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Some Of The Best Answers From Latest Asked Questions

Free ASP.Net and/or CSS Themes

I wouldn't bother looking for ASP.NET stuff specifically (probably won't find any anyways). Finding a good CSS theme easily can be used in ASP.NET.

Here's some sites that I love for CSS goodness:

http://www.freecsstemplates.org/
http://www.oswd.org/
http://www.openwebdesign.org/
http://www.styleshout.com/
http://www.freelayouts.com/

Algorithm to find Largest prime factor of a number

Here is my approach to quickly calculate the largest prime factor. It is based on fact that modified x does not contain non-prime factors. To achieve that, we divide x as soon as a factor is found. Then, the only thing left is to return the largest factor. It would be already prime.

The code (Haskell):

f max' x i | i > x = max'
           | x `rem` i == 0 = f i (x `div` i) i  -- Divide x by its factor
           | otherwise = f max' x (i + 1)  -- Check for the next possible factor

g x = f 2 x 2

What is the difference between procedural programming and functional programming?

In computer science, functional programming is a programming paradigm that treats computation as the evaluation of mathematical functions and avoids state and mutable data. It emphasizes the application of functions, in contrast with the procedural programming style that emphasizes changes in state.

When do you use the "this" keyword?

I don't mean this to sound snarky, but it doesn't matter.

Seriously.

Look at the things that are important: your project, your code, your job, your personal life. None of them are going to have their success rest on whether or not you use the "this" keyword to qualify access to fields. The this keyword will not help you ship on time. It's not going to reduce bugs, it's not going to have any appreciable effect on code quality or maintainability. It's not going to get you a raise, or allow you to spend less time at the office.

It's really just a style issue. If you like "this", then use it. If you don't, then don't. If you need it to get correct semantics then use it. The truth is, every programmer has his own unique programing style. That style reflects that particular programmer's notions of what the "most aesthetically pleasing code" should look like. By definition, any other programmer who reads your code is going to have a different programing style. That means there is always going to be something you did that the other guy doesn't like, or would have done differently. At some point some guy is going to read your code and grumble about something.

I wouldn't fret over it. I would just make sure the code is as aesthetically pleasing as possible according to your own tastes. If you ask 10 programmers how to format code, you are going to get about 15 different opinions. A better thing to focus on is how the code is factored. Are things abstracted right? Did I pick meaningful names for things? Is there a lot of code duplication? Are there ways I can simplify stuff? Getting those things right, I think, will have the greatest positive impact on your project, your code, your job, and your life. Coincidentally, it will probably also cause the other guy to grumble the least. If your code works, is easy to read, and is well factored, the other guy isn't going to be scrutinizing how you initialize fields. He's just going to use your code, marvel at it's greatness, and then move on to something else.

What is the best way to prevent session hijacking?

Let us consider that during the login phase the client and server can agree on a secret salt value. Thereafter the server provides a count value with each update and expects the client to respond with the hash of the (secret salt + count). The potential hijacker does not have any way to obtain this secret salt value and thus cannot generate the next hash.

Language Books/Tutorials for popular languages

Haskell:

O'Reilly Book:

  1. Real World Haskell, a great tutorial-oriented book on Haskell, available online and in print.

My favorite general, less academic online tutorials:

  1. The Haskell wikibook which contains all of the excellent Yet Another Haskell Tutorial. (This tutorial helps with specifics of setting up a Haskell distro and running example programs, for example.)
  2. Learn you a Haskell for Great Good, in the spirit of Why's Poignant Guide to Ruby but more to the point.
  3. Write yourself a Scheme in 48 hours. Get your hands dirty learning Haskell with a real project.

Books on Functional Programming with Haskell:

  1. Lambda calculus, combinators, more theoretical, but in a very down to earth manner: Davie's Introduction to Functional Programming Systems Using Haskell
  2. Laziness and program correctness, thinking functionally: Bird's Introduction to Functional Programming Using Haskell

How do I perform a Perl substitution on a string while keeping the original?

I hate foo and bar .. who dreamed up these non descriptive terms in programming anyway?

my $oldstring = "replace donotreplace replace donotreplace replace donotreplace";

my $newstring = $oldstring;
$newstring =~ s/replace/newword/g; # inplace replacement

print $newstring;
%: newword donotreplace newword donotreplace newword donotreplace

How to decode viewstate

Use Fiddler and grab the view state in the response and paste it into the bottom left text box then decode.

What's the best mock framework for Java?

For something a little different, you could use JRuby and Mocha which are combined in JtestR to write tests for your Java code in expressive and succinct Ruby. There are some useful mocking examples with JtestR here. One advantage of this approach is that mocking concrete classes is very straightforward.

How to download a file over HTTP?

use wget module:

import wget
wget.download('url')

Best practices for catching and re-throwing .NET exceptions

You should always use "throw;" to rethrow the exceptions in .NET,

Refer this, http://weblogs.asp.net/bhouse/archive/2004/11/30/272297.aspx

Basically MSIL (CIL) has two instructions - "throw" and "rethrow":

  • C#'s "throw ex;" gets compiled into MSIL's "throw"
  • C#'s "throw;" - into MSIL "rethrow"!

Basically I can see the reason why "throw ex" overrides the stack trace.

Format numbers to strings in Python

If you have a value that includes a decimal, but the decimal value is negligible (ie: 100.0) and try to int that, you will get an error. It seems silly, but calling float first fixes this.

str(int(float([variable])))

How can I develop for iPhone using a Windows development machine?

Try macincloud.com It allows you to rent a mac and access it through RDP remote control. You can then use your PC to access a mac and then develop your apps.

Cleanest Way to Invoke Cross-Thread Events

I think the cleanest way is definitely to go the AOP route. Make a few aspects, add the necessary attributes, and you never have to check thread affinity again.

Why can't I declare static methods in an interface?

With Java 8, interfaces can now have static methods.

For example, Comparator has a static naturalOrder() method.

The requirement that interfaces cannot have implementations has also been relaxed. Interfaces can now declare "default" method implementations, which are like normal implementations with one exception: if you inherit both a default implementation from an interface and a normal implementation from a superclass, the superclass's implementation will always take priority.

Reading from text file until EOF repeats last line

There's an alternative approach to this:

#include <iterator>
#include <algorithm>

// ...

    copy(istream_iterator<int>(iFile), istream_iterator<int>(),
         ostream_iterator<int>(cerr, "\n"));

.NET - Get protocol, host, and port

Even shorter way, may require newer ASP.Net:

string authority = Request.Url.GetComponents(UriComponents.SchemeAndServer,UriFormat.Unescaped)

The UriComponents enum lets you specify which component(s) of the URI you want to include.

What is the difference between #include <filename> and #include "filename"?

Thanks for the great answers, esp. Adam Stelmaszczyk and piCookie, and aib.

Like many programmers, I have used the informal convention of using the "myApp.hpp" form for application specific files, and the <libHeader.hpp> form for library and compiler system files, i.e. files specified in /I and the INCLUDE environment variable, for years thinking that was the standard.

However, the C standard states that the search order is implementation specific, which can make portability complicated. To make matters worse, we use jam, which automagically figures out where the include files are. You can use relative or absolute paths for your include files. i.e.

#include "../../MyProgDir/SourceDir1/someFile.hpp"

Older versions of MSVS required double backslashes (\\), but now that's not required. I don't know when it changed. Just use forward slashes for compatibility with 'nix (Windows will accept that).

If you are really worried about it, use "./myHeader.h" for an include file in the same directory as the source code (my current, very large project has some duplicate include file names scattered about--really a configuration management problem).

Here's the MSDN explanation copied here for your convenience).

Quoted form

The preprocessor searches for include files in this order:

  1. In the same directory as the file that contains the #include statement.
  2. In the directories of the currently opened include files, in the reverse order in which
    they were opened. The search begins in the directory of the parent include file and
    continues upward through the directories of any grandparent include files.
  3. Along the path that's specified by each /I compiler option.
  4. Along the paths that are specified by the INCLUDE environment variable.

Angle-bracket form

The preprocessor searches for include files in this order:

  1. Along the path that's specified by each /I compiler option.
  2. When compiling occurs on the command line, along the paths that are specified by the INCLUDE environment variable.

In C++, what is a virtual base class?

I'd like to add to OJ's kind clarifications.

Virtual inheritance doesn't come without a price. Like with all things virtual, you get a performance hit. There is a way around this performance hit that is possibly less elegant.

Instead of breaking the diamond by deriving virtually, you can add another layer to the diamond, to get something like this:

   B
  / \
D11 D12
 |   |
D21 D22
 \   /
  DD

None of the classes inherit virtually, all inherit publicly. Classes D21 and D22 will then hide virtual function f() which is ambiguous for DD, perhaps by declaring the function private. They'd each define a wrapper function, f1() and f2() respectively, each calling class-local (private) f(), thus resolving conflicts. Class DD calls f1() if it wants D11::f() and f2() if it wants D12::f(). If you define the wrappers inline you'll probably get about zero overhead.

Of course, if you can change D11 and D12 then you can do the same trick inside these classes, but often that is not the case.

In SQL Server, how do I generate a CREATE TABLE statement for a given table?

I'm going to improve the answer by supporting partitioned tables:

find partition scheme and partition key using below scritps:

declare @partition_scheme varchar(100) = (
select distinct ps.Name AS PartitionScheme
from sys.indexes i  
join sys.partitions p ON i.object_id=p.object_id AND i.index_id=p.index_id  
join sys.partition_schemes ps on ps.data_space_id = i.data_space_id  
where i.object_id = object_id('your table name')
)
print @partition_scheme

declare @partition_column varchar(100) = (
select c.name 
from  sys.tables          t
join  sys.indexes         i 
      on(i.object_id = t.object_id 
  and i.index_id < 2)
join  sys.index_columns  ic 
  on(ic.partition_ordinal > 0 
  and ic.index_id = i.index_id and ic.object_id = t.object_id)
join  sys.columns         c 
  on(c.object_id = ic.object_id 
  and c.column_id = ic.column_id)
where t.object_id  = object_id('your table name')
)
print @partition_column

then change the generation query by adding below line at the right place:

+ IIF(@partition_scheme is null, '', 'ON [' + @partition_scheme + ']([' + @partition_column + '])')

Dynamically load a JavaScript file

Dynamic module import landed in Firefox 67+.

(async () => {
   await import('./synth/BubbleSynth.js')
})()

With error handling:

(async () => {
    await import('./synth/BubbleSynth.js').catch((error) => console.log('Loading failed' + error))
})()

It also works for any kind of non-modules libraries, on this case the lib is available on the window object, the old way, but only on demand, which is nice.

Example using suncalc.js, the server must have CORS enabled to works this way!

_x000D_
_x000D_
(async () => {
 await import('https://cdnjs.cloudflare.com/ajax/libs/suncalc/1.8.0/suncalc.min.js')
 .then(function(){
   let times = SunCalc.getTimes(new Date(), 51.5,-0.1);
   console.log("Golden Hour today in London: " + times.goldenHour.getHours() + ':' + times.goldenHour.getMinutes() + ". Take your pics!")
  })
})()
_x000D_
_x000D_
_x000D_

https://caniuse.com/#feat=es6-module-dynamic-import

Which .NET Dependency Injection frameworks are worth looking into?

Spring.Net is quite solid, but the documentation took some time to wade through. Autofac is good, and while .Net 2.0 is supported, you need VS 2008 to compile it, or else use the command line to build your app.

Simplest way to profile a PHP script

I like to use phpDebug for profiling. http://phpdebug.sourceforge.net/www/index.html

It outputs all time / memory usage for any SQL used as well as all the included files. Obviously, it works best on code that's abstracted.

For function and class profiling I'll just use microtime() + get_memory_usage() + get_peak_memory_usage().

Most efficient way to concatenate strings?

Rico Mariani, the .NET Performance guru, had an article on this very subject. It's not as simple as one might suspect. The basic advice is this:

If your pattern looks like:

x = f1(...) + f2(...) + f3(...) + f4(...)

that's one concat and it's zippy, StringBuilder probably won't help.

If your pattern looks like:

if (...) x += f1(...)
if (...) x += f2(...)
if (...) x += f3(...)
if (...) x += f4(...)

then you probably want StringBuilder.

Yet another article to support this claim comes from Eric Lippert where he describes the optimizations performed on one line + concatenations in a detailed manner.

List of standard lengths for database fields

If you need to consider localisation (for those of us outside the US!) and it's possible in your environment, I'd suggest:

Define data types for each component of the name - NOTE: some cultures have more than two names! Then have a type for the full name,

Then localisation becomes simple (as far as names are concerned).

The same applies to addresses, BTW - different formats!

Recommended SQL database design for tags or tagging

I would suggest following design : Item Table: Itemid, taglist1, taglist2
this will be fast and make easy saving and retrieving the data at item level.

In parallel build another table: Tags tag do not make tag unique identifier and if you run out of space in 2nd column which contains lets say 100 items create another row.

Now while searching for items for a tag it will be super fast.

How do you clear a stringstream variable?

It's a conceptual problem.

Stringstream is a stream, so its iterators are forward, cannot return. In an output stringstream, you need a flush() to reinitialize it, as in any other output stream.

Image UriSource and Data Binding

You can also simply set the Source attribute rather than using the child elements. To do this your class needs to return the image as a Bitmap Image. Here is an example of one way I've done it

<Image Width="90" Height="90" 
       Source="{Binding Path=ImageSource}"
       Margin="0,0,0,5" />

And the class property is simply this

public object ImageSource {
    get {
        BitmapImage image = new BitmapImage();

        try {
            image.BeginInit();
            image.CacheOption = BitmapCacheOption.OnLoad;
            image.CreateOptions = BitmapCreateOptions.IgnoreImageCache;
            image.UriSource = new Uri( FullPath, UriKind.Absolute );
            image.EndInit();
        }
        catch{
            return DependencyProperty.UnsetValue;
        }

        return image;
    }
}

I suppose it may be a little more work than the value converter, but it is another option.

List of macOS text editors and code editors

Eclipse and Netbeans have text editors among a whole lot of other stuff. I don't think you would want to wait 10 seconds for your text editor to become ready :/...If you are going to spend some serious time coding then spend some time and learn to use vim (emacs too but, I recommend vim)

How do I use 3DES encryption/decryption in Java?

import java.io.IOException;
import java.io.UnsupportedEncodingException;
import java.security.Key;
import javax.crypto.Cipher;
import javax.crypto.SecretKeyFactory;
import javax.crypto.spec.DESedeKeySpec;
import javax.crypto.spec.IvParameterSpec;
import java.util.Base64;
import java.util.Base64.Encoder;


/**
 * 
 * @author shivshankar pal
 * 
 *         this code is working properly. doing proper encription and decription
           note:- it will work only with jdk8

 * 

 * 
 */

public class TDes {
    private static byte[] key = { 0x00, 0x00, 0x00, 0x00, 0x00, 0x00, 0x00,
            0x00, 0x01, 0x01, 0x01, 0x01, 0x01, 0x01, 0x01, 0x01, 0x02, 0x02,
            0x02, 0x02, 0x02, 0x02, 0x02, 0x02 };

    private static byte[] keyiv = { 0x00, 0x00, 0x00, 0x00, 0x00, 0x00, 0x00,
            0x00 };



     public static String encode(String args) {


        System.out.println("plain data==>  " + args);

        byte[] encoding;
        try {
            encoding = Base64.getEncoder().encode(args.getBytes("UTF-8"));

        System.out.println("Base64.encodeBase64==>" + new String(encoding));
        byte[] str5 = des3EncodeCBC(key, keyiv, encoding);

        System.out.println("des3EncodeCBC==>  " + new String(str5));

        byte[] encoding1 = Base64.getEncoder().encode(str5);
        System.out.println("Base64.encodeBase64==> " + new String(encoding1));
        return new String(encoding1);
        } catch (UnsupportedEncodingException e) {
            // TODO Auto-generated catch block
            e.printStackTrace();
        }
        return null;
    }


    public static String decode(String args) {
        try {
            System.out.println("encrypted data==>" + new String(args.getBytes("UTF-8")));


        byte[] decode = Base64.getDecoder().decode(args.getBytes("UTF-8"));
        System.out.println("Base64.decodeBase64(main encription)==>" + new String(decode));

        byte[] str6 = des3DecodeCBC(key, keyiv, decode);
        System.out.println("des3DecodeCBC==>" + new String(str6));
        String data=new String(str6);
        byte[] decode1 = Base64.getDecoder().decode(data.trim().getBytes("UTF-8"));
        System.out.println("plaintext==>  " + new String(decode1));
        return new String(decode1);
        } catch (UnsupportedEncodingException e) {
            // TODO Auto-generated catch block
            e.printStackTrace();
        }
        return "u mistaken in try block";

        }



    private static byte[] des3EncodeCBC(byte[] key, byte[] keyiv, byte[] data) {
        try {
            Key deskey = null;
            DESedeKeySpec spec = new DESedeKeySpec(key);
            SecretKeyFactory keyfactory = SecretKeyFactory.getInstance("desede");
            deskey = keyfactory.generateSecret(spec);

            Cipher cipher = Cipher.getInstance("desede/ CBC/PKCS5Padding");
            IvParameterSpec ips = new IvParameterSpec(keyiv);
            cipher.init(Cipher.ENCRYPT_MODE, deskey, ips);
            byte[] bout = cipher.doFinal(data);
            return bout;

        } catch (Exception e) {
            System.out.println("methods qualified name" + e);
        }
        return null;

    }

    private static byte[] des3DecodeCBC(byte[] key, byte[] keyiv, byte[] data) {
        try {
            Key deskey = null;
            DESedeKeySpec spec = new DESedeKeySpec(key);
            SecretKeyFactory keyfactory = SecretKeyFactory.getInstance("desede");
            deskey = keyfactory.generateSecret(spec);

            Cipher cipher = Cipher.getInstance("desede/ CBC/NoPadding");//PKCS5Padding NoPadding
            IvParameterSpec ips = new IvParameterSpec(keyiv);
            cipher.init(Cipher.DECRYPT_MODE, deskey, ips);

            byte[] bout = cipher.doFinal(data);


            return bout;

        } catch (Exception e) {
            System.out.println("methods qualified name" + e);
        }

        return null;

    }

}

Where can I find decent visio templates/diagrams for software architecture?

There should be templates already included in Visio 2007 for software architecture but you might want to check out Visio 2007 templates.

MyISAM versus InnoDB

myisam is a NOGO for that type of workload (high concurrency writes), i dont have that much experience with innodb (tested it 3 times and found in each case that the performance sucked, but it's been a while since the last test) if you're not forced to run mysql, consider giving postgres a try as it handles concurrent writes MUCH better

Is there a way to make Firefox ignore invalid ssl-certificates?

Go to Tools > Options > Advanced "Tab"(?) > Encryption Tab

Click the "Validation" button, and uncheck the checkbox for checking validity

Be advised though that this is pretty unsecure as it leaves you wide open to accept any invalid certificate. I'd only do this if using the browser on an Intranet where the validity of the cert isn't a concern to you, or you aren't concerned in general.

What's the best way to parse command line arguments?

The new hip way is argparse for these reasons. argparse > optparse > getopt

update: As of py2.7 argparse is part of the standard library and optparse is deprecated.

How do you embed binary data in XML?

Base64 overhead is 33%.

BaseXML for XML1.0 overhead is only 20%. But it's not a standard and only have a C implementation yet. Check it out if you're concerned with data size. Note that however browsers tends to implement compression so that it is less needed.

I developed it after the discussion in this thread: Encoding binary data within XML : alternatives to base64.

How to request a random row in SQL?

For SQL Server 2005 and 2008, if we want a random sample of individual rows (from Books Online):

SELECT * FROM Sales.SalesOrderDetail
WHERE 0.01 >= CAST(CHECKSUM(NEWID(), SalesOrderID) & 0x7fffffff AS float)
/ CAST (0x7fffffff AS int)

Transpose/Unzip Function (inverse of zip)?

Since it returns tuples (and can use tons of memory), the zip(*zipped) trick seems more clever than useful, to me.

Here's a function that will actually give you the inverse of zip.

def unzip(zipped):
    """Inverse of built-in zip function.
    Args:
        zipped: a list of tuples

    Returns:
        a tuple of lists

    Example:
        a = [1, 2, 3]
        b = [4, 5, 6]
        zipped = list(zip(a, b))

        assert zipped == [(1, 4), (2, 5), (3, 6)]

        unzipped = unzip(zipped)

        assert unzipped == ([1, 2, 3], [4, 5, 6])

    """

    unzipped = ()
    if len(zipped) == 0:
        return unzipped

    dim = len(zipped[0])

    for i in range(dim):
        unzipped = unzipped + ([tup[i] for tup in zipped], )

    return unzipped

Build a basic Python iterator

Include the following code in your class code.

 def __iter__(self):
        for x in self.iterable:
            yield x

Make sure that you replace self.iterablewith the iterable which you iterate through.

Here's an example code

class someClass:
    def __init__(self,list):
        self.list = list
    def __iter__(self):
        for x in self.list:
            yield x


var = someClass([1,2,3,4,5])
for num in var: 
    print(num) 

Output

1
2
3
4
5

Note: Since strings are also iterable, they can also be used as an argument for the class

foo = someClass("Python")
for x in foo:
    print(x)

Output

P
y
t
h
o
n

What is the correct way to create a single-instance WPF application?

The following code is my WCF named pipes solution to register a single-instance application. It's nice because it also raises an event when another instance attempts to start, and receives the command line of the other instance.

It's geared toward WPF because it uses the System.Windows.StartupEventHandler class, but this could be easily modified.

This code requires a reference to PresentationFramework, and System.ServiceModel.

Usage:

class Program
{
    static void Main()
    {
        var applicationId = new Guid("b54f7b0d-87f9-4df9-9686-4d8fd76066dc");

        if (SingleInstanceManager.VerifySingleInstance(applicationId))
        {
            SingleInstanceManager.OtherInstanceStarted += OnOtherInstanceStarted;

            // Start the application
        }
    }

    static void OnOtherInstanceStarted(object sender, StartupEventArgs e)
    {
        // Do something in response to another instance starting up.
    }
}

Source Code:

/// <summary>
/// A class to use for single-instance applications.
/// </summary>
public static class SingleInstanceManager
{
  /// <summary>
  /// Raised when another instance attempts to start up.
  /// </summary>
  public static event StartupEventHandler OtherInstanceStarted;

  /// <summary>
  /// Checks to see if this instance is the first instance running on this machine.  If it is not, this method will
  /// send the main instance this instance's startup information.
  /// </summary>
  /// <param name="guid">The application's unique identifier.</param>
  /// <returns>True if this instance is the main instance.</returns>
  public static bool VerifySingleInstace(Guid guid)
  {
    if (!AttemptPublishService(guid))
    {
      NotifyMainInstance(guid);

      return false;
    }

    return true;
  }

  /// <summary>
  /// Attempts to publish the service.
  /// </summary>
  /// <param name="guid">The application's unique identifier.</param>
  /// <returns>True if the service was published successfully.</returns>
  private static bool AttemptPublishService(Guid guid)
  {
    try
    {
      ServiceHost serviceHost = new ServiceHost(typeof(SingleInstance));
      NetNamedPipeBinding binding = new NetNamedPipeBinding(NetNamedPipeSecurityMode.None);
      serviceHost.AddServiceEndpoint(typeof(ISingleInstance), binding, CreateAddress(guid));
      serviceHost.Open();

      return true;
    }
    catch
    {
      return false;
    }
  }

  /// <summary>
  /// Notifies the main instance that this instance is attempting to start up.
  /// </summary>
  /// <param name="guid">The application's unique identifier.</param>
  private static void NotifyMainInstance(Guid guid)
  {
    NetNamedPipeBinding binding = new NetNamedPipeBinding(NetNamedPipeSecurityMode.None);
    EndpointAddress remoteAddress = new EndpointAddress(CreateAddress(guid));
    using (ChannelFactory<ISingleInstance> factory = new ChannelFactory<ISingleInstance>(binding, remoteAddress))
    {
      ISingleInstance singleInstance = factory.CreateChannel();
      singleInstance.NotifyMainInstance(Environment.GetCommandLineArgs());
    }
  }

  /// <summary>
  /// Creates an address to publish/contact the service at based on a globally unique identifier.
  /// </summary>
  /// <param name="guid">The identifier for the application.</param>
  /// <returns>The address to publish/contact the service.</returns>
  private static string CreateAddress(Guid guid)
  {
    return string.Format(CultureInfo.CurrentCulture, "net.pipe://localhost/{0}", guid);
  }

  /// <summary>
  /// The interface that describes the single instance service.
  /// </summary>
  [ServiceContract]
  private interface ISingleInstance
  {
    /// <summary>
    /// Notifies the main instance that another instance of the application attempted to start.
    /// </summary>
    /// <param name="args">The other instance's command-line arguments.</param>
    [OperationContract]
    void NotifyMainInstance(string[] args);
  }

  /// <summary>
  /// The implementation of the single instance service interface.
  /// </summary>
  private class SingleInstance : ISingleInstance
  {
    /// <summary>
    /// Notifies the main instance that another instance of the application attempted to start.
    /// </summary>
    /// <param name="args">The other instance's command-line arguments.</param>
    public void NotifyMainInstance(string[] args)
    {
      if (OtherInstanceStarted != null)
      {
        Type type = typeof(StartupEventArgs);
        ConstructorInfo constructor = type.GetConstructor(BindingFlags.Instance | BindingFlags.NonPublic, null, Type.EmptyTypes, null);
        StartupEventArgs e = (StartupEventArgs)constructor.Invoke(null);
        FieldInfo argsField = type.GetField("_args", BindingFlags.Instance | BindingFlags.NonPublic);
        Debug.Assert(argsField != null);
        argsField.SetValue(e, args);

        OtherInstanceStarted(null, e);
      }
    }
  }
}

Is there a simple, elegant way to define singletons?

The Singleton Pattern implemented with Python courtesy of ActiveState.

It looks like the trick is to put the class that's supposed to only have one instance inside of another class.

How do you configure an OpenFileDialog to select folders?

Try this one from Codeproject (credit to Nitron):

I think it's the same dialog you're talking about - maybe it would help if you add a screenshot?

bool GetFolder(std::string& folderpath, const char* szCaption=NULL, HWND hOwner=NULL)
{
    bool retVal = false;

    // The BROWSEINFO struct tells the shell how it should display the dialog.
    BROWSEINFO bi;
    memset(&bi, 0, sizeof(bi));

    bi.ulFlags   = BIF_USENEWUI;
    bi.hwndOwner = hOwner;
    bi.lpszTitle = szCaption;

    // must call this if using BIF_USENEWUI
    ::OleInitialize(NULL);

    // Show the dialog and get the itemIDList for the selected folder.
    LPITEMIDLIST pIDL = ::SHBrowseForFolder(&bi);

    if(pIDL != NULL)
    {
        // Create a buffer to store the path, then get the path.
        char buffer[_MAX_PATH] = {'\0'};
        if(::SHGetPathFromIDList(pIDL, buffer) != 0)
        {
            // Set the string value.
            folderpath = buffer;
            retVal = true;
        }       

        // free the item id list
        CoTaskMemFree(pIDL);
    }

    ::OleUninitialize();

    return retVal;
}

How to insert a line break in a SQL Server VARCHAR/NVARCHAR string

Another way to do this is as such:

INSERT CRLF SELECT 'fox 
jumped'

That is, simply inserting a line break in your query while writing it will add the like break to the database. This works in SQL server Management studio and Query Analyzer. I believe this will also work in C# if you use the @ sign on strings.

string str = @"INSERT CRLF SELECT 'fox 
    jumped'"

Is there an "exists" function for jQuery?

You don't have to check if it's greater than 0 like $(selector).length > 0, $(selector).length it's enough and an elegant way to check the existence of elements. I don't think that it is worth to write a function only for this, if you want to do more extra things, then yes.

if($(selector).length){
  // true if length is not 0
} else {
  // false if length is 0
}

Get file version in PowerShell

Nowadays you can get the FileVersionInfo from Get-Item or Get-ChildItem, but it will show the original FileVersion from the shipped product, and not the updated version. For instance:

(Get-Item C:\Windows\System32\Lsasrv.dll).VersionInfo.FileVersion

Interestingly, you can get the updated (patched) ProductVersion by using this:

(Get-Command C:\Windows\System32\Lsasrv.dll).Version

The distinction I'm making between "original" and "patched" is basically due to the way the FileVersion is calculated (see the docs here). Basically ever since Vista, the Windows API GetFileVersionInfo is querying part of the version information from the language neutral file (exe/dll) and the non-fixed part from a language-specific mui file (which isn't updated every time the files change).

So with a file like lsasrv (which got replaced due to security problems in SSL/TLS/RDS in November 2014) the versions reported by these two commands (at least for a while after that date) were different, and the second one is the more "correct" version.

However, although it's correct in LSASrv, it's possible for the ProductVersion and FileVersion to be different (it's common, in fact). So the only way to get the updated Fileversion straight from the assembly file is to build it up yourself from the parts, something like this:

Get-Item C:\Windows\System32\Lsasrv.dll | ft FileName, File*Part

Or by pulling the data from this:

[System.Diagnostics.FileVersionInfo]::GetVersionInfo($this.FullName)

You can easily add this to all FileInfo objects by updating the TypeData in PowerShell:

Update-TypeData -TypeName System.IO.FileInfo -MemberName FileVersion -MemberType ScriptProperty -Value {
   [System.Diagnostics.FileVersionInfo]::GetVersionInfo($this.FullName) | % {
      [Version](($_.FileMajorPart, $_.FileMinorPart, $_.FileBuildPart, $_.FilePrivatePart)-join".") 
   }
}

Now every time you do Get-ChildItem or Get-Item you'll have a FileVersion property that shows the updated FileVersion ...

Difference between the Apache HTTP Server and Apache Tomcat?

Well, Apache is HTTP webserver, where as Tomcat is also webserver for Servlets and JSP. Moreover Apache is preferred over Apache Tomcat in real time

How do I tell Maven to use the latest version of a dependency?

Sometimes you don't want to use version ranges, because it seems that they are "slow" to resolve your dependencies, especially when there is continuous delivery in place and there are tons of versions - mainly during heavy development.

One workaround would be to use the versions-maven-plugin. For example, you can declare a property:

<properties>
    <myname.version>1.1.1</myname.version>
</properties>

and add the versions-maven-plugin to your pom file:

<build>
    <plugins>
        <plugin>
            <groupId>org.codehaus.mojo</groupId>
            <artifactId>versions-maven-plugin</artifactId>
            <version>2.3</version>
            <configuration>
                <properties>
                    <property>
                        <name>myname.version</name>
                        <dependencies>
                            <dependency>
                                <groupId>group-id</groupId>
                                <artifactId>artifact-id</artifactId>
                                <version>latest</version>
                            </dependency>
                        </dependencies>
                    </property>
                </properties>
            </configuration>
        </plugin>
    </plugins>
</build>

Then, in order to update the dependency, you have to execute the goals:

mvn versions:update-properties validate

If there is a version newer than 1.1.1, it will tell you:

[INFO] Updated ${myname.version} from 1.1.1 to 1.3.2

SQL Server: Get data for only the past year

I found this page while looking for a solution that would help me select results from a prior calendar year. Most of the results shown above seems return items from the past 365 days, which didn't work for me.

At the same time, it did give me enough direction to solve my needs in the following code - which I'm posting here for any others who have the same need as mine and who may come across this page in searching for a solution.

SELECT .... FROM .... WHERE year(*your date column*) = year(DATEADD(year,-1,getdate()))

Thanks to those above whose solutions helped me arrive at what I needed.

Can Windows' built-in ZIP compression be scripted?

Here'a my attempt to summarize built-in capabilities windows for compression and uncompression - How can I compress (/ zip ) and uncompress (/ unzip ) files and folders with batch file without using any external tools?

with a few given solutions that should work on almost every windows machine.

As regards to the shell.application and WSH I preferred the jscript as it allows a hybrid batch/jscript file (with .bat extension) that not require temp files.I've put unzip and zip capabilities in one file plus a few more features.

Boolean Field in Oracle

Oracle itself uses Y/N for Boolean values. For completeness it should be noted that pl/sql has a boolean type, it is only tables that do not.

If you are using the field to indicate whether the record needs to be processed or not you might consider using Y and NULL as the values. This makes for a very small (read fast) index that takes very little space.

JavaScript and Threads

The new v8 engine which should come out today supports it (i think)

How do I fire an event when a iframe has finished loading in jQuery?

I tried an out of the box approach to this, I havent tested this for PDF content but it did work for normal HTML based content, heres how:

Step 1: Wrap your Iframe in a div wrapper

Step 2: Add a background image to your div wrapper:

.wrapperdiv{
  background-image:url(img/loading.gif);
  background-repeat:no-repeat;
  background-position:center center; /*Can place your loader where ever you like */
}

Step 3: in ur iframe tag add ALLOWTRANSPARENCY="false"

The idea is to show the loading animation in the wrapper div till the iframe loads after it has loaded the iframe would cover the loading animation.

Give it a try.

How to submit a form when the return key is pressed?

IMO, this is the cleanest answer:

_x000D_
_x000D_
<form action="" method="get">_x000D_
  Name: <input type="text" name="name"/><br/>_x000D_
  Pwd: <input type="password" name="password"/><br/>_x000D_
  <div class="yourCustomDiv"/>_x000D_
  <input type="submit" style="display:none"/>_x000D_
</form>
_x000D_
_x000D_
_x000D_

Better yet, if you are using javascript to submit the form using the custom div, you should also use javascript to create it, and to set the display:none style on the button. This way users with javascript disabled will still see the submit button and can click on it.


It has been noted that display:none will cause IE to ignore the input. I created a new JSFiddle example that starts as a standard form, and uses progressive enhancement to hide the submit and create the new div. I did use the CSS styling from StriplingWarrior.

How to catch SQLServer timeout exceptions

Whats the value for the SqlException.ErrorCode property? Can you work with that?

When having timeouts, it may be worth checking the code for -2146232060.

I would set this up as a static const in your data code.

Cannot access a disposed object - How to fix?

we do check the IsDisposed property on the schedule component before using it in the Timer Tick event but it doesn't help.

If I understand that stack trace, it's not your timer which is the problem, it's one in the control itself - it might be them who are not cleaning-up properly.

Are you explicitly calling Dispose on their control?

How to create an exit message

I've never heard of such a function, but it would be trivial enough to implement...

def die(msg)
  puts msg
  exit
end

Then, if this is defined in some .rb file that you include in all your scripts, you are golden.... just because it's not built in doesn't mean you can't do it yourself ;-)

How can I cast int to enum?

For numeric values, this is safer as it will return an object no matter what:

public static class EnumEx
{
    static public bool TryConvert<T>(int value, out T result)
    {
        result = default(T);
        bool success = Enum.IsDefined(typeof(T), value);
        if (success)
        {
            result = (T)Enum.ToObject(typeof(T), value);
        }
        return success;
    }
}

Best GUI designer for eclipse?

Look at my plugin for developing swing application. It is as easy as that of netbeans': http://code.google.com/p/visualswing4eclipse/

Converting bool to text in C++

C++20 std::format("{}"

https://en.cppreference.com/w/cpp/utility/format/formatter#Standard_format_specification claims that the default output format will be the string by default:

auto s6 = std::format("{:6}", true);  // value of s6 is "true  "

and:

The available bool presentation types are:

  • none, s: Copies textual representation (true or false, or the locale-specific form) to the output.
  • b, B, c, d, o, x, X: Uses integer presentation types with the value static_cast(value).

Related: std::string formatting like sprintf

What are the differences between delegates and events?

In addition to the syntactic and operational properties, there's also a semantical difference.

Delegates are, conceptually, function templates; that is, they express a contract a function must adhere to in order to be considered of the "type" of the delegate.

Events represent ... well, events. They are intended to alert someone when something happens and yes, they adhere to a delegate definition but they're not the same thing.

Even if they were exactly the same thing (syntactically and in the IL code) there will still remain the semantical difference. In general I prefer to have two different names for two different concepts, even if they are implemented in the same way (which doesn't mean I like to have the same code twice).

Getting ssh to execute a command in the background on target machine

This worked for me may times:

ssh -x remoteServer "cd yourRemoteDir; ./yourRemoteScript.sh </dev/null >/dev/null 2>&1 & " 

Good Free Alternative To MS Access

To be honest - there aren't any free alternatives to MS Access. At least if you mean database development tool (forms, reports, queries, VBA support etc.). If you think about MS Access as a database engine (you mean MS Jet or ACE in fact) then yes - you have a lot of possibilities. There are a lot of free database engines - the most popular are MySQL and PostgreSQL. I can recommend both - it depends what you want to do.

For writing database frontends C++ is one of the worst choices. You should consider MS Visual C#, MS Visual Basic .NET or... Even Java/Swing (if we are talking about desktop application). If you think about the web-enabled frontend - consider PHP (with MySQL or PostgreSQL on the backend) or ASP.NET (with MSSQL Server at the backend).

I strongly recommend you not to use C++ for such job. This language is very efficient and flexible, but advanced database frontend development with C++ is not the best idea. C++ is great in system programming, games development, maths and physics simulations, everywhere where efficiency is the key - like real-time applications etc. Frontends don't have to be daemons of speed - they should look nice and have advanced end-user features (like sorting, coloring etc.). If you are looking for free tools - maybe C# Express or Visual Basic.NET Express 2008 would be the proper choice? Or maybe Java/Swing (check the NetBeans IDE)? Maybe SharpDevelop? But not C++... Leave C++ for the things it suits the best.

Best JavaScript compressor

Here's the source code of an HttpHandler which does that, maybe it'll help you

Passing $_POST values with cURL

$query_string = "";

if ($_POST) {
    $kv = array();
    foreach ($_POST as $key => $value) {
        $kv[] = stripslashes($key) . "=" . stripslashes($value);
    }
    $query_string = join("&", $kv);
}

if (!function_exists('curl_init')){
    die('Sorry cURL is not installed!');
}

$url = 'https://www.abcd.com/servlet/';

$ch = curl_init();

curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_URL, $url);
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_POST, count($kv));
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_POSTFIELDS, $query_string);

curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_HEADER, FALSE);
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER, FALSE);
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_FOLLOWLOCATION, TRUE);

$result = curl_exec($ch);

curl_close($ch);

PHP equivalent of .NET/Java's toString()

You can also use the var_export PHP function.

Regular cast vs. static_cast vs. dynamic_cast

C-style casts conflate const_cast, static_cast, and reinterpret_cast.

I wish C++ didn't have C-style casts. C++ casts stand out properly (as they should; casts are normally indicative of doing something bad) and properly distinguish between the different kinds of conversion that casts perform. They also permit similar-looking functions to be written, e.g. boost::lexical_cast, which is quite nice from a consistency perspective.

SQL Group By with an Order By

I don't know about MySQL, but in MS SQL, you can use the column index in the order by clause. I've done this before when doing counts with group bys as it tends to be easier to work with.

So

SELECT COUNT(id), `Tag` from `images-tags`
GROUP BY `Tag`
ORDER BY COUNT(id) DESC
LIMIT 20

Becomes

SELECT COUNT(id), `Tag` from `images-tags`
GROUP BY `Tag`
ORDER 1 DESC
LIMIT 20

Calculate distance between two latitude-longitude points? (Haversine formula)

Here is the SQL Implementation to calculate the distance in km,

SELECT UserId, ( 3959 * acos( cos( radians( your latitude here ) ) * cos( radians(latitude) ) * 
cos( radians(longitude) - radians( your longitude here ) ) + sin( radians( your latitude here ) ) * 
sin( radians(latitude) ) ) ) AS distance FROM user HAVING
distance < 5  ORDER BY distance LIMIT 0 , 5;

For further details in the implementation by programming langugage, you can just go through the php script given here

What's the difference between a temp table and table variable in SQL Server?

@wcm - actually to nit pick the Table Variable isn't Ram only - it can be partially stored on disk.

A temp table can have indexes, whereas a table variable can only have a primary index. If speed is an issue Table variables can be faster, but obviously if there are a lot of records, or the need to search the temp table of a clustered index, then a Temp Table would be better.

Good background article

How can I discover the "path" of an embedded resource?

I find myself forgetting how to do this every time as well so I just wrap the two one-liners that I need in a little class:

public class Utility
{
    /// <summary>
    /// Takes the full name of a resource and loads it in to a stream.
    /// </summary>
    /// <param name="resourceName">Assuming an embedded resource is a file
    /// called info.png and is located in a folder called Resources, it
    /// will be compiled in to the assembly with this fully qualified
    /// name: Full.Assembly.Name.Resources.info.png. That is the string
    /// that you should pass to this method.</param>
    /// <returns></returns>
    public static Stream GetEmbeddedResourceStream(string resourceName)
    {
        return Assembly.GetExecutingAssembly().GetManifestResourceStream(resourceName);
    }

    /// <summary>
    /// Get the list of all emdedded resources in the assembly.
    /// </summary>
    /// <returns>An array of fully qualified resource names</returns>
    public static string[] GetEmbeddedResourceNames()
    {
        return Assembly.GetExecutingAssembly().GetManifestResourceNames();
    }
}

Getting parts of a URL (Regex)

You can get all the http/https, host, port, path as well as query by using Uri object in .NET. just the difficult task is to break the host into sub domain, domain name and TLD.

There is no standard to do so and can't be simply use string parsing or RegEx to produce the correct result. At first, I am using RegEx function but not all URL can be parse the subdomain correctly. The practice way is to use a list of TLDs. After a TLD for a URL is defined the left part is domain and the remaining is sub domain.

However the list need to maintain it since new TLDs is possible. The current moment I know is publicsuffix.org maintain the latest list and you can use domainname-parser tools from google code to parse the public suffix list and get the sub domain, domain and TLD easily by using DomainName object: domainName.SubDomain, domainName.Domain and domainName.TLD.

This answers also helpfull: Get the subdomain from a URL

CaLLMeLaNN

How can I add (simple) tracing in C#?

I followed around five different answers as well as all the blog posts in the previous answers and still had problems. I was trying to add a listener to some existing code that was tracing using the TraceSource.TraceEvent(TraceEventType, Int32, String) method where the TraceSource object was initialised with a string making it a 'named source'.

For me the issue was not creating a valid combination of source and switch elements to target this source. Here is an example that will log to a file called tracelog.txt. For the following code:

TraceSource source = new TraceSource("sourceName");
source.TraceEvent(TraceEventType.Verbose, 1, "Trace message");

I successfully managed to log with the following diagnostics configuration:

<system.diagnostics>
    <sources>
        <source name="sourceName" switchName="switchName">
            <listeners>
                <add
                    name="textWriterTraceListener"
                    type="System.Diagnostics.TextWriterTraceListener"
                    initializeData="tracelog.txt" />
            </listeners>
        </source>
    </sources>

    <switches>
        <add name="switchName" value="Verbose" />
    </switches>
</system.diagnostics>

What issues should be considered when overriding equals and hashCode in Java?

One gotcha I have found is where two objects contain references to each other (one example being a parent/child relationship with a convenience method on the parent to get all children).
These sorts of things are fairly common when doing Hibernate mappings for example.

If you include both ends of the relationship in your hashCode or equals tests it's possible to get into a recursive loop which ends in a StackOverflowException.
The simplest solution is to not include the getChildren collection in the methods.

Detecting an undefined object property

function isUnset(inp) {
  return (typeof inp === 'undefined')
}

Returns false if variable is set, and true if is undefined.

Then use:

if (isUnset(var)) {
  // initialize variable here
}

How to convert std::string to LPCWSTR in C++ (Unicode)

LPCWSTR lpcwName=std::wstring(strname.begin(), strname.end()).c_str()

Comparing Arrays of Objects in JavaScript

Please try this one:

function used_to_compare_two_arrays(a, b)
{
  // This block will make the array of indexed that array b contains a elements
  var c = a.filter(function(value, index, obj) {
    return b.indexOf(value) > -1;
  });

  // This is used for making comparison that both have same length if no condition go wrong 
  if (c.length !== a.length) {
    return 0;
  } else{
    return 1;
  }
}

How do I REALLY reset the Visual Studio window layout?

If you have an old backup copy of CurrentSettings.vssettings, you can try restoring it.

I had a completely corrupted Visual Studio layout. When I tried to enter debug, I was told that VS had become unstable. When I restarted, my window layout would then be totally screwed. I tried restoring the VS current user settings in the registry from a backup, but that didn't help. However, restoring CurrentSettings.vssettings seems to have cured it.

There seems to be a bunch of binary stuff in there and I can imagine it gets irretrievably corrupted sometimes.

Getting all types that implement an interface

This worked for me (if you wish you could exclude system types in the lookup):

Type lookupType = typeof (IMenuItem);
IEnumerable<Type> lookupTypes = GetType().Assembly.GetTypes().Where(
        t => lookupType.IsAssignableFrom(t) && !t.IsInterface); 

What is MVC and what are the advantages of it?

MVC is just a general design pattern that, in the context of lean web app development, makes it easy for the developer to keep the HTML markup in an app’s presentation layer (the view) separate from the methods that receive and handle client requests (the controllers) and the data representations that are returned within the view (the models). It’s all about separation of concerns, that is, keeping code that serves one functional purpose (e.g. handling client requests) sequestered from code that serves an entirely different functional purpose (e.g. representing data).

It’s the same principle for why anybody who’s spent more than 5 min trying to build a website can appreciate the need to keep your HTML markup, JavaScript, and CSS in separate files: If you just dump all of your code into a single file, you end up with spaghetti that’s virtually un-editable later on.

Since you asked for possible "cons": I’m no authority on software architecture design, but based on my experience developing in MVC, I think it’s also important to point out that following a strict, no-frills MVC design pattern is most useful for 1) lightweight web apps, or 2) as the UI layer of a larger enterprise app. I’m surprised this specification isn’t talked about more, because MVC contains no explicit definitions for your business logic, domain models, or really anything in the data access layer of your app. When I started developing in ASP.NET MVC (i.e. before I knew other software architectures even existed), I would end up with very bloated controllers or even view models chock full of business logic that, had I been working on enterprise applications, would have made it difficult for other devs who were unfamiliar with my code to modify (i.e. more spaghetti).

How to set encoding in .getJSON jQuery

Use encodeURI() in client JS and use URLDecoder.decode() in server Java side works.


Example:

  • Javascript:

    $.getJSON(
        url,
        {
            "user": encodeURI(JSON.stringify(user))
        },
        onSuccess
    );
    
  • Java:

    java.net.URLDecoder.decode(params.user, "UTF-8");

How can I pass arguments to a batch file?

To refer to a set variable in command line you would need to use %a% so for example:

set a=100 
echo %a%  
rem output = 100 

Note: This works for Windows 7 pro.

How can I play sound in Java?

I'm surprised nobody suggested using Applet. Use Applet. You'll have to supply the beep audio file as a wav file, but it works. I tried this on Ubuntu:

package javaapplication2;

import java.applet.Applet;
import java.applet.AudioClip;
import java.io.File;
import java.net.MalformedURLException;
import java.net.URL;

public class JavaApplication2 {

    public static void main(String[] args) throws MalformedURLException {
        File file = new File("/path/to/your/sounds/beep3.wav");
        URL url = null;
        if (file.canRead()) {url = file.toURI().toURL();}
        System.out.println(url);
        AudioClip clip = Applet.newAudioClip(url);
        clip.play();
        System.out.println("should've played by now");
    }
}
//beep3.wav was available from: http://www.pacdv.com/sounds/interface_sound_effects/beep-3.wav

Filtering collections in C#

List<T> has a FindAll method that will do the filtering for you and return a subset of the list.

MSDN has a great code example here: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa701359(VS.80).aspx

EDIT: I wrote this before I had a good understanding of LINQ and the Where() method. If I were to write this today i would probably use the method Jorge mentions above. The FindAll method still works if you're stuck in a .NET 2.0 environment though.

What is the best way to connect and use a sqlite database from C#

Another way of using SQLite database in NET Framework is to use Fluent-NHibernate.
[It is NET module which wraps around NHibernate (ORM module - Object Relational Mapping) and allows to configure NHibernate programmatically (without XML files) with the fluent pattern.]

Here is the brief 'Getting started' description how to do this in C# step by step:

https://github.com/jagregory/fluent-nhibernate/wiki/Getting-started

It includes a source code as an Visual Studio project.

How can I measure the similarity between two images?

You can use Siamese Network to see if the two images are similar or dissimilar following this tutorial. This tutorial cluster the similar images whereas you can use L2 distance to measure the similarity of two images.

Insert into ... values ( SELECT ... FROM ... )

Claude Houle's answer: should work fine, and you can also have multiple columns and other data as well:

INSERT INTO table1 ( column1, column2, someInt, someVarChar )
SELECT  table2.column1, table2.column2, 8, 'some string etc.'
FROM    table2
WHERE   table2.ID = 7;

I've only used this syntax with Access, SQL 2000/2005/Express, MySQL, and PostgreSQL, so those should be covered. It should also work with SQLite3.

Best programming based games

I have to give a shout out to RobotWar which was the first programming "game" that I played way back in the Apple II days. It was written by Silas Warner of Castle Wolfenstein fame.

Copy/duplicate database without using mysqldump

I don't really know what you mean by "local access". But for that solution you need to be able to access over ssh the server to copy the files where is database is stored.

I cannot use mysqldump, because my database is big (7Go, mysqldump fail) If the version of the 2 mysql database is too different it might not work, you can check your mysql version using mysql -V.

1) Copy the data from your remote server to your local computer (vps is the alias to your remote server, can be replaced by [email protected])

ssh vps:/etc/init.d/mysql stop
scp -rC vps:/var/lib/mysql/ /tmp/var_lib_mysql
ssh vps:/etc/init.d/apache2 start

2) Import the data copied on your local computer

/etc/init.d/mysql stop
sudo chown -R mysql:mysql /tmp/var_lib_mysql
sudo nano /etc/mysql/my.cnf
-> [mysqld]
-> datadir=/tmp/var_lib_mysql
/etc/init.d/mysql start

If you have a different version, you may need to run

/etc/init.d/mysql stop
mysql_upgrade -u root -pPASSWORD --force #that step took almost 1hrs
/etc/init.d/mysql start

Delete all but the most recent X files in bash

find . -maxdepth 1 -type f -printf '%T@ %p\0' | sort -r -z -n | awk 'BEGIN { RS="\0"; ORS="\0"; FS="" } NR > 5 { sub("^[0-9]*(.[0-9]*)? ", ""); print }' | xargs -0 rm -f

Requires GNU find for -printf, and GNU sort for -z, and GNU awk for "\0", and GNU xargs for -0, but handles files with embedded newlines or spaces.

What is the best free memory leak detector for a C/C++ program and its plug-in DLLs?

I personally use Visual Leak Detector, though it can cause large delays when large blocks are leaked (it displays the contents of the entire leaked block).

Python module for converting PDF to text

Repurposing the pdf2txt.py code that comes with pdfminer; you can make a function that will take a path to the pdf; optionally, an outtype (txt|html|xml|tag) and opts like the commandline pdf2txt {'-o': '/path/to/outfile.txt' ...}. By default, you can call:

convert_pdf(path)

A text file will be created, a sibling on the filesystem to the original pdf.

def convert_pdf(path, outtype='txt', opts={}):
    import sys
    from pdfminer.pdfinterp import PDFResourceManager, PDFPageInterpreter, process_pdf
    from pdfminer.converter import XMLConverter, HTMLConverter, TextConverter, TagExtractor
    from pdfminer.layout import LAParams
    from pdfminer.pdfparser import PDFDocument, PDFParser
    from pdfminer.pdfdevice import PDFDevice
    from pdfminer.cmapdb import CMapDB

    outfile = path[:-3] + outtype
    outdir = '/'.join(path.split('/')[:-1])

    debug = 0
    # input option
    password = ''
    pagenos = set()
    maxpages = 0
    # output option
    codec = 'utf-8'
    pageno = 1
    scale = 1
    showpageno = True
    laparams = LAParams()
    for (k, v) in opts:
        if k == '-d': debug += 1
        elif k == '-p': pagenos.update( int(x)-1 for x in v.split(',') )
        elif k == '-m': maxpages = int(v)
        elif k == '-P': password = v
        elif k == '-o': outfile = v
        elif k == '-n': laparams = None
        elif k == '-A': laparams.all_texts = True
        elif k == '-D': laparams.writing_mode = v
        elif k == '-M': laparams.char_margin = float(v)
        elif k == '-L': laparams.line_margin = float(v)
        elif k == '-W': laparams.word_margin = float(v)
        elif k == '-O': outdir = v
        elif k == '-t': outtype = v
        elif k == '-c': codec = v
        elif k == '-s': scale = float(v)
    #
    CMapDB.debug = debug
    PDFResourceManager.debug = debug
    PDFDocument.debug = debug
    PDFParser.debug = debug
    PDFPageInterpreter.debug = debug
    PDFDevice.debug = debug
    #
    rsrcmgr = PDFResourceManager()
    if not outtype:
        outtype = 'txt'
        if outfile:
            if outfile.endswith('.htm') or outfile.endswith('.html'):
                outtype = 'html'
            elif outfile.endswith('.xml'):
                outtype = 'xml'
            elif outfile.endswith('.tag'):
                outtype = 'tag'
    if outfile:
        outfp = file(outfile, 'w')
    else:
        outfp = sys.stdout
    if outtype == 'txt':
        device = TextConverter(rsrcmgr, outfp, codec=codec, laparams=laparams)
    elif outtype == 'xml':
        device = XMLConverter(rsrcmgr, outfp, codec=codec, laparams=laparams, outdir=outdir)
    elif outtype == 'html':
        device = HTMLConverter(rsrcmgr, outfp, codec=codec, scale=scale, laparams=laparams, outdir=outdir)
    elif outtype == 'tag':
        device = TagExtractor(rsrcmgr, outfp, codec=codec)
    else:
        return usage()

    fp = file(path, 'rb')
    process_pdf(rsrcmgr, device, fp, pagenos, maxpages=maxpages, password=password)
    fp.close()
    device.close()

    outfp.close()
    return

Get OS-level system information

Hey you can do this with java/com integration. By accessing WMI features you can get all the information.

How do I get the full url of the page I am on in C#

I usually use Request.Url.ToString() to get the full url (including querystring), no concatenation required.

Is Java "pass-by-reference" or "pass-by-value"?

Java always passes parameters by value.
All object references in Java are passed by value. This means that a copy of the value will be passed to a method. But the trick is that passing a copy of the value also changes the real value of the object.

Please refer to the below example,

public class ObjectReferenceExample {

    public static void main(String... doYourBest) {
            Student student = new Student();
            transformIntoHomer(student);
            System.out.println(student.name);
    }

    static void transformIntoDuleepa(Student student) {
            student.name = "Duleepa";
    }
}
class Student {
    String name;
}

In this case, it will be Duleepa!
The reason is that Java object variables are simply references that point to real objects in the memory heap. Therefore, even though Java passes parameters to methods by value, if the variable points to an object reference, the real object will also be changed.

What are the differences between a HashMap and a Hashtable in Java?

  • HashTable is synchronized, if you are using it in a single thread you can use HashMap, which is an unsynchronized version. Unsynchronized objects are often a little more performant. By the way if multiple threads access a HashMap concurrently, and at least one of the threads modifies the map structurally, it must be synchronized externally. Youn can wrap a unsynchronized map in a synchronized one using :

    Map m = Collections.synchronizedMap(new HashMap(...));
    
  • HashTable can only contain non-null object as a key or as a value. HashMap can contain one null key and null values.

  • The iterators returned by Map are fail-fast, if the map is structurally modified at any time after the iterator is created, in any way except through the iterator's own remove method, the iterator will throw a ConcurrentModificationException. Thus, in the face of concurrent modification, the iterator fails quickly and cleanly, rather than risking arbitrary, non-deterministic behavior at an undetermined time in the future. Whereas the Enumerations returned by Hashtable's keys and elements methods are not fail-fast.

  • HashTable and HashMap are member of the Java Collections Framework (since Java 2 platform v1.2, HashTable was retrofitted to implement the Map interface).

  • HashTable is considered legacy code, the documentation advise to use ConcurrentHashMap in place of Hashtable if a thread-safe highly-concurrent implementation is desired.

  • HashMap doesn't guarantee the order in which elements are returned. For HashTable I guess it's the same but I'm not entirely sure, I don't find ressource that clearly state that.

What is the command to truncate a SQL Server log file?

if I remember well... in query analyzer or equivalent:

BACKUP LOG  databasename  WITH TRUNCATE_ONLY

DBCC SHRINKFILE (  databasename_Log, 1)

How to tell which disk Windows Used to Boot

Unless C: is not the drive that windows booted from.
Parse the %SystemRoot% variable, it contains the location of the windows folder (i.e. c:\windows).

Force unmount of NFS-mounted directory

Try running

lsof | grep /mnt/data

That should list any process that is accessing /mnt/data that would prevent it from being unmounted.

How do you beta test an iphone app?

Note that there is a distinction between traditional "beta testing" which is done by professional QA engineers, and "public beta testing" which is releasing your product to the public before it's ready : )

You can do "beta testing" -- loading to specific iPhones/iPods your testers will be using. You can't do "public beta testing" -- pre-releasing to the public.

How to find a Java Memory Leak

Questioner here, I have got to say getting a tool that does not take 5 minutes to answer any click makes it a lot easier to find potential memory leaks.

Since people are suggesting several tools ( I only tried visual wm since I got that in the JDK and JProbe trial ) I though I should suggest a free / open source tool built on the Eclipse platform, the Memory Analyzer (sometimes referenced as the SAP memory analyzer) available on http://www.eclipse.org/mat/ .

What is really cool about this tool is that it indexed the heap dump when I first opened it which allowed it to show data like retained heap without waiting 5 minutes for each object (pretty much all operations were tons faster than the other tools I tried).

When you open the dump, the first screen shows you a pie chart with the biggest objects (counting retained heap) and one can quickly navigate down to the objects that are to big for comfort. It also has a Find likely leak suspects which I reccon can come in handy, but since the navigation was enough for me I did not really get into it.