What version control system is really most popular? Not in terms of getting mentioned on blogs, but in real-world terms of jobs?
Source: this HN comment, though I added CVS to the mix.
What version control system is really most popular? Not in terms of getting mentioned on blogs, but in real-world terms of jobs?
Source: this HN comment, though I added CVS to the mix.
As usual with Android, getting started on a process usually involves a few hiccups. Here is a complete list of the steps it took for me to get started with deploying apps directly to my Android phone from my Windows development box.
Incidentally, I had some trouble getting my PC to recognize the Android over USB initially. It took a few minutes for me to realize that the power adapter for my USB hub had come unplugged.
Several sites are selling Arduino “basic starter kits” for around $55. That’s not a bad deal, but they tack on around ten dollars in shipping! These kits generally include:
I put together my own bundle on Amazon, with free shipping, which costs significantly less:
The total price was $42.84, with free shipping. I saved $22, and the only things missing are a USB cable and some wire jumpers for the breadboard. I have a $2 roll of solid core wire from the local electronics shop for jumpers, and who doesn’t have USB cables laying around?
If you really want purpose-built jumper wires, I have read good things about the NKC Electronics 70 pack ($4.95 + $4.75 S/H) and the CanaKit Premium 30-pack ($7.95 + a whopping $12.52 S/H) looks like it has very high-quality, rectangular connectors.
I installed the Android SDK and the Eclipse IDE for Java and Report Developers, but when I tried to create a new project, the Build Target list was empty.
I had already followed the instructions given in this newsgroup post:
Unfortunately, I still had no targets available in Eclipse. It turned out that problem was that I had no path configured in Eclipse for the Android SDK! This should have been obvious, since when I selected Window | Android SDK and AVD Manager, Eclipse complained that no path was set, but since I always lauched the SDK & AVD Manager from a command prompt, I never received the error dialog. The solution was to open Window | Preferences and browse to C:\Program Files (x86)\Android\android-sdk, then press Apply:
This post describes how I fixed my Wake-On-LAN problem using the powercfg tool. My Toshiba Satellite A505-S6986 wouldn’t respond to magic packets sent over the network.
Before using powercfg, I first checked the following:
Even with these settings configured properly, my laptop still wouldn’t respond to magic packets.
First, I opened a command prompt as administrator. A regular user doesn’t have the access rights to change power options.
Then, I checked to see if the LAN adapter is in the list of devices which can wake Windows:
C:\Windows\system32>powercfg -devicequery wake_armed HID Keyboard Device (002) HID-compliant mouse (001) Logitech USB Wheel Mouse (004)
The Ethernet adapter isn’t in there, so I looked at the list of wake-programmable devices in order to find out the name of my LAN adapter:
C:\Windows\system32>powercfg -devicequery wake_programmable HID-compliant device Realtek PCIe FE Family Controller <=== LAN adapter HID Keyboard Device (002) TOSHIBA Software Modem HID-compliant mouse (001) HID-compliant consumer control device (001) Logitech USB Wheel Mouse (004)
Finally, I enabled wake for my Ethernet device, using the name "Realtex PCIe FE Family Controller":
C:\Windows\system32>powercfg -deviceenablewake "Realtek PCIe FE Family Controller"
(if you see an error like, "Invalid Parameters -- try "/?" for help," it most likely means that you mistyped the device name)
I am now able to wake my laptop from sleep and hibernate modes using the Wake On Lan app for my Android device.
As a long-time Windows/C++ developer, I’m curious to know what technologies are in demand. I’ve personally used Dice.com almost exclusively in the past, but they don’t provide a good interface for viewing job trends. Indeed.com is an aggregating website which compiles results from multiple job-posting sites. It provides a very nice interface for graphing job trends.
Comparing Java, C++, and C#, it appears that there are a tremendous number of Java jobs, while C# and C++ are vying for around the same percentage of total job listings:
Of course, C++ development on *nix is often a very different beast from C++ on Microsoft Windows, and transition between the two can be problematic. If we ignore Java and add a trend line for Windows C++, it becomes clear that C++ on Windows is steadily declining, while by comparison C# is exploding:
I was curious how this compares to data sourced solely from Dice.com. Since they don’t provide any sort of trend interface, I wrote a script which feeds Dice data into the Google Charts API each week:
The “iTunes COM SDK for Windows” archive from the Apple Developer Center contains files which are marked as encrypted. Shortly after extracting the files to my libraries folder, I was surprised to receive a popup dialog from Windows 7, “Encrypting File System,” which prompted me to back up my encryption certificate and key:
I used CIPHER.EXE to verify that the only encrypted contents on the volume were those of the Apple download:
C:\lib>cipher /u /n Encrypted File(s) on your system: C:\lib\24460_itunescomwindowssdk\iTunesCOMWindowsSDK\.DS_Store C:\lib\24460_itunescomwindowssdk\iTunesCOMWindowsSDK\iTunesCOM.chm C:\lib\24460_itunescomwindowssdk\iTunesCOMWindowsSDK\iTunesCOMInterface.h C:\lib\24460_itunescomwindowssdk\iTunesCOMWindowsSDK\iTunesCOMInterface_i.c C:\lib\24460_itunescomwindowssdk\iTunesCOMWindowsSDK\LicenseAgreement.rtf C:\lib\24460_itunescomwindowssdk\iTunesCOMWindowsSDK\ReadMe.rtf C:\lib\24460_itunescomwindowssdk\iTunesCOMWindowsSDK\SampleScripts\.DS_Store C:\lib\24460_itunescomwindowssdk\iTunesCOMWindowsSDK\SampleScripts\CreateAlbumPlaylists.js C:\lib\24460_itunescomwindowssdk\iTunesCOMWindowsSDK\SampleScripts\RemoveDeadTracks.js C:\lib\24460_itunescomwindowssdk\iTunesCOMWindowsSDK\SampleScripts\RemoveUserPlaylists.js C:\lib\24460_itunescomwindowssdk\__MACOSX\._iTunesCOMWindowsSDK C:\lib\24460_itunescomwindowssdk\__MACOSX\iTunesCOMWindowsSDK\._.DS_Store C:\lib\24460_itunescomwindowssdk\__MACOSX\iTunesCOMWindowsSDK\._iTunesCOM.chm C:\lib\24460_itunescomwindowssdk\__MACOSX\iTunesCOMWindowsSDK\._iTunesCOMInterface.h C:\lib\24460_itunescomwindowssdk\__MACOSX\iTunesCOMWindowsSDK\._iTunesCOMInterface_i.c C:\lib\24460_itunescomwindowssdk\__MACOSX\iTunesCOMWindowsSDK\._LicenseAgreement.rtf C:\lib\24460_itunescomwindowssdk\__MACOSX\iTunesCOMWindowsSDK\._ReadMe.rtf C:\lib\24460_itunescomwindowssdk\__MACOSX\iTunesCOMWindowsSDK\._SampleScripts C:\lib\24460_itunescomwindowssdk\__MACOSX\iTunesCOMWindowsSDK\SampleScripts\._.DS_Store C:\lib\24460_itunescomwindowssdk\__MACOSX\iTunesCOMWindowsSDK\SampleScripts\._CreateAlbumPlaylists.js C:\lib\24460_itunescomwindowssdk\__MACOSX\iTunesCOMWindowsSDK\SampleScripts\._RemoveDeadTracks.js C:\lib\24460_itunescomwindowssdk\__MACOSX\iTunesCOMWindowsSDK\SampleScripts\._RemoveUserPlaylists.js
To fix this, I opened the properties for the iTunesCOMWindowsSDK folder, selected the General tab, clicked Advanced, and unselected “Encrypt contents to secure data”:
The Apple iTunes SDK (“iTunes COM SDK for Windows”) is astonishingly difficult to find. It can be found on the Dowloads & ADC Program Assets (connect.apple.com) page. In the “Downloads” box on the right, click on “Developer Tools,” then search the page for “iTunes COM SDK for Windows.”
The irritating thing is that there seems to be no direct path from the Apple Developer’s Center to this “Downloads & ADC Program Assets” page.
If you’re looking for domain registration/DNS reviews, you probably know how hard it is to find pages that aren’t just poorly concealed spam or astroturfing ‘affiliates’. While for a registration option better than GoDaddy, I found a bunch of suggestions on Hacker News, in this post from 2008. Hacker News is a social bookmarking site targeted at tech startup entrepreneurs. Its users tend to be technically proficient, and it has an extremely high signal-to-noise ratio in its comments.
To create this table, I simply read through the comments and added each recommended registrar. The ‘upvotes’ column represents the tally of upvotes received by comments which mentioned the registrar in a positive light. The ‘negatives’ column reflects the number of upvotes received by comments about the registrar which were generally negative. This is by no means a precision ranking method, but it should provide a reasonable summary.
‘Privacy’ refers to whether the registrar offers private registration. ICANN rules dictate that a current address be listed, which creates obvious privacy concerns. This can be avoided by (technically) legally transferring the domain name to a 3rd party, which is referred to as “domain privacy,” “private registration,” or some other, proprietary term.
The pricing column data are correct, to the best of my knowledge, as of March, 2011.
Update September 7, 2011: This HN comment indicates that Name.com has some evil in their Registration Agreement. They automatically park your new domain, serve up their own ads, but make you legally responsible for the content of those ads.
Name | Upvotes | Negatives | Base Cost | Privacy |
---|---|---|---|---|
EasyDNS | 24 | 0 | $19 / yr | ? (spam guard is mentioned) |
NearlyFreeSpeech.NET | 12 | 0 | $8.99 / yr | $0.01 / day (approx $3.65 per year) (plus possible document/voicemail forwarding fees, normally don't apply) "RespectMyPrivacy" |
Dynadot | 11 | 1 | $9.75 / yr | $2 / yr |
Namecheap | 35 | 6 | $10.16 / yr (price varies by TLD) | $2.88 / yr "WhoisGuard" |
1&1 | 14 | 4 (sort of) | $8.99 / yr | Free? |
Google (sort of) | 5 | 0 | $10 / yr | No? |
DynDNS | 3 | 0 | $15 / yr | $9.95 / yr ("Secret Registration") |
Gandi | 6 | 0 | $15 / yr | Free |
DirectNIC | 4 | 4 | $15 / yr | $5 / yr ("directPrivacy") |
Joker | 6 | 0 | $12.80 / yr | No? |
Name.com (also Domainsite.com) | 3 | 1 | $9.99 / yr | Free? |
Register 4 Less | 1 | 0 | ? | ? |
Yahoo! Domains | 4 | 0 | $9.95 / yr | $9.00 / yr |
Netfirms | 1 | 0 | $7.99 / yr | Free |
Domain Monger | 1 | 0 | $17 | ? |
DreamHost | 11 | 1 | ? Included in hosting plan? | Free |
GoDaddy (aka Domains By Proxy) | 7 | 2 here, here | $11.99 / yr | $9.99 / yr |
id3v2 is a powerful command line tool for editing MP3 ID3 tags. Getting it to compile on Windows under Cygwin, though, took a bit of effort.
For the convenience of others, here is id3v2 0.1.12 compiled under Cygwin. It depends upon Cygwin and Cygwin’s zlib package.