Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Computing/2007 November 27

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[edit] November 27

[edit] Chords in Turing

Hello. How can I play musical chords in Turing? I have tried assigning the treble and bass clefs as different processes and forking both of them. That never worked. I have tried installing the Turing 4.0.5 compiler in Advanced mode (i.e. Turing can have multiple source files open simultaneously) and running both source files simulanteously. That never worked. Hence is playing musical chords in Turing possible? Thanks in advance. --Mayfare (talk) 01:11, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

..how are you trying to play it? --ffroth 02:14, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
I know nothing about Turing but it sounds to me like it can only have one sound channel open at a time and one note per channel? If that's actually the case then you'll have no luck playing chords via that method. You might see if there's a way to access a MIDI interface with the language, as MIDI can support lots of notes and lots of channels. --24.147.86.187 (talk) 04:09, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

I am unsure of how I am trying to play the chords. My last resort is to have a symphony of computers. (In that case, I would need seven computers for which would be too much to ask.) --Mayfare (talk) 00:21, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] 700mb/80 mins

On my CD-R writable CD's, it says that the capacity is "700mb/80min". Why is there the time restriction? If I fill up my CD with 80 mins of MP3 music, it's only taking up about 300-400mb. Why can I not fill up the rest of the CD? Thanks. Acceptable (talk) 01:31, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

It's for normal CDDA recording length, you can only fit 80 minutes of CD audio (not MP3, that's written as a file), see Red Book (audio CD standard). --antilivedT | C | G 01:45, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
"Audio CD"s are badly compressed- just burn flac data files for equivalent quality --ffroth 01:46, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
I don't think it's compressed at all, it's just PCM encoded in EFM. --antilivedT | C | G 01:48, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
CD audio (CDDA) is certainly not compressed - but it has one huge advantage over flac/MP3/ogg/whatever. If your CD is scratched to some certain degree, the player will simply not be able to read files stored in CD-ROM mode. In 'audio CD' mode, it has lots of error correction and error recovery techniques that will allow even fairly serious damage to be recovered from - often without so much as a glitch. So you are trading capacity for robustness. SteveBaker (talk) 02:30, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
Wait a minute. 44100 (samples per second) * 2 (bytes per sample) * 2 (stereo channels) * 60 (seconds per minute) * 80 (alleged minutes) = 846720000 bytes, way over 700 megs. What's missing? --tcsetattr (talk / contribs) 02:55, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
There are more error correction codes used in CD-ROM format than Audio CD format. According to Compact Disc#Data structure, each sector can have 2352 bytes of music in Audio CD format or 2048 bytes of data in CD-ROM format. So 846720000 bytes (80 minutes) of Audio CD music use the same number of sectors as 737280000 bytes (~703 megabytes) of CD-ROM data. --Bavi H (talk) 07:33, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
But since an audio CD is just making a stream of sound, it doesn't need ECCs.. if it can't read the bit then oh well, it just skips to the next thousandth of a second --ffroth 01:29, 30 November 2007 (UTC)
Correct, indeed storing uncompressed audio on a CD-ROM is generally likely to be a more reliable way of storing the audio then CD Audio. Of course you can add extra parity if you want. However, neither of these are likely to help when you're just playing the audio (CD Audio is better since the player will just skip the section whereas with CD-ROM most drives and software will keep trying to read and will eventually stop reading if the file can't be properly read unlike with CD Audio) but it does mean you are more likely to be able to recover it if you ever want to. 07:51, 1 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Properties Summary Tab...

Hi, I was using someone else's computer today and went to look at the comments of a picture. I clicked on Properties but there was no Summary tab... Is there a way to get the summary tab? They had XP by the way. Thanks!! --Zach (talk) 05:09, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Why can't I print in color?

I have a Canon S300 color printer that is 5 years old. When I bought it I had no problems making color prints. In recent months I have only been able to print in black & white / grayscale. Do I need to reinstall the driver, or is something else going on? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.120.95.52 (talk) 15:44, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

(Generic) possibilities:
  • Someone, somewhere along the way changed a preference in the printer driver so everything is forced into greyscale.
  • Someone, somewhere, changed a preference in one or more particular application programs so that everything is forced into greyscale. PowerPoint used to do this by default!
  • The printer has run out of one or more ink colors and has decided to fall-back to greyscale printing.
  • Windows hasn't frustrated you enough these last few months so it's decided to do this just to be a pain in your butt.
Does the printer driver have the ability to print a test page? Can the prnter itself print a test or demo page? Does that come out in color? That might help you figure out in which part of the system the problem lies.
Atlant (talk) 17:13, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
I used to have an S7000 (something like that - the same family as yours anyway). The printer itself has (I believe) the ability to print a test page - you have to hold down some buttons on the front panel as you power up the printer. That would allow you to rule out the printer itself, ink, that kind of thing. Check the owner's manual. SteveBaker (talk) 17:16, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Creative Zen Vision W on Linux?

I just bought a used Zen Vision W at half the price of a new one, but I haven't yet received it. Will it work on Linux? JIP | Talk 18:10, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

Almost certainly. Almost all recent players implement the USB mass storage device class, which means they just appear to your computer to be an external disk. Then you'd use a program like Amarok to load it with content. -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 18:14, 27 November 2007 (UTC)


I agree - there are a few MP3 players that don't work - but almost all do. Depending on which version of Linux you use, the thing will probably be auto-mounted a few seconds after you plug it in. Then it's just like it was a directory on your disk drive - probably under /media or /mnt somewhere. (SuSE Linux puts it under /media using the name of the device as the folder name beneath that). Then you can copy files into and out of it at will, just like any other disk directory. When you unplug it, it should unmount just as automatically. SteveBaker (talk) 18:55, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
I don't intend to use it as so much a music player than a photograph and movie player. The original reason why I bought it was to be able to store over six times the combined capacity of my memory cards when I'm out on a photographing trip and have no access to a computer. JIP | Talk 20:36, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
As far as Linux is concerned - it's just like a hard drive or a floppy. It doesn't care what files you put onto it. If you can read and write it at all, you can put anything you like onto it. I use my MP3 player to carry C++ program source code, 3D models, texturemaps...oh...and some music. SteveBaker (talk) 00:04, 28 November 2007 (UTC)
Keep in mind that the resolutions and bitrate of the video it can play are limited. When you use the Windows software to transfer video, it will check to make sure the video you have selected is within spec for the player and will offer to convert it to a usable format if it is out of spec. If you're using Linux to feed the Zen Vision W, you'll lose this feature so make sure your videos play before you take it out and rely on being able to watch it. If it's out of spec, the Zen will tell you right after you hit play. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 97.0.165.247 (talk) 15:56, 28 November 2007 (UTC)
This discussion and this discussion make it sound like it's not nearly so simple. I figure it's like with my Canon PowerShot S3 IS camera. It does not appear as a USB storage device under Fedora 8 Linux. However, GThumb is able to use PTP to download images from it. Upload is not possible. From what I've read, the situation with the Zen Vision W should be the same. "yum install gnomad2" took all of four seconds to complete, and now I have a program to download photographs off the Zen Vision W. I still haven't actually received the Zen Vision W, so I don't know how it works in practice. JIP | Talk 18:57, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Fedora 8 questions

After I upgraded to Fedora 8, I've seen two annoying things that I don't know how to fix.

  • yum-updatesd keeps running an automated update process periodically. This update process clogs up my ADSL network connection for hours and can only be interrupted with kill -9. And it doesn't even seem to be of any use, because I have never seen it report it actually downloaded or installed anything, or even asked me if it was OK to do so. Have I somehow misunderstood this daemon? Is it possible to turn it off "nicely" instead of kill -9:ing the whole daemon process?
  • Whenever Evolution receives new mail, I get a pop-up notification in Gnome Panel telling me I have new messages. Yes, I can see that, thank you! Is there a way to turn these pop-up notifications off?

JIP | Talk 18:50, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

In system-config-services, see if yum-updatesd is listed. If so, uncheck it so it won't be running when you start the computer. If it isn't in services, it may be in your /etc/cron.daily directory - telling it to run every day. There are other ways to have it run all the time, but those are the two common ways to do it. -- kainaw™ 18:57, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
I ran the Services configuration application found in the Administration menu and was able to turn yum-updatesd off. Thank you! JIP | Talk 19:19, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Anyone earning through digitalpoint.com's forums

I came today across a website called forums.digitalpoint.com, where forum where anyone can start new threads or simply topics and earn money. You can also reply to already started topics and also earn from that. Do anyone of you earn from that website or know about earning through that website? I am not a great writer, so I cant blog. But I usually write comments for articles in blogs and news sites. So I thought why cant I do something like this as my part time job. (Yes, few minutes a day). Do you have any idea how much people earn through this? What is the average people earn through it? How many topics should you start and how many replies should I get for topics I have started to earn $100? Any other better website to earn? (Not just forum websites, but anything else also) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 59.92.125.9 (talk) 19:39, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

They must be using advertising to pay for this - they probably don't earn even $0.01 per page-view and they probably take 50% of the cash - so the community share of that is maybe half a penny per view - but that's got to be shared amongst whoever posted to the thread - suppose there are 10 respondants to each thread? So you're probably going to be earning maybe a hundredth of a penny per view. For $100 then you need about a million people to read your threads each week! That would have to be a very compelling topic! So no - there is no way on earth that you are going to earn even $1 per week doing this. Recite after me: "THERE AIN'T NO SUCH THING AS A FREE LUNCH". SteveBaker (talk) 23:49, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
Good book! --ffroth 01:57, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] 20 Pin ATX PSU Modification...

Hello! I just want to ask if it's safe to add 4 more pins to a 20-pin ATX PSU?
And will it work on a 24-pin motherboard?
Thanks for reading this...
--Hellraiser102604 (talk) 19:42, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

I don't know if it's safe but I wouldn't do it simply because getting out of paying $50-100 for a new PSU is not worth the risk of electrocution/component damage. I would imagine because the 4 pin is an extra +12V that from a technical standpoint it might be pretty difficult. You may be able to get some sort of molex to 4 pin adapter, too. -Wooty [Woot?] [Spam! Spam! Wonderful spam!] 14:45, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

I am pretty sure most ATX Powersupplies have an extra 4 pin connection specifically for this very purpose. If it doesn't I highly advice against modifying your power supply. If you do something wrong the chances are pretty high of you ruining your mainboard, aside from the fact that the PSU can hold power for ages after the PC has been turned off. Check if you have an extra 4 pin connector, if not just shell out on a new power supply. They don't cost very much and are certainly a lot cheaper than replacing your whole PC because of some dodgy wiring EDIT: Look for something like the smaller connector on this picture - [1] TheGreatZorko (talk) 09:55, 29 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] playing .flv files

I have a bunch of .flv files and I can't get them to play? What codec/program do I need to play them? I'm running on Vista right now. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 206.169.187.67 (talk) 22:42, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

VLC media player works on Windows XP, it should also work on Vista. --LarryMac | Talk 23:26, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
In my experience it has problems seeking (jumping from place to place) in FLV files, so you can recode them (just changing the packaging format to AVI or MP4) using Mediacoder. -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 23:28, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
In my experience VLC hoarks on practically every filetype I give it in one way or another (mine can't seek FLVs either). I've never seen such an unstable application so heavily touted! I know it's free and all that, but... --24.147.86.187 (talk) 05:17, 28 November 2007 (UTC)
I have been putting these onto an internal server I have running, then setting up a web page with 'ufo.js' (Google for it) to replay them. Then I watch them in my browser - just as you do when watching YouTube or whatever. It's not convenient if you just want to quickly see just one movie - but if you have a bunch of them and you want to watch them more than once (my son's 3D animations for example) then it works out pretty well. It's platform independent too. SteveBaker (talk) 23:44, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
Download the Klite Codec Pack. Then you can play them in Media Player. Exxolon (talk) 00:09, 28 November 2007 (UTC)
NO do not download a giant codec pack! --ffroth 01:56, 28 November 2007 (UTC)
You know, you've complained in the past that codec packs are a significant performance hit. Do you have any evidence to back this up? From what I can tell, they aren't that significant. This page has benchmarks on a number of programs and finds that even one of the largest codec packs (K-Lite Full) is far less significant on the system than just having too many fonts. Anyway, I'm just curious where your anti-codec opinion stems from. I've never seen them as the main culprit for slowing down things—most people have twenty greedy background applications anyway (AIM, virus scanners, anti-spyware, etc.), a few codecs is not likely going to break the camel's back. --24.147.86.187 (talk) 05:15, 28 November 2007 (UTC)
It's not a matter of performance at all. But you shouldn't go installing a slew of plugins to try to play every conceivable format. Windows is really stupid about not letting you see what directshow filters you have installed, so it's important to carefully keep track of what you install. Throwing a codec pack at it will just cause you headaches when you think "I wonder if anyone other than mplayer will ever implement working matroska seeking, I should check if my mkv splitter has been updated recently" and you realize that you have no idea what it's even called and come to think of it you're not even sure you have one. What are you going to do, download an mkv video and just test if it plays? Ugly. Codec packs don't give you cute little options in the add/remove programs list, they just copy binaries all through your system folders. Say you're staring at a 1.5gb video download (legal of course blah blah) with a long list of arcane video specs. Do you have any idea whether you're actually going to be able to play the video? Or are you going to find out after 2 hours that you don't have the proper codecs? You need to know enough about the codecs to decipher the specs anyway, and if you know what you're doing you might as well do it yourself instead of blindly running some giant dubiously-licensed multi-installer assembled by a random otaku fansubbing group that promises to put out updates but is only as reliable as its founder's willingness to tear himself away from anime and go to work to pay for the server. Still not convinced? Well I don't even really have this thought out, it's just an age-old piece of wisdom: never ever install codec packs, period. Here's a long quote from a stupid page that gets called stupid for masquerading as XHTML and giving me malformed code and screwing up my browser:
Anyone ever look inside a “Codec Pack” are see what you really are installing? Most people don't even think about it. Well, I download the “famous” K-Lite Codec Pack and exacted the files from the installer, I was very supprised to see exactly what they installed. For the purpose of this post i'm looking at the “Mega Pack” from K-Lite.
First thing you will notice when looking at the files exacted from the installer is the amount of pirated software you are installing. This thing had files from 3ivx, DivXNetworks, Ligos, Real Network, Apple Computer, Microsoft, Cyberlink, Elecard, and Intel. All of these files were cracked to allow the basic timebomb the software has not to be active anymore.
In addition to them being pirated, they install out-of-date versions and versions that can confilt with each other. Why do I need the DivX decoder from DivX Networks and a build of the XviD decoder? The DivX decoder will decode XviD. The 3ivX decoder, also included, will also decode DivX and XviD content. So, DivX, XviD, 3ivX, all can help decode the same video formats. Confused? Windows is too. In addition many “Codec Packs” come with ffdshow, this also decodes both DivX and XviD (ffdshow is open source and should be the only decoder you install, goto SourceForge.net for more)
The files installed from Microsoft will break the Windows Media Encoder, anyway why do you need to install files included in Windows to begin with? Does that make any sence? This thing had many files from WMP 8, why? WMP is a part of Windows, this thing only installs on Windows! I seem to also see the famous DivX Audio Codec, this being an OLD hack on WMA. This will break a few things in Windows too.
In case you need to play third party formats this thing will install any DShow decoder you can think of, yet I can't think of a reason I would never need to use it. I have yet to see a video encoded with VP6. I think i'm also loooking at two different Ogg decoders, again why? You do not need all of this junk!
On to MPEG-2 deocoders. Off the top of my head I see CLVSD.ax (Cyberlink), mcdsmpeg.ax (MainConcepts), mpgdec.ax (Elecard), and lmpgvd.ax (Ligos) . All of those listed MPEG-2 cost money. On another note, mpgdec.ax doesn't play along with other DVD Decoders installed. In WMP (and WinDVD and PowerDVD) you should get a “Copyright Protection” error when playing a DVD. Un-registering mpgdec.ax will fix that if it happens to you. I think the nice group of pirates who put this together registered the decoders in order correctly, so it should not happen. But if you already had a MPEG-2 decoder install, this would likely through it off. 321 Studio's DVD X Copy will do the same, it seems to be a bug in Elecard's decoder TMK.
If you have not figured it out yet, there is ZERO reason to ever install a “Codec Pack“. ffdshow from SourceForge will decode DivX, XviD, 3ivX, and more without included pirated decoders. It's open source and 100% free. If you would like to do DivX encoding purchase the encoder from DivXNetworks. You can do XivD encoding for free, without download a “Codec Pack“ Go search for “XviD Binaries“ Nic's and Koepi's are GREAT. Use those, don't trust what's in a “Codec Pack“
If you have any questions about decoder's or encoder's feel free to ask me, just don't install a “Codec Pack” in order to get the codec's on your system. Not only is it illegal to download these (Ya, I broke the law, so you be smart enough not too) but it's stupid to listen to anyone who says you need a “Codec Pack” Be smart. If anyone suggests to a person to download a “Codec Pack”, correct them! The less people who screw up their systems the better.
Another issue with these is that the “uninstallers” do not really uninstall all of the crap they put on their. Without you extracting all of the files from the setup's and then writing a batch file to unregister them all, you are kind of screwed for getting them off of the system.
Back to the land of the grammar-educated. One final point: the obligatory google fight to finish off a long reply. Also read this good thread from some wise folks. Also, who are you? An IP who remembers my comments from like 6 months ago.. --ffroth 08:29, 29 November 2007 (UTC)
The best flv player I have found is GOM Player. —Wayward Talk 08:39, 29 November 2007 (UTC)

MPlayer (other frontends) ¦ Reisio (talk) 03:21, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] How do you remove macfuse from a macbook

hello i recently installed macfuse on my macbook, but do not need it, i want to remove it but do not know how i have tired to find out but am unsure. any help would be appreciated.

Simon 27/11/07 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.153.33.4 (talk) 23:02, 27 November 2007 (UTC)


Errrr, surely you just double click your hard drive> applications> said software and drag into trash.

Or is it some weird software? 86.139.90.55 (talk) 23:59, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

There are uninstall instructions on their FAQ. --24.147.86.187 (talk) 03:14, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Largest CompactFlash card for camera?

I have a Canon PowerShot A70 camera. I would like to know what's the largest CF card I can use with it. All the manual says is "CompactFlash Type I" which doesn't help much. Thanks. F (talk) 23:45, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

You are lucky it uses Compact flash. It has a limit of 137 gigabytes, which is not yet reached by current flash cards available. Whether the camera can make good use of it is another question. For example my old Kodak camera cannot show the picture count when it is over 999, and when there are too many pictures the serial connection locks up. But it can still fill the card with a couple of thousand images. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 03:40, 28 November 2007 (UTC)