Code Inquisitor

Upgrading squeezebox server on whs & Visual C++ dependancy

2011-11-27T00:51:00.001Z

I was upgrading my squeezebox server 7.6 on my windows home server via the whs console | Settings | Add-ins. To install v7.7 first I had to uninstall 7.6, no problem. When I tried to install v7.7, which has been renamed Logitech Server, it said it needed the Microsoft Visual C++ 2010 SP1 Redistributable Package (x86) and gave a download link from the Microsoft site. To install this I did the following.

Downloaded vcredist_x86.exe to my machine.
I used robycopy from the command line to copy the file to a shared directory on whs. (I needed to create the directory in whs, as when created via remote desktops it did not have permission to write to it).
From the laptop I ran remote desktops. I needed to login from remote desktops to my whs server as the administrator. I needed to launch the command line to run the installation file.

Syncing with WHS

2011-09-25T00:14:00.001+01:00

I wanted to sync some directories on my machine to a shared folder on my server which runs Window Home Server. I used my backup s/w of choice, Cobian backup. A large percentage of files did not copy with errors like "The specified network name is no longer available" / "The network path was not found" / "The filename, directory name, or volume label syntax is incorrect".

I also tried the free microsoft synctoy. It did not copy any additional files on the same sync with some of the same errors.

What worked for me in the end was surprisingly the free Microsoft, Robocopy. It has a default feature to skip files that already appear in the destination folder with identical size and timestamp.

robocopy source destination /e /zb /r:5 /purge

e.g. robocopy "f:\my documents\my music" \\myserver\music /e /zb /r:5 /purge

Groovy tip: initialise ArrayList

2010-06-25T00:17:00.002+01:00

Q	I have an ArrayList of known length, each element containing a comma separated string, some list members may be empty, the list starts empty and is built up. But the list elements start null, is there a way to initialise them?
A	def myArrayList = (0..99).collect { '' }

Eclipse tip: switch/change tab

Git tip: add to comments

2010-03-30T20:03:00.001+01:00

I have done a git commit but want to append to the comments I have added.

In the root of your repository directory you will find a .git folder. In there there is a file "COMMIT_EDITMSG" which contains the comments for the current commit. To bring up the default editor (VIM, unless you have your custom editor specified in the [core] section of .gitconfig - located in the home directory - e.g. "editor = e:\\JGSoft\\EditPadPro6\\Editpadpro.exe, you can do git commit --amend

Eclipse tip: switch/change tab

2010-03-24T20:02:00.005Z

Q	I have looked at a lot of the Eclipse keyboard shortcut cheat sheet lists but I can't find a shortcut to change tab in the editor?
A	Use ctrl+e to pop up a list of the open tabs which you can scroll though to change focus. Alternatively, you can use ctrl+page-up / ctrl+page-down to navigate to the right/left tabs respectively.

Git Tip: unstaging

2010-03-23T23:34:00.012Z

In Git you have your working tree and your repository but the necessary in-between state is the staging area. Files get staged by doing a git add. What's the opposite of a git add, i.e. how can I "unstage" a file?

Updated 25 August 2011.

Embarrassingly, I just saw the comments now over a year later and it turns out I have a lot to learn with GIT, I have not used it enough and got this completely wrong as the comments testify. I leave my deleted answer for my own education. I have turned on comment notification now!

As the handy command line help on a git status shows, files can be unstaged with git rm.

To wipe any changes you have made since the last commit, do a git reset HEAD <file name with complete path>

Cygwin tip: copying text

2010-03-22T20:24:00.000Z

Q	How can I copy text in a cygwin window?
A	In the system menu, select properties and then Options \| Edit Options \| QuickEdit mode. You can then highlight text in the window and press enter to copy it to the clipboard.

Eclipse tip: code completion shortcut

2010-03-21T20:32:00.001Z

Q	In Eclipse, ctrl+spacebar is not bringing up code completion?
A	Check for any shortcut collisions. On my machine I discovered that Dexpot's task switcher default shortcut is the same, it can be changed in configuration. I use Dexpot for Virtual Desktopping and it is a vital component of my toolkit.

Eclipse tip: editing class header

2010-03-08T17:21:00.006Z

How can I change the class header in Eclipse to add a company copyright blurb?

${filecomment}

${package_declaration}

${typecomment}

${type_declaration}

The text that gets substituted for ${filecomment} can be edited via Window | Preferences | Java | Code Style | Code Templates | Comments | Files. When editing the template you have the option in the GUI to insert variables and you can see which ones are available.

This header will only shows up in new classes after choosing "Generate comments" in the new Java class wizard.

Eclipse Tip: Loading Maven repository

2010-03-06T08:11:00.003Z

I cloned a Maven repository from github, How do I open this in Eclipse?

Issue a mvn eclipse:eclipse command in the cloned project root (where the pom.xml resides), which creates the default eclipses directories/files. This project can then be opened in Eclipse. Note, as the .pom file changes (by other developers) you may need to regenerate the Eclipse project using this command and refresh in Eclipse.

Alternatively, if you have the Maven plugin installed in Eclipse you can then do File | Import | Maven | Existing Maven Projects and point to the directory with the pom.xml.

Git tip: checkout from github via cygwin

2010-03-05T22:30:00.001Z

Q	In trying to checkout a repository from github using cygwin (unix like command line interface for windows), according to the github help is do a ssh git@github.com. However, I got a "Permission denied (publickey)".
A	The missing ingredient for me was that cygwin uses the HOME environment variable and this was not set on my machine. I was then able to do a git clone git@github.com:<github repository>.

Eclipse tip: creating getters and setters

2010-03-04T23:27:00.005Z

Q	I have to create a standard Java bean class but don't fancy having to type all those nasty getters and setters. Is there any code generator I can use?
A	Enter all the private properties in the class and then right click and select Source \| Generate Getters and Setters...

Git tip: windows home directory

2010-03-03T22:09:00.005Z

Q	Working with Git on Windows and wanting to connect to Github, one needs to install msysgit. The github help for Generating SSH keys, says thar one needs to copy the keys to ~/.ssh. What do I do in windows?
A	This look like notation relevant to Unix but I learned from this iwebthereforeiam post that the slash represents the home directory, which in Windows XP is the user directory under the "Documents and Settings" folder.

Eclipse tip - import xml code formatting rules

2010-03-02T21:24:00.005Z

Q	I got sent eclipse code formatting rules by xml. How can I use this?
A	In Eclipse (Galileo 3.5.1) open Windows \| Preferences \| Java \| Code Style \| Formatter & do an import selecting the xml file

Martin Fowler on the meaning of life

2009-08-26T14:15:00.000+01:00

Regular expression & new lines

2009-08-25T16:48:00.000+01:00

Windows line breaks are LF (\r) followed by a CR (\n), so to match a line break in windows use the regular expression \r\n.

If you have a line break, $ will match before the line break, and ^ after it.

You can match a CR (\r) not followed by LF (\n) with \r(?!\n).

UNIX uses an LF character only.

Apple uses a CR character only.

Playing BBC streams in Winamp (Windows)

2009-06-04T15:35:00.007+01:00

This post updated 23 March 2010

Install Winamp

Install Tara plugin. Ensure "Process audio though Winamp" is unchecked in Preferences | Plug-ins | Input | Tara Audio Video Plugin. [Test: Is this still needed?]

Install Real Alternative

If your primary sound driver changes, e.g. you plug your laptop into and external sound card, I have found that you may need to reconfigure the driver in Preferences | Plug-ins | Output | Nullsoft DirectSound Output | Device & select the sound driver from the first drop down.

Open the BBC Player and select the show you are interested in

Hover over the show and right click to copy the link address, it is in the form
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/<Programme ID>/<stream name>
e.g. http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00rbtcd/Gilles_Peterson_Bonobo_live_in_the_studio

Put the <Programme ID> into the superb iPlayer PID Convertor to give you the BBC .ram

Experimental show with Mary Ann Hobbs

Worldwide show with Giles Peterson

Leftfield show with Rob da bank

Drum and Bass Show with Fabio and Grooverider

If you wish to organise your bookmarks, e.g. have the above under a BBC category, I recommend ML Bookmark Categoriser.

Bookmarks that are shown in the Bookmarks view in the Media Library are stored in the %Appdata%\Winamp\winamp.bm file. You can open that file in Notepad and copy+paste the contents into another winamp.bm file.

Listening to streams, especially the above 2 hour BBC shows, might not be convenient in one sitting. You can use the Amarok plugin to bookmark the position in the stream - indeed multiple positions of desired.

IDEA GWT Sample Application & SmartGWT

2009-02-03T17:26:00.001Z

Assumes: Have IDEA v8 & GWT installed

v8 of IDEA comes with a GWT Plugin. To check you installed the plugin have a look on the Web/Java EE Technologies Plugins page of the Plugin wizard (File|Configure plugins)

Run the new project wizard and select to create a new project from scratch, 'GWT' The last page of the wizard allows you to select the desired technologies, choose GWT and point to your local GWT installation. This creates a new GWT facet, you can see this by opening File|Project structure & selecting modules.

Right click on the top level 'GWT' node in project tree, select New|Google Web Toolkit|GWT Sample application, give it a name of 'Sample'

Open Run|Edit Configurations and select a GWT Configuration. Select the html file to open: sample.Sample/Sample.html. Set the VM parameters to -Xmx512M. otherwise you may have running out of memory issues. Run this new configuration and you see the sample GWT application:

Note: In sample.html I had to change
<script language="javascript" src="gwt.js"></script>
to
<script language="javascript" src="sample.Sample.nocache.js"></script>

SmartGWT

Download SmartGWT (http://code.google.com/p/smartgwt/) and unzip to a convenient location. Create a lib directory under your GWT project and copy
smartgwt.jar here. Open File|Project structure and select Libraries, select + to add new library 'smartgwt' and select attach classes and attach sources to point to this smartgwt.jar

In Sample.gwt.xml, add
<inherits name='com.smartgwt.SmartGwt'/>

Open {smartgwt}\samples\helloworld\src\com\mycompany\client\HelloWorld.java and append the onModuleLoad code to Sample.java. Rerun the application and you will see the sample SMARTGWT added.