Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Computing/2008 July 14

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July 14

C++

I just started C++ today so... I compiled "Hello world". When I run it, a command prompt window pops up for a split second. It pops up and is gone so fast I can even see what happens. This is what I have written:
   #include <iostream>

using namespace std;

int main()

{

cout << "Hello, world!";

return 0;

}

So, can anyone tell me how to fix this so the prompt stays up and I can see the output on the screen? Thanks, Ζρς ι'β' ^¡hábleme! 00:09, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

You've written a console-mode program, so you should run it from the console (aka command prompt). -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 00:14, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Looks like it's just a command-line program, so if you just double-click the .exe file, it will exit the command window immediately it processes the "return" statement. There are 2 easy solutions:

1. 1. If instead you open a command window, navigate to wherever the .exe file is, and then type in the name of the file, it will exit back to command-line mode without closing the window.
   2. Read the next lesson in your book and add something like "cin >> str;" before the return (of course you will need to give str a type); the program will pause for you to type something before exiting.

Astronaut (talk) 00:24, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Nevermind, I found i out what the problem was. (I don't have a book, I'm just learning from the web.) I'm using Dev-C++, so before the return 0;, I just needed to put system("pause"). I found out that that's not required in Visual Studio so apparently the person writing the tutorial was using Visual Studio. (It also runs ok from the GUI now that it pauses.) Thanks, Ζρς ι'β' ^¡hábleme! 00:41, 14 July 2008 (UTC)  Done

Windows XP and Core 2 Duo (E8400) - Can't get second core to work.

First, is there something that MUST be done during a Windows XP installation so it will recognize both cores in a dual core CPU? If so, do tell! Otherwise, read on:

1. BIOS setting was ok, I guess. The only option that looked relevant said "SW Single Processor Mode -- Disabled"
2. Windows XP SP2 installed, running as Multiprocessor according to device manager.
3. Device manager shows a single CPU, so does Task Manager.
4. Only one core is visible with cpuz. Intel's diagnosis program tells me the second CPU is "disabled".

Reinstalled Windows, normally. Same thing. Any ideas of what's going on? I've looked in several forums already, no luck. :( — Kieff | Talk 02:01, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Usually there is nothing you need to do to enable the second core. Have you tried a Linux LiveCD and see if you can use the second core there? If you can't it's probably hardware related. --antilived^{T | C | G} 09:50, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Each core in multicore processors are usually treated as separate processors, so from memory (its hazy, I'm a proud Linux user), only XP Professional supports two processors. If the version you are using is Home, then the second core will not be used. Rilak (talk) 13:26, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

According to this article, XP Home should support multi-core but it does not support multi-cpu, if that's not just a little confusing.

What version of Windows are you installing? XPHome SP2 should support multi-core, but XP SP0 or SP1 might not ---J.S (T/C/WRE) 02:55, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

Every version of XP Home should support. I run here C2D T7250 and can access both cores via SP2. You sure you didnt buy a Core 2 Single? HardDisk (talk) 14:26, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

how to determine format of a word processing file?

Can someone point me to a way to figure out what word processor created a given file? I have some old files with no extensions. I would have thought that between NeoOffice and the unregistered version of Pages, I'd be able to open any file I'd ever created, but I'm stuck on a few. --Allen (talk) 03:50, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

I presume you're using a Mac given the reference to Pages and NeoOffice. Have you tried using the Get Info (Command + I) function? It should list the file type under "Kind", with or without a file extension. --Canley (talk) 09:45, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

file (Unix)? Mac OS X probably has that hidden in the terminal. --antilived^{T | C | G} 09:49, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Thanks... Get Info doesn't work because I destroyed some sort of metadata while FTPing the files (I think that's what happened... at least that's when I lost their time stamps). I didn't know about file (Unix), and it does work on some of them, but for the really tough ones it just returns "data". I'm even more baffled what I could have done with these files. --Allen (talk) 14:10, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

I figured it out now... they're just files created by versions of Appleworks that are so old Pages doesn't support them. I was confused because I was under the impression that Pages opened all Appleworks files. Now I'm just frustrated... what does Apple expect us to do with old files? --Allen (talk) 14:26, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Beyond a certain point, there's diminishing returns on supporting old formats. About all you could really do is A) search for a conversion utility online or B) find an older Mac with AppleWorks that can import the old files and export to another format (RTF is the most likely candidate). — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 22:23, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

iptables question

I'm just not figuring this out. I want to drop all inbound connections to a specific port unless those connections originate from a handful of specific IP addresses. Basically, I just want to make a service running on this port only visible to certain hosts. Can anyone give me an example iptables rule? Thanks a lot. 192.156.33.34 (talk) 07:12, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Sure:

iptables -A INPUT -i eth0 -s 192.168.0.0/16 --dport 80 -j ACCEPT

This rule lets anything from the example IP address range block on the eth0 interface to access port 80 (web server). This rule is the simplest, so it isn't secure. For example, it does not specify the destination IP address or the protocol, etc. Rilak (talk) 13:20, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

If you don't specify the transport layer protocol, you can't specify the port. So:

iptables -A INPUT -i eth0 -s 192.168.0.0/16 -p tcp --dport 80 -j ACCEPT

--Juliano (T) 13:28, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Yes, I forgot to mention that... funny thing is that I was implementing some NAT rules in iptables just today. Rilak (talk) 13:43, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Defragment HDD

How long does it take to defragment a 40 GB HDD? If I stop in the middle, will Windows XP make a mess out of my data? If I don't stop, is there still any risk involved? 83.54.217.146 (talk) 09:53, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

The basic advice is never to stop a defragmentation in the middle. How long it takes to defragment depends on whether you're going for a full defragmentation or a quicker version that operates very simply. The risk to your data of just doing a normal defragmentation is minimal to zero (the main problem comes if you get a power cut in the middle). Sam Blacketer (talk) 09:57, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Fragmentation also depends on how recently you've defragmented the drive. If it is not fragmented at all, defrag will finish rather quickly. Other than stopping in the middle, there are two possible problems: It is possible (though very rare) that a good file will be moved to an area of the drive with a bad/failing sector. Then, the file won't be good anymore. This is not a defrag problem - it is a problem with the drive itself. If you have a program that opens a file and tries to write to it while it is being moved, it can cause a problem. This shouldn't happen because defrag locks the file while it moves, but some programmers may try to ignore this and write to a locked file anyway. Again, this is not a defrag problem. It is a programmer problem. -- kainaw™ 12:01, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

I just want to note that I've stopped defrags in the middle before on virtual drives (by stopping it with the program itself, not by turning the machine off or something dramatic) and it was fine—never any problems. If you resume the defrag later it speeds over the first half pretty quick. --98.217.8.46 (talk) 14:22, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

I can only confirm that. if you stop normally in Windows XP, your files will suffer no harm. Defrags are not brain surgery, the OS just takes the pieces of the files and put them together. Another story is probably if you are defragmenting Windows system files in an external HDD and cut the power off. In this late case, you'll mkae probably a mess from your OS. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mr.K. (talk • contribs) 18:24, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Windows's defragging on NTFS is extremely stable. It is a very safe proceedure. You can stop it at any time you want with no ill effects. Although I wouldn't recommend it you can pull the power plug from your computer in the middle of a degrag if you wanted to...for some reason. Sam's comments may be regarding FAT defragging, which I don't know much about. KEEP IN MIND, if your hard disk is damaged defragging can make the situation worse. Just FYI. --mboverload@ 20:09, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

When in doubt, it is good practice to do a full scan (preferably boot time) before defragmenting. Defragmenting NTFS should be much faster than defragmenting in FAT32. (Yeah, I know. I used to be, and probably am, biased in favor of FAT32 but that has nothing to do with the question.) Kushal (talk) 02:52, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

Stopping normally in the middle has no risk, you can quit the defragment process or shut down the OS (which will tell the process to quit) without risking anything. If you pull the cord or hold down the power button, on the other hand, you've got the same risks that are always present in doing so while writing data to the disk. --Random832 (contribs) 18:12, 18 July 2008 (UTC)

PS3 multizone DVD player?

The PS3 can be used as an upscaling DVD player. It is also sold region locked. How can I make the PS3 play DVDs from other regions? F (talk) 11:41, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Upscaling doesn't really worth the hype it has. The truth is your TV already does it when you feed the signal from your normal DVD player to it, and it doesn't increase the amount of detail. --antilived^{T | C | G} 12:52, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Well, it's not worth the hype, I agree, but I disagree that your TV already does it. If I play DVDs from my PS2 on my progressive scan TV, there's some diamond shaped "watermarks". Other than that, it's true. --Wirbelwindヴィルヴェルヴィント (talk) 17:22, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

I have to disagree. Upscaling is a very important technology and the PS3 is one of the best. Perhaps you are refering to the hype that upscaling makes DVDs look like Bluray, which is of course bull. --mboverload@ 20:10, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

It probably is not very easy to do it (or someone at Sony can anticipate a bad rap). Depending on where you live, it might be legal to use HandBrake to convert it into another format and play the movies so. I wish I could help more but my knowledge of Regional lockout and DVD region code is severely limited. Kushal (talk) 02:48, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

Excel on a Mac

On a Mac, how do I set Excel so that instead of displaying the data as it will print, ie with everything broken down into individual A4 pages, it displays as one continuous sheet with no breaks? Thanks 92.2.122.213 (talk) 13:42, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

View > Normal. --98.217.8.46 (talk) 14:18, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

What time is it ?

Resolved

 – StuRat (talk) 02:51, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

Is there a Windows line command (MSDOS) which will tell me the current time without prompting me to change the clock as "TIME" does ? StuRat (talk) 15:47, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

"TIME /T" seems to do what you require. TSP (talk) 15:54, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Or DATE /T Mankerranker (talk) 15:55, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Those don't work for me (under Windows 98). They just say "Invalid time. Enter new time:" (or the same thing with dates). They do work on my Windows XP computer, however. So, is there a way to do this under Windows 98 ? I'm more familiar with Unix, so I don't quite know how to do this in Windows. StuRat (talk) 16:23, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

It would be pretty trivial to write such a program, no? --98.217.8.46 (talk) 17:35, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Not that trivial, especially if I want it to run on different Windows versions and show the same result. Is there a way to feed a return character to the time command ? Maybe something like "^M" > TIME ? Or maybe there's an environment variable, so I could do something like "echo $TIME" ? StuRat (talk) 18:40, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

I think you can go (verbatim): echo. | time -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 19:13, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. That's quite an improvement. However, even though it doesn't wait for the user to hit enter anymore, it still displays a second line with "Enter new time:" on it. Is there a way to only display the first line with the time ? (Something equivalent to the Unix "cut" command ?) StuRat (talk) 20:16, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Try this, probably best if it's in a batch file: @ECHO. | time | find "The current time is" --LarryMac | Talk 20:36, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Well, the @ at the beginning did something really bad, locking up my MS-DOS session so I had to use the Task Manager to kill it, which left the current executable hosed up such that I no longer have permission to delete it. What was that supposed to do ? However, once I eliminated that and changed the wording on the find string (they apparently changed the text slightly from "Current time is" to "The current time is" from Windows 98 to Windows XP), it worked great:

ECHO. | time | find "urrent time is"

Thanks ! StuRat (talk) 23:20, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

@ just means that the command line won't display in a batch file. (so you wouldn't see the ECHO line itself, just the result.) My bet is that it just didn't work for some reason (maybe due to the "current time" thing) but you couldn't see that because of the @ character. You could probably re-add it to your current line and have it work fine. (Or not, it's your preference.) --98.217.8.46 (talk) 00:53, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

I see. It seems safer to leave it off. Thanks again. StuRat (talk) 02:44, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

An alternative to "echo. | time" is "time < nul". --Bavi H (talk) 00:58, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

No, that doesn't work in Windows 98. It produces a large number of ^A characters on the "Enter new time:" line, and then locks up the MS-DOS window. StuRat (talk) 02:44, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

I just want to mention that using the @ to supress output of the current line has been a feature of batch for almost as long as DOS batch has existed. I didn't even think twice about typing it in my sample command. --LarryMac | Talk 13:19, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

Jayski's Silly Season Site

Hi My name is Paul Ogilvie and I believe that you either own or control the Jayski site that is owned by ESPN and run by Jay ?(He is the one that started the site). I have been able to view the site until Friday? have tried everything. the last test told me to contact the owner of the site to find out why it is not available to me. Some of my friends can get on but I have been stopped How do it get back on the Site? Thank You Paul email removed —Preceding unsigned comment added by 166.128.97.181 (talk) 17:11, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

This is the reference desk of Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. You are talking to Wikipedia volunteers. No-one here owns this website, and I doubt anyone knows anything much about it. You can contact Jayski at jayski at jayski dot com. Algebraist 17:26, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Maybe this nifty tool can help you in the future. Kushal (talk) 02:41, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

Implementing a flood fill more efficiently

In regard to the Java flood fill code I posted above, the recursive approach gets very inefficient as the picture size progresses. In fact, changing the maximum size from 160×120 to 320×240 makes the JVM stack overflow because all of the recursive method calls. Is there a way to make the algorithm use less recursion but still function the same? JIP | Talk 17:16, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

You don't need any recursion. Write the code with a store (it's typically a stack) and just push values to be processed to it:

 workpile = empty
 workpile.push (startX, startY)
 while workpile isn't empty:
   (x,y) = workpipe.pop()
   paintPixel(x,y)
   // push an entry for each adjacent pixel that needs painting
   if needsPainting(x-1,y): workpile.push(x-1,y)
   if needsPainting(x,y-1): workpile.push(y-1)   
   // etc

If you code this properly, your stack is of 32bit ints rather than full java method call frames, and so should be many times smaller.

Fun hack: there's no reason, with this method, why your fill has to proceed from a single seed point. You could specify an additional floodfill api that takes multiple seeds, and has multiple workpiles but still considers them all serially in the same while loop, and the effect would be that several fills would run concurrently, which should look cool. You could exploit multiple processors by extending this to several genuinely concurrent filler threads, but you'd need to supply additional constraints to stop them from fighting (such as "thread A only paints x values between 0 and 50". I doubt that, for images of the size and type you'd normally fill, if the overhead and the bother would yield worthwhile results.

Better yet, you can exploit some reasonable shortcuts based on what you're expecting to fill. If you're expecting to fill with large runs of horizontal or vertical pixels (that is, you're not filly horribly convoluted snakey patterns) then instead of recursing to go right, write code that looks like this:

 if rightPixel needs painting:
   scan rightward until you find a stopper: for each, paint that pixel and push any adjacent pixels that need painting

Hmm, on looking (after the fact) at flood fill they've mostly got all the stuff above already. -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 18:12, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Thanks! I understand exactly what you're meaning. I just have to take the time to write the pseudocode out in Java. JIP | Talk 18:33, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Incidentally if you're painting onto a surface that's currently being displayed (I forget the innards of Java2D, and you've not explained what exactly you're painting into - I don't think Java2D is synchronised) you incur a lot of penalties from synchronisation and refresh. If you can keep the image in a regular array, floodfill into that, and only shove that at the display API when you're done then you won't have those problems. And when you're accessing an array you're not having to call setPixel/getPixel methods to do stuff. -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 18:23, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

I am already doing that. The flood fill algorithm is done on an array of ints, not on a java.awt.Image. The image gets read into the array at the beginning and written back at the end. JIP | Talk 18:33, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

I fixed the algorithm, and now it's working perfectly. Thanks to you all. At first I was mystified because it kept making stripes into the image, but then I realised I had written image.getHeight() where I needed to write image.getWidth(), making the pixel value checking useless for non-square images. The next step is to fix fine-tune the needsPainting() method. A uniform threshold isn't going to work - lighter parts need higher thresholds and darker parts need lower ones. JIP | Talk 19:47, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

flood fill animation

That's good. Y'know, if you're feeling industrious, the flood fill article could do with an animation. While it has graphics that show the algorithm per-pixel, it doesn't convey the macroscopic appearance of a flood fill on a convoluted shape so familiar to anyone who played Twin Kingdom Valley or The Hobbit. I figure you've done the hard part, and you could straightforwardly amend your program to:

• read Image:Canard.jpg (probably downscaled a bit)
• floodfill the body green from a seed somewhere on the wing
• for every pixel, emit a numbered image file
• use ImageMagick to turn them into an animated GIF (it's easy)

;) -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 20:08, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Meh, I got bored and did it myself - see right. -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 17:38, 16 July 2008 (UTC)

MP3 Players

I looked at our list of MP3 players but can't find what I'm looking for. Is there a list out there of currently available MP3 players which behaves just like a USB drive when transfering music? (For example, I had an Archos player which used USB connections to transfer files, it's own internal software made a list of all the songs on the device through the FAT, I think, and required no extra software on the computer to transfer). Pluses for me would be 20GB+ HDD or maybe even 4~8GB+ of flash, and foreign language support. My Zen Vision M is a pain is the butt because it requires stupid software to transfer files (or SMP which I hate), can only play music through their own crappy software when connected to the computer, and since 90% of the songs on my player is Japanese with Japanese track titles, it's hard to scroll to any song because it sorts everything as after 'Z', so probably 75% of all my songs and artists are between Z and A when I try to find it. Any non-iPod players out there that'd fit my requirements? Even Zunes are ok. --Wirbelwindヴィルヴェルヴィント (talk) 17:17, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

In List of mp3 players, those with an MSC entry of "yes" (in the syncing and transfer section) implement the USB mass storage device class, which is USB-speak for "disk drive type thing". -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 18:16, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Why do you dislike iPods so much? because they need special software to transfer music? --grawity 18:23, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

No need to interrogate the guy because he doesn't like a particular product. Perhaps he uses Linux. Perhaps he doesn't want custom software. Perhaps he is philosophically opposed to hardware with built-in encryption. Perhaps he doesn't like the interface. Perhaps he doesn't like the style of the device. (Apple's shiny, rounded look & feel is pretty over-exposed at the moment. It's even, dare I say, starting to seem old.) The point is, his question was already answered, what's the point of harassing him on his brand choice? APL (talk) 19:04, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

I would say grawity is right in asking that question. Do you suppose that the iPod will naturally evolve with everyone who don't want to use it for a particular reason stay muted? The OP is not compelled to answer and grawity is not a troll. Kushal (talk) 02:39, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

Well, does the list of MSC compatible devices include devices where part of an MP3 player can be used as a hard drive? For example, I had a Zen Xtra where you can allocate part of the device to be used as a hard drive through MSC, but you can't access the music that way, which would still not be what I want. Also, the reason I don't want to use an iPod is because people don't really realize how close to a monopoly it is. I mean, seriously, airlines wanted to put iPod chargers for each seat, etc. Making students buy iPods for podcasts. I'm sure there are others, but these things don't sit well with me. --Wirbelwindヴィルヴェルヴィント (talk) 16:00, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

I don't know if you've looked at them already, but Archos's current generation can function as MSC devices in the way you want. I'm not sure how well they handle Japanese characters (though for what it's worth, they handle Icelandic fine...) — Matt Eason ^{(Talk &#149; Contribs)} 16:11, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

Kushal, Wikipedia's reference desk is not the correct place for Apple to be conducting market research into why some small number of people do not prefer their product. APL (talk) 18:44, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

Spawn c++ processes in new console windows.

I'm using _spawnv(P_NOWAIT, "process.exe", my_args ); to spawn new processes but whenever I do, it appears in the same console window as the original program. Also, the first process will close prematurely if I use another _spawnv. How do I have each _spawnv process launch in a new console window? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 205.214.236.66 (talk) 18:31, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

You don't say what OS you're running on (I'm guessing windows from that .exe extension). If this were Unix (et al) you'd instead spawn another xterm (or whatever) process with your text-mode C++ app supplied as an argument to that. I'd guess that XP/Vista's cmd.exe can do the same, but I've been overoptimistic about Windows before. -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 18:40, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

I'm on XP, sorry. Based on the above, does anyone know of a command I can pass to the program to have it start in a new window, or can I do this indirectly through a batchfile maybe? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 205.214.236.66 (talk) 18:46, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

See what happens if you spawn ("cmd.exe","/c","process.exe",myargs) (per this). -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 18:56, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, guys. It works best if the program writes then executes it's own batch file. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 205.214.236.66 (talk) 19:10, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

If you don't mind using the Win32 API instead of the standard C libraries, then CreateProcess (which is what the Windows implementation of spawn ultimately calls, anyway) lets you specify in its dwCreationFlags parameter CREATE_NEW_CONSOLE. CreateProcess gives you much finer-grained control over the new process than does spawn, and so is probably the better option anyway if you are running under Windows. KiwiBiggles (talk) 05:44, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

Making partitions and losing data

If you make a new partition in an HDD, is there any risk of loosing data? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.79.111.175 (talk) 18:43, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Yes. If the drive is currently all one partition with data, your partitioner program must be capable of moving data around to make empty space for the new partition. If not, it will simply truncate the existing partition and usually erase the file directory - making it an empty drive. -- kainaw™ 19:09, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Take a look at List of partition utilities. If you follow the links and check the features, you will find that many or most have the ability to repartition drives while preserving data. -- Tcncv (talk) 02:03, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

Bear in mind anything which modifies existing partitions run the risk of screwing up and damaging your partition. I've had this happen before. Depending on how they're designed, you will have problems if it dies (power failure etc) during some part of the operation. Whatever happens, if something goes wrong often if you check before you do anything further, you can recover most of your data (presuming you have somewhere to copy it to) but there are never any guarantees. Most partitioning tools will remind you to make sure you have backups before doing something major like modifying your existing partitions. Of course, you should always have backups anyway Nil Einne (talk) 21:03, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

Bagle (computer worm)

Which form of the Bagle has "Be Not Jealous"? Ericthebrainiac (talk) 18:58, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

The closest I could find was this one that includes the message "Dont get jealous!!" -- Tcncv (talk) 02:11, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

Problems with MAME32 and Nebula emulator

I have the MAME32 emulator and a few roms for it. Whenever I try and play a game, it loads the rom files correctly, but does not find these 4 files: sfix.sfx sp-s2.sp1 sm1.sm1 000-lo.lo

I searched online, and found a .zip file download that has these files in it. I put it in my rom folder and unzipped it, just as it said to, but the emulator is STILL not reading the files, even though I can see them right there in front of me.

I also have the Nebula NeoGeo emulator, and it experiences the same problems. In this emulator, though, it says I need the files: Neo-geo.rom ng-sfix.rom ng-sm1.rom ng-lo.rom

Here's an excerpt from the faq that comes with Nebula: "Q1. Can't load Neogeo games, Nebula says that neo-geo.rom is missing but I have it inside the game zip. A: Neo-geo.rom, ng-sfix.rom and ng-sm1.rom (and now ng-lo.rom) MUST be in a file called neogeo.zip in any of the rom directories you have configured. NG-LO.ROM file must be 64k (65536 bytes) and it's the same than the first 64K of the old 128k NG-LO.ROM"

I downloaded a .zip file named "neogeo.zip" but all it had in it was the 4 files needed for the MAME32 emulator (which is still not reading them). What exactly is my problem, here?! The Mighty KELP (talk) 20:59, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

I have a file called neogeo.zip in my roms directory, and it has these files: 000-lo.lo, asia-s3.rom, sfix.sfx, sm1.sm1, sp-e.sp1, sp-j2.rom, sp-s.sp1, sp-s2.sp1, sp1.jipan.1024,usa_2slt.bin, vs-bios.rom. My mame32 has always worked with neogeo games with the zip file like that. Sandman30s (talk) 12:26, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

And where do you get this .zip file? Could you link me to it, please? The Mighty KELP (talk) 16:58, 18 July 2008 (UTC)

Comodo firewall and McAfee security center

Hi all. I've just installed the Comodo firewall (replacing ZoneAlarm, which was acting up), but McAfee security centre keeps giving me the warning that "Outbound firewall is not installed on your computer". Is this just a case of the two applications not getting on together, or is Comodo not giving full protection? (I haven't changed any settings on the firewall since installation, btw) Thanks. 91.143.188.103 (talk) 21:18, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Open mp3 in a new Winamp?

Hello. Is there a way to open an mp3 file in a new Winamp instance by double-clicking it by default? (It's really annoying that double-clicking an mp3 files makes the Winamp instance already running erase its whole frickin' playlist and replace it with the single mp3 file!) If this can't be done, I'm open to suggestions on other equally light-weight and unobtrusive players able to do this ^-^. Thanks in advance, Kreachure (talk) 22:17, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

What I do is have some other media player (usually Media Player Classic) set as my default mp3 player. That way I can have winamp running and never worry about the problem you've described. APL (talk) 23:55, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Right click the file and select the option you need. If you have nothing else, you can always enqueue it. Kushal (talk) 03:24, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

Whilst I don't have Winamp on the computer I'm writing this on, IIRC, there is an option (in Winamp) to make the default action "Enqueue" instead of "Play". That way, double-clicking on an MP3 file will add it to the current Winamp playlist. — QuantumEleven 11:49, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

In my Winamp (v5.531) it's options/preferences/general preferences/file types/Enqueue files on double click in Windows Explorer. Algebraist 12:00, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

Enqueue might not be the functionality he wants. It sounds like the functionality he wants is to play some file now, while not killing his (probably paused) playlist. I do this all the time, which is why I recommend having some other media player as the default mp3 handler. APL (talk) 12:41, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

Winamp->right click on the Winamp Window->Options->Preferences->Setup/File types-> Enqueue as default action. This is for Winamp 2.x so if you're running Winamp 5.x then the directions may not work as well but it should still have that option.--droptone (talk) 12:18, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

Nope, I certainly don't want to enqueue a song I want to hear right now into my 850+ song playlist. Enqueuing is the only alternate option I had already found for playing an mp3 file on Winamp, either by right-clicking, on preferences, or even on Windows file type options. I guess having an alternate default mp3 player to open mp3s directly is a good idea (and I do have Media Player Classic in my comp already, I just never thought of it as an mp3 player!), so I guess I'll be doing that. Thanks. Kreachure (talk) 13:09, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

I do that a lot - foobar2000 will have my "background music" playing, and when I want to listen to something specific without disturbing it I open the file in Media Player Classic. All while VLC is playing the TV episode I'm watching :) — QuantumEleven 15:46, 17 July 2008 (UTC)