Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Computing/2007 April 9

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[edit] April 9

[edit] MAC vs. Mac

This may be better suited to the language desk though it's computer related so I'm trying here... Why do people, who in my experience are generally not Apple Mac buyers/users, call Macs "MACS"? It's not an abbreviation acronym and never has been. So why do people capitalize it? Dismas|(talk) 02:27, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

I'm thinking it's three letters (like file extensions) and doesn't seem to mean anything at first glance, so it sounds to them like it should be an abbreviation acronym. And I've seen a few Mac users call them MACs :P -- Consumed Crustacean (talk) 02:51, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
I don't know about them, but MAC capitalized means MAC address to me, so the computers are Macs. Maybe they think it's like IBM and HP etc. --Wirbelwindヴィルヴェルヴィント (talk) 04:02, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
It's not supposed to be capitalized, whenever I se it I think MAC Address, too.--Ryan 16:13, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
I am both a MAC and a Win user, and I capitalize MAC, probably for the reason that Wirbelwind says. I don't capitalize Win, though. ScouseMouse - スカウサーUK! 00:23, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Hooking up N64 to PC

I have question. You see, I have a site for a Nintendo 64 game. The only problem is that it has no game pictures, and it wold be unethical to steal images of Google Image search. So I thought I may hook my system up to my computer to take screenshots. But how do I do this? Ftw I have both a MacBook Pro with Vista and Leopard beta. I also have an HP Pavilion a814x desktop computer (which I would prefer to use). How do I hook it up, or if that not possible, how do I take screenshots on it in general? Thank you. --TV-VCR watch 04:12, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

You need a TV / video capture card that can accept composite or coaxial or whatever type of video output you have from the N64. That, or an emulator along with the appropriate ROM. -- Consumed Crustacean (talk) 04:21, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
My desktop has NVIDIA GeForce4 MX 4000. Laptop has ATI Mobility Radeon X1600 256 MiB GDDR3. Or if neither work, where may I find a free emulator? Thank you. --TV-VCR watch 04:50, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
The best N64 emulator currently is Project64. Concerning ROMs, you are on your own, but in theory it's not illegal to own ROM copies of the games you phisically own, in case you are wondering. --Sn0wflake 05:01, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
You would probably know if either of those were the TV tuner versions; it would say somewhere, and they might have come with an input cable or have extra ports for input. As for ROMS: there are (somewhat expensive) devices to copy them off of the carts, and there are websites/P2P networks/"etc." that distribute them. The legality of the latter method is, indeed, not happy. -- Consumed Crustacean (talk) 05:08, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
Does ROM mean the game cartridge? If that is so, I own the game in question, San Francisco Rush 2049. :D --TV-VCR watch 05:11, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
It refers to the data on the cartridge, which you need off of the cartridge and on your computer to use with an emulator. It's possibly legal to download the ROM file off of some site if you own the actual game, but I can't provide legal advice here :P. It's not ethically wrong. (And as an aside, I used to own that. Fun game :D) -- Consumed Crustacean (talk) 05:15, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
I will download the P64 program, and contact if I have any questions. Thanks. --TV-VCR watch 05:19, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
Well now I have a question! How do I get the ROM onto my computer to use in in Project 64 v1.6? --TV-VCR watch 05:30, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
Again, you need either to use a somewhat expensive device to do so, or simply search for and download a ROM that someone else has ripped. The latter is of questionable legality, though it may or may not be okay if you own the actual cart. -- Consumed Crustacean (talk) 05:36, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
I am confused! Where may I find a ROM to download of SFR49? Or what is this device you speak of? --TV-VCR watch 05:44, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
Well, I lol'd! I searched for one and found one instantly! It is downloading as I type this, but my, it is 16.2 megabytes, and I am still using dialup while waiting for my DSL to activate! This may take a while. T_T --TV-VCR watch 05:49, 9 April 2007 (UTC)


It's common misconception that you can dl a ROM if you own the cartridge. In reality, the only ROMs you can legally own are those you ripped yourself from cartridges you legally owned and still legally own. Although we are not supposed to give legal advice here, I figured making you more worried as opposed to less could never hurt. ;) Chris M. 14:54, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
This is likely to depend on the jurisdiction, and in many if not most of them, on the specific interpretation a judge might arrive at when and if such a case ever came up. The specific circumstances, where a person in possession of a legal copy of a work would find it more convenient to download a second copy off the net than to simply copy his own are sufficiently recent, and even today sufficiently uncommon, that there are likely to be few precedents or statutes explicitly addressing the issue. In any case, in practice the legality might end up depending on secondary issues, such as what purpose the copy was downloaded for, whether the downloaded copy was identical to the original, whether the original was deliberately copy-protected rather than merely incidentally difficult to copy, whether the user had accepted any EULAs, whether said EULAs actually are legal and enforceable or not, and, perhaps most importantly, on whether the download was made through a file-sharing application that would simultaneously upload the content to third parties. In short, "it depends." —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 02:32, 10 April 2007 (UTC)
It would nice if people just accepted that the final user is allowed to have a backup copy of a legitimately owned game. There will certainly be no legal case made against somebody due to the person merely owning a ROM version of a N64 game that ceased being produced over a decade ago, and if by some disturbingly impossible event that actually happens, I highly doubt soke kind of header check of the cart versus ROM or whatever will be made. So to the person who started the question, legalese aside, just go ahead and download the game. We cannot point you where, though. That would be ilegal. --Sn0wflake 06:40, 10 April 2007 (UTC)
Why must all technical questions about file ripping/sharing be turned into arguments about the legalities? Why can't we just stay on topic, and assume that anyone who's going to commit (what might be ruled as) a copyright violation has weighed the risks? NeonMerlin 18:52, 11 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Movies in ppt

Hey, I'm trying to put a movie in powerpoint and it won't work! I hit the Insert>Movies and Sounds>Movie from File... and the thing won't work. I mean, it doesn't even show up on the "Undo" drop list. Is there anything I can do? --JDitto 04:21, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Laptop keyboard - stuck key

I replaced my enter key. It previously worked OK without the little metal bar but I found it today and wanted to make the edges work well when I hit them (the bar makes it so that when you hit the edges it registers with equal weight as in the center). Well I tried with and without it and the key is stuck - it pops up a fraction of an inch, works, but won't pop up all the way. Laptop is a DV1000 series. Got suggestions? -Wooty Woot? contribs 06:27, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

It sounds like the tiny spring isn't able to push the key up any more, possibly due to the added weight of the metal bar. Can you find a stronger spring with the same dimensions and substitute it in ? StuRat 06:34, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
The thing is, it doesn't work even without the metal bar! I haven't messed with the button ("nipple" is the best way to describe it) but as a last resort that's an option. I just had a thought: perhaps the force of pushing it in rather misaligned the spring inside, so it no longer is pushing back on the key. Of course, this is just a hypothesis at this point. -Wooty Woot? contribs 06:50, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
Yes, that's possible, but this misalignment might have bent the spring beyond it's elastic limit, in which case it will permanently be weakened. In any case, I believe you need to pry that key off and see what's going on underneath. You could "borrow" a good spring from some key you never use (like "scroll lock", in my case). StuRat 18:22, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
There are too interlocking rectangles above the key "nipple" that I can't remove. I think either I'll glue the back of the key to the "nipple" (it works fine if I don't press and click it in) or replace the keyboard, since I can't get inside. -Wooty Woot? contribs 23:22, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
OK, sounds like a plan. In the meantime, you can probably use the enter key on numeric keypad. StuRat 05:06, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Beginner's use of a database

I have an XML file that is a database formatted for MySQL. Each record has, among other fields, a name and three fields called HD, CR and LA. HD will contain a number (usually an integer, but occasionally a fraction with a '/' separating the sides) followed by a 'd' and some other text; the number before the 'd' is the part I'm interested in. CR will always be an integer, and LA will be either an integer or a dash (a dash is distinct from zero). What I'd like to do is create a table whose four columns are name, HD, CR and LA and copy it into OpenOffice.org Calc. Can I do this in OpenOffice.org Base, or straight in Calc? If so, how? (Base doesn't even recognize XML files as databases when I use the Open command, and there's no Import or Insert File command that I can see.) NeonMerlin 06:36, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

You could of course load it into MySQL and do an appropriate select statement to get it into a format that Calc will recognize, but a quick Perl hack might do. If the record you describe looks like:

<record name="some name" hd="42/19dSomeOtherText" cr="99" la="-">

Then a one-liner as below should give you a comma-separated values file that Calc can grok. --TotoBaggins 14:06, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

perl -wnle '@fields=qw(name hd cr la); for $field (@fields) { ($h{$field}) = / $field="([^"]+)"/ or next LINE } $h{hd} =~ s/d.*//; print join ",", @h{@fields}'  <  db.xml  > db.csv
Unfortunately, the fields aren't parameters, but child tags of the record tags, like this:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1"?>
<ms>
 <m>
  <name>Example</name>
   :
   : other fields
   :
  <hd>38d10 (xyz)</hd>
  <cr>22</cr>
  <la>-</la>
 </m>
</ms>

NeonMerlin 22:04, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

How about importing XML into MySQL and then exporting in csv format? Im sure PhpMyAdmin can export in csv, and Calc would have to accept csv. Shinhan 11:56, 10 April 2007 (UTC)
In keeping with the perl one-liner theme, this rather dirty one should work for the example you just posted. It assumes that each record is within <m></m> tags:
perl -wle '$_=join("",<>); print "$1,$2,$3,$4" while (m#<m>.+?<name>(.+?)</name>.+?<hd>(.+?)d.+?<cr>(.+?)</cr>.+?<la>(.+?)</la>.+?</m>#smg)' <db.xml >db.csv
Johnnykimble 12:12, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Limewire not working

Lately when I try to open limewire, nothing comes up. I keep clicking and clicking and nothing's happening! What should I do? --124.181.241.101 06:59, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

Sure it's not loading behind your windows? (it doesn't automatically go on top). Also check ctrl-alt-del and make sure only one copy is running. -Wooty Woot? contribs 07:06, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
Limewire plugs your computer up with lots of malware/adware. Try something else? − Twas Now ( talk • contribs • e-mail ) 07:07, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
Not true, Limewire is malware-free. -Wooty Woot? contribs 07:21, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
Try Phex if you want to keep using the Gnutella network. NeonMerlin 18:40, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
Hey it's working for me. I have 4.9.33. Btw, you should also try Ares Galaxy. It's free (opensource), and it's good. --Hirak 99 07:35, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
I miss the days of Audiogalaxy. − Twas Now ( talk • contribs • e-mail ) 17:28, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
Uninstall Limewire and install Shareaza, Shareaza is free software, can access the limewire network (Gnutella) plus the Gnutella2 network plus the eDonkey network, all simultaneously Glover 07:53, 11 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] ~$ on Microsoft Word documents

Hi, When I save certain documents (in Word it seems to be randomly), it creates a hidden file, the name of which is the saved document's filename but with the first two letters of that filename replaced with ~$. Does anyone know what this is or why it happens? Thanks very much, Bioarchie1234 08:59, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

I believe it is a backup. Try opening it to see. -Wooty Woot? contribs 09:03, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
When I try to open it it says the program needs a converter to open this. When I say yes it takes ages doing nothing and when I say no another conversion thing comes up but it wants to use Japanese (Shift-JIS). If it is a backup is it safe to delete? Thanks. Bioarchie1234 09:13, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
It's a temp file, not a backup. It's created when you work on a file without saving it, or when the file is so large that it needs to save itself more often than your regular saves. I get lots of them when I am working with my really big (200 pages) tables. I mean lots, like a dozen during a sitting, despite saving regularly and often. It's nothing to worry about. Anchoress 09:17, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
Yes, that's right. You can delete them after closing your Word document if they don't delete themselves. JoshHolloway 09:53, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
There's an MSKB article for this: Description of how Word creates temporary files. The '~' sign is the standard sign for the temporary file. The '$' sign indicates the file is an owner file. See the owner file section in the article. Johnnykimble 11:42, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
Thanks for your help! Bioarchie1234 10:39, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] LINUX open source sponsoring

Any idea how the linux community churns out latest versions and updates for their software?Are there any sponsors?Any if they are volunteers, they are really really helpful people i guess...210.212.194.209

I don't know of any distros that have sponsers. Slackware from what I've read, pays for their CDs, web site bandwidth, and other expenses with the money they get from selling hard copies of their distro, Slackware books, and t-shirts. The software, AFAIK, is written by volunteers though. Dismas|(talk) 10:02, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
Some major developers of key projects are actually employed by companies that have significant interest in open source software. This allows these developers to work full time on the projects that said companies make revenue off of. -- mattb @ 2007-04-09T16:01Z
The people behind Ubuntu offer bounties for some development tasks, but most of the software in Linux distributions is from unpaid volunteers. Johnnykimble 08:56, 10 April 2007 (UTC)
Fedora's Core developers are RedHat employies and then I think there just a group of volunteers who help code translate and document. A lot of FSF software is used in Linux (or should I say GNU/Linux) and the FSF has lots of sponsors (I think google is one). --Lwarf 09:53, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] DVD BURN

I burnt two sessions on a DVD-R. The two sessions can be read on the same computer, but not on my home computer running XP, and only one session on Win98.Any idea why??~~ —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 210.212.194.209 (talk) 10:07, 9 April 2007 (UTC).

I'm not sure why, but the same type of thing happens to me. StuRat 18:14, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

Tons o things come into play here, one thing could be the book type you used when burning the DVD in question. It is preferable to use DVD-ROM book type for higher compatibility, also if burning with Nero (sorry if you don't like its the first that comes to mind) then you can also check a check box for higher compatibility. Then you have to check the speed, despite how many times people may argue this, older DVD-ROM's are sometimes bad at reading new technology read: Dual Layer (DVD9), and it's higher technologies, and higher speeds come into play as well. Next some DVD-ROM's if they're not burners themselves, will have problems reading more than 1 session. If the DVD is not finalized will also cause non-burners to not pick up the info. One last tip is disabling Windows Burn feature for some odd reason cures this sometimes. To disable it Right click on the burner, select properties,and select the recording tab and disable it. Hope this helps. 200.12.231.42 22:29, 9 April 2007 (UTC) Ag for MemTech

[edit] Samba asymmetrical speeds

I have a 'nix computer and a Windows XP SP2 box, with a share on the XP box. Downloads are nice and quick, yet uploading only takes place at about 15k/s. Is this an inherent Samba thing or what's going on? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 58.163.129.56 (talk) 10:56, 9 April 2007 (UTC).

All I can say is that it should be the same both ways, whether copying from the 'nix box to XP share or the other way round. It certainly shouldn't be as slow as 15kB/s (kilobytes). You are talking about transfers over your LAN and not the Internet? Obviously if you were talking about internet transfers, 15kB/s is a pretty normal upload speed. With many cable\DSL services, the upload is often ~15kB/s (128kb/s), ~30kB/s (256kb/s) or ~60kB/s (512kb/s), while the download speed can be as high as 2mB/s (16mb/s). Johnnykimble 11:36, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
No, this is indeed over the LAN. I've noticed from a little Google search that I'm not the only one with this problem and that there aren't any real solutions posed, so the question is still an open (and interesting) one.
You could take a look and see if there's any odd looking traffic in a trace when you're uploading. You will of course need to know what to look for (and what you're looking at), but if you're familiar enough with network protocols it might be useful. You can use Ethereal to get the trace (it's possibly already on your *nix box). Johnnykimble 11:50, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
The XP box is running NAT for the 'nix box, but I doubt the overheads incurred by NAT would be so great as to swamp the Samba upload.
Do other protocols work correctly? For example, have you tried FTPing between the machines? Johnnykimble 08:53, 10 April 2007 (UTC)
I don't have a lot of time to set up a FTP server now, but I might try that later.
Have you tried:
socket options = TCP_NODELAY SO_RCVBUF=8192 SO_SNDBUF=8192
Glover 05:37, 11 April 2007 (UTC)
That didn't work. The comment options said "Linux" -- is that just an assumption or a Linux-specific optimization (just out of curiosity).

[edit] Full Screen

Hey guys, how would I exit fullscreen in a computer game (Starcraft-I know its old, but its still good) if that option is not available in the game option menu? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 65.93.133.10 (talk) 12:40, 9 April 2007 (UTC).

Usually Alt-Tab will get you out. Or you could try Winkey or Ctrl-Esc. If not, on Windows XP, you could try Ctrl-Alt-Del or Ctrl-Shift-Esc. x42bn6 Talk 12:46, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
Alt-Enter is a common combination to toggle full screen mode in Windows. Johnnykimble 13:23, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
Just plain ESC (escape key) works for some games. StuRat 18:11, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
Some games have a command line option -w for windowed mode. Alt-F4 will just stop the game. Glover 05:10, 11 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Question about bibliographic management software

How do programs like EndNote extract bibliographic information from online databases & library catalogues? 68.40.198.80 12:36, 9 April 2007 (UTC)Susie

Ummm... have you tried EndNote#Operation? --♪♫ ĽąĦĩŘǔ ♫♪ walkie-talkie 16:21, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the quick response. I'm afraid I don't see where the page you mention addresses my specific question. 68.40.198.80 03:57, 11 April 2007 (UTC)Susie

[edit] DVD burner not allowing the burning of DVDs

I have a DVD burner and I never used it to burn DVDs until today. I have a case of 50 blank DVDs and I've tried several. What happens is I put the DVD in the drive, then when I go to move a folder into the drive (as I would when burning a CD), it says "windows encountered a problem when trying to move this folder, what do you want windows to do?" I'm not completly sure if the drivers are correct but I'm also not completely sure where to find the make and model of this drive without opening up the system and unplugging stuff (if that would even work). If that is the only course of action I'll do it but I imagine it's somewhere on the computer, if that is the problem. Not sure what to do, so if someone can give me a hand, I'd appreciate it, thanks! Chris M. 14:32, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

Personally I use Nero Burning ROM for burning, works better for me. Splintercellguy 14:59, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
Any tips on how I can get that? Chris M. 15:34, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
Yeah me too it works nicely. Here, But it's a Trial. I can give you some pirate copies even, but I think promoting such on Wikipeida is not a good idea. --♪♫ ĽąĦĩŘǔ ♫♪ walkie-talkie 16:14, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

Are you sure that your DVD burner is compatible with the DVD blanks that you're trying to use? Aside from the question of DVD-R and DVD+R (different media!), there's also the question of burning speed.

Atlant 16:24, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

Yup, I have a +/- R/RW 16x burner and have 16x discs. Chris M. 17:33, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

The Nero suggestion above is good, but I also wanted to mention why the drag and drop copy doesn't work. I believe some of the older current operating systems (like Windows 98) were written back when computers either didn't have any DVD drives at all or had read-only DVD drives. Thus, the O/S didn't include drag-and-drop DVD burn drivers. This is why you may need to run a separate software product, like Nero, to do copies to the DVD (even though you can copy from the DVD using Windows). Incidentally, I would have expected the DVD burner to come with the required software, such as Nero. You might want to check the box. StuRat 18:08, 9 April 2007 (UTC)


The reason for your error is what StuRat says, windows cannot address anything after the 80 mins on a normal disc. Even WinXP which is slightly newer cannot burn onto DVD's with it's built in burning engine. I do believe Nero now makes Nero Express Lite or something like that for free. You might want to look into that. 200.35.168.129 22:34, 9 April 2007 (UTC) Ag for MemTech


I have winXP and I was burning Data on the CD, not movies, so the time limit isn't an issue, but I'm looking into the Nero Express Lite you mentioned. Chris M. 05:50, 10 April 2007 (UTC)
In order to do a drag 'n' drop to a DVD, you need to have some kind of packet writing driver software running for your DVD burner. For Nero, the specific product is called InCD, there are some others listed in the packet writing article. If you have any kind DVD burning software installed, it might just be a matter of setting the properties on your drive. --LarryMac 13:13, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] acceptance testing

why is acceptance testing important? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 122.167.149.144 (talk) 15:50, 9 April 2007 (UTC).

We have an article for the Acceptance testing. Read it yourself, it will better than asking from someone, isn't it :-) --♪♫ ĽąĦĩŘǔ ♫♪ walkie-talkie 16:04, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
Do your own homework. The reference desk won't give you answers for your homework, although we will try to help you out if there's a specific part of your homework you don't understand. Make an effort to show that you've tried solving it first. JoshHolloway 16:08, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

I'm not sure this is homework, so I will assume good faith and answer.

[Oh, come on, it was clearly a homework question! —Steve Summit (talk) 01:06, 10 April 2007 (UTC)]

Acceptance testing is important because it has the potential to find bugs not found in testing done by programmers. There are many reasons for this:

1) The most ominous is that programmers may intentionally hide a bug they know about.

2) Programmers inevitably see things from a programmer's POV, which often is different from what the customer wants. As a result they may not consider something to be a bug which the customers do. A programmer might say "You wanted the supplier list sorted in alphabetical order ? Why would you want that when it's already sorted by the hexadecimal supplier index number ?".

3) During acceptance testing, realistic use of the program is more likely. While the programmer might have tested the program alone, on a high-end computer, the acceptance tester might have other programs running which they normally would run along side the one being tested, and might use less powerful computers in different configurations, with a different operating system, etc. Some of this is also encountered in integration testing and cross-platform testing, but those tests still may not have the same combo that a real customer is likely to use. StuRat 17:28, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Content Based Image Retrieval

What is the current state of content based image retrieval?

Annevbast 18:13, 9 April 2007 (UTC)annevbast

It is possible to reliably retrieve porn by telling the CBIR to search for images with skin tone color. All joking aside, I wouldn't use any content based image retrieval solution unless your images are a very specific and small image domain. CBIR may be useful for retrieving particular fonts with qualities that you want, for example. But my experience has been that most CBIR systems are pretty much useless if your trying to organize random images semantically.
Source: (I did a lot of reading on this kind of stuff for my CS master's thesis 2 years ago). Root4(one) 18:46, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
This is some very promising recent research. Even got picked up by slashdot. risk 18:35, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Free Video Edit / Subtitle

Hi,

I have a video taken from Sony handycam. I need to add subtitle to it. How can I do that?

Thanks Slmking 20:04, 9 April 2007 (UTC)


Hey Slmking

this is normally a dvd site but feel free to look into it for it provides subtitling info and tutorials www.doom9.org http://www.doom9.org/subtitle_guides.htm i would recomend substation alpha,vobsub, and subrip

Also most editing software for videos has subtitle options in them, i use Sony Vegas for example or sometimes Premiere you can usually get trials for this software to see which best fits your needs. Hope this helps. 200.35.168.129 22:39, 9 April 2007 (UTC) Ag for MemTech

[edit] Free tools for creating PDF file from HTML file with inline TIFF images?

Are there free tools available that can convert an HTML file with inline TIFF images into PDF? A requirement is that the tool must recognize some kind of size specification for the TIFF images. That is, the tool must recognize some form of specification, be it HTML or CSS, or something else, that specifies the scaled size of inline TIFF images (e.g. 4 cm x 5 cm).

(Converting the TIFF images into another format first would be an unattractive option, as the file size penalty would be substantial. The input to the process has a simple structure, so if a freely available tool does the job but takes a different source format, that would be OK, so long as it's relatively easy to convert the source document into that format.)

Thanks. --64.236.170.228 20:32, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

  • Well this may help - cutePDF appears as a printer on your PC, and anything you send to it to get printed it will convert to PDF and ask you where you want to save the file to. The nice thing about it is that it's freeware, opensource, and doesn't watermark itself on any of the documents. So in other words, if you're happy with a PDF of how the page would look like printed, then that's the solution to look out for. I'm not sure about TIFF image support - but if TIFFs can be printed from whatever program you're viewing them in then rest assured it can PDF it. Rfwoolf 03:19, 10 April 2007 (UTC)
Thanks for the response. I'm aware of cutePDF and similar approaches for generating PDF files, but they are not the right solution in this case. To use cutePDF or something similar, you need an application that can handle HTML files with inline TIFF files. Popular browsers don't handle TIFF files, not natively anyway. The TIFF images are in that format because it yields the smallest file sizes by far for the desired quality. Any conversion process must preserve the file size advantage to be useful. I found a non-free solution that, fortunately, only uses tools I already have. Thanks nevertheless. --64.236.170.228 15:42, 11 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Connecting my computer to my TV

My video-card has an S-Video out plug. Can I just connect that to my TV (using a SCART converter, for instance) to use my computer to show video on my TV? Obviously I would have to make a separate connection for the audio, but would it work other than that? Can I use any resolution (which is downscaled to PAL), or will I have to use some special resolution when doing this? --Oskar 20:58, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

Oh, and by the way, I'm using Ubuntu --Oskar 21:06, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
I've no experience of this on Ubuntu unfortunately, but this link looks pretty promising. You don't have to use a scart converter if your TV has a composite connection. In this case you can get an S-Video>Composite cable. On your TV, next to the composite-in, there should be two phono connections, for L and R audio. You can get a lead for this that connects to the 'line out' jack on your sound card. Composite is lower quality than S-Video though, so the converter might be a good idea (but get one that has audio connections on it if possible). Johnnykimble 21:20, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
I actually have a SCART-converter, so that's not really a problem. It has audio-inputs on it (that is, it has a composite video input, a S-Video input and two audio inputs). But is that all it takes, it just works? --Oskar 21:26, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
Eh, yea. That's all you need as far as hardware is concerned. The hurdle is the software though. If you follow the instructions in that link I mentioned, and make the correct changes to your xorg.conf, it should just work. As far as resolution is concerned, you can just pick the one that looks best. On a 28" CRT TV, this is typically 800x600, anything bigger can look too small and blurry. Johnnykimble 21:30, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
Yes I just read that link you provided the second after I posted. I guess it's not that easy :) I looks doable anyway, so I'll experiment with it. Thanks! (I do have windows installed although I almost never used it, so that's a last resort, I guess) --Oskar 21:32, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
Actually, one more other thing I forgot to mention was Macrovision. You might have some issues with the desktop displaying correctly, but any video overlays not showing up on the TV. This is usually to do with the Macrovision protecion on the TV-Out so that you can't record to a VHS tape or other media. In most cases however, you can get software to disable this. Johnnykimble 21:34, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Recommender system

How does the recommender system in Amazon work to provide recommendation to users?

I don't know the exact mechanics but it records the products you buy and those you just look at and then it finds products which are similar. For example if you buy a copy of Season 1 of Battlestar Galactica then it will recommend Season 2 to you. Recommendations normally come with information on the exact reason it's been recommended to you.
The exact algorithm is no doubt a well guarded secret, but considering the amounts of data involved, it would have to be a very fast system. Something that only needs a couple of passes over the set of customer purchases. This is one way: http://www.sigmod.org/vldb/conf/1994/P487.PDF . A very basic method would be to estimate the probability that someone who bought product A, will enjoy product B, P(A|B) by the number of people that bought product A, B and both. The definition of Conditional probability tells us that P(A|B) = P(A and B) / P(B). The probabilities can then be setimated from the number of people who bought the items. So if you bought a Battlestar Galactica DVD, the system can check if you would like an Alias DVD, by calculating P(A and B) = the number of people who bought both DVD's / The total number of customers. And P(B) = the number of people who bought the BSG DVD / the total number of customers. Divide the first by the second, and you have an estimate of the probability that you want to buy Alias. Simply return those products for which that probability is the highest. This is all oversimplified of course, but I would guess that that's the basic principle they use. risk 22:24, 9 April 2007 (UTC) (NB: The first paragraph is an unsigned comment, not mine)


I agree completely with you risk, it's highly probably and likely. Also they do take into consideration key words such as directors,actors,and genre those are used as multipliers i would assume at the final product of risk's formula. it would increase the likelihood of you wanting to purchase it by lets say 1.25 if it had the same actors. that's my 2 cents 200.35.168.129 22:44, 9 April 2007 (UTC) Ag for MemTech

As noted, the specific algorithm used by Amazon is most likely proprietary. We do actually have a (rather stubby) article about recommender systems, and there is more detail, in the collaborative filtering article which the first article references. The latter article also lists quite a few sources that may provide additional information. --LarryMac 12:59, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Climate Change

I am making a research on the environment for my personal use and will like to know some of the basic things such us climent change and things that can be done to save the environment

Manay thaks Benjji

Try typing climate change in the "search" box and clicking on "go". You will quickly find a very good answer to your question. --Kainaw (talk) 22:36, 9 April 2007 (UTC)