Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Computing/2010 March 10

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March 10

(Win XP) How to forbid XP from accessing one particular wireless network?

I work in an office with several wireless networks. I only have access privileges to one, but it happens to be the one with the weakest signal. Annoyingly, my XP relentlessly tries to "help" me by connecting to any of the other networks preferentially. Is there a way to tell my Win XP wireless interface to always ignore certain networks? I don't have any third party wireless software, I'm just using the XP default UI. 218.25.32.210 (talk) 00:43, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Generally speaking, XP should not be connecting to any network that you haven't previously told it to connect to. Right click the network icon in the system tray (next to the clock) and hit "Status". In that window, hit "Properties". (Or, go to Start -> Control Panel -> Network Connections, and right click the wireless connection and hit "Properties".) You should get a dialog box titled "[Wireless Connection Name] Properties". This box has 3 or 4 tabs across the top ("General", "Wireless Networks", "Authentication" and maybe "Advanced") and a "Connect using:" box just below the tabs that lists the network device that is currently in use. Click the "Wireless Networks" tab. On this tab, there should be a box labelled "Preferred Networks". XP will connect to these networks in the order they are listed once one or more of the networks are detected. Make sure your network is the only one that is listed, and it should be the only network XP will try to connect to. Xenon54 / talk / 01:41, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Thank you! That did the trick! 218.25.32.210 (talk) 02:03, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Can't Install Windows XP from Within Windows 7

I am trying to install Windows XP on a parition of my hard drive from within Windows 7 and it won't let me. In other words, I booted from Windows 7, made a new parition, and I put the Windows XP cd in and it does not give me the option to install when the welcome menu comes up. Its dimmed out. How would I go about doing this? I am trying to quad boot. I tried booting from the Windows XP cd and installing it and it did work, but my computer would only boot from Windows XP and it would not give me a list of operating systems to choose from on startup. Does anyone know a solution? Thanks —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.169.39.243 (talk) 01:51, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Ideally you should install Windows XP before you install Windows 7, since Windows XP is old and does not know about Windows 7 nor the new bootloader so overwrites it with its own (Windows 7 should recognise any older version of Windows and add it to the bootloader). However you can do it your way. Well not installing from within Windows 7, that will never work (with Windows but I strongly suspect most OSes you can only ever overwrite the existing OS from within an existing OS which obviously means you can only install a newer version i.e. upgrade the existing install) but a simple search will find plenty of links helping you to fix the bootloader [1] [2] [3] [4] [5]. Incidentally, since Vista & 7 use the same bootloader and are fairly similar in many ways, searching for help doing Vista followed by XP would be useful if you can't find 7 specific advice (some of these are for Vista). Alternatively if you intend to quad boot and given it's not clear to me what ther other OSes are, using some other bootloader may be a better option Nil Einne (talk) 03:21, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Actually, Windows 7 installs its boot loader on a separate partition, unlike Windows Vista. Also, since I intend to give the OP meaningful advice, I recommend that they boot from a Windows 7 DVD and do a startup repair. If they do not have a Windows 7 DVD, then they can install EasyBCD inside Windows XP and use it to repair the Windows 7 bootloader.--Chmod 777 (talk) 09:44, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

By default yes, you can disable it however (and some people really hate this for various reasons as illustrated in an earlier question). In any case, while your clarification may be useful, and is something I didn't make clear enough, I don't believe it makes much of a difference to the end result. The fact it's on a seperate partition doesn't mean Windows XP won't overwrite the bootloader. I haven't tested it but I would have presumed it does since it would likely just install the bootloader to the active partition which in the Windows 7 case would be the recovery partition if available. Even if it doesn't overwrite the bootloader, it obviously normally would set the Windows XP partition (or whereever it dumps the bootloader) to be the active partition so you still have a similar problem although it would theoretically be easier to fix (since you just have to change the active partition rather then reinstall the bootloader) although as illustrated in your suggestion and in the earlier links, the simplest way to fix it is probably just to allow the Windows 7 DVD to fix it then add Windows XP if necessary to the Windows 7 bootloader. Nil Einne (talk) 15:58, 12 March 2010 (UTC)

I have done this exact process myself, and Chmod and Nil's advice is sound. Install XP on a separate partition like you have, and then run the repair installation from your Win7 disk so you can restore the Win7 bootloader. Then you can use EasyBCD to enable booting from both Win7 and XP. Alternatively, you can use VMware Player to create a virtual machine inside of Win7 that you can install XP on. Depending on your hardware and what you plan on using XP for, it may run a little slower this way, but depending on what problems you run into while installing XP (though it sounds like your installation went fine), VMware may be a little easier to implement. —Akrabbim^talk 16:44, 12 March 2010 (UTC)

network upgrade question

I currently have three desktops and a laptop on a wired 10/100 network. The laptop has 208.11g. Two of the desktops have 1Gb ethernet connections and one as 10/100. I'm planning to upgrade to a wireless 802.11n router with 1Gb ethernet ports. The laptop will then be used wireless.

Will the two desktops with 1Gb ethernet connectors be able to communicate at 1Gb/sec, or will the fact that there is a 100Mb machine on the network slow the whole network down to 100Mb/sec?

If all desktops have 1Gb/sec ethernets, will the wireless slow them down, or will they be able to communicate with each other at 1Gb?

Will Cat 5e cables be OK? (The longest run is 25 feet, I think.) Bubba73 ^{(You talkin' to me?)}, 04:12, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

The desktops with 1Gb connections will be able to access the other desktops at 1Gb speeds. But while accessing either the desktop with 100mb or the wireless laptop the speed will be reduced to the max speed of the computer being accessed.Your whole network should not slow down. Cat 5e cable will be fine for gigabyte networking, but I'd recommend you going with cat 6 if you can. Source – Elliott(Talk|Cont)  08:05, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Thank you. Bubba73 ^{(You talkin' to me?)}, 16:37, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

I got the 1GB network going, but transferring large files is only between 2 and 3 times as fast as the old 100Mb router. I tested files roughly 300MB in size. The router shows that both computers are getting 1Gb connections. Could the Cat 5e cables be the problem? Or what could it be? Bubba73 ^{(You talkin' to me?)}, 06:32, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

Turns out, one of the cables was only Cat-5. (One was Cat-6.) I'm replacing the Cat-5 with Cat-6.

Resolved

Bubba73 ^{(You talkin' to me?)}, 08:03, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

Removing Atdmt Cookie

I've just started getting a window pop up asking me if I want to allow acces to an atdmt cookie. I've googled and found some spyware removal stuff but I'm sceptical. Is there a simple way of removing it with my current McAfee protection or maybe Windows Defender?? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 91.111.124.236 (talk) 09:14, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

It depends on what browser you use and on your operating system. If you use Internet Explorer as a browser, the cookie is stored as a text file. To delete it in Windows XP, you'd go to Start --> Run... and type "%USERPROFILE%\cookies" and then press ENTER. Then, you'd select the file and delete it. If you use Firefox as a browser, you go to Tools --> Privacy --> Show Cookies, select it, and click "Remove Cookie."

By the way, cookies are pieces of text. They're not spyware, although they can be used to keep track of the web sites you visit. Anti-virus programs like McAfee and AVG make a big fuss about them to make their programs seem more important. Most cookies aren't used for market research but to allow you to log into web sites, among other things.--Chmod 777 (talk) 09:29, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

OK, thanks. I've found the cookie folder (Windows) and deleted the atdmt one. That place is FULL!! Can I delete everything or will it have a negative effect on operation? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 91.111.124.236 (talk) 10:00, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

You can delete them all but anything you've asked your browser to remember (logins, passwords, autofill boxes etc) will be lost and you'll have to re do them all. Another easier way to delete all the cookies is to (1) on firefox go Tools -> Clear recent history, and select the cookies checkbox, or (2) on internet explorer go Tools -> Internet options -> General and select Delete browsing history. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Fire2010 (talk • contribs) 11:45, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Laptop Mousepad Mouswheel Not Working In Games

The mousewheel on my HP G60 laptop's mousepad doesn't work in some games I've been playing recently. Usually it's not a problem, but I've found that more and more games these days seem to be using the mousewheel for ever more important tasks, like zooming in/out for example (the reason I say it's getting more important in this case is because the play areas are getting bigger and bigger, c.f. Ubisoft's R.U.S.E.) I am testing the public Beta of RUSE at the moment but can't really see the details of the game (something it is well-known for) as I can't zoom in. I am unable to map other keyboard controls to zoom as the game won't let me change the controls. In any case, it's not just this game (that was just an example). Is there any way I can find out why my mousewheel is not working on this (and other games - Battlefield 2142 being another I can think of off-hand) and find out what I can do about this short of reinstalling drivers? Cheers. --KägeTorä - (影虎) (TALK) 11:24, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Plugging in an external mouse (to see if it's mouse wheel works in those games) might help to diagnose the problem. StuRat (talk) 15:29, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Cheers. I plugged in an external mouse and found that that works perfectly. I would really prefer not to use an external mouse, though, as my workspace is somewhat prohibitive (enough room for a laptop and a coffee!). Any help would be appreciated. --KägeTorä - (影虎) (TALK) 12:34, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

Ok, that gets us closer to figuring out the problem. It sounds like the internal wheel is mapping to different "Mouse Wheel Events" than the external wheel. An event monitor (what, no article ?) should help you determine if this is actually the case. Perhaps someone else can describe how to do this. Also, there may be some software on your computer for setting up the internal mouse wheel, so you might want to search the help files for that. And, if nothing else works and you are stuck with an external mouse, they make tiny ones just for laptops. StuRat (talk) 14:09, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

Cheers. I've looked at the help files, and they basically just gave me links to the software that sets the mouse up. The only options I have in the mouse wheel tab are the number of lines to scroll up and down, and the option to waggle the mouse wheel sideways with the same effect (which doesn't apply to my computer anyway, because it's not an actual wheel, just a flat metal strip like most laptops). I would be interested in finding out about this event monitor you mention, so I shall keep an eye on this thread. Thanks again. --KägeTorä - (影虎) (TALK) 21:57, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

is there a mobile device that takes a 3G sim and exposes it over local WIFI?

I have a data-only 3G sim card nominally for use in my netbook, but it also goes just as easily into my iPhone. However, then I have to take out my voice-only SIM card from the iPhone. I was wondering if there is a portable device I can carry with me that I can put the sim card into (instead of into my netbook) which will expose the internet connection over Wifi, ie the iPhone can connect to it over WIFI, then I can both receive phone calls on my voice-only sim and use the net from my wifi. thank you. 82.113.106.94 (talk) 12:45, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

This device from Solwise seems to do what you are asking for. There may be others depending on your price range and location. Coreycubed (talk) 14:16, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Does your netbook have a WiFi adapter in addition to the SIM card? You may be able to use the netbook to expose the SIM connection over WiFi: http://tameyourpc.blogspot.com/2009/07/windows-7-as-wireless-access-point.html. -- Coneslayer (talk) 14:23, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

thanks, guys. but the point would be a mobile device, more mobile than a netbook, something I can just put in my other pocket... I guess you would have found already it if it were out there... Thanks anyway. 82.113.106.94 (talk) 14:26, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Something like this [6] ? --Phil Holmes (talk) 14:59, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

n800 + USB adapter (or any other portable linux device with usb and wifi but I believe n800 is the cheapest as of now). --194.197.235.240 (talk) 15:35, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

A cheap (second hand) Symbian/WinMo smart phone with the appropriate software (eg. Joikuspot for Symbian) will also do the job, although it does tend to drain your battery rather fast. --antilived^{T | C | G} 11:25, 12 March 2010 (UTC)

As Phil Holmes said, there are definitely devices like this, I've read about them before. Other then the one linked to there's also [7] [http://www.techchee.com/2009/09/11/huawei-e5-portable-3g-wifi-router/ and hardly surprisingling, we even have an article MiFi. Whether this would be more effective then something above, I don't know Nil Einne (talk) 14:25, 15 March 2010 (UTC)

Setting up a whitelist for email

Is there a way to set up in gmail so only messages from specified senders is allowed in my inbox? Thanks! 20.137.18.50 (talk) 13:52, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

If the whitelist is not very long, the simplest way is to set up a Gmail filter. From your Gmail inbox, click on Create a filter. In the Has the words box, paste the following:

-from:{ address@one.com address@two.com }

Replace the above addresses with the actual addresses you want to whitelist. You can add as many addresses as you want, just make sure each address is separated by a space. Click on Next Step, then check the box marked Delete it. Click Create Filter and you're all set. Let us know if this works for you. Coreycubed (talk) 14:39, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

One thing to be aware of when using a white-list, however, is that it will tend to block e-mails from people you know, such as when they get a new e-mail address. Also, sometimes people you know may send you something from another website, like an e-cards site or even Wikipedia. StuRat (talk) 15:24, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Quantifiers in bash shell expression?

Regular expressions (in perl, at least) allow the use of quantifiers like

([0-9]{1,3}\.[0-9]{1,3}\.[0-9]{1,3}\.[0-9]{1,3})

to match an IP.

Is there a similar way of using quantifiers when dealing with bash shell expressions?

Imagine matching all files in a directory that have an IP address as file name, without the use of perl, grep or other external tools. Going the brute force way like

ls -1 [0-9].[0-9].[0-9].[0-9]
ls -1 [0-9].[0-9].[0-9].[0-9][0-9]
ls -1 [0-9].[0-9].[0-9].[0-9][0-9][0-9]
...

doesn't seem right, even though it would probably work. -- 78.43.60.58 (talk) 14:05, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Shell globbing is more limited than regular expressions, and I don't believe bash has quantifiers. The solution is, of course, to use "perl, grep or other external tools". The whole Unix philosophy, especially shell scripting, is centered on the toolkit approach. -- Coneslayer (talk) 14:08, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

In particular, you could pipe ls through grep in order to get a list of files: ls | grep "..." | ls -l should take the list of filenames, filter it down, and then give you a long listing for each of the filenames that remain. (It won't work if there are files with newlines in their name, but that's a very unlikely problem.) Paul Stansifer 15:52, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

I think you mean something like ls -l `ls | grep "..."`. You can't pipe things into ls to control what it lists. However, I think switch the OP used was -1 (one), not -l (ell). That switch lists only one filename per line. When ls is piped into something, its only lists one file per line by default, making the -1 switch unnecessary if you're piping into grep or something for filtering. -- Coneslayer (talk) 16:09, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Oh, duh, you're right on both counts. ls -1 | grep "..." is all that the OP should need for this task, where the -1 is optional, but nice for clarity. Paul Stansifer 22:56, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Specifically, this line works: ls | egrep "[0-9]{1,3}\.[0-9]{1,3}\.[0-9]{1,3}\.[0-9]{1,3}" 83.250.239.198 (talk) 15:07, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

Software cheat prevention

Where does a computer store the memory to prevent uninstalling and reinstalling trial software to use the trial period again?--Mikespedia is on Wikipedia! 14:41, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

It varies depending on the software, but I've seen some applications store this data in tiny hidden (and seemingly unrelated) files in the Windows directory/other system folders, but most commonly it seems to be stored in the registry in keys that aren't actually related to the product and aren't named accordingly either. Although I've not seen it happen I would imagine some bits of software possibly even "dial home" with a hardware ID of the computer to check if it's previously had a trial running on it or not. ZX81 ^talk 15:04, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

I've definitely come across software which requires online activiation for a trial. I've also come across software which hides details in unused sectors of the disk, e.g. Adobe products and other software using MacroVision SafeCast hides it in absolute sector 32 Nil Einne (talk) 14:31, 15 March 2010 (UTC)

It will be different for different types of software. So if you are trying to reset a trial period, there is no single place to look for it. I'm not sure if the Ref Desk is willing to give you advice on specific programs or not (it is piracy of a sort). --Mr.98 (talk) 15:07, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

In addition to registry keys, some programs will use Alternate data streams attached to innocent looking files (or even folders). Process monitor is a useful tool for investigating program behaviour, though in the spirit of the arms race, countermeasures can be expected! 94.196.85.114 (talk) 17:46, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Windows 7 – sound keeps dropping

Hi, I'm using a Dell Inspiron Windows 7 laptop. Every time I put it on stand-by, then bring it back, there is no sound: regardless of the volume, online videos, system sounds etc. play as if it's muted, and in Windows Media Player, it refuses to do anything (the bar doesn't move along, no video plays etc.) – anyone got a solution? Thanks! ╟─TreasuryTag►Not-content─╢ 16:15, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

The sound driver may be defective; it's one of the responsibilities of the sound driver to re-initialise itself and the sound hardware when the system is coming up from standby. If the supplied driver is defective then it may be failing to discharge this responsibility properly then you'd get no sound after coming back up. You should make sure you're running the latest driver that Dell supply; failing that, Dell's online support service may have a fix. -- Finlay McWalter • Talk 18:24, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Link checking

Hi, I'm looking for a quick and effective way to check the validity of URLs (i.e. - do they 404 or not?) in an Excel spreadsheet. Is there a program / plugin that would systematically go through each cell containing a URL and tell me wether it returned any data or not? I can put the URLs in a text file if possible.

The link checkers I've investigated so far seem to only accept single URLs, and doing each one manually would take forever. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.149.255.225 (talk) 17:04, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

The following code works with AutoIt, freeware scripting software that I use to automate everyday tasks. All you'd need to run the code would be to install AutoIt and save this as a text file with the .au3 extension.

#include <IE.au3>
$file = FileOpen("C:\URLs.txt", 0)
$file2 = FileOpen("C:\results.csv", 2)
$o = _IECreate("www.google.com")
While 1
	$url = FileReadLine($file)
	If @error = -1 Then ExitLoop
	_IENavigate($o, $url)
	$d = _IEPropertyGet ( $o, "title" )
	If $d = "Internet Explorer cannot display the webpage" Then
		$result = $url & ",Invalid"
	Else
		$result = $url & ",Valid"
	EndIf
	FileWriteLine ($file2, $result)
WEnd
FileClose($file)
FileClose($file2)

It's simple code, I tested it with a few URLs and it worked just fine. Feel free to modify the paths to suit your needs. This was run on Windows XP with Internet Explorer 8. If you run this and it doesn't work quite right for you, let me know what's wrong. (Alternatively, if this is too technical in nature to begin with, please say so!) Coreycubed (talk) 19:46, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

"wget" has an option, --spider, which will do this. It's a standard tool on Linux, and probably the BSDs and Mac. Its also part of cygwin if you use MS-Windows. An example is

wget --spider --no-verbose http://www.google.co.uk/    www.google.com/foo ; echo $?
200 OK

http://www.google.com/foo:
19:42:39 ERROR 404: Not Found.

FINISHED --19:42:39--
Downloaded: 0 bytes in 0 files
1

The first line is the is command, the rest, apart from the last line is from wget. The '1' is the errorlevel returned from wget, '1' means an error occured, '0' means no errors. wget can also read the URLs form a plain-text file. CS Miller (talk) 19:46, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Thankyou both for your contributions, I will review this and attempt to implement it! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 62.31.58.156 (talk) 21:08, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Google search

Is there a way when searching on Google to only find recent events if for example as I was doing, looking for security threats on social networking sites, I am finding lots going back to 2007, now I assume these threats are no longer valid today but maybe wrong, so is there a way to find the latest security threats for online social networking sites, thanks Mo ainm~Talk 17:35, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

You can use Google's advanced search to specify how recent the page is (you may need to click on the plus sign near the bottom to display the field that lets you select the date). This may not be 100% reliable. --Normansmithy (talk) 18:05, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Good tip thanks. Mo ainm~Talk 18:47, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Similarly, Google News Search lets you limit a search to news articles about security threats after a specific date. -- kainaw™ 20:52, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

How to make an mp4 file

I have a sequence of svg images. I know how to make an animated gif from them, but I need to make a mp4 file. How can I do that? If possible please with free software (Linux or Mac OS X), this is just a hobby and I can't pay lots of mony. Thank you. Hevesli (talk) 20:35, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

This article discusses how to do so with ffmpeg. You may have to make the SVGs into a bitmapped image format like PNG first (which you can do with Inkscape or Gimp, and which Imagemagick's convert program can do wholesale); experiment a bit with this, as different SVG renderers do subtly different things, and they all seem to have nontrivial bugs. I haven't tried this process myself, so I'd be interested to know how you get on - please let us know. -- Finlay McWalter • Talk 20:40, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

If you're animating SVG files, Synfig Studio might be the tool that you want to produce the animation in in the first place. It's got a steep learning curve, though. Paul Stansifer 22:50, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Java 2d graphics

If i have method as such

	public void PaintComponent(Graphics g){
		g.drawString("test",50,50);
		repaint();	
	}

How can i call this from another class? Assuming i have created an object of the class. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.148.254.106 (talk) 20:56, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

I'm confused about what you're doing, and I think you may be too. paintComponent() (note the lowercase initial p) is a method of a Swing component which is called (by the system repaint handler) to actually do painting. repaint() is a method that anyone can call, which doesn't do any painting, but instead enqueues an event that requests the system repaint handler to, at some later time, call paintComponent on that control (technically it enqueues and event which is handled asynchronously in another thread). I'm confused because you're calling repaint() inside your paintComponent(), which will enqueue a fresh repaint event, which will re-call your paintComponent() again, ad infinitum. I think what you want to do is to remove the call to repaint() in your paintComponent() method, fix the name of that method, and then call repaint() in your other class. I'm sorry if I've only served to confuse things; if so, this article might explain things better. -- Finlay McWalter • Talk 21:10, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Maps

Is there any good software for making maps? Software that has customized tools for things like cities, watercourses, roads, borders, topography, etc, not like Photoshop where you have to make everything yourself. Thanks, Shannon^talk _contribs 21:38, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

If you want to make maps of the United States, you're in luck. There is a ton of freely available GIS data. The Census Bureau provides most of the data you would need -- water, cities, roads, railroads, etc. You can also search the website of the state's Department of Transportation (usually http://dot.state.[ab].us where [ab] is the state abbreviation, though there are exceptions) for more complete data. (If you were to use state data you must be careful not to run afoul of copyright. State data may be copyrighted, while federal data by law must be public domain.) You feed all this data into a program such as Quantum GIS which then spits it out for you in a nice map. All you would need to do then is customize how you want the map to look and export it as an SVG. (You might want to take a look at Wikipedia:WikiProject U.S. Roads/Maps task force/Tutorial for basic instruction. Although that tutorial specifically targets road maps, the basic process remains the same.)

I dunno whether there is freely available data for European countries. I think there is some for Germany from the Bundesamt für Kartographie and Geodäsie, but I haven't been their website in a while so I don't know if they still provide it. I think there might be some for the UK, as well, but it might not be free. Most likely, you would need to Google third-party data if you were to focus on Europe.

Feel free to contact me if you have further questions (I wrote most of the linked tutorial for USRD). Xenon54 / talk / 22:40, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

No, not premade maps of an actual place, just software that can make features on maps without a basemap, i.e. just free to make any map whether of a real or nonexistent place. Shannon^talk _contribs 01:38, 12 March 2010 (UTC)

So you're looking for, as an example, something that can take a blank canvas and just draw a river, a road, and a border, that does not necessarily have a relation to somewhere in the real world? I am not aware of any such software, although you could try going into Inkscape and using the freehand pen tool... Xenon54 / talk / 01:51, 12 March 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, I meant that. I make most of my maps with Photoshop but feel it's not good, sufficient, professional enough. Wonder if the people who make the atlases such as Earth Concise do it; I have a feeling they all have some sort of special software. Shannon^talk _contribs 07:33, 12 March 2010 (UTC)

This is a LONG shot. Some games (especially 3rd person perspective role-playing games) come with a map/terrain editor packaged in e.g. Heroes of Might and Magic II or Warcraft III World Editor. It MAY be the case that some companies offer the map editor as a free download. It MAY be the case that you can export the created maps as jpegs. It MAY be the case that the graphics look realistic rather than cartoony. This Google search brings up a few results. Good luck. Zunaid 07:54, 12 March 2010 (UTC)

avi player for win mobile 6 on htc p4530 (herald)

Can you suggest one? I've tried pocket dvx and sompyplayer but don't work.. thanks in advance --87.5.31.44 (talk) 21:59, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

I used TCPMP for quite some time and loved it. It's not compatible with all builds, so mess around with it and see if it works. There are custom builds for certain phones, you may want to check PPCGeeks' HTC Herald forum for suggested media players. (There's a paid version called of TCPMP called CorePlayer which I didn't like as much.) Coreycubed (talk) 14:09, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

What a nifty connection problem.

On my Windows Vista computer (the one I'm using now), it seems that I lose my Internet connection every few minutes, for all of two or three seconds, before getting it back. It's unnoticeable during general use, but it can get annoying when I'm, say, going to knife someone in the back only to be told that I'd lost connection and I'm actually lying comatose on the floor.

I also have Ubuntu on this computer, which I'm extremely unfamiliar with. I tested out the problem the only way I know how; by playing a game - specifically, RuneScape. The problem didn't seem to exist on Ubuntu, though with a game as slow-paced as RuneScape, it's difficult to be certain.

This is a connection problem that I've never heard of before. I don't suppose anyone has any advice? Vimescarrot (talk) 22:12, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Rather than saying you "lost your Internet connection", is it possible it's just delayed by some other process ? Automatic updates, for example ? Or some malware reporting your porn-viewing habits back to base ? :-) StuRat (talk) 01:14, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

I've no idea. Is it? I wouldn't know how to check. This problem has been persisting for a year and a half now. Does anything update every two minutes? I use Windows Live OneCare for all my security "needs"...For anything that actually needs safety, I use Ubuntu. Would OneCare pick up a porn-reporting malware? Wouldn't that malware be bored senseless by my lack of original taste by now? Vimescarrot (talk) 01:27, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

Well, you could try using the Task Manager to kill every non-vital process, and see if that solves it. If so, reboot and kill processes selectively, until you find the culprit. StuRat (talk) 06:31, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

If I was to kill all my protection, how much risk would I be putting myself at? Just playing BF2142, not using a browser. That seems to have worked, at least a little bit. Vimescarrot (talk) 15:45, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

I think you'd be OK as long as you just play that one game, provided you trust them not to send you any malware. StuRat (talk) 15:50, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

Turns out to be wishful thinking. I killed OneCare entirely and the problem still persists. I don't know what other programs in my task manager are actually safe to kill; I don't know what most of them do...I'll still give it a go, but it'll take me a while; the game is the only way I know of to test it, and I don't play that often (twice a day, maybe). Vimescarrot (talk) 17:06, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

If it's not too technical for your comfort level, you could grab Wireshark and run it while you play your game. When you see the big pause, note the time and go see in Wireshark what was happening on the network at that time. Hopefully you'll see something suggestive like a lot of traffic to useless-updates-for.some-crap-I-installed-and-forgot-about.com which could lead you to a solution. Of course, there are many things that could be going wrong besides network congestion. Maybe some large background process is starting up, maybe the cat sitting on the router at your ISP is licking himself furiously and getting static in your packets. --Sean 18:37, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

...while licking his packets. StuRat (talk) 18:43, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

Maybe it's a bit obvious, but this would also be a good time to make sure you have the most recent drivers for your network card. If the probably really doesn't exist in Ubuntu, a glitch in the windows drivers would definitely be a possible explanation for this. Indeterminate (talk) 10:59, 13 March 2010 (UTC)

JPEG Image won't display in IE6

Can anyone help me figure out why this image will display in Firefox but not IE6? [removed] Helpful replies only, please. The Hero of This Nation (talk) 23:37, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Whoever made the image saved it as a CMYK (cyan-magenta-yellow-black) JPEG, rather than an RGB (red-green-blue) JPEG. Printers understand CMYK. Monitors display everything in RGB. CMYK JPEGs will not display in any version of Internet Explorer and look very odd in Apple's Safari browser. Is this your image? Whoever made it needs to open up the original again and then save it again as an RGB JPEG. Do not open the current JPEG -- open the original AI, EPS, PSD, etc., file used to create the logo.--Chmod 777 (talk) 23:50, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Thank you, that is very helpful -- now I am able to tell the person who made the image what to do to rectify the situation. The Hero of This Nation (talk) 23:56, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Why are all my rar downloads corrupt?

I used to have no problems downloading. Now almost every RAR file I download is corrupt. Even small rars. Some of them are fixed by RAR repair, a lot aren't.

I downloaded a more recent version of winrar, it didn't help.

What do you think is causing this? How can I fix this?--Gary123 (talk) 23:45, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Well, one thing to try is to use a different browser. If you are using IE, see if Firefox does anything different. If you are using Firefox, try IE, or Safari, or something else. Additionally, are all these RARs from the same source? Because it could be the source website that is messing them up. You could try downloading them to a different computer and seeing if those are still corrupt or not. Figuring out tech problems is primarily an issue of eliminating possibilities—finding the one variable that indicates the source of the problem. --Mr.98 (talk) 01:36, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

I've used both firefox and seamonkey. I have the problem at multiple download sites. --Gary123 (talk) 02:25, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

Could you give us a link to test? ---— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 04:08, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

Back in the olden days, viruses used to append themselves at the ends or beginnings of files, thus rendering them corrupt. Still, weird error. --Ouro (blah blah) 07:01, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

For example one librivox zip, I downloaded recently was corrupt the first time, but I re-downloaded and it was fixed. Do you think it might be a connection problem? Except that when I check the size of the corrupt files, it is often the correct MB size. Also for corrupt audio rars, often some mp3 are extracted but not others. --Gary123 (talk) 07:30, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

Make sure you're extracting from the beginning file and not one of the subsequent part files, otherwise it will always show corrupt. Also try extracting with 7zip —Preceding unsigned comment added by Fire2010 (talk • contribs) 13:56, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

Bad Internet connection? Maybe it is not only RAR files that get corrupt, but all (big) files (in which corruption is easily detected). --Andreas Rejbrand (talk) 14:00, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

The size of the file does not affect whether corruption is detected or not. Corruption is detected using a checksum on the file. On of the following is most likely the cause: your connection is poor (and you are dropping packets), the server isn't serving the files correctly, the uploader didn't compress them correctly, or your unzip program isn't working. Or of course, it could be a "ghost in the machine".=DSmallman12q (talk) 22:46, 12 March 2010 (UTC)

No, I did not mean that either. The two brackets are not related. I just meant that a corrupted EXE (for instance) is easier to spot than a corrupted Shakespearean novel. --Andreas Rejbrand (talk) 12:33, 14 March 2010 (UTC)