Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Computing/2009 August 12

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August 12

Bulk listing of books for sale on Amazon

Are there any free third-party tools for listing books in bulk for sale on Amazon? NeonMerlin 00:19, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

You mean other than the Amazon provided Book Loader tool? SunSw0rd (talk) 17:59, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Yes, since I don't have enough items to justify becoming a Pro Merchant. I'm just trying to sell 45 books in preparation for a move. NeonMerlin 18:49, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Bluetooth screwups.

I have a cheap AT&T cellphone that's "paired" via bluetooth to my car's audio system.

At work (I'm a computer game programmer) I recently switched from a USB XBox360 controller (plugged into my PC) to a wireless controller.

I notice that when my cellphone is placed on the desk, the XBox controller will periodically flash all of it's lights...which I think means that it's lost radio contact...even though it's just 18" from the radio transmitter 'dongle'. This doesn't particularly surprise me, with the controller, the dongle and the phone so close together, interference is pretty likely.

However, since I switched controllers - on three separate occasions in 10 days, my cellphone refused to talk to my car until I turned it off and on again and went down into the BlueTooth menu and turned on the 'pairing' again.

Needless to say, I'm going back to using a cable-connected Xbox controller...but I'm curious. Is it my imagination - or is the Xbox360 controller somehow screwing up my phone's bluetooth interface? If so, what's the mechanism here?

SteveBaker (talk) 02:16, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

What frequency does the Xbox controller use? Have you had the same issues with the phone's Bluetooth disabled (or, if that's not possible, a phone without Bluetooth on the same cell network)? NeonMerlin 03:11, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Xbox uses 2.4 Mhz according to "Xbox 360 Wireless Headset" just like bluetooth#Air interface.--OMCV (talk) 03:27, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Oh - so it uses the bluetooth frequency - but not the bluetooth protocol?! I didn't know that. That's a typically microsoftian trick! Ohhh - look! There is a perfectly good standard here. Let's ignore it and invent something worse! <sigh> Well, I suppose that explains the interference. Is it reasonable to assume that the phone shuts down its bluetooth interface when there is too much random garbage on the frequency? SteveBaker (talk) 12:33, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

This is not on your main point, but I assume you've ruled out the possibility that the controller was flashing its lights because it was low on battery. Anyway, I'm surprised you didn't switch back to a wired controller after day 1. How many times a day did you reach over for the wireless controller and have to hit the big (X) and then wait for 5 seconds while it powered up and established its connection with the dongle? Tempshill (talk) 04:19, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Yeah - swapping out the batteries was my first reaction - but it only gets into that state when the cellphone is nearby. Certainly the 'waiting to power up' thing is annoying - and you can be assured that I'm going back to a USB controller ASAP. This is more a matter of curiosity than practicality. SteveBaker (talk) 12:33, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

I'm surprised by this, too — you would think that Xbox players would possibly own a cell phone and that they might be carrying it around in their pocket within, say, 10cm of the controller. Tempshill (talk) 16:19, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Cellphones cause quite a bit of RF interference. For a low-tech solution, you could just wrap some tin foil around the phone, although that might interfere with your reception. Indeterminate (talk) 03:35, 13 August 2009 (UTC)

Merging software

I was wondering how many programmer years it would take to merge the following pieces of software into a functional integrated system?

1. A program to process NMR spectra (Fourier transform and other manipulations): SpinWorks written in C# (GPL).
2. A program to draw molecule and possibly annotate NMR spectra: BKchem [1] written in Python (GPL).
3. A management system that can handle/synchronize distinct clusters of files as a single unit across most platforms through a simple to use webbrowser plug-in: Zotero [2] written with JavaScript + SQLite (ECL).

Furthermore if you have a prediction of the the required effort to get a basic system working, can you substantiate your answer with with a reference that could be used in academic article.--OMCV (talk) 02:31, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Can you clarify what you want the integrated system to do? Without further programming I can't see any connection between 1 and 2 (except that they are both scientific)

Similarily 2 only produces drawings, whereas 3 manages references.

Also program 2 only creates 2D diagrams - for nmr spectra three dimensional structures are practically a neccessity.

Basically, there doesn't seem to be any data that can be shared between the three programs - making integration meaningless. What functionality did you want the final product to have?83.100.250.79 (talk) 10:24, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

A plugin environment like (3) that allows the program to function on many machines with minimal user known how would be good, (3) is especially ideal since most NMR data sets start are a collection of files (similar to web pages). Once data is transferred to the plugin's storage environment a user could process the NMR data with (1) in the process producing at least one more file for (3) to manage. Once the NMR data is processed the user would be able to annotate the spectra with (2) probably producing another file. Once all this is done (3) would be able to synchronize and backup this data to an online achieve allowing access from all the user's computers (instrument computer, work desktop, home laptop, ect.) all the while retaining the ability to analysis and manipulate the data with (1) or alter adjust the annotation with (2). This is where it it gets a bit my hypothetical since I think (3) is still refining its full functionality, but ideally one user could share their data sets with select colleagues who are also use the plugin. The next step in the project would be to allow the publication of data sets to a data repository that can be searched by the public; but that step would be phase two of the project well after the successful merger and tweaking of the software described above.--OMCV (talk) 12:17, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Note:Synthetic chemist have very little use for 3D structures in their day to day activity of synthesis. In most cases stereo chemistry is more easily interpreted from a 2D projection than a 3D projection. In the 7 years I've conducted NMR based research I've only wanted a 3D model on a couple occasions and it both it was easier to produce a physical ball and stick model. Its true that software that can model molecules in 3D is a minimal requirement for computational chemistry such as modeling a molecules interactions with another molecule but those projects are usually conducted by an individual other than synthetic chemists.--OMCV (talk) 12:28, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Annoting nmr spectra with images should be fairly trivial, c# can do this, either as an overlay, or combining the images. Do you want the process to work entirely in a browser without installed programs, or is the download of an application acceptable?

So really you want it (1) to work in a browser, with online storage. The use of (3) still isn't totally clear - Do you need the citation finding aspects of zotero, or do you just need a browser based database system? Do you want zotero modified so that it automatically extracts nmr meta-data (samples,field strength etc) from a page for storage in a database?83.100.250.79 (talk) 12:55, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

I think I should ask - do you want compatability with any of the NMR spectra databases mentioned in the linked article?83.100.250.79 (talk) 13:34, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Also out of curiosity from your stated other interests - does the name S.Ebbens mean anything to you?83.100.250.79 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 13:42, 12 August 2009 (UTC).

Right now the most common way to handle NMR data is to collect it at a central facility and then ftp to the facilities computers to move the NMR data folders onto a group or personal computer for further processing. In theory a plugin like (3) could have the ability to manage a personal database over several computers (no need for tedious FTP). A system like (3) would also be nice since it can handle clusters of files behind the scenes, right now: reference meta data, web pages, pdfs, notes, attachments. In the case of NMR data the date behind the scenes would include: FID (the actual raw data), acquisition log, two other files (in the case of Varian NMRs), once processed by (1) there would be another a file for processed data, once annotated by (2) there would be some sort of structure/annotation file, then there would be a need for a meta data file(s) useful to the personal and/or public database, attached notes useful for the chemist, probably things I haven't thought of each getting their own file but all presented to the user as a single cohesive data set through a user friendly interface analogues to (3). As I understand it all of this data handling couldn't be done through a webpage (since we don't give webpages direct access to our harddrives) so the final program would need to be a plug-in or stand alone program.

I wrote most of NMR spectra databases, and those databases are either proprietary and/or rather useless. The idea behind combining the three pieces of software is to develop a tool that is useful to synthetic chemists in its own right but can easily become the front end for a user-modified NMR database. As far as annotating with (1) or (2), I don't know much about 2D chemical structure files but I know that they are more than image files and contain connectivity data. Any spectra structure annotation would best connect the peak(s) or spectral range to one or more atoms based on the connectivity data. My ability to write code is nonexistent so I have no idea how what you said about using writing something with C# to annotate is reasonable or unreasonable.

Sorry I don't think I know Ebbins, I'm state side and have only visited England once.--OMCV (talk) 15:04, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

It's probably worth asking how much of a full 'database' you want - I assume there will be multiple copies of spectra eg by date, operator, batch, etc? Would you want to be able to say - search for spectra by operator/date acquired/machine used. If so I think it would be best to start by finding a 'cloud database provider' something with a structured query language - then attach the actual 'ping' data to that. (You could use a simple data storage provider, there are no issues with attaching a database program via the net - most online retailers do it).

If that's not needed then one folder per spectra containing all the data would do just as well.

Are all the spectra expected to be in the same format? or are different manufacturers machines used - giving different file ouputs?

As far as programming goes there's no real difference between storing the data locally, or on an external server.

Thinking about it the actual programming work to join up data, meta-data, store it somewhere, and create a simple interface for accessing.displaying it isn't that great. The bigger problem is accurately defining the types of data set, the variants (if any), future extensibility, and specifically what you want it to be able to do. The main issue that I can see is the format that the machines output their data - to get a reliable and accurate automated system for extracting that could be the most time consuming part - do the machines emit their meta data in a standard format (eg CSV, or other accessible by a spreadsheet or database)? - a programmer would really need a systematic description of the way the data is to be presented before being able to start. Particularily the format in which machine readable meta-data is output. (extracting it from human readable form would be problematic) eg [3]

Also was the spectra annotation to be done manually, or were you hoping that the machine would automatically assign peaks to molecular structure based on connectivity and atom type data?83.100.250.79 (talk) 16:04, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

I wish I could comment on your database concerns and ideas but I really don't know enough about databases. The itunes type interface of (3) would be a really nice way to access NMR data, before an external database is considered.

I realize there is no difference between storing data locally or on an external server but for users to be comfortable with the system they will want to backup their data themselves. I wouldn't risk my data by storing it exclusively with a cloud service. The users would also want access to their data when their off line. I think syncing would in the long run take less bandwidth then uploading data to a server and than pulling data when ever its needed. Plus the less a user needs to do the better, no need to make them upload their data all the time if it syncs automatically.

The big advantage of working with or starting from (1) is that it contains translators for the spectra files of the major NMR producers. Thankfully NMR software technology evolves very slowly and formats don't change often. Independent handling formatting issues would be a major selling point for the system described above.

I would envision manually annotation since I wouldn't expect a computer to do a decent job. With that said I'm sure the user would want a system that allowed a great deal of control over the annotation and how annotations are displayed. A feature that I haven't mentioned is the ultimate desire to export an image for use in publications, posters, and presentation that contains a a) processed spectra, b) 2D molecular image, c) annotation, and sometimes d) a text box listing conditions. The user will want a huge amount of control over the formatting of this image: the text, aspects of the spectral scale, integrals styles, peak labeling/lists, line weights, molecule styles, positions of all the elements, annotation (a color coded system, table, arrows from atoms to peaks, ect.). Features that control some of these variables can be found in (1) and (2) but fine tuning the production of this image will involve a lot of original work.--OMCV (talk) 17:15, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

.rar files

Can someone suggest a one stop program that will seamlessly play .rar files? I downloaded a video in this format, couldn't open it with windows media player or real one or quicktime, so then I searched the web and found some free "splitting" program which would supposedly help in some way, downloaded that, had no luck with it. Running windows XP on a Dell. Thanks in advance.--68.160.243.210 (talk) 03:57, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

The .rar file format is a lot like a .zip file: it's a file that contains one or many compressed files and folders. You need WinRAR to decompress it. WinRAR can save its .rar archive files while "splitting" them (for example, you might want five 4GB files instead of one 20GB one, so you can write the five 4GB files onto five DVD+R discs), but the splitting is optional. I don't know of any software that will "seamlessly play" a video or music file that's stored inside a .rar file; normally you would decompress the .rar file and then you can do whatever you want to the contents. Tempshill (talk) 04:11, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the advice. I just downloaded WinRaR but I'm not sure I understand what to do with it. Say I download a .rar document. So I use WinRaR to decompress it right? But then what format is the video in? I still have to use a program to run it right? So either WinRaR saves the video in a new format I can choose? or it has a play function? Or if it just decompresses, how do I ever know what file format the compressed file is in so I'll know if once decompressed it will be in a format compatible with one of my video playing programs?--68.160.243.210 (talk) 04:35, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

If you have winrar then you can simply open the file and you'll see the file inside (unless it's split up). Then you right click the file and do "uncompress to XXXXXX". then you have the video file. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 65.184.21.210 (talk) 05:01, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

That's right. WinRAR doesn't know from video files. It doesn't convert video formats or have a play function. Its main purpose is to compress any kinds of files into a smaller archive file (the .rar file). Whoever created that .rar file of yours (let's call him Bob) originally started with a video file - maybe it's an .mpeg, or an .avi, or whatever - and they compressed it into that .rar file. After you decompress the .rar file, you'll have the same .mpeg or .avi or whatever sort of file Bob started with. Tempshill (talk) 06:07, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Okay I think I understand now. When a file is in .rar there's no way to tell what format the contents inside are in until you do the decompression. Anyway, I just tried to uncompress the file using WinRar and it got near the end of decompression and then told me I don't have sufficient "volume". I "only" have an 8 gb drive but this doesn't seem right.--68.160.243.210 (talk) 10:11, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

No, you can open the file with WinRar and view the file listing inside. I think you might possibly have missing volumes, such as .r01, .r02, etc. as your source might have been split into multiple rar files. Sandman30s (talk) 10:50, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

How much free space do you have, and how big is the compressed .rar file? What operating system do you use? (Win XP) --Andreas Rejbrand (talk) 10:44, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

RAR volumes are often made up of multiple files. They might be named yourfile1.rar, yourfile2.rar, or they might be yourfile.rar, yourfile.r01, yourfile.r02, etc. You can't uncompress the files INSIDE the RAR volume unless you have all of the files in the volume. So if they say you are MISSING a volume, then you need to make sure you have ALL of the RAR files for that RAR volume (and keep them all in the same directory). (It sounds complicated, but once you get it working right, it'll make sense.) --98.217.14.211 (talk) 14:42, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Sony CLIÉ PEG-TJ35

Hi wikimates! By any chance, do you know the maximum size of a Memory Stick a Sony CLIÉ PEG-TJ35 can read? Thank you in advance --Ulisse0 (talk) 12:41, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

The manual, on Sony's website, talks about Memory Stick media on page 124 (as numbered on the manual pages). It is thick with Sony jargon and unnecessary repetition of stock phrases, and there is no simple table with this information; but it looks to me like you can use 1GB, 512MB, or 256MB Memory Stick Pros. It looks to me like you can also use Duo cards with an adapter but the manual is silent on the supported capacities (maybe it's the same). Tempshill (talk) 16:15, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Guess the dictator/sitcom character

I remember playing Guess the Dictator/Sit-Com Character when I was at university in around 1995. Just how long has it been online? --OpenToppedBus - Talk to the driver 12:51, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

The www.archive.org archive shows that the home page of the site you linked began linking to this unfunny and unfun game starting on March 9, 2001. It's possible you played it at some other website. Tempshill (talk) 05:03, 13 August 2009 (UTC)

Bluetooth Marketing

what is meant by bluetooth marketing???where is it used???I would like some details about it please.thanks —Preceding unsigned comment added by Gd iitm (talk • contribs) 16:30, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

See Proximity marketing. -- kainaw™ 16:33, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

larger checkbox on python pages

Can the checkbox be made to look larger using python scripts and clickable area expanded? Any online source for sripts for this purpose? Thank you. --Clericalmonk (talk) 17:02, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Which graphical toolkit are you using? Python supports several. -- Finlay McWalter • Talk 17:06, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

tkinter--Clericalmonk (talk) 17:25, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

On p37 of the Tkinter 8.4 reference manual here there is a list of attributes for the Checkbutton widget that includes height (defaults to 1 line) and width (default determined by size of label). You can also use the font attribute to change the size of the label text. Gandalf61 (talk) 10:02, 13 August 2009 (UTC)

Font identification?

Can anyone identify either of the two fonts on this logo for me? Thanks :) ╟─TreasuryTag►voice vote─╢ 17:28, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

That server is not set up right and clicking on the logo tries to download it. Here is the page with the logo: [4]. --98.217.14.211 (talk) 18:01, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

The font is very similar to Tahoma and Frutiger, but the serifs are a little more jaunty, like ITC Officina Sans. Hmm. --98.217.14.211 (talk) 18:01, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Try these sites:

• http://www.identifont.com/
• http://www.myfonts.com/WhatTheFont/

---— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 18:24, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

...though it'll almost certainly be a waste of time. Those sites are seriously lousy at identifying fonts. --98.217.14.211 (talk) 18:28, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

They get you something close most of the time. They don't always get the exact font, especially if it's a copycat font. Gigs (talk) 18:45, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

Create a transcript from an audio/video file

I recently recorded my grandfather as he told me about his life from childhood and the about the wars he served in. It would be great to have a transcript of this recording, as it is somewhere around 3 hours long! What is the best software available (free or other) to do this? Can it distinguish between voices? Jared (t)  17:29, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

You're probably best off just transcribing it by hand. It'll be far more accurate and save you a lot of time cleaning it up. It doesn't take as long as you'd think it would; maybe 6 hours total for all of that, spread out over a few days, it isn't so much. You'll spend more time trying to find software for it than that, and spend even more time fiddling with it and fixing it up. This is the kind of thing that a human does infinitely better than the software does, at the moment. --98.217.14.211 (talk) 18:30, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

I agree that doing it yourself may be the most practical thing for a one-off like this. Other options include using a transcription service, which charge US$1-2 per minute. Running the recordings through speech compression first might save you some money. --Sean 15:30, 13 August 2009 (UTC)

If you have windows 7 or dragon naturally speaking - listen to the tape in one ear and repeat.. I use that method for my transcripts and it's much quicker than typing. --Cameron Scott (talk) 15:45, 13 August 2009 (UTC)

List of speech recognition software may be of interest. 78.144.246.133 (talk) 13:03, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Repainting on different threads in Java

Hello! I'm working on a Java program that needs to be able to handle multiple repaint() calls on high-quality images as quickly as possible, so I'm thinking about running the repaint() calls in a thread pool, but I'm concerned (with my incomplete knowledge of the Swing repaint() mechanism) that this simple strategy won't do any good because I think calling repaint() fires a PaintEvent that ultimately ends back on the event-dispatch thread. So, my question is what additional steps do I need to take to make sure the painting takes place entirely on its designated thread? Thank you!--el Aprel (^facta-_facienda) 18:34, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Hi again el Aprel - hopefully you have read the documentation on the Swing paint process? It seems like it will depend whether you are using heavyweight or Java lightweight (Swing) components. You can also apparently override the default RepaintManager with your own implementation. This is not something I've done; usually I use one of the javax.media advanced 2D drawing packages... Nimur (talk) 20:21, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

I believe what you want is to implement the

paintImmediately()

function and use it appropriately. See Synchronous Painting in the same document I linked above - and notice the important caveat about overlapping requests. Your thread pool scheduler will need to handle those intelligently (since you are overriding the default scheduler used by the standard

paint()

function, with its event dispatch model). You might also want to read Threading and Swing - your threadpool threads should be Swing Worker Threads, and obey the conventions for interacting with the on-screen GUI elements. Nimur (talk) 20:47, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Thank you, Nimur! Your advice and linked documents were very helpful.--el Aprel (^facta-_facienda) 18:44, 13 August 2009 (UTC)

Math AutoCorrect Shortcuts

Hello. How can I print a full list of Math AutoCorrect shortcuts from Word 2007 equation editor? For example, typing \div in equation editor produces the division sign, ÷. I found this PDF on the Web: http://bakins-bits.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2007/11/word-2007-equations-and-mathematical-symbols-math-autocorrect-symbols.pdf. My printer could not print some of the symbols. I unsuccessfully tried searching Microsoft's website. Thanks in advance. --Mayfare (talk) 23:33, 12 August 2009 (UTC)