I should ask what the character is too (chinese for 'you've been hacked' no doubt) ?!! Sf5xeplus (talk) 13:14, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Request - whomever does identify the character (maybe somebody more skilled in the use of a Chinese IME), could they paste it in plain-text as well? I have a sneaking suspicion it's going to be a character encoding glitch - most likely "-1" in one of the unicode code-pages or something. Nimur (talk) 14:34, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

It is a character encoding glitch. It is, for some reason, using unicode when it shouldn't. The character is 楷, meaning "good". -- kainaw™ 14:38, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Would you elaborate how can an HTML page (especially one encoded in UTF-8) not use Unicode?—Emil J. 14:46, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

It is using a code that it shouldn't be using - if you want to be painfully pedantic. -- kainaw™ 16:45, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

It's marked all my edits as good - that's a feature not a bug :)

I suppose a bug report is pointless, as I can't reproduce it.Sf5xeplus (talk) 16:46, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Simple email forwarding

For a club I'm a member of, I'd like to be able to set up an email address that will forward messages to a (small) specified list of recipients, with no, or minimal, action required by the recipients themselves. The purpose its to allow members of the group to send a message to all other members by emailing to a single address. We're currently using Yahoo Groups, but are finding that rather cumbersome to use, and we don't need all the facilities it provides. Can anyone recommend a suitable way of achieving this? (Preferably free, of course, or at least very cheap.) AndrewWTaylor (talk) 15:23, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

A distribution/mailing list? Not too savvy about it myself, but this page might be worth a look: http://email.about.com/od/outlooktips/qt/Distribution_List_Outlook.htm - as might the google search I got it from http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&biw=1260&bih=810&q=outlook+mailing+list&aq=f&aqi=g1g-c4g1g-c1g1g-c1g1&aql=&oq=&gs_rfai= Darigan (talk) 16:24, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Do you want this to be hosted by some other web service, as Yahoo Groups is; or do you control a web server yourself so you can install some software? If the latter, see LISTSERV or Electronic mailing list and follow the links from there for various solutions you can set up on your server. Comet Tuttle (talk) 16:30, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Thanks both. @Darigan: it needs to be independent of the email client and usable by e.g. Hotmail users. @Comet Tuttle: Ideally I want it externally hosted - there isn't a server I can use; we do have a couple of Internet domains, but the company they are registered with (FreeParking) only allows forwarding to a single email address (as far as I can tell). AndrewWTaylor (talk) 17:26, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Upgrading my HP ATi Mobility Radeon 4530

I was trying to run a program that didn't work on my Hewlett Packard laptop. Talking with someone on the net I was told that my ATi Mobility Radeon 4530 driver was outdated. I needed to upgrade in order to run the program, and i followed a link given to me to download it :

http://www.nvidia.com/Download/index.aspx?lang=en-us

on this site I chose option 2, to let the site determine what upgrades i needed so I followed that and ended u pwith this site:

http://drivers.softpedia.com/get/GRAPHICS-BOARD/ATI/HP-ATi-Mobility-Radeon-HD-4530-4650-Driver-56312000-Rev-A.shtml

I downloaded the files and installed the program. But at the end of installation a message told me it was finished and that I already had these upgrades, and that i was now only upgrading atop upgrades I already had. So i figured ok, then it must be in order and I have the necessary upgrades. But, another program called "Driver Mender" which I also downloaded from the links i got to check the computer's system and let me easily upgrade my computer with the newest stuff tells me that I still have ATi Mobility Radeon 4530 and that it is in need of upgrade. And I don't understand why this is happening when i downloaded HP ATi Mobility Radeon HD 4530/4650 Driver upgrade from this link :

http://drivers.softpedia.com/get/GRAPHICS-BOARD/ATI/HP-ATi-Mobility-Radeon-HD-4530-4650-Driver-56312000-Rev-A.shtml

So i'm confused since everytime i try install it again it still says I already have the upgrades, but then the Driver mender says the opposite. Where on my computer can I go to check my system information, including of course what version of the ATi Radeon driver i have?

Any advice on what to do, or what sites to go to to get the latest upgrades? Free of course, like this one was.

As for the program I was supposed to run in the first place, nevermind that, because I'm not running that program now after all (Don't ask) but i still want my computer to be upgraded as good as possible when i have the chance.

Any clever computer minds out there? :) Krikkert7 (talk) 18:14, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

For an ATI driver (not an NVidia, for which your first link is, which isn't going to work) either go to ATI's own website or to HP's website and pick the appropriate driver for your model of laptop. I can't think of any reason you'd get it from anywhere else. -- Finlay McWalter ☻ Talk 19:57, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Yes i know, the nvidia page only helped me determine what upgrades I needed, and i didn't download anything from that site but found my way to the other link i showed and downloaded from there. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Krikkert7 (talk • contribs) 01:29, 3 November 2010 (UTC)

base64_decode

I came across a footer.php file that looks like it is encrypted as it just contains random letters and digits, base64_decode is the only part that makes any sense so I assume encryption was used on it. Is there any way to decode this page. Mo ainm~Talk 19:51, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

That sounds like it's base 64 encoded; you really shouldn't see that (the browser should automatically decode it), but you can manually decode it. You can do that on your own computer (using one of the many base64 libraries) or with an online thing like this. -- Finlay McWalter ☻ Talk 19:55, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Thats great thanks I'll have a look at that. Mo ainm~Talk 19:59, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Weird networking trouble

I wrote a few days ago for advice about my computer (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Reference_desk/Computing#Unallocated_space). However, I have a bigger problem starting yesterday. Basically, this computer (Dell Alienware) connects fine to the port in the wall but my computer (Asus n61jv-x2) does not. To confound the problem, the wireless router stopped working* the same time as the ASUS did and I have been scratching my head since. Both systems are running Windows 7 and as far as I know, the same wired networking hardware (Atheros AR8132 on the Alienware and AR8131 on the Asus) too. I am at a loss to what to do. Any ideas please? I don't know how much IT can help as the port is clearly functional (right?). Thank you! You guys are my hero. Kushal (talk) 20:16, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

*To clarify, we were both using the wireless router Netgear WGR614v7 but now that it is not working, I have the Alienware hooked up to the wall. The router seems to be pretty much alive but the logo i on the router stays a blinking yellow. Resetting the router did not help. Kushal (talk) 20:20, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Just to clarify, did you try unhooking the Alienware machine from the router so you could make sure to use exactly the same plug on the router when attempting to hook up your computer to the router? What exactly happens when your computer is hooked up to the router and you restart your computer? What happens when you ping the router's IP address from the command line? Comet Tuttle (talk) 20:45, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Comet, Thanks for answering. Yes. I tried various things. When I hook up the Alienware to the wall, everything is fine. When I hook up the Asus to the wall, there is no connection. When I hook up either machine to the Netgear, I am connected to the router but there is no Internet. Because I was able to get into the router's management system at routerlogin.com , I did not think about pinging the router. I mean, the connection between the router and the computer seems fine. It is just the router to the wall part that's messing me. Kushal (talk) 21:54, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Hold up, that's not clear enough - when you hook up the Asus to the router, you are able to ping it and connect to its management web page? I had started to suspect that, against the odds, you had experienced a simultaneous hardware failure of both the router and the Ethernet circuitry on the Asus, so the solution was to get a new router and also get a new Ethernet adapter for the Asus (like a PC card or maybe a USB Ethernet adapter). But if the Asus is able to communicate with the router, then you may be able to fix this by just replacing the router and twiddling with the Asus's network settings. Comet Tuttle (talk) 00:07, 3 November 2010 (UTC)

Any ideas on what tweaks I could do to it? I am new to Windows 7. Kushal (talk) 15:50, 3 November 2010 (UTC)

OK, I have more details. I can connect via ethernet at another place. In my room, whenever I connect by ethernet, I see multiple connections called Network 2 and Network 3 (or something) simultaneously connected. Is that a problem? The place I connected successfully at only shows one active connection. Help? Kushal (talk) 16:02, 3 November 2010 (UTC)

MacBook Pro

Hi. I have a Macbook Pro that is now about four and a half years old. I'm not sure what state it should be in by this stage but it seems to have slowed down remarkably in the last few weeks, since giving it a lot more use after a few months of respite. I've never done anything to 'clean up' my hard drive or anything technical like that, I've just used it normally over the years but I've not put so much on it to warrant it taking up to ten minutes to load a web page and constantly tell me programs are not responding. Does anyone have any ideas on what I could do to speed it up? 128.232.247.49 (talk) 21:59, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Are you running low on disk space? It is preferable to have at least a few gigabytes of free disk space on your computer. Kushal (talk) 23:05, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Do you live near an Apple Store? Going to a Genius Bar would probably be an easy way to get a quick diagnosis (which wouldn't cost anything). Otherwise it is pretty hard to tell what the issue is from the description you've given. When something is acting up funny on mine, I try to figure out what is going on from the Activity Monitor (Utilities > Activity Monitor; then go to Window > Activity Monitor to make sure the main screen is displaying). Sort the processes by CPU — what's at the top? Is there something hogging up the processor? Sort by "Real Mem" — is something unusual hogging all the RAM? Look at the "System Memory" tab — are you consistently out of RAM? Look at Disk Activity when you are doing something that might take a long time — does it seem to lock up at all? Paying attention to these kinds of indicators can let you know if the problem is, say, rooted in a hardware issue (e.g. not enough RAM or a buggy hard drive) rather than a software issue. Also, what OS are you using? I found that my MacBook running 10.4.11 got very slow for awhile and that many of my programs were just not very efficient about its usage of memory, and a lot of that was fixed when I upgraded to 10.6 (which was fairly cheap and easy, in the end). --Mr.98 (talk) 23:14, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

The disk is about the only part that can slow down, either if files are fragmented heavily, or if bad blocks are being mapped out and the replacement blocks are non-local. If you want to keep the computer going, try reformatting and reinstalling, or buy a replacement drive. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 23:32, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Disk defragmenting might be useful for this... 70.241.22.82 (talk) 16:35, 3 November 2010 (UTC)

Disk fragmentation is not an issue on OS X - never worry about it. run Disk Utility (or Disk Warrior, if you own it) on the hard drive to see if its failing, try reseating the ram sticks (bad or loose ram can confuse the system); add more ram if you have a Gb or less, check to see if some background app is hogging a lot of CPU (usual culprits are the Finder and mdworker - both of those should settle out over time), if all else fails, download Yasu (or equivalent) and clear all the caches, system swap files, update the prebindings, etc. (sometimes corrupt font or system caches can cause a bit of a tizzy). --Ludwigs2 16:42, 3 November 2010 (UTC)

November 3

help for connecting to server

i installed this game ..london law on my ubuntu 10.10...thye ask for a host to connect to ...how do i find it out and how do i find out the port number..thanksMetallicmania (talk) 03:15, 3 November 2010 (UTC)

Slash in the IP address

What does it mean when there is a slash in the IP address, such as 192.168.0.0/24 ? 220.253.253.75 (talk) 06:58, 3 November 2010 (UTC)

The concept is explained in our article on CIDR notation. Regards, decltype (talk) 07:02, 3 November 2010 (UTC)

It's an ip range. In that example, it means everything in the range "192.168.0.0" to "192.168.0.255" 82.44.55.25 (talk) 09:49, 3 November 2010 (UTC)

In other words, it is the number of 1s in the subnet mask. So /24 is equivalent to the subnet mask of 11111111111111111111111100000000 or 11111111.11111111.11111111.00000000 or 255.255.255.0 - WikiCheng | Talk 12:19, 3 November 2010 (UTC)

IT milestones in 2007

Hi, Can you direct me to a website / article which lists the major milestones of Information Technology in 2007 ? - WikiCheng | Talk 08:21, 3 November 2010 (UTC)

Wikipedia? --Andreas Rejbrand (talk) 08:49, 3 November 2010 (UTC)

Where on there does it list the specifically IT milestones? --Mr.98 (talk) 12:03, 3 November 2010 (UTC)

I don't think it does. The closest I could find is Timeline of computing 2000–2009. Although by that, it doesn't look like 2007 was a very busy year. Indeterminate (talk) 15:08, 3 November 2010 (UTC)

Items with multiple attributes

I want to re-write a simple book-keeping program that labels, categorises, and group-totals the enteries in my bank statements, as supplied in CSV format. The earlier version written in old Basic used an array to represent the various parts of each line: date, amount, description, category, etc.

In more modern languages, is there any way of representing this kind of multi-attribute data that is better than an array? Or should I just stick with arrays? Is there any language, especially a basic-like language, that makes things such as totaling a column in an array easy to do? I do not want to use a spreadsheet. Thanks 92.15.0.194 (talk) 14:33, 3 November 2010 (UTC)

I would suggest you could represent the items as a struct or a class. Then you would have item.date, item.amount, etc. You would then have an array (or, in many languages a list) of items, and could quickly iterate over them to produce the sums. C# will certainly do this, and I would stronlgy expect VB.net to be the same. No doubt there are other alternatives. --Phil Holmes (talk) 14:40, 3 November 2010 (UTC)

(edit conflict)If the set of attributes is fixed, you'd mostly represent each entry as a tuple (aka a struct in C or an object in Java), where each element of the tuple had a type appropriate for the kind of data that attribute would store. If, on the other hand, attributes could be entirely arbitrary, you'd probably use a hashtable to store each of the attribute-name:attribute-value pairs. Then you'd probably have an array of entries (other data structures might be appropriate depending on how you'd be accessing them). Pretty much any modern programming language can do all this very simply. I try not to specifically evangelise, but certainly doing this in Python would be straightforward. -- Finlay McWalter ☻ Talk 14:46, 3 November 2010 (UTC)

Was just wondering why you say "I do not want to use a spreadsheet", and how hard and fast that restriction is. Sorting line items by category and sub-totalling within categories (plus a whole lot more) is exactly what pivot tables in MS Excel do for you. If you want the fun and challenge of rolling your own code then that is fine - just as long as you realise that you are doing a 5 mile run when you could take a taxi instead. Gandalf61 (talk) 15:12, 3 November 2010 (UTC)

Exaggeration. Totaling a column in an array takes a line of code. 92.24.178.95 (talk) 17:33, 3 November 2010 (UTC)

Story Management software

Im looking for some software to manage stories

so for example, if i make a story with the title Example i cant make another one with the same title as its already taken (getting rid of duplicates)

can be either offline (on my computer) or online (a bit like a wiki) and for txt and/or doc and/or PDF, i dont mind which

thanks in advance :D

Sophie ^(Talk) 16:34, 3 November 2010 (UTC)