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August 9

Cell phone without a baseband processor

Are there cases of where a cell phone (smart or otherwise) does not use a separate processor/CPU for managing its radio (i.e., there would only be the application processor and no separate firmware)? --Melab±1 ☎ 00:47, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

Very early mobile telephones did not even have any software at all. Depending on what you want to count as a "cellular" telephone, many did not even contain digital electronics - for example, early "1G" technology was purely analog. (Okay - the pedantic details are nagging at me: 1G mobile phones probably had a computer and did have some digital signalling for network control - but pre-1G analog radio telephony did not have any digital or software-controlled signalling). The transition to modern multi-CPU computerized radiophones has been gradual. Nimur (talk) 02:45, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

I read on some forum that some of Nokia's phones running Symbian don't have a baseband processor (although whoever said it may have been confused; he referred to phones with a separate baseband processor as being "dual core"—maybe not the right terminology). Just to clarify this for anyone else who responds, when I say "without a separate baseband processor", I mean that the radio is controlled by the application processor; I am not referring to SoCs that have integrated baseband processors (they would still have a baseband processor). --Melab±1 ☎ 15:16, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

I think what you mean to say is "... the radio firmware and the application software reside in the same address space." It is also possible that you may mean "...the radio control software time-shares a single execution pathway with the application software." Conceivably, you may also mean "...the radio is controlled by electronics that are packaged in the same piece of plastic as the application software controller." There are certainly some devices that satisfy any or all of these criteria; but probably none are commercially available "cellular telephone" devices. This approach would be difficult to design using competitively-available electronics parts; and this design unnecessarily exposes the radio to serious fatal errors in application-software. Separation of function is more common. In any case, the radio is still controlled by the application processor; but, the commands take the form of higher-level software signals that are interpreted by the radio-control firmware. How else might you want to control the radio? Do you want to directly specify signal waveforms? (If so, no commercially available telephone device can do that). Nimur (talk) 18:32, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

The second option. The application processor is the only major processor (I consider the baseband a major processor, in this case). I read here that in the HTC Desire Z/T-Mobile G2, the baseband boots up first and operates independently of the Android firmware. My ideal setup is a single firmware installation controls everything. I would like this because you would be able to completely customize the software (depending on whether or not there are hardware-based signature checks). Also, I prefer a singular set of controlling firmware. --Melab±1 ☎ 01:01, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

Identify a satellite-view or bird's-eye-view image?

File:90 intersection.JPG is claimed as an own work, but it looks to me as if it's a screenshot of some website that provides bird's-eye views or satellite views. Any idea of the source? It's not Google Satellite or the bird's-eye-view on Bing; I don't have Google Earth, and I'm not familiar with other programs, so I can't give any more ideas. The location is 41°49′40″N 80°45′56″W. Nyttend (talk) 04:44, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

You can ask him. General Rommel (talk) 07:13, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure that's not satellite. That was taken from an aircraft. Have you considered the possibility that user:Route11 owns an airplane? It's pretty easy to take photos like that if you own a plane. APL (talk) 08:38, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

That was my initial thought (I was in a light airplane myself yesterday), but the image itself was very much unlike any photos I've seen: it has a vaguely computer-generated feel to it, similar to that of Bing's bird's-eye-view. Nyttend (talk) 12:55, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

Based on the positions of the cars its from Wikimapia ( http://www.wikimapia.org/#lat=41.827778&lon=-80.765556&z=16&l=0&m=b ) Kellhus (talk) 13:03, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

Actually, looking again its the same image that Googlemaps uses (cars are identical) its just been tilted Kellhus (talk) 13:06, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

That specific imagery is provided by DigitalGlobe (see the copyright on the mapping services pages). I seriously doubt that some random Wikipedia user owns the DigitalGlobe copyright and is releasing that copyrighted work to the public domain. -- kainaw™ 13:10, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

I marked the image as "disputed" and left a note with the author. -- kainaw™ 16:54, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

It was off google earth but, I did not know what to upload it under, so I uploaded under own work. I know I shouldn't of done that. Is there any way to upload it diifferent?SR11 (talk) 14:07, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

No. It cannot be uploaded. It is copyrighted by DigitalGlobe. Unless you get them to release it to public domain, they own it. Just because Google paid licensing to allow you to see it in Google Earth doesn't mean that you now have the right to distribute it to other repositories. -- kainaw™ 14:20, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

I've marked the image as a copyvio, and it is to be hoped that it will be deleted ASAP. --Tagishsimon (talk) 14:24, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

Starting programs via Run

In WindowsXP if I write "firefox" in the Run box in Start Menu, Firefox starts. Why? How can I do the same with Total Commander? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 109.74.50.52 (talk) 07:02, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

Firefox's executable is firefox.exe, which is in your computer's path. If you know TC's executable's name, then the same will (probably) work. For WindowsXP, start the task manager, select the Application Tab, click ONCE on TC's icon, right click and select "Go To Process". This will show the processes's name. CS Miller (talk) 08:00, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

You meant to link PATH (variable). I think it's more likely that firefox is not in the search path, but is listed in HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\App Paths in the registry. Adding it to the search path might be a solution to the OP's problem. You can do this by pressing Win+Pause, going into "advanced settings" and clicking the "environment variables" button, finding the one named "Path" and double-clicking it, and adding C:\Program Files\Mozilla Firefox (or whatever) to the end separated by a semicolon. You may have to log out and in again to see the change. -- BenRG (talk) 17:47, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

This can help you set up any program to be accessible via Run AvrillirvA (talk) 11:41, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

Name of open internet group?

I remember seeing a video interview a while back with someone who was talking about his organization's efforts to promote the use of peer-to-peer and anonymity technologies to create a more open form of internet than the current government/corporate controlled system. I'm not sure about the technologies they intend to use, but the gist that I got was that instead of routing traffic through centralized telecom carriers, internet traffic would be routed via a p2p wireless mesh network. I'm trying to find the name of this group, or perhaps groups that are working on something similar. Anyone here ever heard of this group? What is the name of the organization? Thanks. -- Jrtayloriv (talk) 18:01, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

.p2p perhaps? --Melab±1 ☎ 18:25, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

Perhaps you heard about Tor (anonymity network) ? TheGrimme (talk) 19:22, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

functions of a function

Hi. In a computer algebra system such as mathematica or sage, suppose I define H() to be the Heaviside function, and the ask the system to evaluate $x=H(1+(f(3))^{2})$, where f() is a very complicated, massively expensive and difficult function. A human is clever enough to know straight off that x=1. But is mathematica or sage clever enough to know this without evaluating f()? Another example might be to establish whether $n=2^{10000000}-1$ is prime. I know that it isn't, but would a computer have to evaluate n first, *then* check it for primality? I am not sure exactly what I'm asking here; I guess I'm asking what the computer science term for "knowing enough about H() to avoid having to evaluate its argument exactly". Yours in confusion, Robinh (talk) 20:50, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

Formally, that is called short-circuit evaluation: recognizing that, due to the structure of a sub-expression, full evaluation is unnecessary. This saves a lot of compute-time, and is used by many compiler and optimization algorithms. I am not aware of any computer algebra systems that can deduce the specific sort of expression short-circuiting that you listed above; but I'm not a CAS expert by any means. However, I do know a bit about compiler internals, and I can tell you that the correct implementation of short-circuit evaluation is both (i) very ugly; (ii) prone to unintuitive side-effects, even if they are logically valid; and (iii) exacerbated by bugs in code and/or bugs in the compiler. Just yesterday I was reading the LLVM Blog, and came across "What Every C Programmer Should Know about Undefined Behavior", which contains some pathological examples of short-circuit evaluation of C code. C syntax is different from the allowable syntax of a CAS system input; consequently, the theory and practice of static analysis in C is much simpler than that of a CAS language. But the same general ideas apply: if the C-compiler / CAS interpreter determines that a sub-expression always evaluates to a known value, the evaluation code can be replaced with a hard-coded constant.

You may find Evaluation strategy and Formal grammar helpful in understanding how we design such "smarts" into an interpreter for a CAS. You might also find this list of other optimization techniques interesting; and in particular, Partial redundancy elimination (PRE), also known as "Expression Elimination" (EE); or the related, "Common subexpression elimination" (CSE). Nimur (talk) 21:06, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

There is no general approach to determining the properties of functions. For any interesting property a function expressed in a Turing-complete language can have ("interesting" can be defined quite broadly) it's not possible to decide whether a particular function has that property. Therefore, there is no general way to "examine" a function that is any better than just evaluating it.

Of course, there exist many optimizations that compilers can and do perform — the undecidability result just means that sometimes they'll miss a place where the optimization can be performed. But the properties are generally far simpler than things like "results in a value {above/below} x for input {above/below} y" (given that you need to figure out relevant values of x and y first). It's much faster to leave that stuff, which can really benefit from intuition, to the humans. Paul (Stansifer) 22:42, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

(OP) thanks guys, some interesting links. I like Stansifer's comment about undecidability above. But it strikes me that it might be possible to "catch" lots of short-cuts by "evaluating" subexpressions in the laziest (ie easiest) way possible. For example, evaluating $1+(f(x))^{2}$ sage would first observe that the answer is real, then non-negative, then positive, then greater than or equal to 1, then maybe some other result such as $\in [1,14]$, and only then proceed to actually find the exact answer. Then it could pass each result in turn to H() and find that the first two aren't good enough, but the third *is* good enough. So it stops there, never having to actually evaluate f() exactly. I see that no scheme can catch every possible simplification. But surely a system like this one could catch a good number of them, and save a lot of time. Or is this a hopelessly optimistic approach and even a rudimentary implementation would be AI-hard? Robinh (talk) 01:38, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

Yes, but you implicitly prioritized this set of properties: e.g., that the algebra system should bother to check whether the argument to the Heaviside function is real or positive. This is because you already know that having a real, positive argument will simplify the evaluation of H(x). You can therefore design the CAS system to check if those simplifying assumptions are satisfied. The hard part is knowing which set of assumptions will make a problem simpler. If your CAS hadn't already known the unique nature of the Heaviside function, why would it have bothered checking these properties of its input arguments?

Ultimately, it comes to this: a CAS system can be programmed to check for specific special cases. As I said above, I am not aware of any CAS that does contain special-casing logic specifically for the Heaviside function. I know that Waterloo Maple did start by assuming all functions might produce matrices of complex number outputs; and it began to narrow them down to vectors, and scalars; and restrict the domain to real numbers; and eventually, integers, or rationals, if possible. Similarly, range-checking can determine whether a arbitrary-precision arithmetic implementation is needed (e.g., should the function evaluate to a BigNum or 64-bit float?) So, range- and domain-checking are "special cases" of function properties that can be designed into CAS implementations. But no CAS can be expected to know every possible optimizable result in all possible scenarios for all possible functions. Such evaluation would be computationally more challenging than brute-force evaluation. From the practical standpoint, CAS systems are designed to simplify expressions when possible; and the algorithms that implement existing CAS systems probably prioritize optimizations that appear commonly during ordinary use.

Here is SymPy, an open-source CAS implemented in Python. You can read several of its special-case evaluation mechanisms, and see how they are implemented in program-code: SymPy Core Module documentation, Assumptions Module, and you can browse source-code that implements the symbolic assumptions module. As I mentioned before: this is nasty, complicated source-code; have a look at even the simple cases of basic number-theory assumption evaluation. Nimur (talk) 18:07, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

(OP) Thanks, Nimur. I'm beginning to see the deal. My little chain above did indeed make lots of implicit assumptions. Hmm. Although I can report that sage determined, instantaneously, that $2^{100000000}-1$ was composite. The source code you pointed me to was indeed complicated. Is there an "Idiot's guide to CAS" book that you could recommend? cheers, Robinh (talk) 20:07, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

Router gives wrong location

I just installed my brothers old router. He had it when he lived in a different city then where I am now. When I connect my cell phone to the wireless network, it shows my location on Google latitude, Grindr, and on the local weather to be in Cedar Falls, where he use to live. How do I fix this? I just upgraded to the newest firmware version also and Cisco won't provide support unless I pay, which I won't do. CTJF83 21:52, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

There is nothing wrong with your router. The problem is that Google, and many other companies, use a very unusual method to determine your location. They drive around on the street sniffing wireless networks; and they save the MAC address of every router they discover, storing it in a giant database that maps individual routers to individual GPS coordinates. Companies like Google then sell this data to third-party companies as part of a "location based service" data package. At some point, one of these services registered your router's WiFi MAC address and location; and any internet website (including Google) is now registering that outdated position as your current location. So, any website that uses that method is "auto-detecting" your location incorrectly. Some websites allow you to disable or override your "auto-detected" location. Firefox allows you to disable the voluntary submission of your location-data to websites. Nimur (talk) 22:20, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

So, how can I clear it out of my router, or redetect it? CTJF83 22:57, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

You might try changing the router's SSID or changing the MAC address that it reports. Or, you can disable location-services in your web browser, as I suggested above. Essentially, your web browser is (by default) set up to report its position to (e.g.) Google, and then relay that information to any website, on-request. For example, Firefox provides this "service" to track your location using Google, as a default option; and then, Firefox sends Google's best-guess for your location to any website who asks for it. Disable this system, by following the instructions here. Nimur (talk) 23:44, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

Many location services use Skyhook, which allows you to submit specific location data here. Once you've done that (and the change has propogated into their database), it should work correctly for everything that uses Skyhook as a backend. Of the services you list, at least Grindr does. gnfnrf (talk)

Ok...that's the one I most want accurate location for...thank you, I'll try that and let you know! CTJF83 01:38, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

August 10

Cannot access Windows Update

I need help. I need to access Windows Update, and I keep getting this error: "The website has encountered an error and can not display the requested page." I'm doing this on a computer that not only isn't mine, but is entirely in French, so I can't really navigate much due to my inability to read the language. Anyone who can help me out on this, please, I need your guidance. Windows XP Service Pack 2, if it helps. --70.29.252.46 (talk) 00:10, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

Well, the 1st update you should run is to install service pack 3, right? You can download the enire SP3 package in French here and install it manually. Vespine (talk) 04:25, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

Problem long solved, but thanks for the suggestions nonetheless. --70.29.252.46 (talk) 08:14, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

computers?

would it cost more to buy a computer or make one? what would be needed to make a computer? 70.241.16.91 (talk) 00:22, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

Commonly, computer hobbyists assemble a computer by purchasing pre-fabricated parts: a computer case, a power supply, a CPU and heatsink, a main-board, and a video card (for example). It is possible that this will save you money, but it depends on your skill as a shopper and your technical expertise. If you want to make a computer from more elemental parts, it will require far more expertise, and a lot more time and money. Nimur (talk) 00:34, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

There's heaps of websites that go into a lot of detail about what's involved with building your own PC. Yes it's typically cheaper but most people do it because it is fully customizable, you can put in only and exactly the components you want. I've never bought a pre-made computer, but if you've never even opened up a PC case and swapped a video card or upgraded a disk or anything, I would not recommend you start with building a whole computer, unless you have easy access to a friend who has built computers and is willing to help you. Things can go wrong and if you can't work out what it is, you'll be stuck with an expensive and large door stop. Vespine (talk) 01:49, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

I doubt if you'd save a great deal of money building a PC from parts, but it may well be worthwhile if you can reuse parts from old PCs. I managed to cannibalise two duff PCs to make a working one without too much difficulty - not exactly state of the art, but it cost me almost nothing, and enabled me to keep online long enough to afford a proper upgrade. As Vespine says, you'll need some backup from someone with a bit of experience to attempt a new build, so why not see if you can get hold of some obsolescent hardware first, to tinker with - too often, PCs get scrapped while they are still usable. AndyTheGrump (talk) 02:03, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

It depends on the type of computer you're looking for too. If you want a high performance "Gamer Machine" you may well find that you save a significant amount of money assembling it yourself, because the markup on those machines is rather high. But if you're looking for a "bare bones" cheapest computer you can buy, the price difference probably won't be significant. 76.28.67.181 (talk) 06:49, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

Also note that there are web sites that allow you to specify every component in the computer, and then they will assemble it for you. This provides the flexibility you might want without having to be an expert at computer assembly. Price-wise, though, it's in the same range as buying a computer off-the-shelf, although if you pick all premium components this approach will cost significantly more. StuRat (talk) 02:08, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

Another note not brought up above... If you are not in a rush and can plan well, you can save a lot of money by buying the parts you need only when they are on sale. I put together a computer that would normally run around $2,000 for $500 by purchasing each part when it was heavily discounted with large rebates. It took about 6 months. If you plan to do this, there has to be some order to your purchase. This is how I did it:

1. Buy a CPU. The CPU will limit what kind of motherboard you can use.
2. Buy a motherboard and CPU fan. The motherboard will limit the kind of memory you need, the power supply, and the case.
3. Buy memory, hard drive, and case at any time. Buy the video card (if you want a high-end one) next. That will put a power requirement on your power supply.
4. Buy the power supply.
5. At any time, pick out the monitor, keyboard, and mouse that you like.

Then, once you have all the parts, you are ready to go - except you don't have a Windows license. I don't use Windows, so I never factor that into my costs. -- kainaw™ 12:29, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

I see a couple problems with that strategy:

1) Your components may remain untested until after their warranty has expired, making it impossible to return any defective parts.

2) Technology improves and prices fall so quickly in this area that 6 month old components might cost more and do less than those purchased today. StuRat (talk) 14:37, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

Just because it irks me only a little, more then one person has now said buy a "cpu fan": If you buy a boxed cpu, you do not need a cpu fan, they come with a perfectly decent cpu fan. Today's CPUs are NOT the 100degC monsters of several years ago, pretty much all the stock coolers are perfectly fine.Vespine (talk) 22:59, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

Yes and no. Again, it rather depends on your PC. If you are building an overclocked gaming machine, you may well want a heatsink/fan combination the size of a halfbrick - if you look at the power consumption, even a standard CPU at stock clock speeds and voltages is producing enough heat for it to be worth looking at as a potential problem, so any extra (passive) cooling can't be a bad thing IMO. AndyTheGrump (talk) 03:05, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

Having built quite a few comptuers of various types including with aftermarket HSFs I agree with Vespine here. Any modern retail CPU comes with a HSF that is up to the job under normal settings and conditions. If the stock HSF isn't up to the job, the product is clearly defective and you should be entitled to return it in many countries. Obviously if you are overclocking or you find the HSF too noisy or for a variety of other reasons you may want to consider an aftermarket HSF. And similar if you buy a non retail CPU it probably won't come with a HSF. But for a retail CPU the stock HSF should be fine. Case cooling may need some consideration but that's a different matter. BTW, I would personally avoid any component other then perhaps HSFs and cases which come with only a 6 month warranty. Not saying I agree with the above strategy, in fact I would agree with StuRat's second point that most of the time it would be a mistake from a price standpoint (well for the HSF, keyboard/mouse, case and PSU it may be ok) but I've never lived in the US only Malaysia and New Zealand and we rarely have the sort of rebates that seem common there. Nil Einne (talk) 13:00, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

Yes and yes :P We ARE talking about a person here considering building their FIRST PC. They should not be thinking of building a pimped up overclocked gaming rig, and we should not be talking them into it. Once they become an ENTHUSIAST they will learn and consider aftermarket CPU cooling for themselves, it's a (completely) unnecessary complication and expense for a first build. As for noise, I've bought and build almost every intel CPU architecture since 486 days and since core 2 duo 4 or 5 yeas ago, the stock sinks have been very cool AND quiet. Vespine (talk) 23:13, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

o-p here, thanks for all the help! :) 70.241.16.91 (talk) 19:36, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

MS Office on a tablet

I should be very grateful if someone tells me can I open the MS OFFICE 2011 files in a tablet PC.I have many typing works and I want to know can I connect a bluetooth keyboard to a tablet? any proposal or answer is appreciated in advanc.--Chavosh (talk) 05:58, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

I've changed the title of the section to something more descriptive than simply "Question". As it says at the top of the page, things like Question, Query, or Problem are frowned upon. I'm sorry I don't have an answer for your question though. Dismas|^(talk) 06:07, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

It depends on the tablet. If the tablet runs MS Windows, then you can install and run MS Office. On an Apple iPad you can use applications such as Documents to Go and Apple's iWork[1] to view Office files, though they may not have the full functionality of MS Office. Various file viewers are also available for Android tablets. As for keyboard, the iPad supports bluetooth keyboards[2], and many other tablets will too, but you'll have to check for the specific tablet you have or are thinking of buying. --Colapeninsula (talk) 12:05, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

Hi-Grade ftp site for laptop drivers

I've been trying to help with somebody else's old laptop, which would be handy for using like a netbook. It works, but has no display adaptor installed, so it's stuck at an annoying resolution like 640x480. I assume it needs its drivers, which I assume are at the manufacturer's FTP site, linked to from this page: http://www.higrade.com/nqcontent.cfm?a_id=10956 (or the direct link is ftp://ftp.higrade.com/2010/Drivers/)... but the link never loads. I've tried just clicking it in Firefox, and I've also tried using FireFTP, and I've tried from two different connections (his house and mine). Is it just that their FTP server is down, or is there some way in? Is there another source of these drivers (for the Hi-Grade 4400) which has a moderate to reasonable chance of giving me the right files and not some malware? Is there some source of a generic driver which might be suitable instead?  Card Zero  (talk) 13:09, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

If you can find out what kind of graphics card it has, or the integrated card model / chipset it is, you might be able to find the driver from a different source. Is it Intel? TheGrimme (talk) 17:04, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

I don't have access to it right now, but I remember the processor is a Celeron, if that helps. Not sure what software to use to identify the make of the graphics card.  Card Zero  (talk) 20:34, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

OK, I got my hands on it again and found out:

GPU: SiS 315 Intergrated

Chipset: Northbridge: SiS 650

so I did the obvious thing and found the SiS site and downloaded the SiS 315 series GPU drivers for the right system, 32-bit XP, and ran the setup program ... and got the message "The setup program could not find a suitable driver, the setup program will terminate". Huh? Why on earth didn't that work? What else can I try? (Update) I found I could install the SiS 315 driver via the Windows control panels - it must be in a CAB file somewhere I suppose - but then I get "this driver cannot start" once it's installed. Perhaps the system profiler I used (Everest) got it wrong, and the GPU isn't SiS 315? I also tried hw32_384 and SiSoft Sandra (two other profilers) but couldn't get either to run (the first said something about missing setup files, and the second just triggers a reboot for some reason whenever I try to run it). Is there a simple way to find out what the GPU is?  Card Zero  (talk) 22:56, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

Got it! I didn't need the SiS 315 GPU driver, I needed the SiS 650 IGP driver. Sorted.  Card Zero  (talk) 23:52, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

undefined reference to vtable

I'm trying to compile a program I've been writing, for which I have received much helpful advice on this ref desk, and now it's almost done, I'm getting a compile-time error, "undefined reference to vtable". Needless to say, I'm using virtual functions, but there doesn't seem to be anything wrong with the program, and the error message seems to be from the underlying aspects of the compilation process (such as the linker). Ordinary compiler errors state a line number in the .cpp file, but here there are no line numbers, just a lot of weird information. Here's some of the info it dumps:

/tmp/ccTEIg2P.o(.gnu.linkonce.t._ZN4NodeC2Ev[Node::Node()]+0x7): In function `Node::Node()': diffs.cpp: undefined reference to `vtable for Node'

/tmp/ccTEIg2P.o(.gnu.linkonce.t._ZN4NodeD2Ev[Node::~Node()]+0x7): In function `Node::~Node()': diffs.cpp: undefined reference to `vtable for Node'

I'm using a rather old version of Linux (Fedora Core 4) and g++, with the compile command, g++ -Wno-deprecated -o diffs diffs.cpp. Is there a fault in my program, or is it g++, and can I get around it, or do I need to upgrade? Is there by any chance a free compiler around somewhere online, that can take text and produce an executable, as a temporary stopgap that will enable me to double-check it is the computer not me? Thanks again in advance, It's been emotional (talk) 17:23, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

Try defining the parent class functions as pure virtual functions, by specifying their definition this way:

  virtual void myFunction(int myArg) const = 0;

This is a common error. Make sure all virtual methods, including the constructor and destructor, are either pure virtual ( =0) or are defined. I find the = 0 syntax to be one of the most unintuitive aspects of the C++ language. Java uses the abstract keyword, instead of setting a pure virtual function to 0. Nimur (talk) 22:20, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, because I never would have worked that out, and I don't think I ever would have found that link. I'm now getting a segmentation fault, which is glory, because I know how to deal with that one. It's been emotional (talk) 02:45, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

Different Voltage slower computers?

I have a Dell Studio laptop and I use it in North America with 100-110 V. Recently, I travelled to a country where the AC voltage is 240 V. After using my computer for a few days, the computer would freeze after been used for a few minutes and could only run properly in safe mode. My adapter says it can handle anywhere between 100-240 V voltage. After returning home to NA, the computer is running properly again. Could the AC voltage have had an impact on the performance of the computer? Acceptable (talk) 17:50, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

"Theoretically," the voltage should have had no effect on the computer. Typically, by the time the computer's internal ACPI power-supply sees the power, it's already been conditioned by the brick-shaped thingie in your cord (the AC/DC power supply). Analog circuitry inside the AC/DC supply should have produced a clean, standard DC current and voltage level (the same output, no matter what the input voltage); and the computer shouldn't have had any "knowledge" that its original input was 220 volt mains power.

In practice, if the AC/DC supply is imperfect (!), it may have supplied a different DC current or voltage when its input was 240 V. Any number of software or firmware level "glitches" may have occurred as a result: ACPI drivers tend to be flaky and can contribute to system instability. Nimur (talk) 18:13, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

I work in IT support and although I'm not a "hardware person", I think it is extremely unlikely that voltage had anything to do with your laptop being slow and crashing. It might have just been a coincidence, or maybe there is something else that you do when you are traveling that you don't do at home, like don't start up shut down properly all the time, or boot up not on your regular network, or something else. If it was a desktop computer, maybe you could convince me of some strange power filer effects or something, I've seen desktop power supplies cause "gremlin" issues, but on a laptop the adapter is essentially a glorified battery charger. Having said that, I'm not saying it's IMPOSSIBLE, I learned long ago never to absolutely rule out any hypothesis without solid proof, no matter ridiculous or implausible it sounds, but I would investigate other more likely things first, like look through your event log.. Vespine (talk) 22:55, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

And for reference, there's Power_supply_unit_(computer)#Laptops. It doesn't say much except to add that the power that comes out of the adapter is conditioned a second time by the laptop it self. Vespine (talk) 01:06, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

Mains voltages in the UK can legally exceed 250v, and do so regularly in country areas, but even this should not, in theory, change the voltage output within the laptop. (My "power brick" is designed for 100 to 240v AC and runs fine on 252v without causing problems.) As others have said, "shouldn't" doesn't mean "didn't". I would have thought that fluctuating voltages would be a more likely cause. My laptop behaves very oddly when I (foolishly?) try to run it in my car using a 12v to 240v inverter power supply. The two switch-mode circuits in series evidently interact in some strange way. Dbfirs 08:59, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

explicitly forbid a Windows 7 process from consuming more than 95% of the CPU

Sometimes, weird things happen where a weird browser plugin malfunctions and starts consuming 100% CPU. I've always wondered why OS developers let that sort of thing happen -- shouldn't it always allow for a "small reserve backup" to allow you enough CPU cycles to decently call up a process management program to kill to deal with the problematic process in question? Are there any rules you can implement that allow noncritical programmes to behave normally, but will never give them more than 95% of the CPU cycles? If not, why doesn't such a programme exist? elle _{vécut heureuse} ^{à jamais} (be free) 18:54, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

Windows' kernel allows you to set preemption properties: Scheduling Priorities. You can change your program's shortcut to always start with a certain priority-level. Here are some tips for different ways to set that up.

If you're asking the more philosophical question: why doesn't the Windows GUI (explorer.exe, or its child processes) forcibly preempt user-space programs? This is a design feature; Windows permits a user-application to use the entire system's resources. In certain other operating systems - most notably, a true Unix such as Solaris, your system administrator may specify hard preemption limits on specific processes (including the GUI or X Server). However, the details of making such a kernel-scheduling tweak are very complicated - undesirable side effects, like system instability and deadlock, may occur. For this reason, most computer platforms, such as certain Unix and all Linux and Windows, are designed to be "interactive with users." Their schedulers allow you to "pleasantly ask the Kernel to please preempt" a specific program. (No hard-guarantees). If you are a kernel engineer, you can easily design your computer system to never deadlock; but most users are not kernel engineers; so this is the better design-decision for a desktop computer. Technically, your computer never crashes when Firefox goes haywire - it's just sluggish. If your computer were a flight-control hardware for an airplane, it would be better to crash Firefox than to crash the plane because of sluggish response. Nimur (talk) 19:25, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

There is never a need to keep "spare" CPU cycles: at any given point in time the CPU might as well be doing something. There already exists a notion of priority in scheduling, which allows for programs like BOINC to soak up 100% of unused CPU time without affecting normal operations. The problem is probably, as Nimur said, that the UI just doesn't have high enough priority (looking at my Ubuntu system, it looks like X is running at normal priority, so the same thing can happen to it). I don't know enough about these issues to explain why this is the case, though. Paul (Stansifer) 02:45, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

There are still priority inversion-like scenarios on non-real time systems, even if CPU/IO priorities are being used. For example, a rogue process might allocate a lot of memory or access a lot of data on the disk, forcing the data of other programs and the UI, even if running at a higher priority, out of memory. When these programs are accessed again, their data needs to be read back from disk, and during that time the lower priority processes can continue to run (and perhaps make matters worse). See Thrashing_(computer_science). Unilynx (talk) 10:06, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

Where to find certificates in Windows 7?

Our application at work uses certificates for WCF authentication. My former boss made a great program which automatically creates a certificate, places it in the "My" store in the "LocalMachine" location, and writes its thumbprint in the WCF <serverCertificate> configuration. But my question is, how do I actually find this certificate in Windows 7 so I can view what it contains? I tried the Certificate Manager (certmgr.msc) and it found a certificate with the same subject name and creation date, so I guess it should be it, but neither the key ID or the thumbprint were anything like what my boss's program had written in the <serverCertificate> configuration. Yet the WCF service manages to find the certificate. How does all this work? Have I found the actual certificate in certmgr.msc? If yes, then why is its thumbprint different? If not, then where is it? JIP | Talk 19:51, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

August 11

Does lowering the volume on an MP3 player increase battery life?

If the volume is at 50% then does that mean that 50% of the voltage is going to the headphones and the other 50% is being wasted as heat in the resistors (or potentiometer) that reduce the voltage, making it use the same amount of electricity as if the volume was at 100%? --Codell (talk) 01:35, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

Yes. If you mute the sound, your MP3 player will consume a little little power for display and (maybe) internal data processing. Marthelati (talk) 04:29, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

It's not a direct answer to the question, but the actual decoding of the MP3 format is fairly CPU-intensive (and therefore battery-intensive). Fifteen years ago, your average desktop computer was too slow to decode MP3 in real-time, the way your portable player can do with ease now. This processing certainly consumes a lot of power, even at 0% volume. decltype (talk) 07:17, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

You are misunderstanding how a resistor works. Take a good look at Ohm's law. The resistor does not "burn off" the excess - it reduces the total current flow. Increasing the resistance of the potentiometer (turning down the volume) decreases the current flowing through it and subsequently through the audio amplifier and speakers. It is analogous to a half opened tap/faucet - the rate of water flow through it is less than when it is fully open. As other answers have pointed out the audio amplifier and speakers may however only be responsible for a small proportion of the total power consumption of the device. Roger (talk) 07:40, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

I'm not familiar with the circuit design of MP3 players, but I would have expected that most of them control the volume electronically, rather than with a potentiometer, so very little energy will be "burnt off" in resistors. A volume control built into the headphones is more likely to be a potentiometer with greater energy loss, but not the 50% you calculate. Remember that perceived volume is logarithmic (see decibel). A significant proportion of the energy from the battery goes towards producing amplified sound, especially at high volume, so the answer is yes, battery life is significantly increased when you turn down the volume, but not doubled if you reduce the volume by 50%. The exact percentage increase would depend on the particular model, and would require experimental data to determine because there are other factors such as battery capacity depending on current. Dbfirs 08:41, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

Resolved

 – Thank you. I was indeed misunderstanding how a resistor works; and have learned that the CPU consumes most of the power.--Codell (talk) 20:06, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

I just want to add a link to an open source mp3 player implementation (started over 10 years ago) - a FPGA, likely specialized for the specific implementation to play MP3 files from some memory: http://www.pjrc.com/mp3/info.html , which in turn have little overhead compared to a standard PC 10 years ago Azalin (talk) 19:47, 16 August 2011 (UTC)

What? A METAL DETECTOR APP? (Android Marketplace)

Someone on a KurzweilAI forum said he had a metal detector app once, though he was sure it was a joke app.

I would believe that it was indeed a joke app.

On the other hand, what kinds of tech advances would be required of cellphone tech in order to create a real-working metal-detecting app??? --70.179.163.168 (talk) 05:39, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

Typical metal detectors work (roughly) by detecting interference in an antenna caused by the presence of metal. There's a bit more to it than that, but since cell phones do have antennas and can detect signal strength at least, it's not so difficult for me to believe that somebody might have been clever enough to write an app that interprets fluctuating signal strengths in such a way that it can act as a crude metal detector. Now, I don't know whether apps have that kind of access to the hardware, and I don't know whether patterns of changes of cellular signal strength are enough to actually make it work, so it very well could have been a joke. —Bkell (talk) 07:29, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

Many modern screenphones contain magnetometers, which they use to sense the strength and orientation of the Earth's magnetic field. This provides a basic compass function when the GPS and cell-based positioning systems aren't available. Data from the magenetometers is retrieved using the Android SensorManager and GeomagneticField APIs. I have a sensor monitoring app called GPS Status which shows a lot of the interesting information available to apps (GPS satellite constellation visibility, battery level, ambient brightness, pitch/roll/acceleration, and magnetometer data). If I put the phone on a wooden desk, or hold it in space, it reports a magnetic field of about 46 μTesla. Placed atop a steel filing cabinet it reports 193 μTesla, an effect that's noticeable out to at least 10cm. But it's hopeless at "detecting" anything smaller - any influence my watch or keys might have is less than the ordinary variation its sensor sees, even if held right under the phone. So strictly speaking it can detect very large steel objects that are very close to it, so it's nominally a metal detector, but (I expect because it's relying on the Earth's magnetic field, rather than generating its own and observing the changes in what it receives back) its so insensitive that it's useful only for novelty value. -- Finlay McWalter ☻ Talk 09:03, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

Android device with a USB Host port

Are there any Android devices currently on the market or "comming soon" that have a USB Host facility built in? So far all the devices I have seen (various phones and a Samsung Galaxy Tab) do not have a type A (or Micro-A) USB port and so are limited to only be a peripheral instead of controlling other peripheral devices. Roger (talk) 08:31, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

In the coming soon category (very soon according to most sources - a matter of days to weeks rather than months) there is the Lenovo Thinkpad Tablet, don't be put off by the fact that it looks like a netbook on the website - that's the optional keyboard dock. Equisetum (talk | email | contributions) 09:53, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

I know someone with a fairly cheap Android tablet (I think a Zenithink ZT 180 rebrand). It has an ordinary type A port and I presume has USB host facility because it can support memory sticks (I think) and definitely can support USB mice (keyboard too although can't remember if I tested that) and from memory of results during my searches some 3G and wifi dongles as well. However bear in mind unless you have good programming experience or there is a good modding community you may still be limited by whatever drivers available on the specific Android distro provided by whoever made your tablet (and whether the software allows access to the periheral supported by those drivers when rooted or whatever). E.g. for this friend's tablet USB bluetooth adapters don't seem to be supported from testing and searches this seems to be a common problem. Nil Einne (talk) 13:11, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

BTW, the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 apparently doesn't have a USB A port, but it either has USB host functionality built in (requiring only a passive adapter) or has some other connectivity function that enables a stand alone USB host device (my guess is it's the former) sinc according to our article: "A USB host adapter was made available in June 2011. The dongle plugs into the 30-pin dock connector and allows USB compatible accessories such as keyboards, mice, and thumb drives, to be connected to the tablet." Nil Einne (talk) 12:14, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

Cheapo Android tablet battery life

I've just bought a no-name "seven inch" Android minitablet that's described as having "Rockchip 2818 1.0Ghz (ARM+DSP+GPU)", 256MB and (?) 4GB of memory (I mean, aside from and Micro-SD card), and Android 2.1. It was new, and cost very little over the interwebs. I wasn't expecting much, but I was expecting a battery life longer than fifteen minutes, which is all I get when doing something innocuous like attempting to view a PDF. ("Attempting", because zoom as I wish, it's too small. I assume that some other software will do the job.) Fifteen minutes is of course so short that the device is worthless. I'm now drafting a chilly message to the dealer, but I'm wondering what to say. It's obvious to me that anything like this should be usable for four hours, and that it's just this example that's a lemon, and I should ask for a replacement -- but I'm an Android ignoramus and maybe it's common knowledge that the charge capacity of batteries designed for these particular devices halves every three months after manufacture; maybe I should ask for a different model. What battery life can one reasonably demand of a new (but slightly old-stock) cheapo cheapo tablet? (The minuscule user's guide for this one talks of a charging time of five hours [ha ha] but says nothing about how much use you can then get out of it.) -- Hoary (talk) 09:19, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

The screen is what mostly determines the battery life - based on the batteries you have. Some batteries have longer life. Some have shorter life. The best you can do is get better batteries and dim the display on the screen. (Note: The following is heavily influenced by the excessive frequency of which coworkers bring me crap they've purchased on shopping networks and expect me to make it work as well as an iPad...) Basically, you feel it should be illegal to sell electronic devices with terrible battery life. Similarly, it should be illegal to sell diet drugs that don't work. It should be illegal to sell credit consolidation plans that don't work. It should be illegal to sell mosquito repellent bracelets that don't work. The key concept here is caveat emptor. There will always be some ass who slaps together some garbage and tries to sell it. If you go after the no-name super-cheap garbage, you will most likely get garbage that comes from a no-name company that doesn't care about you and, even though it was super-cheap, you will be out the money you spent. -- kainaw™ 12:59, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

Ah, screen brightness. Well, I can reduce that when I get my paws on the replacement. I'd assumed, perhaps naively, that low-power screen technology would have improved (or that better options would have got cheaper) during the popularity of netbooks: at a given brightness level, this screen might consume even 100% more juice than it should, but surely not 300% more.

One way in which this toy resembles the iPad is that both hide the battery. I've no idea of where it is or what size it is.

I don't know about your part of the world, but in mine the options are expensive iPad (of course from a company that has a huge ad budget), expensive Android devices from companies that have big ad budgets, and cheap Android devices from companies I've never heard of. I don't begrudge Apple its profits, and I've bought from Apple in the past. But I'll get something that will "satisfice" me until swish tablets with repeatedly tweaked OSes cost less than netbooks. -- Hoary (talk) 14:08, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

I didn't say this earlier since it was mostly OT. But actually in New Zealand where I believe the OP is from, the Consumer Guarantees Act requires goods are fit for their normal purpose [3] [4]. Because of limited resources and other factors, this and other requirements often aren't particularly well enforced in the computing field or particularly against low end retailers and unlike is sometimes done in Europe, there's usually little guidance on what it actually means. But unless the device was sold as basically requiring a permanent power connection with the battery only for brief emergencies, and presuming the OP isn't doing something wrong I have strong doubts a tablet with only a 15 minute battery life would qualify. I don't know if there have been any legal cases and I don't know if I'd go as far as the OPs 4 hours, but I would expect at least 1 hour. I strongly expect organisations like the Consumers' Institute of New Zealand or TV shows like Fair Go would agree with me and writing to them is sometimes a useful step. The Citizens Advice Bureau [5] could perhaps often some guidance whether there's ever been any cases. Ultimately taking a case before the Disputes Tribunal [6]. I'm presuming of course the OP has purchased the item from a retailer or something of that sort, not via an auction like TradeMe or even from overseas in which case they've elected (knowingly or not) to purchase something in a manner not covered by the extensive consumer protections of NZ law. Nil Einne (talk) 16:06, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

It very probably has a broken battery. Check with the manufacturer. Dmcq (talk) 18:48, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

Unable to create an Yahoo account.

I cannot create an Yahoo account, it said I answered the CAPTCHA incorrectly but it was correct. Windows 7 with Internet Explorer 9, help. Marthelati (talk) 13:16, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

How many times did you try? Nil Einne (talk) 13:19, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

Indefinitely many times. Marthelati (talk) 13:24, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

Did you check carefully that your upper and lower case characters were correct? Did you try loading a different captcha code? Did you try using the audio code instead? Are you sure that it was the the captcha code that was wrong, and not that you were missing some other piece of required information? Did you try reloading the page and trying again? These are generally pretty obvious, but I'm just putting them out there, cos there's not really much reason it shouldn't work. --jjron (talk) 15:28, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

The OP claims they tried 'Indefinitely many times' which I presume means they tried many different captchas. I do agree an audio captcha may be useful. Nil Einne (talk) 16:13, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

Is "an Yahoo" British English, or just plain wrong, like the use of "indefinitely" in place of "definitely" ? StuRat (talk) 17:31, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

My guess is English not first language or at least pretending to be. User has been blocked as an abusive sockpuppet so hopefully we'll never know Nil Einne (talk) 18:07, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

JDK, JRE, x86, x64

What I already know:

• JDK contains the JRE. There's no need to install the JRE after installing JDK.
• 32-bit version of JDK works well on 64-bit OS.
• Some well written programs check if other instance exists and refuses to install if there is any.

But I don't know:

• Does JDK x64 contain the JRE x86 and vice-versa?
• What is the purpose of 64-bit JDK, when I am writing a program for a virtual machine?
• I already have JRE installed. Now I installed JDK. Can JDK detect and not overwrite it? I know it depends on those who develop JDK, but does anyone know?

The Oracle website does not have any explaination at all (or because I haven't found it yet). -- Livy the pixie (talk) 14:16, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

What is the purpose of 64-bit JDK, when I am writing a program for a virtual machine? The compiler, virtual machine, etc are 64-bit native-code applications (not Java; written in C or C++), and hence can use the extra facilities of the 64-bit chip (it might even compile more quickly). The java byte code should be identical. --Colapeninsula (talk) 14:35, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

[7] suggests the compiler is written in Java although I presume as you said, it's usually distributed compiled to native machine code rather then Java byte code. In answer to the OP, I'm pretty sure the Windows x64 JDK as with the JRE doesn't come with the x32 JRE. You need to download and install that seperately if it's desired. Nil Einne (talk) 18:16, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

Linux Keyring prompt fix

According to this and this website, the issue i currently am having with a wireless network keyring can be resolved by deleting a default keyring file in a certain location. However, this file does not exist on my system.

From terminal:

  home@home-HP-Pavilion-dv9000-EZ458UA-ABA:~/.gnome2/keyrings$ ls
    login.keyring  user.keystore.AZNLQV  user.keystore.Q84TQV
    user.keystore  user.keystore.HD0RQV  user.keystore.WU8TQV

  home@home-HP-Pavilion-dv9000-EZ458UA-ABA:~/.gnome2/keyrings$ ls -a
    .   login.keyring  user.keystore.AZNLQV  user.keystore.Q84TQV
    ..  user.keystore  user.keystore.HD0RQV  user.keystore.WU8TQV

My guess is maybe i have a different version of the software? though that is rather more a stab in the dark than an educated guess. Should i delete one of these files which may operate the same as the intended default.keyring?

216.173.144.164 (talk) 14:48, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

It's hard to answer questions like this without knowing what Linux distro you are using. Looie496 (talk) 20:07, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

What computer manufacturer gives better warranty deals?

I believe I should move on from Dell with my next laptop/swivel tablet because some of their warranty deals are rip-offs.

I was promised year-long software warranty tech support for $239, then I learned that $239 covers just 4 incidents, then I was offered $110 for another 3.

I want warranty packages that are good for a period of time, period. Not for a period of time in a number of incidents.

So what competing PC manufacturer will offer better warranty packages (to include software warranties, not just hardware) than Dell?

(Also, this manufacturer has to allow me to choose my own parts/components like how Dell & Apple does when I shop for a new system on their websites. That would help me a lot. Thanks.) --70.179.163.168 (talk) 18:01, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

Why would a toolbar disappear?

I could have just changed computers at this library, but when I asked someone for help she asked if there was a mouse, and when I moved my mouse across the top of the screen the toolbar magically appeared. Then it disappeared. I should add that on Wikipedia, the sign-in link disappears if the toolbar is there, as do "My contributions".

Most of these computers are Internet Explorer, and another one said it was Windows XP. I don't know what this one is.Vchimpanzee · talk · contributions · 18:45, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

Don't take this personally, but I work in IT support and i'm really struggling to understand what you mean. I could have just changed computers at this library, don't understand what you mean by this. toolbar magically appeared. what do you mean by "toolbar"? What did it look like? Did it have menus or buttons and what did they say? "internet explorer" is not a kind of computer, it's just a program you use to browse the internet, it is the default browser installed on windows computers.

If I had to take a wild guess, maybe someone has dragged the task bar to the top of the screen and selected the "auto hide the task bar option"? Click this task bar image, does it sort of look like that? If it is, you can right click it, select "options" and un-tick the box that says "auto hide the task bar". If you are feeling adventurous, you can also try to drag it back down to the bottom of the screen. You have to make sure "lock the task bar" is NOT selected when you right click the task bar, then you have to click and hold on an empty part of the task bar and literally drag it down to the bottom of the screen and then let go of the mouse button. If it's NOT that, then I wrote all that for nothing lol.. Vespine (talk) 22:59, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

If I had to take a wild guess, press f11.--Shantavira|^{feed me} 07:29, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

You know, I looked all over the web and all over Wikipedia for the correct terminology (as well as a possible solution). When I say Toolbar, I mean there was no back button, no forward button, no place to type the URL. If I move the mouse across the top of the screen in just the right way, which sometimes is more difficult than it is at other times, because sometimes nothing happens, then all that stuff appears.

I'm no longer at that library but they need to fix it. And if I say a computer is "Internet Explorer" then you're supposed to know what that means. I don't think anyone understands how hard it is just to think how to explain a problem, much less do it in the exact way you want.

I looked up F11 and I guess that is the problem.Vchimpanzee · talk · contributions · 17:54, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

Networked printer problems

In the office I work we have 4 PC's connected to a networked printer all through a server, but every now and again one of the PC's won't print and what we have to do is go into Devices and Printers and un-install the printer and then re install it. Has anyone any ideas why this is happening as it has happened on the 3 PC's that are connected wirelessly but not the one that is directly connected to the printer by a cable, thanks. Mo ainm~Talk 21:37, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

Using VLC to add video effects/adjustments to vids

I use VLC on Ubuntu. You can easily add video effects and adjustments to videos (like changing the contrast, or rotating the vid) during playback but can you make those changes permanent? The Convert/Save menu doesn't seem to be able to do that, as far as I can tell (it's not the easiest thing in the world to use). TresÁrboles (talk) 21:47, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

I'd use ffmpeg or mencoder, but you might prefer using a GUI app, such as… (in no particular order) LiVES, CinePaint, Avidemux, Kino, CineFX, Kdenlive, PiTiVi, Cinelerra. ¦ Reisio (talk) 11:02, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

Tr0ub4dor&3 vs. correcthorsebatterystaple

Just some fact-checking. (that's from xkcd.com) Does the first password has 2^28 of entropy and the second 2^44? Is the second password harder for a computer to crack?Quest09 (talk) 23:46, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

For future reference, the relevant comic is #936. In practice the answer depends on the sizes of the dictionaries from which the two passwords (or their components) are drawn. -- Finlay McWalter ☻ Talk 00:02, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

And here's some discussion from Randall Munroe the cartoonist, of the bases on which he drew this particular cartoon. --Tagishsimon (talk) 00:06, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

Also of possible interest is the PGP passphrase faq, which advocated a similar strategy 18 years ago (see the answer to the first question). 130.76.64.116 (talk) 00:14, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

In the latter case it looks like he's using 4 dictionary words, so that's 44/4 == 11 bits each. That assumes a dictionary of 2^11 entries, which is 2048, which seems rather small. -- Finlay McWalter ☻ Talk 00:12, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

The author proceeds to only count certain bits: he assumes that the only relevant entropy is defined by the decision-tree as a passcode string is created per a specific recipe. For example, he counts the bit-length of a lookup-dictionary of known words. This is simply wrong. This methodology quantifies representations of abstract pieces of information with "bits" according to a known recipe for generating password sub-strings; but it then presumes that the attacker knows the recipe; and the author fails to account for any bits of entropy related to the fore-knowledge of the recipe. (Specific example: which words are in the lookup-dictionary? How long is the dictionary? Those pieces of information have entropy too!) If the method had any merit, it was lost at that point. I would tag this whole comic with ; the assumptions and conclusions may be suitable for a comic strip, but are probably not up to snuff for a cryptography or security-best-practices publication. Kudos to the author for bringing attention to the concept of heuristic-based password guessing, rather than pure brute-force iteration; but his math is off by a few orders of magnitude. Nimur (talk) 00:46, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

I think that it's correct to discount those bits; after all, a recipe is good precisely if it still works well when everyone uses it. Paul (Stansifer) 02:13, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

The latest (episode 313) Security Now podcast discussed this comic pretty well: [8]. They talk about it pretty early on in the podcast. - Akamad (talk) 01:58, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

The discussion of the comic starts at about 19:20 and ends at about 32:00, but I don't recommend it. Steve Gibson is one of those celebrity "experts" whose main skill is self-promotion. I'd even go so far as to call him a crackpot, based on his web site. Munroe clearly understands what constitutes a strong password; Gibson is clearly very confused. -- BenRG (talk) 10:40, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

Gibson does not claim that his little tool is a password strength meter. He just presents some metrics for understanding how many passwords can be created by combining a certain set of elements. 88.14.196.229 (talk) 13:53, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

"Temporarily" installing software

I'm looking for a way to only "temporarily" install a software on Windows 7 64-bit. The case is that I'm going to need to install a program which I'll really only need to use once, so I'd rather not have it install on my system and then uninstall it, as that will likely change some registry gobbledygook I don't want it to. I'd opt for using a virtual machine like VirtualBox, but all my previous operating system ISOs were on my (currently inaccessible) older computer. Preferably I'd like to install the program inside the virtual machine, let it do what it needs to, and then just delete the virtual hard disk. So, does anyone have an alternative solution to my query? Thank you and cordially, 141.153.215.55 (talk) 03:33, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

Ideally it should come with an uninstall script that will clear up all the registry entries when you remove it. This can be accessed under Add/Remove programs. If you don't trust that it will have this (or that it will work), do a system checkpoint before the install, then roll back to that point after the run. Note that any data file created might also be wiped out, so make a backup copy if you want to save it. StuRat (talk) 04:36, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

Either use Sandboxie, System Restore, or Windows XP Mode. 118.96.159.34 (talk) 11:17, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

Sandboxie is probably the easiest way. Just make an empty sandbox and run the program's installer in that sandbox, and to "uninstall" it, delete the sandbox (after extracting any files you want to keep). It's compatible with most applications, though not all. -- BenRG (talk) 10:46, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

August 12

Mouseover pop-up CHN-ENG translator for Internet Explorer?

Moved from Language Desk by Falconus^{p t c} 03:14, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

Hi everyone, I use the Perapera-kun add-on for CHN-ENG translation in Firefox. It lets you hover your mouse over hanzi to see the meaning. However, some sites in China don't work with Firefox (for example, certain online banks) and I was wondering if anyone knew of an add-on for IE with similar mouseover translation functionality. I haven't been able to find one... Thank you. — Preceding unsigned comment added by The Masked Booby (talk • contribs) 01:58, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

cropping jpg images

I've got an image with the .jpg file extension on a Linux machine. I thought maybe using ooffice to view it I could do some cropping. Hasn't worked so far. My other option my be finding something on some MS Windows machine in a university library and downloading the thing there. What should I do? Michael Hardy (talk) 04:31, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

Pretty much any image editor would allow you to crop a JPG. In Windows, Microsoft Paint works just fine. StuRat (talk) 04:34, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

A lot of Linux distributions include GIMP, which can do it. Looie496 (talk) 04:49, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

You could try an online image editor like this AvrillirvA (talk) 09:33, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

I do basic image editing in Linux using F-Spot Tinfoilcat (talk) 09:25, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

Note that the jpeg format uses lossy compression. By cropping in a general purpose image editor, you will decode and re-encode, thereby adding new artefacts to those that were created the first time the image was jpeg-encoded. To avoid unnecessary loss of quality, use a specialized cropping program that understands the jpeg format. Jpegtran is the grand-daddy, JpegCrop is a user-friendly windows interface. --95.34.139.175 (talk) 20:18, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

Google forces its localized domain on me

Why is it that when I attempt to change Google.ca back to Google.com, it just refuses to go to the US based domain? But when I'm the US, I'm perfectly capable of accessing the Canadian domain without the main one getting in my way? Yet funnily enough, I can access Google.fr, Google.co.uk, Google.de and so on from Canada with no issue, yet it has serious beef with me trying to access Google.com. Even when I sign into my Google account, I don't seem to have much of a say in my preference of which domain I want. Why is that? 70.29.252.46 (talk) 09:54, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

See this article. 118.96.159.34 (talk) 11:17, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

One of the problem is .com isn't really a US domain but a generic domain and when someone links to google.com they aren't necessarily intending to link to the US site in particular. I wonder whether www.google.us (which does work) also always takes you to the US site Nil Einne (talk) 12:40, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

I would've never guessed to do that. Thanks. 70.29.252.46 (talk) 15:47, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

Google problem

This morning, Google started acting weird on my Fedora 12 Linux system using FireFox 3.6. When I make a search that returns multiple pages of results, and browse to some page past the first one and click on a result, then when I click "Back" Google throws me back to the first page. If I click "Back" again then I get to the right page. This seems to happen every time. It does not happen on my work computer, which uses Windows 7 and FireFox 5. What the heck is going on here? JIP | Talk 15:03, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

Are you using the HTTPS everywhere extension? -- Finlay McWalter ☻ Talk 15:10, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

No. JIP | Talk 15:27, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

Also Google regularly inflicts random page tests and changes on random connections. (And they kind of suck at JS :p) ¦ Reisio (talk) 15:11, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

This stopped when Google thought I had searched too much for one day and asked me to fill a CAPTCHA. Then after I closed the browser window and did another Google search it started again. JIP | Talk 20:04, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

Screen Quality with Video Question/Concern

Hi, I just bought a new Dell XPS 17 laptop with a 17 inch 900p screen, I have another laptop that is 6 years old and runs 1280 x 800 with a 15 inch screen. Watching the same 720p and 1080p video on both side by side, I think the quality on the old laptop is better, the new one seems a little less sharp and slightly lower quality (the old screen is less reflective). Am I imagining it? Is it the difference in reflectivity? It is that the old screen is smaller? Or is there something I can do to fix this? Thanks for any help:-) 71.195.84.120 (talk) 17:10, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

The reflectivity or brightness are about the only things it could be -- the pixel size on the two systems is virtually identical. Looie496 (talk) 17:26, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

This is off topic, kind of, but I noticed that the results are near identical, if not slightly better, on the new screen with several other hd videos. Going back to the orginal ones I tested, I noticed that they are of a slightly smaller filesize, is it possible that the videos themselves are of varying quality and that the defects are more apparent on the newer display due to size and higher resolution?

The 900 -vs- 800 is not to big a diff, though they are the same vertical size, but width wise its 1600 to 1280; although the 1600 is on a wider screen. I'm not saying that you are wrong, just that I don't really know much about this and am not sure how to determine how big a difference there is/should be. Thank you:-) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.195.84.120 (talk) 17:41, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

720p is 1280x720. The old laptop can show it 1:1 without scaling, but your new laptop is apparently scaling it to 1600x900, and thus making the image fuzzier. 80.186.103.202 (talk) 17:51, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

Is native resolution the problem? Comet Tuttle (talk) 20:38, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

One other factor could be the refresh rate. If the new computer has a slower refresh rate, images could look choppy during movement, especially when looking out the corner of the eye. StuRat (talk) 19:45, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for your answers :-) After using it for a bit, I'm starting to notice that a lot of hd videos play better, thuogh some still don't...I have two other questions. Would a lower res video play better on the smaller older screen or the newer, since the newer screen would require stretching it out and such? Second, I debated a lot between the 900p and 1080p screens and went with 900 because I think it would be easier to read off of (I have 10,000's of ebooks) and figured that at 17 inches and arms length away, the videos wouldn't look to diff on it; that and most of the video I have is 720p. That being said, I'm curious if I made the right choice? Honestly, I just want to get rid of (or justify) the nagging voice in my head that keeps telling me I could have got something better (I get a new computer every six years or so, so I'm going to have this one for a while) Any thoughts would be much appreciated; yes, I know, I'm probably over thinking this. Thank you :-) 209.252.235.206 (talk) 06:44, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

I'd say a larger screen with a higher resolution is the best choice. You generally want to display a video at it's native resolution to avoid any up-scaling or down-scaling of the image, which can distort the image, make it blurry, or introduce lag. With a large screen at high res, you do have the option to make the image window smaller than the entire screen. Unfortunately, some inferior video software doesn't seem to have the option to display at 100% resolution, and just goes with the current window size, whatever that happens to be. As for e-books, if they allow you to set the font, then again the largest resolution would let you use a larger font, which should have more resolution for each letter, making them clearer. StuRat (talk) 07:28, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

flickr

Hello. Are there any web archives or mirrors (accessible to the public) that have old pictures from flickr? I remember there was this beautiful landscape that a certain user had, CC-BY license, which is just the perfect resolution for my new computer screen, but which the user has taken down (waybackmachine has been rather unhelpful; flickr "doesn't allow frames", whatev that means). I have tried contacting the user, but he has been unresponsive. Thanks. 203.117.33.23 (talk) 18:25, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

And where was this top secret image? ¦ Reisio (talk) 19:54, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

I assume you know about archive.org? Comet Tuttle (talk) 20:20, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

Wayback Machine is part of Archive.org. So I think that's covered. --Tagishsimon (talk) 20:23, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

PS2 .STR Audio Files

I've got some audio tracks from a PS2 game copied to my hard drive, and I was wondering if there was a program out there that can play these tracks... and if possible convert them to .wav or .mp3

thanks 157.157.39.8 (talk) 20:11, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

Where's the security weakness?

I'm running XP Mode only for a scanner, so while I run Virtual PC I don't run it for more than a few minutes. I use a flash drive to store the resulting images, and "XP" has access to only the virtual HD and physical DVD-ROM drive. I have Firewall up but don't want to patch the "XP". I'm guessing then that any security weakness that would affect me would be in Virtual PC. Is that correct? 66.108.223.179 (talk) 23:25, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

Virtual PC could have bugs allowing the virtualised XP access to its host machine, but the likelyhood of malware targetting such a vulnerability would probably be small. However, if the XP machine were to pick up any malware that tries to spread itself further over the network, that malware is now on the wrong side of any router firewall you may have. It may still try to infect other machines on your network, including the hosting Windows 7 installation, if those are not properly secured. Unilynx (talk) 10:01, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

August 13

Video Enhancement and Programming

Hi, I've been wanting to write a program that would perform certain effects on a video, then output a modified copy. While I think I have sound ideas and am comfortable with programming, I do not know enough about video file formats and how they are played to get started and was hoping to get pointed towards some information regarding that. For example, any info on the following would help. 1.) Given a(n) wmv, mpeg, avi, etc. how would I extract an array of frames from it? 2.) If I play an a x b resolution video on a, say, 1080p screen, how does the player decide what values the extra pixels should have? 3.) More importantly, if I extracted an array of frames from an a x b res video, then added to them and increased the size to c x d res and built a video from that, would the end result be a c x d res video? For the 1st question I just need to know how frames are stored, I can figure the rest out. The 3rd sounds kind of obvious, but differences between screen resoultion and video resolution and lack of knowledge make me want to ask just to be safe. Thank you for any and all help :-) 209.252.235.206 (talk) 06:38, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

1) How the frames are stored is quite complex, due to various compression methods. For example, there are compression methods for each frame, but there are others for multiple frames (if an object doesn't move, there's no need to describe it in each subsequent frame). What I've done is used software that allows me to grab single frames and extract them as as PPM RAW ASCII format, which is human readable and uncompressed RGB values (each 0-255, typically). This makes the files huge, but it does make them easy to process with a program. I've then modified the frames and stitched them together as animated GIFs, but I imagine you can make other formats, too.

2) See video upscaling.

3) Yes, you can store the frames at a higher resolution, although I suspect that all frames in a single movie must have the same resolution. Also, there are limits on the max resolution for each format.

Something else I should add is that video rendering/processing is very slow. If you expect to, say, invert the colors on a full-length movie, I'd expect this to take many days to process, especially if you exceed the RAM of your machine and must go to paging space. StuRat (talk) 07:38, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

Here's a recent question we had on this desk where the format of a frame in PPM RAW ASCII format is described: [9]. StuRat (talk) 07:56, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

I'd consider using FFmpeg's libraries to handle the video format part, and working with the RGB frames it can provide. See eg http://dranger.com/ffmpeg/tutorial01.html Unilynx (talk) 09:53, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

Help with MS Access 2007 (VBA) to open a new instance of excel 2007 instead of excel 2003

I am writing a vba code in MS Access 2007 that creates and opens a new instance of MS Excel 2007 (have added the reference to MS Excel 12.0 already). Code for reference here:

Dim xlApp as excel.application Set xlapp = CreateObject("Excel.Application")

The problem here is that every time the code runs, it opens excel 2003 instead of excel 2007. I want it to open an instance of excel 2007 instead of exce l 2003.

Additional details: OS: Win 7 I have both MS Office 2003 and 2007 installed on my system. I have already tried 'Diagnose' in MS Excel (similar to detect & repair in MS Excel 2003 which makes it default for all excel files). Also, tried un-registering excel 2007 and then registering again but didn't help. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 122.173.224.151 (talk) 12:09, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

You might take a look at this article, especially the section on "automation" and multiple versions. It doesn't seem to be up to date for Excel 2007, but it does give some hints to look at (figuring out what the Excel 2007 class name is). --Mr.98 (talk) 18:44, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

How to make each excel files open in a same instance of excel 2007

Whenever i open an excel file on my system, it opens in a new instance of excel 2007. I want them to open in same instance of excel, how can i do t? Details: OS: Win 7 MS Office 2007 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 122.173.224.151 (talk) 12:12, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

On Excel 2003, you untick the box Show... Windows in Taskbar, under Tools.. Options.. View. I'd guess it's the same in 2007. --Phil Holmes (talk) 15:57, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

That doesn't make any difference in my Excel 2000. When I open from within the running instance, the new file opens in that instance, but if I open by double-clicking the file, the operating system (Vista) opens a new instance of Excel. Behaviour might be different in newer versions. Dbfirs 16:15, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

databases

does anyone have passwords to databses. i mean im doing reserhc project in schol and im not finding anything in the schol databses

so i hope someone can give me passwords thanks. i'd be nice to get a pasword for teh Harvard databses thanks all — Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.183.70.187 (talk) 15:21, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

You appear not to understand the purpose of a password. Suggest you read the article.--Shantavira|^{feed me} 16:19, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

Just FYI, to get access to the Harvard e-resources would require having a Harvard PIN, which would mean you would have access to all sorts of other Harvard student or employee services, information, etc., of whomever's PIN it was. Nobody is likely to post their PINs willingly. --Mr.98 (talk) 18:41, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

Obsolete or backdated website

If a website lacks current information and valuable data, then should it be called backdated website or obsolete website? thanks--180.234.82.244 (talk) 16:24, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

"Out of date" would be the phrase I'd use. But of the choices you present, "obsolete" makes more sense than "backdated". 82.43.90.27 (talk) 17:49, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

See Out-of-Date Websites Invite Problems | Branding and Marketing.

—Wavelength (talk) 18:05, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

How to find a lost iPhone

My iphone has been lost, and it could be anywhere in the city I'm currently residing in. I haven't downloaded MobileMe, iHound, or any of those things. Is there a way to locate it after it's already been lost? 70.179.55.4 (talk) 22:22, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

Call the number and see if a good Samaritan answers and agrees to return it (offer a reward just in case). However, you might not be able to hear if anybody answers over that annoying ringing coming from under your couch. :-) StuRat (talk) 23:22, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

After you try this, if you don't get your phone back, block it using it's IMEI. Quest09 (talk) 13:07, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

Parallels desktop

So I am in the midst of installing Windows 7 using Parallels Desktop for Mac. I was curious as to whether because my computer is a mac, I do not have to worry about viruses, or whether even though it's a mac, because I will be running Windows on the parallels desktop, I am susceptible like an actual PC owner.--108.46.97.251 (talk) 23:26, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

It's the OS that's susceptible, not the hardware (by and large). Your Windows installation will be at risk the same as any other. ¦ Reisio (talk) 16:58, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

August 14

How would a website/network know that it's you, even if your IP address is changed?

Sometimes, users are so hellbent on hating you that they'll remember your IP address so that you don't escape their hate just by changing your username.

Then you figure out how to change your IP address.

There are two other methods of users still figuring out who you are, that I know of:

• Having a distinctive writing style and interests shared by no one else on that site/network
• Failing to delete cookies (that have your old login info, etc.)

What are some other, more technical methods of finding out who you were? How commonly are those methods employed, and how do you circumvent said methods? --70.179.163.168 (talk) 00:28, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

MAC address? General Rommel (talk) 00:45, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

I'm not sure any website can see your MAC address. Maybe if you authorized some kind of Java applet? Even then, I don't know. --Mr.98 (talk) 01:42, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

Separate from cookies are Local Shared Objects, which hold a lot of info and are not often treated the same as regular cookies. I also recall reading somewhere that User agent strings (because of all the gunk they contain about plugins and browsers and versions and etc.), when combined with simple Javascript-accessible info (screen resolution, for example), often renders an pretty specific match (e.g. a one in few thousand chance that you are the same user). --Mr.98 (talk) 01:42, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

The Electronic Frontier Foundation has a good article series starting here. They list e.g. Flash cookies and sites cooperating (voluntarily or involuntarily) via HTTP referrer and information provided in the URI. The User agent string alone carries on average 10.5 bits of identifying information, and if combined with other information (available fonts, resolution, plugins) can give quite unique fingerprints. I have the Computer Modern fonts installed in my Mac Fontbook (for use in Keynote), and apparently that alone makes me unique among the 1709638 users that participated (so far) in their Panopticlick experiment. There is a scientific paper on the approach here. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 08:53, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

Yes, that's what I was thinking of; thanks! --Mr.98 (talk) 12:48, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

People can be quite clever, for instance one can serve slightly different versions of the same javascript which has an identifoier in to different people and depend on the caching, if they delete a cookie then the id can be got from the javascript instead and the cookie reinstated. We could do with some technologies like that on Wikipedia as we get plagued by some very persistent vandals. Individuals though do not normally go to such extremes and you can avoid them by not visiting their websites, so it sounds like the OP is visiting a website and trying to do something there and the website owner does not like it. If this is so then who exactly is hellbent on hating? Dmcq (talk) 09:30, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

disable keyboard on laptop

i got water on my laptop keyboard and the arrow buttons are going crazy and the rest of the keyboard is shot. i have a usb keyboard, but the wild normal laptop overrides it. is there a way to disable it? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.181.202.2 (talk) 01:24, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

Device Manager? General Rommel (talk) 02:47, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

solution of computer problem

I have a dos base software name 'cross' which is use in retail medicine shop. I have dell inspiron laptop with core i3 processer. in my laptop i install windox xp and the software runnim=ng well I also used a epson dot matrix printer. to print out from printer I use two operation 1. control panel-add hardware-wizard-I have already attached hardware-add new hardware-network adapter-loopback adapter and 2. c:\documents and setting\administrator>net use lpt1 \\computer name\shaired printer name then show ... the command completed successfully but now I install windos 7 ultimate in my laptop, my software running well in my laptop.I want to print out by printer I performed operation 2 before operation 1 and it happens many times e:\user\Supriyo>net use lpt1 \\computer mane\shaired printer name it show ... the command completed sucessfully but I can not get print then I performed operation 1 and then 2 but it show system error 85 occured the local device name is already in use what can I do to get print in windos 7 ultimate.Gonsusona (talk) 02:35, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

Are you running the Command Prompt as an administrator? (not just as a Windows administrator account, but specifically right-click the Command Prompt shortcut and "Run as administrator") as under Windows 7 (and likely Vista) you're probably going to need to do that. Then if it still doesn't work, try using lpt2 or lpt3 instead of lpt1. I could be wrong, but I don't think Windows 7 will let you remap an existing port so you have to use a different port number i.e. lpt2 or lpt3. Hope this helps!  ZX81  ^talk 02:40, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

ok I will try it.Gonsusona (talk) 10:33, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

I move the above response from Gonsusona here from the thread below as I presume it relates to this thread Nil Einne (talk) 13:41, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

Stretch screen resolution

Hello,

I have a laptop with a nVidia 540M graphic card and Windows 7 64 bits. Is it possible to stretch the screen rather than having two huge black bars on each side of the screen when I'm running older games that don't have built-in support for widescreen, nor fan-made hacks? My nVidia control panel only has options for custom settings like AA filtering, even with the latest drivers. Same thing for the Intel graphical drivers thingy. Actually I believe there's an option (It's in French and I'm used to English computing terms, quite ironically) but there's only one choice (something to the effect of center screen (FUUU). I also tried using the «maximize» option of shortcuts. Doesn't work either.

I'm thinking about installing a Windows XP 32 bits partition, because a significant number of older games either don't run or they run very badly (brillant Microsoft engineers decided to dump 16 bits support in Win 7 x64 - despite a lot of early 2000s applications still relying on it to some extent). Will this also fix this? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 8.18.145.160 (talk) 06:38, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

I don't think this is simply a decision of 'brillant Microsoft engineers'. In [[X86-64#Long mode|long mode],] x86-64 CPUs (in other words a decision by AMD which Intel and Via later also followed) only provide support for 16-bit protected mode applications. Any applications which require real mode or virtual 8086 mode can't be run. Therefore only certain applications could be run without Microsoft tweaking the Windows on Windows layer to provide more emulation. Given the risk later proven real of continuing to provide so much legacy code, combined with the fact there are already plenty of virtual machines and emulators, it's perhaps not surprising Microsoft chose not to spend time reinventing the wheel updating the WoW and NTVDM layers so they could work in long mode.

If you are using Windows 7 Professional, Enterprise or Ultimate, Windows XP mode is supported which is probably an easier option then installing a secondary OS. Of course if you have an XP licence for the second copy you plan to install, perhaps it also allows you to install it in a VM. If you intention is to run early 2000s games which use 16 bit code, Virtual PC (used by Windows XP mode by default) may be enough. If it isn't, the most likely problem would be the limited 3D support in Virtual PC, in which case VirtualBox and VMware have hardware acceleration support. (If the only problem is 16 bit installers, you may want to see if there's a way to install it in Windows 7 x64.)

If you do want to go down the installing a secondary partition with Windows XP x32 route, be aware companies are dropping support for Windows XP, so you may find difficulty getting your hardware to work with it. And you're probably more likely to encounter problems with a laptop, since generic drivers don't always work if they are available (I believe in the case of Nvidia even Omega drivers don't work for mobile/laptop graphics chipsets). A quick search suggests there are no official (or beta) drivers from Nvidia for your graphics chipset for XP. You may be able to find some unofficial drivers but I wouldn't get my hopes up if you haven't found some.

BTW on desktop cards, the Nvidia control panel has a 'adjust desktop size and position' submenu option under the 'display' menu. For LCD or widescreen (not sure which one) monitors, this usually shows a 'when using a resolution lower than my display's native resolution' for which there is the option to 'use NVIDIA scaling' (the one without 'with fixed-aspect ratio') usually means no black bars. If there is no such option for the mobile drivers and you've tried multiple versions, you may be SOL (well unless your display has such an option, for a built in LCD monitor on a laptop this is unlikely but if you're using a fancy LCD monitor it's possible). I presume you're aware if you stretch it in that way, the aspect ratio will be wrong, so people and objects will appear squashed/fat.

There is a slight possibility the Nvidia or Intel drivers on XP will provide such an option despite it not existing in the Windows 7 drivers, but I doubt it. In fact were it not for you saying the option doesn't exist on Windows 7, I would have expected you'd have been even less likely to have support for such an option on XP then on Windows 7 (particularly considering you have a very recent mobile chipset).

Nil Einne (talk) 13:30, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

Another option might be to use an external monitor. If you have a non-wide-screen monitor, then it should fit better. With any luck, you might have a monitor which is taller than the laptop's, and thus gives you a bigger image. StuRat (talk) 17:12, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

I did not know about the whole 16 bits thing, sorry. I stand corrected.

Oddly enough, I just unlocked the stretching option in the Intel Graphical Drivers thingy. After fiddling around and pressing the hotkey for enable/disable panel fitting which is CTRL+ALT+F11, My desktop changed to a "center screen" mode (I had the two ugly black bars on my desktop). But under Intel Graphical Device, I now had three options, so I choose to revert to default, which was supposed to stretch in the first place, and I maxed my resolution, as it had been downgraded. Now the games are shown correctly, and there is only one choice under "stretching", like before.

Probably a registry bug or something? This is weird (but cool) Raskolkhan (talk) 18:36, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

How do I install language support without Microsoft Office?

I would like to install IMEs for Hindi, Korean, Japanese and Chinese. However, I'd like to find a way to do so without needing MS office first so that I can type in those languages without it. Thanks. --70.179.163.168 (talk) 08:06, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

My MS office program is now in windows.old folders, but how do I get it to work again?

Dell had me reinstall Windows while saving all my previous files to windows.old. I tried opening MS Office from there but I couldn't. Since it came with the laptop, I asked them to send me a replacement copy but they said I had to pay for another one (if they practically mandated a reinstall, then I ought to get software that originally came with the system replaced for free.) _{Because of this, next year, my next laptop will not be from Dell.}

How do I take the MS office files from the windows.old folders anyhow so that I can get them to work again? Are there other (legal) ways to get MS office to work again for free? --70.179.163.168 (talk) 08:06, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

Stopping Firefox from flashing a page and then changing it

I just looked for an article [10] only to realize it was one of those stupid Kluwer abstracts that changes to another page ([11]) if you have JavaScript disabled, or are running NoScript, etc. Normally when I don't have the patience for this I just hit the Stop button as it's loading. But voila, I can't find a stop button on Firefox 5.0, even in the section to customize the menu. Fortunately control-U does work, so I managed to get a look at the source:

<noscript>    
  <meta http-equiv="Refresh" content="0;url=/_layouts/1033/OAKS.Journals/Error/JavaScript.html" />
</noscript>

Anyway, how do I keep Firefox from doing this when I don't want it, and where did the stop button go? Wnt (talk) 13:48, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

The stop button appears at the right end of the location field while the page is loading. It changes to a reload button once the page is loaded, which is pretty annoying but I guess it saves some space. You can also hit Escape to stop it. NoScript has a helpful option (under the Advanced tab) to "Forbid META redirections inside <NOSCRIPT> elements" for dealing with this kind of website rudeness. Firefox has an option (under Advanced/General) to "Warn me when web sites try to redirect or reload the page", but it will drive you insane if you turn it on all the time. Bobmath (talk) 14:53, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

Is defragmenting pagefile.sys and hiberfil.sys worth it?

According to Defraggler, pagefile.sys and hiberfil.sys (among some other things, including some supposedly random gibberish under C:\System Volume Information\ - what exactly is that anyway?) make up roughly 22% of the defragmented files on my Windows 7 laptop. Should I just let these files be, or should I go actually take the time to defrag them? 141.153.215.229 (talk) 17:11, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

Defragmenting is really only important when you are low on disk space. Is this the case ? StuRat (talk) 17:16, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

I suppose so. I mean, I still have some GBs of space available, but not enough to install a large program or something... 141.153.215.229 (talk) 18:13, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

If you have less than 10% of your disk empty, you will probably take a heavy performance hit, since the read/write head has to move a lot to access parts of files stored non-contiguously on the platter. This is especially true for a file used for paging (which is happening if you run out of RAM and the computer starts swapping data in and out). So yes, it makes sense to defragment the page file. It also always makes sense to buy more RAM and more disk. ;-) --Stephan Schulz (talk) 18:27, 14 August 2011 (UTC)