ded's blog

Clean Code

2011-12-30T22:36:00.002+01:00

Clean Code (A Handbook of Agile Sortware Craftmanship) by Robert C. Martin is a must-read.

Here are a few notes about it (filtered).

Regasm : insufficient system resources

2011-11-18T22:40:00.003+01:00

Got this error at work :

Regasm : error RA0000 : Insufficient system resources exist to complete the requested service

I played a little with procmon (Thanks a lot Mark !) I looked for "INSUFFICIENT RESOURCES" in the events. This event was due to a RegCreateKey in HKCR/Wow6432Node/CLSID. It turned out that it was not possible to create a subkey with regedit.

HTH

How To Really Reset Folder Settings in Windows 7

2011-07-02T17:43:00.005+02:00

Sometimes, Windows 7 automatically updates explorer's columns. For example, if a folder has a mp3 file, columns headers will be artist, song, etc.

This is really annoying for all other files of the same folder.

Configuration is stored in registry. Deleting and creating again such a folder will not reset its configuration. You have to delete keys in registry.

Here is the .reg file found on sevenforums.com :

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[-HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Shell\BagMRU]
[-HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Shell\Bags]

[-HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\ShellNoRoam\Bags]
[-HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\ShellNoRoam\BagMRU]

[-HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Classes\Local Settings\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Shell\BagMRU]
[-HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Classes\Local Settings\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Shell\Bags]

[-HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Classes\Wow6432Node\Local Settings\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Shell\Bags]
[-HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Classes\Wow6432Node\Local Settings\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Shell\BagMRU]

Révolution... 6 mois plus tard

2011-05-27T21:04:00.003+02:00

Reçu ce jour (6 mois et 12 jours après la demande effectuée le 15 décembre) :

Free Haut Débit

Bonjour,

Nous avons le plaisir de vous annoncer que votre nouvelle Freebox pour votre ligne ******** est en cours d'expédition au point relais KIALA.

[...].

Vous serez informé par email et SMS de l'arrivée de votre colis au point relais KIALA choisi.

Sincères salutations,

L'équipe Free

Windows 7 sp1 [Solved]

2011-03-12T21:09:00.022+01:00

Windows update fails to install service Windows 7 sp1. After downloading the 900 MB of windows6.1-KB976932-X64.exe (I also downloaded Windows_Win7SP1.7601.17514.101119-1850.AMD64CHK.Symbols.msi and Windows_Win7SP1.7601.17514.101119-1850.AMD64FRE.Symbols.msi, almost 300 MB each but I am still not sure about the requirement of these two), I tried to update manually. But this failed again : "L'installation n'a pas réussi", "l'assembly n'a pas pu être trouvé". "Détails" do not give a lot more info : "Erreur : ERROR_SXS_ASSEMBLY_MISSING(0x80073701)". There is a link to get more info ("Se connecter pour en savoir plus sur ce problème"), but this does not help me solve this problem.

Found the same problem here and here.

Looking deeper in C:\Windows\Logs\CBS\CBS.log (>250 MB) :

2011-03-12 22:11:26, Info                  CBS    Exec: Resolving Package: Package_43_for_KB976098~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64~~6.1.1.1, Update: 976098-91_neutral_LDR
2011-03-12 22:11:26, Info                  CBS    Exec: Resolving Package: Package_43_for_KB976098~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64~~6.1.1.1, Update: 976098-91_neutral_LDR, PinDeployment: amd64_8c41fc7eb0dbe2daefc621237184c0e3_31bf3856ad364e35_6.1.7600.20561_none_e8d566dacff1f5ff
2011-03-12 22:11:26, Error                 CSI    0000000c@2011/3/12:21:11:26.177 (F) d:\w7rtm\base\wcp\componentstore\csd_locking.cpp(324): Error STATUS_SXS_ASSEMBLY_MISSING originated in function CCSDirectTransaction::LockComponent expression: (null)
[gle=0x80004005]
2011-03-12 22:11:37, Error                 CSI    0000000d (F) STATUS_SXS_ASSEMBLY_MISSING #1573632# from CCSDirectTransaction::OperateEnding at index 0 of 1 operations, disposition 2[gle=0xd015000c]
2011-03-12 22:11:37, Error                 CSI    0000000e (F) HRESULT_FROM_WIN32(ERROR_SXS_ASSEMBLY_MISSING) #1573517# from Windows::ServicingAPI::CCSITransaction::ICSITransaction_PinDeployment(Flags = 0, a = 8c41fc7eb0dbe2daefc621237184c0e3, Version = 6.1.7600.20561, pA = PROCESSOR_ARCHITECTURE_AMD64 (9), Culture neutral, VersionScope = 1 nonSxS, PublicKeyToken = {l:8 b:31bf3856ad364e35}, Type neutral, TypeName neutral, PublicKey neutral, cb = (null), s = (null), rid = [77]"Package_43_for_KB976098~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64~~6.1.1.1.976098-91_neutral_LDR", rah = [1]"2", manpath = (null), catpath = (null), ed = 0, disp = 0)[gle=0x80073701]
2011-03-12 22:11:38, Info                  CBS    Failed to pin deployment while resolving Update: 976098-91_neutral_LDR from file: (null) [HRESULT = 0x80073701 - ERROR_SXS_ASSEMBLY_MISSING]
2011-03-12 22:11:38, Info                  CBS    Failed to resolve item[0] in Package: Package_43_for_KB976098~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64~~6.1.1.1, Update: 976098-91_neutral_LDR [HRESULT = 0x80073701 - ERROR_SXS_ASSEMBLY_MISSING]
2011-03-12 22:11:38, Info                  CBS    Failed to resolve execution update. [HRESULT = 0x80073701 - ERROR_SXS_ASSEMBLY_MISSING]
2011-03-12 22:11:38, Error                 CBS    Failed to resolve execution package: Package_43_for_KB976098~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64~~6.1.1.1 [HRESULT = 0x80073701 - ERROR_SXS_ASSEMBLY_MISSING]
2011-03-12 22:11:38, Info                  CSI    0000000f@2011/3/12:21:11:38.370 CSI Transaction @0x34c280 destroyed

I think the important part is Package_43_for_KB976098~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64~~6.1.1.1. So I tried to download KB976098 for x64 and install it manually, but windows tells me it is already installed.

sfc /scannow found nothing.
System Update Readiness Tool (KB947821 [v14]) does not help either (cannot install).

I eventually managed to install SP1 thanks to Kris post : I had to remove 4 KB : KB976098, KB979306, KB981793 and KB979916. Problem solved !

Argotic Syndication Framework Desillusion

2011-02-20T19:37:00.007+01:00

When I discovered Argotic Syndication Framework a few hours ago, I thought : One to rule them all. They say on their web site that I don't have to speak the syndication langage.

But, I failed to make it work on the first syndication feeds I tried :

blog.free.fr atom feeds generated with dotclear raise the following exception :

   at Argotic.Common.Guard.ArgumentNotNullOrEmptyString(String value, String name)
   at Argotic.Syndication.AtomPersonConstruct.set_Name(String value)
   at Argotic.Syndication.AtomPersonConstruct.Load(XPathNavigator source)
   at Argotic.Syndication.AtomPersonConstruct.Load(XPathNavigator source, SyndicationResourceLoadSettings settings)
   at Argotic.Data.Adapters.Atom10SyndicationResourceAdapter.FillFeedCollections(AtomFeed feed, XPathNavigator source, XmlNamespaceManager manager, SyndicationResourceLoadSettings settings)
   at Argotic.Data.Adapters.Atom10SyndicationResourceAdapter.Fill(AtomFeed resource)
   at Argotic.Data.Adapters.SyndicationResourceAdapter.FillAtomResource(ISyndicationResource resource, SyndicationResourceMetadata resourceMetadata)
   at Argotic.Data.Adapters.SyndicationResourceAdapter.Fill(ISyndicationResource resource, SyndicationContentFormat format)
   at Argotic.Syndication.AtomFeed.Load(XPathNavigator navigator, SyndicationResourceLoadSettings settings, SyndicationResourceLoadedEventArgs eventData)
   at Argotic.Syndication.AtomFeed.Load(Uri source, ICredentials credentials, IWebProxy proxy, SyndicationResourceLoadSettings settings)
   at Argotic.Syndication.AtomFeed.Create(Uri source, ICredentials credentials, IWebProxy proxy, SyndicationResourceLoadSettings settings)
   at Argotic.Syndication.AtomFeed.Create(Uri source, SyndicationResourceLoadSettings settings)
   at Argotic.Syndication.AtomFeed.Create(Uri source)

It fails to parse publication dates in Univers Freebox syndication feeds or Slashdot feeds.

Well, it seems I have to learn this langage anyway...

Edit : After failing again on slashdot feeds with .NET 3.5 classes, I found Peter's blog. Actually my code was getting closer to his solution.

Merci à la TVA !

2011-02-01T22:06:00.005+01:00

Les opérateurs profitent de la hausse de la TVA pour augmenter les tarifs des téléphones. Il y a deux semaines, on pouvait avoir un forfait Bouygues Telecom Evasio 1h+1h à 34 € (engagement d'un an), avec un HTC Desire pour :

phoneandphone : 1 € - Aujourd'hui : 169 €
BT : 59 € - Aujourd'hui : 180 €

Voleurs !

Mais bon, il suffit de se détendre ! 51 € en blanc :^( chez Virgin Mobile avec le code promo DESIRE et le forfait E-Devine à 31 €.

Recover Acer Aspire 1650

2011-01-30T10:24:00.018+01:00

Useful keys :

F2 : Enter BIOS Setup
F12 : Choose boot device (if F12 key
enabled in BIOS)

Notes :

You definitely need a backup DVD where Acer eRecovery has burnt the content of the hidden partition. Unfortunately, this DVD might not include everything (like Acer eRecovery for example - as if this restore process should be a one-time thing).

Steps :

Boot on backup DVD and wait for restore process to end. This will ovewrite the first partition with the content of the DVD big file. It takes about 12 min.
Then the laptop reboots on the DVD to finish copying files.

It seems that the real copy happens at 40 % (see HD activity). If I kept some linux partitions, it would froze at 40 % doing nothing (HD led off)

Then, if you reboot, Windows would use the following partitions :

C: : old hidden partition (hda1)
D: : old C: (hda2)
E: : old D: (hda3 or hda5)

IMHO, having two C:-like partitions is really messy.

That's why I want to hide the first partition again. This can be done in a few steps :

Hide the first partition
Copy the first partition (hda1) to the second (hda2)
Eventually reboot

Linux comes to the rescue. I use the Gentoo Minimal Install dvd (iso) for x86. So the detailed steps are :

Burn Gentoo minimal dvd
Reboot on this dvd (F2 or F12 can help)
Hide hda1 : (this commands sets hda1 type to Compaq Diagnostics, disables boot on hda1, enables boot for hda2 and save)

fdisk /dev/hda
t 1 12
a 1
a 2
w

Mount hda1 and hda2 :

mkdir /mnt/win/c
mkdir /mnt/win/d
mount /dev/hda1 /mnt/win/c
mount /dev/hda2 /mnt/win/d

Optional : save hda2 content :

mkdir /mnt/win/d/old
mv /mnt/win/d/* /mnt/win/d/old

Copy hda1 to hda2 :

cp -a /mnt/win/c/* /mnt/win/d

Reboot to windows

reboot

Then your fresh new WindowsXP will start using second partition.

Acer sucks, try Asus.

Edit :

Radeon X300 does not work after reboot. ATI driver fails to install.
Intel 2200BG wifi card does not work either.
Keyboard is not recognized and locks the Touchpad.
Startup desktop.ini file is opened automaticaly when XP starts ? Might be because the linux copy did not take into account the hidden attribute...

Edit : Merging the two first partitions to get 30 GB on C:\ fixes them all. No more post-install copy step. No more problem with ATI driver, etc.

TechEd 2010

2010-11-08T22:31:00.010+01:00

I am currently in Berlin for Microsoft TechEd 2010. It is a first-time Tech Ed and a first time in Berlin. Unfortunately I fear I will not have time to discover the city as there is a lot to do at the conference.

I attended the Silverlight pre-conference as Visual Studio's was dedicated to beginners. Funny thing : they use a lot of penguin images in their example.

The infrastructure in place is quite impressive. Lots of machines everywhere, with wireless network, that's great !

The keynote was a lot about aaS (as a service) stuff : infra/platform/app as a service, with clouds everywhere. Well even the newest private cloud seems quite far away for day to day real life problems.

New UE46B8000 firmware

2010-10-27T23:20:00.003+02:00

Samsung has just issued a new firmware for the UE46B8000 models. This is version 3002. If you still have version 3000, you must upgrade to version 3001 first.

Changes :

DLNA browsing speed has been greatly improved.

Windows 7 Elevated Startup Shortcuts

2010-08-19T23:06:00.002+02:00

Shortcuts in Windows 7 Startup folder configured with elevation (administrative privileges) will not be launched.

You need to create a scheduled task with administrative (maximum) rights configured to start when you open a session.

Asus U30JC-QX010X : Asus WebStorage

2010-08-14T15:25:00.006+02:00

Asus WebStorage suddenly stopped asking for a login/password. I mistakenly clicked on the icon below Computer and it just asked for EULA agreement. Then I've been able to use the dedicated 1000 GB storage for my backups. Asus support told me a couple of months ago that U30JC-QX010X had no WebStorage offer included.

But :

This is just a 2 months trial.
Asus WebStorage pollutes all synchronized folders with .awo directories.
You cannot disable default folders (Favorites, Documents and some BackupDemo folder on the desktop).

Setup Gentoo on Asus U30JC-QX010X : Part 4 - Webcam

2010-07-29T15:00:00.004+02:00

In order to use the asus U30JC-QX010X webcam on Gentoo, I needed to enable a few options in the kernel (2.6.34-r2) :

CONFIG_MEDIA_SUPPORT=y
CONFIG_VIDEO_DEV=m
CONFIG_VIDEO_V4L2_COMMON=m
CONFIG_VIDEO_ALLOW_V4L1=y
CONFIG_VIDEO_V4L1_COMPAT=y
CONFIG_VIDEO_MEDIA=m
CONFIG_IR_CORE=y
CONFIG_VIDEO_IR=y
CONFIG_MEDIA_TUNER=m
CONFIG_MEDIA_TUNER_CUSTOMISE=y
CONFIG_VIDEO_V4L2=m
CONFIG_VIDEO_V4L1=m
CONFIG_VIDEO_CAPTURE_DRIVERS=y
CONFIG_VIDEO_HELPER_CHIPS_AUTO=y
CONFIG_VIDEO_IR_I2C=m
CONFIG_V4L_USB_DRIVERS=y
CONFIG_USB_VIDEO_CLASS=m
CONFIG_USB_VIDEO_CLASS_INPUT_EVDEV=y
CONFIG_SND_RAWMIDI=m
CONFIG_SND_RAWMIDI_SEQ=m
CONFIG_SND_USB=y
CONFIG_SND_USB_AUDIO=m

Added use flags :

media-tv/xawtv X alsa opengl
media-video/mplayer v4l v4l2

I only needed to emerge xawtv and mplayer. usbutils was already installed by hal.

Then, you can test your webcam :

mplayer tv://

Reference : Webcam - Gentoo Linux Wiki

Filed my first Gentoo bug today

2010-07-28T19:17:00.003+02:00

While struggling again with linux nvidia driver to use my Geforce 310m under Gentoo, I found a bug in eselect-opengl package. The patch is available in bugzilla.

Unable to add new components in Windows 7 [Solved]

2010-07-24T20:53:00.051+02:00

I wanted to add IIS on my asus laptop with Windows 7 Pro x64 but it keeps failing miserably. I cannot add any new component. It fails with the error :

French : Une erreur s'est produite. Certaines fonctionnalités n'ont pas été modifiées correctement.
English : An error has occurred. Not all of the features were successfully changed.

It is not linked to my tuning of windows 7 professionnal as I have enabled back again services, tasks, auto run registry keys and startup shortcuts.

I have also enabled again system restore for both C and D drives. Strangely, I had to temporarily rename the C drive to its original name (OS) to avoid strange errors when validating the new configuration.

I found on the net that the following command line could help :

fsutil resource setautoreset true C:\

But it hasn't fixed my problem.

Each attempt adds five Windows Error Reporting events in the Application events log like :

Récipient d’erreurs 660181886, type 5
Nom d’événement : CbsPackageServicingFailure2
Réponse : Non disponible
ID de CAB : 0

Signature du problème : 
P1 : 6.1.7600.16385
P2 : Microsoft-Windows-Foundation-Package
P3 : 6.1.7600.16385
P4 : amd64
P5 : unknown
P6 : 80073701
P7 : Resolve
P8 : Installed
P9 : Installed
P10 : Windows Optional Component Manager

Fichiers joints :
C:\Windows\Logs\CBS\CbsPersist_20100719145300.cab
C:\Windows\Logs\CBS\CbsPersist_20100720135637.cab
C:\Windows\Logs\CBS\CbsPersist_20100724175736.cab
C:\Windows\Logs\CBS\CbsPersist_20100724190432.cab
C:\Windows\Logs\CBS\CbsPersist_20100724202127.cab
C:\Windows\Logs\CBS\CBS.log
C:\Windows\servicing\Sessions\Sessions.xml
C:\Windows\winsxs\poqexec.log
C:\Windows\inf\setupapi.dev.log

Ces fichiers sont peut-être disponibles ici :
C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\WER\ReportArchive\Critical_6.1.7600.16385_12b152e0507da7dbac253e5d6773b3d790739076_02e58056

Symbole d’analyse : 
Nouvelle recherche de la solution : 0
ID de rapport : 48d9af65-9764-11df-89ff-9b9906ca6306
Statut du rapport : 0

Récipient d’erreurs 1105700561, type 5
Nom d’événement : WindowsWcpOtherFailure3
Réponse : Non disponible
ID de CAB : 0

Signature du problème : 
P1 : 6.1.7600
P2 : base\wcp\componentstore\csd_locking.cpp
P3 : CCSDirectTransaction::LockComponent
P4 : 321
P5 : c015000c
P6 : 0x05f3852f
P7 : 
P8 : 
P9 : 
P10 : 

Fichiers joints :
C:\Windows\Logs\CBS\CbsPersist_20100719145300.cab
C:\Windows\Logs\CBS\CbsPersist_20100720135637.cab
C:\Windows\Logs\CBS\CbsPersist_20100724175736.cab
C:\Windows\Logs\CBS\CbsPersist_20100724190432.cab
C:\Windows\Logs\CBS\CbsPersist_20100724202127.cab
C:\Windows\Logs\CBS\CBS.log
C:\Windows\servicing\Sessions\Sessions.xml
C:\Windows\winsxs\poqexec.log
C:\Windows\System32\LogFiles\Scm\SCM.EVM
C:\Windows\Logs\CBS\FilterList.log
C:\Windows\Temp\WER6622.tmp.hdmp
C:\Windows\Temp\WER66ED.tmp.mdmp

Ces fichiers sont peut-être disponibles ici :
C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\WER\ReportArchive\Critical_6.1.7600_61fd7aaf67694893e820b3fd1752ddf4faf4e84_06197a3e

Symbole d’analyse : 
Nouvelle recherche de la solution : 0
ID de rapport : 48d9af64-9764-11df-89ff-9b9906ca6306
Statut du rapport : 0

Extract from C:\Windows\Logs\CBS\CBS.log (with telnet client component) :

Info    CBS    Perf: Resolve chain started.
Info    CSI    0000000b@2010/7/24:20:44:42.885 CSI Transaction @0x69300e0 initialized for deployment engine {d16d444c-56d8-11d5-882d-0080c847b195} with flags 00000002 and client id [101]"TI1.30092144_4010074112:2/Microsoft-Windows-Foundation-Package~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64~~6.1.7600.16385"
Info    CBS    Exec: Resolving Package: Microsoft-Windows-Telnet-Client-Package~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64~de-DE~6.1.7600.16385, Update: TelnetClient
Info    CBS    Exec: Resolving component from existing package; passing NULL manifest path to PinDeployment and hoping things haven't been scavenged.
Info    CBS    Exec: Resolving Package: Microsoft-Windows-Telnet-Client-Package~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64~de-DE~6.1.7600.16385, Update: TelnetClient, PinDeployment: amd64_microsoft-windows-t..oyment-languagepack_31bf3856ad364e35_6.1.7600.16385_de-de_c3c58e4b573d9172
Error   CSI    0000000c@2010/7/24:20:44:42.913 (F) d:\w7rtm\base\wcp\componentstore\csd_locking.cpp(321): Error STATUS_SXS_ASSEMBLY_MISSING originated in function CCSDirectTransaction::LockComponent expression: (null) [gle=0x80004005]
Error   CSI    0000000d (F) STATUS_SXS_ASSEMBLY_MISSING #238072# from CCSDirectTransaction::OperateEnding at index 0 of 1 operations, disposition 2[gle=0xd015000c]
Error   CSI    0000000e (F) HRESULT_FROM_WIN32(ERROR_SXS_ASSEMBLY_MISSING) #237957# from Windows::ServicingAPI::CCSITransaction::ICSITransaction_PinDeployment(Flags = 0, a = Microsoft-Windows-Telnet-Client-Deployment-LanguagePack, Version = 6.1.7600.16385, pA = PROCESSOR_ARCHITECTURE_AMD64 (9), Culture = [l:10{5}]"de-DE", VersionScope = 1 nonSxS, PublicKeyToken = {l:8 b:31bf3856ad364e35}, Type neutral, TypeName neutral, PublicKey neutral, cb = (null), s = (null), rid = [96]"Microsoft-Windows-Telnet-Client-Package~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64~de-DE~6.1.7600.16385.TelnetClient", rah = (null), manpath = (null), catpath = (null), ed = 0, disp = 0)[gle=0x80073701]
Info    CBS    Failed to pin deployment while resolving Update: TelnetClient from file: (null) [HRESULT = 0x80073701 - ERROR_SXS_ASSEMBLY_MISSING]
Info    CBS    Failed to resolve item[0] in Package: Microsoft-Windows-Telnet-Client-Package~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64~de-DE~6.1.7600.16385, Update: TelnetClient [HRESULT = 0x80073701 - ERROR_SXS_ASSEMBLY_MISSING]
Info    CBS    Failed to resolve execution update. [HRESULT = 0x80073701 - ERROR_SXS_ASSEMBLY_MISSING]
Error   CBS    Failed to resolve execution package: Microsoft-Windows-Telnet-Client-Package~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64~de-DE~6.1.7600.16385 [HRESULT = 0x80073701 - ERROR_SXS_ASSEMBLY_MISSING]
Info    CSI    0000000f@2010/7/24:20:44:45.042 CSI Transaction @0x69300e0 destroyed
Info    CBS    Perf: Resolve chain complete.
Info    CBS    Failed to resolve execution chain. [HRESULT = 0x80073701 - ERROR_SXS_ASSEMBLY_MISSING]
Error   CBS    Failed to process single phase execution. [HRESULT = 0x80073701 - ERROR_SXS_ASSEMBLY_MISSING]
Info    CBS    WER: Generating failure report for package: Microsoft-Windows-Foundation-Package~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64~~6.1.7600.16385, status: 0x80073701, failure source: Resolve, start state: Installed, target state: Installed, client id: Windows Optional Component Manager
Info    CBS    Failed to query DisableWerReporting flag.  Assuming not set... [HRESULT = 0x80070002 - ERROR_FILE_NOT_FOUND]
Info    CBS    Failed to add %windir%\winsxs\pending.xml to WER report because it is missing.  Continuing without it...
Info    CBS    Failed to add %windir%\winsxs\pending.xml.bad to WER report because it is missing.  Continuing without it...
Info    CBS    Reboot mark refs: 0
Info    CBS    Enabling LKG boot option
Info    CBS    Exec: End: nested restore point - complete.
Info    CBS    Restored system sleep block state: 0x80000000
Info    CBS    Client aborted the install. [HRESULT = 0x800f0821 - CBS_E_ABORT]
Info    CBS    Exec: Processing complete.  Session: 30092144_4010074112, Package: Microsoft-Windows-Foundation-Package~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64~~6.1.7600.16385 [HRESULT = 0x80073701 - ERROR_SXS_ASSEMBLY_MISSING]
Error   CBS    Failed to perform operation.  [HRESULT = 0x80073701 - ERROR_SXS_ASSEMBLY_MISSING]
Info    CBS    Session: 30092144_4010074112 finalized. Reboot required: no [HRESULT = 0x80073701 - ERROR_SXS_ASSEMBLY_MISSING]

A few notes :

STATUS_SXS_ASSEMBLY_MISSING : Culture is wrong ! Why the hell is it looking for German (de-DE) packages on my French laptop ?
The log tells Reboot required: no but it asks for reboot anyway (even if nothing is installed!)

I have downloaded System Update Readiness Tool (100 MB) even if the ERROR_SXS_ASSEMBLY_MISSING error might not be fixed by this tool (not listed in the error table). After 25 min execution, no error were detected in C:\Windows\Logs\CBS\CheckSUR.log.

Sytem File Checker tool (sfc /verifyonly) found nothing (aucune violation d'intégrité).

Google search :

An error has occurred. Not all of the features were successfully changed. : 8.000.000 results
on microsoft.com only : 3.200 results
with CbsPackageServicingFailure2 event only on microsoft.com : 2 results
with WindowsWcpOtherFailure3 event only on microsoft.com : 1 result
with WindowsWcpOtherFailure3 event : 20 results (including this blog)

Running the package manager by hand is a bit more explicit (I use the same name as in my French graphical user interface):

pkgmgr /iu:"Client Telnet"

Gestionnaire de package Windows
Echec de l'opération avec 0x80073701
L'assembly référencé n'a pas pu être trouvé.

Well this is the ERROR_SXS_ASSEMBLY_MISSING error found earlier in Component Based Servicing log (CBS.log).

After some research with Process Monitor, it seems that TrustedInstaller.exe fails to open the registry key HKLM\COMPONENTS\DerivedData\Components\amd64_microsoft-windows-s..oyment-languagepack_31bf3856ad364e35_6.1.7600.16385_de-de_08eb0375be2e567f. I can confirm this with regedit : the de_de key is missing, I only got these versions : el-gr, en-us, es-es, fr-fr, he-il, it-it, nl-nl, pt-pt and zh-tw.

Note: HKLM\COMPONENTS might be missing on Windows 7. In this case, it would be generated completely if you launch Windows package manager UI.

These keys matches files under C:\Windows\winsxs. I cannot find the de-de files in this folder. This is what Andre Ziegler told me in the forums. He also confirmed that I need to reinstall Windows 7 (again :( ).

If I look into C:\Windows\System32\catroot\{F750E6C3-38EE-11D1-85E5-00C04FC295EE}, I can find all language files, and the German file in particular (like Microsoft-Windows-Shell-InboxGames-Package~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64~de-DE~6.1.7600.16385).

As adviced in Win7 Inside Out - WinSxS, I have launched language packs setup application lpksetup but German pack is not installed (as expected : manifests are missing).

Note: WinSxS = Windows Side by Side assemblies.

Thanks to mydigitallife, I have downloaded German MUI pack : windows6.1-kb972813-x64-de-de_399ac15b2d55fd5dea0770d98825d7e75f4ad533.exe. To install this pack :

Run pack exe to extract lp.cab file
Download vistalizator
Choose add language
Select lp.cab file
Validate language installation
Make German the new display language : no !

It is now possible to add new features. Victory !

How to read ext2 / ext3 partition under Windows 7

2010-07-05T21:31:00.004+02:00

Ext2IFS works !
You must enable Vista compatibility mode (I have chosen Vista SP2).
Then you can assign drive letters in the control panel (IFS Drives Control Panel Item in Icon mode).
Unfortunately, it seems that you need to shutdown your computer to properly unmount the drive (hibernation improperly unmounts partitions).

How to disable UAC for an application

2010-06-27T00:15:00.006+02:00

It is possible to disable UAC consent prompt for some applications with Microsoft ACT.

References :

But unfortunately, this does not work on Windows 7 Pro x64. I failed to disable UAC consent prompt for Process Explorer.

WPF Cover Flow Tutorial : Part 8

2010-06-24T22:07:00.022+02:00

I've been told that Part 7 had memory leaks. In the comments, I link a blog article describing how to study memory leaks : you can watch the Private Bytes performance counter.

We need :

The performance counter
A callback displaying the counter value
A timer

using System.Diagnostics;
using System.Windows.Threading;

private readonly PerformanceCounter counter = GetCounter();
private readonly DispatcherTimer timer = new DispatcherTimer();

private void timer_Tick(object sender, EventArgs e)
{
    long kb = Convert.ToInt64(counter.NextValue() / 1000);
    perfLabel.Content = string.Format("{0,12} KB", kb.ToString("###.###.###"));
}
private static PerformanceCounter GetCounter()
{
    var counter = new PerformanceCounter();
    counter.CategoryName = "Process";
    counter.CounterName = "Private Bytes";
    counter.InstanceName = Process.GetCurrentProcess().ProcessName;
    return counter;
}
public TestWindow()
{
    ...
    timer.Tick += timer_Tick;
    timer.Interval = TimeSpan.FromMilliseconds(100);
    timer.Start();
}

<Grid>
    ...
    <Label Content="0 KB" Height="23" HorizontalAlignment="Left" Margin="12,12,0,0" Name="perfLabel" VerticalAlignment="Top" Width="142" Foreground="Red" />
</Grid>

Here is the result in video.

Current implementation always stay close to 90 KB :

If we comment out Cover Destroy method:

public void Destroy()
{
    //visualModel.Children.Remove(this);
}

The counter grows continuously :

Note : the ThumbnailManager does not handle empty image files. Loading such a file would throw an OutOfMemoryException.

Windows Media Network Sharing Service Memory Usage

2010-06-23T20:34:00.001+02:00

Windows Media Network Sharing Service can consume a lot of memory, like 2.5 GB. WTF ?! AFAIK, I have nothing to share. What is consuming all this memory ?
Hopefully, I still have 1 GB free.

Windows 7 fait rebooter la freebox

2010-06-21T08:35:00.017+02:00

Depuis que j'ai acheté mon asus u30jc-qx010x, la freebox ADSL (Firmware 1.6.6) reboote régulièrement.

Ce soir, ça redémarrait plusieurs fois par heure jusqu'à ce que je l'éteigne.

Pistes déjà éliminées :

Ce n'est pas lié à un navigateur en particulier (IE, Firefox ou Chrome)
Désactiver ipv6 sur la carte wifi et sur la freebox ne change rien.

Après un peu de recherche, il s'avère que désactiver les services suivants provoque un redémarrage de la freebox après avoir surfé un certain temps :

BFE (Moteur de filtrage de base)
IKEEXT (Modules de génération de clés IKE et AuthIP) : dépends de BFE
PolicyAgent (Agent de stratégie IPsec) : dépends de BFE

Windows 7 Search

2010-06-20T10:56:00.004+02:00

If you want to index all C: content, some folders are excluded by default :

C:\$Recycle.Bin
C:\ProgramData
C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Search\Data
C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\Menu Démarrer
C:\Utilisateurs (C:\Users)
C:\Utilisateurs\*\AppData
C:\Utilisateurs\*\Favoris
C:\Utilisateurs\*\AppData\Local\Temp
C:\Windows
C:\Windows\CSC (hidden)

Temp folders are not listed in exclusion list.

Windows 7 pictures

2010-06-19T18:52:00.011+02:00

Default user pictures are stored in C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\User Account Pictures. The format is a bitmap 128x128.

Default login screen backgrounds are stored in C:\Windows\System32\oobe\background.bmp and C:\Windows\SysWOW64\oobe\background.bmp. The format is bitmap 1024x768. You can change the default background if you create C:\Windows\System32\oobe\info\backgrounds\backgroundDefault.jpg. 96% quality (cf. gimp) is not supported but 85% quality is OK. Then it is possible to keep the same background for the login screen and your desktop.

You might need to set HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Authentication\LogonUI\Background\OEMBackground value to 1 (dword).

Setup Gentoo on Asus U30JC-QX010X : Part 3 - X

2010-06-15T23:07:00.015+02:00

This post is greatly inspired from Gentoo Xorg How-To.

Edit 2010-07-27 :

Replaced vesa by intel in VIDEO_CARDS. Using vesa cannot scale X to 1366x768 and it is not compatible with vesa framebuffer.
nvidia is not working. It is better to remove it to avoid problems when enabling xorg-x11 opengl (conflict between lib32 and lib64 folders).

Edit /etc/make.conf and define both INPUT_DEVICES and VIDEO_CARDS :

INPUT_DEVICES="evdev synaptics keyboard mouse"
VIDEO_CARDS="nvidia intel"

Edit use flags for a couple of packages needed for X. You can group these settings in /etc/portage/package.use/X :

media-fonts/corefonts X
media-fonts/dejavu X
sys-apps/dbus X
sys-apps/hal laptop X
x11-base/xorg-server hal
x11-drivers/xf86-input-synaptics hal

Emerge Xorg :

emerge xorg-server
env-update && source /etc/profile

Select xorg-x11 (this might be not necessary) ;

eselect opengl set xorg-x11

Emerge hal :

emerge hal
rc-update add hald default

Update keymap if needed :

mkdir -p /etc/hal/fdi/policy
cp /usr/share/hal/fdi/policy/10osvendor/10-keymap.fdi /etc/hal/fdi/policy

<merge key="input.xkb.layout" type="string">fr</merge>

/etc/init.d/hald restart

Add yourself to the video group (maybe not needed).

Nvidia (I fail to use Nvidia and the Geforce 310m for now. No better result with 256.35) :

/etc/portage/package.keywords/X :

~sys-kernel/gentoo-sources-2.6.33-r2 ~amd64
~sys-kernel/gentoo-sources-2.6.34-r1 ~amd64
~x11-drivers/nvidia-drivers-195.36.24 ~amd64
~x11-libs/libvdpau-0.3-r2 ~amd64

Emerge kernel, nvidia-drivers, glx tools (like glxgears) :

emerge gentoo-sources-2.6.33-r2
emerge nvidia-drivers-195.36.24
emerge mesa-progs

module-rebuild will rebuild the necessary packages when upgrading your kernel :

emerge module-rebuild
module-rebuild populate
module-rebuild rebuild

Configure Xorg :

Xorg -configure

Copy /root/xorg.conf.new to /etc/X11/xorg.conf. You need to comment the Nvidia section to keep only vesa (Nvidia fails).

#Section "Device"
# Identifier  "Card0"
# Driver      "nvidia"
# VendorName  "nVidia Corporation"
# BoardName   "Unknown Board"
# BusID       "PCI:1:0:0"
#EndSection

Emerge enlightenment. It is also a good idea to add xterm and some font packages. Set enlightenment default :

emerge enlightenment corefonts dejavu xterm

~/.xinitrc :

exec /usr/bin/e16

At this point, once the new kernel has been installed, you should be able to start enlightenment safely (with intel driver only for now).

For info, small kernel updates :

diff config-2.6.33-r2.0 config-2.6.33-r2.7

< CONFIG_ACPI_VIDEO=y
> CONFIG_ACPI_VIDEO=m
< CONFIG_I2C_ALGOBIT=y
> CONFIG_I2C_ALGOBIT=m
< CONFIG_AGP=y
< CONFIG_AGP_AMD64=y
< CONFIG_AGP_INTEL=y
> CONFIG_AGP=m
> CONFIG_AGP_INTEL=m
< CONFIG_DRM=y
< CONFIG_DRM_KMS_HELPER=y
> CONFIG_DRM=m
> CONFIG_DRM_KMS_HELPER=m
< CONFIG_DRM_I915=y
> CONFIG_DRM_I830=m
> CONFIG_DRM_I915=m
< CONFIG_VIDEO_OUTPUT_CONTROL=y
< CONFIG_FB=y
> CONFIG_VIDEO_OUTPUT_CONTROL=m
> CONFIG_FB=m
> CONFIG_FIRMWARE_EDID=y
< CONFIG_FB_CFB_FILLRECT=y
< CONFIG_FB_CFB_COPYAREA=y
< CONFIG_FB_CFB_IMAGEBLIT=y
> CONFIG_FB_CFB_FILLRECT=m
> CONFIG_FB_CFB_COPYAREA=m
> CONFIG_FB_CFB_IMAGEBLIT=m
< CONFIG_FB_TILEBLITTING=y
< CONFIG_FB_EFI=y
> CONFIG_FB_UVESA=m
< CONFIG_VGACON_SOFT_SCROLLBACK_SIZE=64
> CONFIG_VGACON_SOFT_SCROLLBACK_SIZE=256
< CONFIG_FRAMEBUFFER_CONSOLE=y
> CONFIG_FRAMEBUFFER_CONSOLE=m
> CONFIG_LOGO_LINUX_MONO=y
> CONFIG_LOGO_LINUX_VGA16=y

Nvidia errors :

NVRM: failed to copy vbios to system memory.
NVRM: RmInitAdapter failed! (0x30:0xffffffff:868)
NVRM: rm_init_adapter(0) failed

Asus FastBoot

2010-06-12T22:13:00.002+02:00

Asus FastBoot delays the start up of applications configured to start automatically in the registry through Microsoft/Windows/CurrentVersion/Run keys.

It is handled by the AFBAgent service.

Keys are moved from Microsoft/Windows/CurrentVersion/Run keys to HKLM/SOFTWARE/Microsoft/Shared Tools/MSConfig/startupreg.

Application delayed by default on an Asus U30JC-QX010C :

Adobe Reader Speed Launcher ("C:\Program Files (x86)\Adobe\Reader 9.0\Reader\Reader_sl.exe")
ASUS Screen Saver Protector (C:\Windows\AsScrPro.exe)
CLMLServer ("C:\Program Files (x86)\CyberLink\Power2Go\CLMLSvc.exe")
RtHDVCpl (C:\Program Files\Realtek\Audio\HDA\RAVCpl64.exe -s)

Asus U30JC-QX010X : Tuning Windows 7 Part 4 : Auto Run

2010-06-06T22:32:00.033+02:00

Many programs are configured to start automatically. Note that a couple of x86 applications are configured in the x64 registry. I prefer to remove the keys and keep the application installed, just in case... It is still possible to reset the keys afterwards.

You must disable Asus FastBoot to find some applications listed below.

Keys than can be removed safely :

HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run :

Sidebar (C:\Program Files\Windows Sidebar\sidebar.exe /autoRun)

HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run :

AmIcoSinglun64 (C:\Program Files (x86)\AmIcoSingLun\AmIcoSinglun64.exe) : Alcor Micro USB Card Reader. Not needed to read USB of SD cards.
ASUS WebStorage (C:\Program Files (x86)\ASUS\ASUS WebStorage\SERVICE\AsusWSService.exe MySyncFolder) : No free 20 GB account is available for this Asus.
IgfxTray (C:\Windows\system32\igfxtray.exe) : Intel Graphics Tray Icon. I rarely need to modify these settings.
NvCplDaemon (RUNDLL32.EXE C:\Windows\system32\NvCpl.dll,NvStartup) : NVidia startup utility. Does not prevent the NVidia control panel to start. Seems useless ?

HKLM\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run :

Adobe Reader Speed Launcher ("C:\Program Files (x86)\Adobe\Reader 9.0\Reader\Reader_sl.exe")
ATKMEDIA (C:\Program Files (x86)\ASUS\ATK Media\DMedia.exe) : To configure a media key to launch Windows Media Player but no such key exists on my laptop.
ATKOSD2 (C:\Program Files (x86)\ASUS\ATKOSD2\ATKOSD2.exe) : Driver for the missing fingerprint reader. Also provides pretty UI for Fn function keys. When disabled, Fn keys still work, but with a classic UI.
CLMLServer ("C:\Program Files (x86)\CyberLink\Power2Go\CLMLSvc.exe") : Cyberlink Media Library.
HControlUser (C:\Program Files (x86)\ASUS\ATK Hotkey\HControlUser.exe)
RemoteControl9 ("C:\Program Files (x86)\CyberLink\PowerDVD9\PDVD9Serv.exe") : DVD Remote Control.
Setwallpaper (c:\programdata\SetWallpaper.cmd) : Batch is missing !
UpdateLBPShortCut ("C:\Program Files (x86)\CyberLink\LabelPrint\MUITransfer\MUIStartMenu.exe" "C:\Program Files (x86)\CyberLink\LabelPrint" UpdateWithCreateOnce "Software\CyberLink\LabelPrint\2.5") : DVD printing startup utility. WTF ?
UpdateP2GoShortCut ("C:\Program Files (x86)\CyberLink\Power2Go\MUITransfer\MUIStartMenu.exe" "C:\Program Files (x86)\CyberLink\Power2Go" UpdateWithCreateOnce "SOFTWARE\CyberLink\Power2Go\6.0") : DVD burning startup utility. WTF ?

Other keys :

HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run :

ETDWare (C:\Program Files\Elantech\ETDCtrl.exe) : Smart-Pad.
HotKeysCmds (C:\Windows\system32\hkcmd.exe) : Hot Key Commands from Intel graphics driver.
Persistence (C:\Windows\system32\igfxpers.exe)
RtHDVCpl (C:\Program Files\Realtek\Audio\HDA\RAVCpl64.exe -s)

HKLM\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run :

ASUS Screen Saver Protector (C:\Windows\AsScrPro.exe)

When playing with these settings, the ELAN Smart-Pad can be disabled. Actually, it was running until I enter my password to open a session. Then, it was disabled. I needed to open the mice parameters in the control panel, open ELAN tab and enable the device. The laptop might also fail to detect the usb mouse. In this case, open the Device Manager, right click (with the touchpad) on the mouse section and scan for hardware changes.

Edit 2010.08.14 : Asus Web Storage.

Asus U30JC-QX010X : Tuning Windows 7 Part 3 : Tasks

2010-06-06T19:37:00.020+02:00

More than 40 scheduled tasks are configured under Windows 7 Professional on my Asus laptop. Task scheduling has been greatly improved. It is now possible to configure a task so that it starts when some user open a session. These tasks are responsible for many processes running in the background. Task are also organized hierarchicaly.

Some of these tasks are configured with the Administrators group which does not exist on my French laptop. I must fix the task user first to be able to disable the task.

The following tasks can be disabled :

\ACMON (bad user) : Asus Splendid Video Enhancement Technology
\ASUS Live Update (bad user)
\ASUS SmartLogon Console Sensor (bad user) : Face identification with webcam
\ASUSControlDeck (bad user) : Asus Control Deck application
SidebarExecute : Might be the nuisance responsible for automatically resizing (some) windows by reserving the right of the screen.
\WC3 (bad user) : Asus Wireless Console 3

Requirements :

\ASUS P4G (bad user) : Power 4 Gear. This task must be running to launch Power 4 Gear (BatteryLife.exe). But this task can be annoying : it automatically disable transparency and force some white asus wallpaper when running on battery.

Asus U30JC-QX010X : Tuning Windows 7 Part 2 : Services

2010-05-30T20:05:00.046+02:00

More than 70 services are started by default on my Asus laptop with Windows 7 Professional.

Many services can be disabled.

Home Group management :

FDResPub (Publication des ressources de découverte de fonctions)
HomeGroupListener (Écouteur HomeGroup)
HomeGroupProvider (Fournisseur HomeGroup)
p2pimsvc (Gestionnaire d’identité réseau homologue) : Remote assistance and Home Groups
p2psvc (Groupement de mise en réseau de pairs)

Network :

BITS (Service de transfert intelligent en arrière-plan) : required for Windows update.
CscService (Fichiers hors connexion) : usefull to synchronize files between computers.
Dnscache (Client DNS)

Network security :

BFE (Moteur de filtrage de base)
IKEEXT (Modules de génération de clés IKE et AuthIP)
MpsSvc (Pare-feu Windows)
PolicyAgent (Agent de stratégie IPsec)
WinDefend (Windows Defender)

Security :

wscsvc (Centre de sécurité)
wuauserv (Windows Update)

Window manager :

Themes (Thèmes)
UxSms (Gestionnaire de sessions du Gestionnaire de fenêtrage)

Others :

AFBAgent (AFBAgent) : Asus FastBoot agent
DPS (Service de stratégie de diagnostic) : Might be usefull to ease automatic network reconfiguration.
iphlpsvc (Assistance IP) : IPv6
LanmanServer (Serveur) : Share file and print resources, Home Groups
PNRPsvc (Protocole PNRP) : Required for remote assistance and Home Groups
SeaPort (SeaPort) : Microsoft Search Enhancement Applications
ShellHWDetection (Détection matériel noyau) : Autoplay hardware events
Spooler (Spouleur d'impression)
SysMain (Superfetch)
TrkWks (Client de suivi de lien distribué) : Maintain shortcuts for moved NTS items accross the network
upnphost (Hôte de périphérique UPnP) : Manage hosted upnp devices
WerSvc (Service de rapport d'erreurs Windows) : Error reports.
wlidsvc (Windows Live ID Sign-in Assistant)
WMPNetworkSvc (Service Partage réseau du Lecteur Windows Media) : Share windows media player libraries with upnp
WSearch (Windows Search)

Two more services could have been disabled :

NlaSvc (Connaissance des emplacements réseau) and netprofm (Service Liste des réseaux) but they must be enabled for the Scheduled Task Manager to work properly (if they are disabled, opening the Conditions tab of a scheduled tasks crashes as it throws an exception.)
lmhosts (Assistance NetBIOS sur TCP/IP) is said to be legacy support for NetBIOS over TCP/IP, but I do not known how to access other shares (e.g. NAS) with this service disabled.

References :

Todo :

ASLDRService (ASLDR Service) : Asus ...
ATKGFNEXSrv (ATKGFNEX Service) : ATK Generic Function Service.

Asus U30JC-QX010X Boot Keys

2010-05-16T18:37:00.006+02:00

F2 : Enter BIOS
Suppr : same as F2, but F2 is more reliable
F9 : Restore with AI Revovery
F10 : Configure booting options
Esc : Choose boot device

These keys do not work upon leaving hibernation. And Windows 7 boot menu is not shown either.

Lost Nvidia Geforce 310M

2010-05-16T18:22:00.009+02:00

My graphic card disappeared from my asus. I was trying to load latest linux nvidia drivers (with modprobe nvidia) to use the Nvidia Geforce 310m under linux but it told me no such device. The card is also missing in lspci output when I boot Gentoo. And it is not showing anymore in Windows device manager. I only got the Intel HD video driver. Actually, I am not sure anymore about seeing Nvidia driver there... This started to drive me crazy until I read my previous post and saw the line I was looking for :

01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation GT218 [GeForce 310M] (rev a2)

I did not find anything disabled in the BIOS. As far as I remember, I only switched boot devices (well using Esc key let you choose the booting device).

Well I am currently restoring the four AI Recovery backup DVD and I will see if it helps...

The card is still missing after recovery.

I just filed a case on Asus support web site... Follow up in comments.

Asus U30JC-QX010X : Tuning Windows 7 Part 1

2010-05-15T22:35:00.009+02:00

Bluetooth

Disable bluetooth :

Panneau de configuration / Centre réseau et partage / Modifier les paramètres de la carte / bluetooth (F5 might be necessary)
Désactiver
Propriétés / Bluetooth / Paramètres Bluetooth / Désactiver la carte Bluetooth
(elevated) net stop btwdins
(elevated) net stop bthserv
(elevated) sc config btwdins start= disabled

Enable Bluetooth :

(elevated) sc config btwdins start= auto
(elevated) net start btwdins
(elevated) net start bthserv
Bluetooth tray icon / Activer l'adaptateur
Panneau de configuration / Centre réseau et partage / Modifier les paramètres de la carte / bluetooth (F5 might be necessary)
Activer

More coming soon...

Edit 2010-07-31 : It is also possible to enable and enable bluetooth device with devcon utility from Windows Driver Kit (WDK) :

devcon find *|sort
devcon enable "USB\VID_0B05&PID_1788"
devcon disable "USB\VID_0B05&PID_1788"
devcon status "USB\VID_0B05&PID_1788"

Digging into Windows 7 (Professional)

2010-05-15T20:51:00.021+02:00

When you are used to Windows XP and you do not really know Vista, you got a few surprises as you start browsing folder in Windows 7.

Windows 7 annoyances :

Contextual menu of folders has no Search entry. You are encourage to use Windows Search and the input box in the toolbar.
Access to many (hidden) items in your personal folder (jonction folders) is denied (like Application Data, Cookies, Local Settings, Start Menu, Models, Recent, SendTo...) Well, actually, you have access to the target folder (somewhere in AppData like AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows or AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows).
You realize that the folder tree in the Explorer is not the underlying folder tree on your hard drive. In French version, the Explorer shows you a C:\Utilisateurs folder whereas it is C:\Users actually.
Window manager ignore elevated Windows (when arranging windows with Tile, Cascade, etc.). Same problem with Alt-Tab.
No dock tool bar for your shortcuts. You must attach your programs in the task bar. Nevertheless, you cannot attach two copies (as a normal user and elevated) of the same program. Cygwin entry is conflicting with command prompt. There is no option to run attached applications as elevated.

Windows 7 : 2 days to get first BSOD

2010-05-15T00:52:00.007+02:00

I do not have Windows 7 Professional for a long time and it took me only 2 days to get my first BSOD.

ma config info :

Bug Check Code : 0x000000C2
Bug Check String : BAD_POOL_CALLER
Date du crash : 14/05/2010 22:38
Source du crash : fltmgr.sys+8F0B
Chemin : C:\Windows\system32\drivers\fltmgr.sys
Description : Gestionnaire de filtres de système de fichiers Microsoft
Version du produit : 6.1.7600.16385

Secunia PSI might be to blame.

Setup Gentoo on Asus U30JC-QX010X : Part 2

2010-05-14T22:46:00.005+02:00

Here is common hardware info about Asus U30JC-QX010X :

lspci

00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corporation Core Processor DRAM Controller (rev 12)
00:01.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation Core Processor PCI Express x16 Root Port (rev 12)
00:02.0 VGA compatible controller: Intel Corporation Core Processor Integrated Graphics Controller (rev 12)
00:16.0 Communication controller: Intel Corporation 5 Series/3400 Series Chipset HECI Controller (rev 06)
00:1a.0 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 5 Series/3400 Series Chipset USB2 Enhanced Host Controller (rev 06)
00:1b.0 Audio device: Intel Corporation 5 Series/3400 Series Chipset High Definition Audio (rev 06)
00:1c.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 5 Series/3400 Series Chipset PCI Express Root Port 1 (rev 06)
00:1c.1 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 5 Series/3400 Series Chipset PCI Express Root Port 2 (rev 06)
00:1c.5 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 5 Series/3400 Series Chipset PCI Express Root Port 6 (rev 06)
00:1d.0 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 5 Series/3400 Series Chipset USB2 Enhanced Host Controller (rev 06)
00:1e.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801 Mobile PCI Bridge (rev a6)
00:1f.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corporation Mobile 5 Series Chipset LPC Interface Controller (rev 06)
00:1f.2 SATA controller: Intel Corporation 5 Series/3400 Series Chipset 4 port SATA AHCI Controller (rev 06)
00:1f.3 SMBus: Intel Corporation 5 Series/3400 Series Chipset SMBus Controller (rev 06)
00:1f.6 Signal processing controller: Intel Corporation 5 Series/3400 Series Chipset Thermal Subsystem (rev 06)
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation GT218 [GeForce 310M] (rev a2)
03:00.0 Network controller: Atheros Communications Inc. AR9285 Wireless Network Adapter (PCI-Express) (rev 01)
04:00.0 Ethernet controller: Atheros Communications AR8131 Gigabit Ethernet (rev c0)
ff:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corporation Core Processor QuickPath Architecture Generic Non-core Registers (rev 02)
ff:00.1 Host bridge: Intel Corporation Core Processor QuickPath Architecture System Address Decoder (rev 02)
ff:02.0 Host bridge: Intel Corporation Core Processor QPI Link 0 (rev 02)
ff:02.1 Host bridge: Intel Corporation Core Processor QPI Physical 0 (rev 02)
ff:02.2 Host bridge: Intel Corporation Core Processor Reserved (rev 02)
ff:02.3 Host bridge: Intel Corporation Core Processor Reserved (rev 02)

cat /proc/cpuinfo

processor : 0
vendor_id : GenuineIntel
cpu family : 6
model  : 37
model name : Intel(R) Core(TM) i5 CPU       M 430  @ 2.27GHz
stepping : 2
cpu MHz  : 2267.000
cache size : 3072 KB
physical id : 0
siblings : 4
core id  : 0
cpu cores : 2
apicid  : 0
initial apicid : 0
fpu  : yes
fpu_exception : yes
cpuid level : 11
wp  : yes
flags  : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 clflush dts acpi mmx fxsr sse sse2 ss ht tm pbe syscall nx rdtscp lm constant_tsc arch_perfmon pebs bts rep_good xtopology nonstop_tsc aperfmperf pni dtes64 monitor ds_cpl vmx est tm2 ssse3 cx16 xtpr pdcm sse4_1 sse4_2 popcnt lahf_lm ida arat tpr_shadow vnmi flexpriority ept vpid
bogomips : 4521.00
clflush size : 64
cache_alignment : 64
address sizes : 36 bits physical, 48 bits virtual
power management:

processor : 1
vendor_id : GenuineIntel
cpu family : 6
model  : 37
model name : Intel(R) Core(TM) i5 CPU       M 430  @ 2.27GHz
stepping : 2
cpu MHz  : 2267.000
cache size : 3072 KB
physical id : 0
siblings : 4
core id  : 2
cpu cores : 2
apicid  : 4
initial apicid : 4
fpu  : yes
fpu_exception : yes
cpuid level : 11
wp  : yes
flags  : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 clflush dts acpi mmx fxsr sse sse2 ss ht tm pbe syscall nx rdtscp lm constant_tsc arch_perfmon pebs bts rep_good xtopology nonstop_tsc aperfmperf pni dtes64 monitor ds_cpl vmx est tm2 ssse3 cx16 xtpr pdcm sse4_1 sse4_2 popcnt lahf_lm ida arat tpr_shadow vnmi flexpriority ept vpid
bogomips : 4521.75
clflush size : 64
cache_alignment : 64
address sizes : 36 bits physical, 48 bits virtual
power management:

processor : 2
vendor_id : GenuineIntel
cpu family : 6
model  : 37
model name : Intel(R) Core(TM) i5 CPU       M 430  @ 2.27GHz
stepping : 2
cpu MHz  : 2267.000
cache size : 3072 KB
physical id : 0
siblings : 4
core id  : 0
cpu cores : 2
apicid  : 1
initial apicid : 1
fpu  : yes
fpu_exception : yes
cpuid level : 11
wp  : yes
flags  : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 clflush dts acpi mmx fxsr sse sse2 ss ht tm pbe syscall nx rdtscp lm constant_tsc arch_perfmon pebs bts rep_good xtopology nonstop_tsc aperfmperf pni dtes64 monitor ds_cpl vmx est tm2 ssse3 cx16 xtpr pdcm sse4_1 sse4_2 popcnt lahf_lm ida arat tpr_shadow vnmi flexpriority ept vpid
bogomips : 4521.75
clflush size : 64
cache_alignment : 64
address sizes : 36 bits physical, 48 bits virtual
power management:

processor : 3
vendor_id : GenuineIntel
cpu family : 6
model  : 37
model name : Intel(R) Core(TM) i5 CPU       M 430  @ 2.27GHz
stepping : 2
cpu MHz  : 2267.000
cache size : 3072 KB
physical id : 0
siblings : 4
core id  : 2
cpu cores : 2
apicid  : 5
initial apicid : 5
fpu  : yes
fpu_exception : yes
cpuid level : 11
wp  : yes
flags  : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 clflush dts acpi mmx fxsr sse sse2 ss ht tm pbe syscall nx rdtscp lm constant_tsc arch_perfmon pebs bts rep_good xtopology nonstop_tsc aperfmperf pni dtes64 monitor ds_cpl vmx est tm2 ssse3 cx16 xtpr pdcm sse4_1 sse4_2 popcnt lahf_lm ida arat tpr_shadow vnmi flexpriority ept vpid
bogomips : 4521.75
clflush size : 64
cache_alignment : 64
address sizes : 36 bits physical, 48 bits virtual
power management:

cat /proc/acpi/battery/BAT0/info

present:                 yes
design capacity:         84000 mWh
last full capacity:      80700 mWh
battery technology:      rechargeable
design voltage:          15000 mV
design capacity warning: 8400 mWh
design capacity low:     840 mWh
capacity granularity 1:  840 mWh
capacity granularity 2:  840 mWh
model number:            UL50-56
serial number:            
battery type:            LIon
OEM info:                ASUSTek

Setup Gentoo on Asus U30JC-QX010X : Part 1

2010-05-14T20:20:00.040+02:00

Here is how to setup Gentoo on my brand new asus.

Summary :

Resize partitions with gparted.
Setup minimal gentoo
Update Windows 7 boot loader

Partitioning :

Burn last GParted live iso (current is 0.5.2-9).
Enter BIOS (sup key)
Switch boot devices
Launch GParted
Remove 30 GB from D: (/dev/sda5)
Add / partition : 25 GB (/dev/sda6)
Add /home partition : 5 GB (/dev/sda7)

I don't think I need a swap partition.

To install Gentoo, I followed both x64 (last updated in 2008) and x86 (updated in 2010) guides.

Boot : gentoo with fr keymap.
Set root pasword : passwd ...
Load wifi : modprobe ath9k
ln -s /etc/init.d/net.lo /etc/init.d/net.wlan0
Edit /etc/conf.d/net and /etc/wpa_supplicant/wpa_supplicant.conf

Copy them from another box through a usb key or edit them from scratch with nano.

/etc/conf.d/net :

modules=( "wpa_supplicant" "!iwconfig" )
wpa_supplicant_wlan0="-Dwext"

/etc/wpa_supplicant/wpa_supplicant.conf :

ctrl_interface=/var/run/wpa_supplicant
ctrl_interface_group=0
eapol_version=1
ap_scan=1
fast_reauth=1
network={
 ssid="freebox_essid"
 key_mgmt=WPA-PSK
 psk="secret"
 priority=20
}

Start network : /etc/init.d/net.wlan0 start
Mount partitions :

mount /dev/sda6 /mnt/gentoo
mkdir /mnt/gentoo/home
mount /dev/sda7 /mnt/gentoo/home

Set date

Stage3 :

cd /mnt/gentoo
links http://www.gentoo.org/main/en/mirrors.xml

Links keys : Download / Quit.
releases/amd64/current-iso/stage3-amd64-20100408.tar.bz2

tar xvjpf stage3-*.tar.bz2

snapshots/current/portage-latest.tar.bz2

tar -xvjf /mnt/gentoo/portage-latest.tar.bz2 -C /mnt/gentoo/usr

make.conf :

nano -w /mnt/gentoo/etc/make.conf

Got CFLAGS and CXXFLAGS from Gentoo wiki.
MAKEOPTS is cpu count plus one.

CFLAGS="-march=core2 -msse4 -mcx16 -mpopcnt -msahf -O2 -pipe"
CXXFLAGS="${CFLAGS}"
MAKEOPTS="-j5"

mirrorselect (free.fr) :

emerge mirrorselect
mirrorselect -i -o >> /etc/make.conf
mirrorselect -i -r -o >> /etc/make.conf

Chroot :

cp -L /etc/resolv.conf /mnt/gentoo/etc/
mount -t proc none /mnt/gentoo/proc
mount -o bind /dev /mnt/gentoo/dev

chroot /mnt/gentoo /bin/bash
env-update && source /etc/profile
export PS1="(chroot) $PS1"

Portage :

emerge --sync

USE="-fortran -ipv6 mmx nptl nptlonly sse sse2 unicode"

locale & time :

nano -w /etc/locale.gen

en_US ISO-8859-1
en_US.UTF-8 UTF-8
fr_FR ISO-8859-1
fr_FR@euro ISO-8859-15
fr_FR.UTF-8 UTF-8

cp /usr/share/zoneinfo/Europe/Paris /etc/localtime

Kernel (2.6.32-r7) :

emerge gentoo-sources
make menuconfig

Default .config
Changes :

    Device Drivers  --->
[*]   Network device support  --->
[*]     Wireless LAN  --->
[*]       Wireless LAN (IEEE 802.11)  --->
<M>         Atheros Wireless Cards  --->
<M>           Atheros 802.11n wireless cards support
    File systems  --->
<*>   The Extended 4 (ext4) filesystem
[*]     Ext4 extended attributes
[*]       Ext4 POSIX Access Control Lists
[*]       Ext4 Security Labels

CONFIG_ATH_COMMON=m
CONFIG_ATH9K=m
CONFIG_EXT4_FS=y
CONFIG_EXT4_FS_XATTR=y
CONFIG_EXT4_FS_POSIX_ACL=y
CONFIG_EXT4_FS_SECURITY=y

make -j5 && make modules_install
cp arch/x86_64/boot/bzImage /boot/kernel-2.6.32-gentoo-r7

nano -w /etc/modules.autoload.d/kernel-2.6

ath9k

fstab :

nano -w /etc/fstab

/dev/sda6 / ext4 defaults,noatime 1 1
/dev/sda7 /home ext4 noatime   0 2

network : copy net and wpa_supplicant.conf (you can use alternate console with Alt-F2)

cd /etc/init.d
ln -s net.lo net.wlan0
rc-update add net.wlan0 default
emerge dhcpcd wpa_supplicant

System configuration :

emerge syslog-ng vixie-cron
rc-update add syslog-ng default
rc-update add vixie-cron default
rc-update add sshd default

Set root password (do not skip this step!) :

passwd

Config files :

nano -w /etc/conf.d/clock

TIMEZONE="Europe/Paris"

nano -w /etc/rc.conf

EDITOR="/usr/bin/vim"
XSESSION="e16"

nano -w /etc/conf.d/rc

RC_PARALLEL_STARTUP="yes"

nano -w /etc/conf.d/keymaps

KEYMAP="fr-latin9"

grub :

emerge grub

nano -w /boot/grub/grub.conf

default 0
timeout 50
splashimage=(hd0,0)/boot/grub/splash.xpm.gz
title Gentoo
root (hd0,5)
kernel /boot/kernel-2.6.32-r7 root=/dev/sda6

grub

grub> root (hd0,5)
grub> setup (hd0,5)
grub> quit

Save boot sector (to some usb key):

dd if=/dev/sda6 of=boot.grub bs=512 count=1

Reboot :

exit
umount /mnt/gentoo/dev /mnt/gentoo/proc /mnt/gentoo/home /mnt/gentoo
reboot

Update boot loader :

Steps based on this post
Copy boot.grub to C:\
Open a cmd as administrator :

C:\>bcdedit /export bcdedit-export-100513
L'opération a réussi.

C:\>bcdedit /create /d Gentoo /application BOOTSECTOR
L'entrée {4bd6ad4c-7c0c-11de-baef-deb9d273c9fa} a été correctement créée.
L'entrée {4bd6ad4d-7c0c-11de-baef-deb9d273c9fa} a été correctement créée.

C:\>bcdedit /set {4bd6ad4d-7c0c-11de-baef-deb9d273c9fa} device boot
L'opération a réussi.

C:\>bcdedit /set {4bd6ad4d-7c0c-11de-baef-deb9d273c9fa} path \boot.grub
L'opération a réussi.

C:\>bcdedit /set {4bd6ad4d-7c0c-11de-baef-deb9d273c9fa} locale fr-FR
L'opération a réussi.

C:\>bcdedit /displayorder {4bd6ad4d-7c0c-11de-baef-deb9d273c9fa} /addlast
L'opération a réussi.

C:\>bcdedit -v
...

Secteur de démarrage en mode réel
---------------------------------
identificateur          {4bd6ad4d-7c0c-11de-baef-deb9d273c9fa}
device                  boot
path                    \boot.grub
description             Gentoo
locale                  fr-FR

Now you should be able to select Gentoo on next reboot.

Not seen in amd64 guide :

ccache
emerge -vuD --newuse world
emerge --oneshot libtool
dispatch-conf
perl-cleaner all
python-updater

Notes :

grub menu is not visible ?!
A lot of packages need to be emerged, still.

Some hardware info is available in next post.

Commande materiel.net

2010-05-10T22:56:00.008+02:00

0 % jeudi soir : paiement (produit en stock)
30 % vendredi : demande de justificatifs pour justifier mon identité (1ère commande?) sur mon mail perso non consultable depuis le boulot :(
50 % lundi : en cours d'approvisionnement (suite à l'envoi des documents pendant le week-end). Plus de stock ?!
60 % lundi soir : commande complète : en cours de traitement
85 % mardi matin : commande complète : préparation
100 % mardi midi : commande expédiée
UPS mardi après midi : infos facturation reçues
UPS mardi soir : enlèvement
UPS mercredi matin : livraison refusée à cause d'un naze
UPS mercredi soir : re-livraison et réception ! Yes !

Update wampserver apache version

2010-05-09T23:33:00.003+02:00

Here is a batch that would do the work. It is based on a thread in the forums. Provided as is without any warranty.

@echo off
set dest_root=E:\usr\wamp\bin\apache
set source_root=%~dp0

set apache_zip=
for /f %%f in ('dir /b/ogn %source_root%httpd-*') do set apache_zip=%%f
if "%apache_zip%"=="" goto :eof
set unzip_dir=%apache_zip%
set unzip_dir=%unzip_dir:~0,-4%
if "%unzip_dir%"=="" goto :eof
if exist "%unzip_dir%" rd /s/q "%unzip_dir%"
e:\usr\7-Zip\7z x -o%unzip_dir% %apache_zip% 

echo %unzip_dir%

set ver=%unzip_dir:~6,-14%
set dest_dir=%dest_root%\Apache%ver%
echo %dest_dir%

if exist "%dest_dir%" rd /s/q "%dest_dir%"

set previous_ver=
for /f %%f in ('dir /b/ogn/ad %dest_root%\Apache*') do if not "%%f"=="%ver%" set previous_ver=%%f
set previous_ver=%previous_ver:~6%
set previous_dir=%dest_root%\Apache%previous_ver%
echo %previous_dir%

mkdir %dest_dir%
robocopy /NP /MIR /NFL "%unzip_dir%\Apache2" "%dest_dir%" /XD lib /XD include /XD manual
copy %previous_dir%\wampserver.conf %dest_dir% >nul
copy %previous_dir%\conf\httpd.conf %dest_dir%\conf >nul

rd /s/q %unzip_dir%

Elixir setup

2010-05-09T01:13:00.008+02:00

Free a lancé le projet elixir poru développer des jeux pour freebox. Ce toolkit se base sur enlightenment mon window manager par défaut quand je retourne sur la banquise.

Pour éviter d'installer Elixir n'importe où sur ma babasse en suivant le tutorial de noob plein de ./configure && make && make install, j'ai préféré utiliser la méthode gentoo en utilisant l'overlay officiel d'enlightenment. De l'aide supplémentaire est disponible sur le wiki gentoo.

Quelques notes :

Installation de portage-2.2 (mise à jour nécessaire de package.keywords et package.unmask)
Pour chaque package du set, ajout d'une ligne =category/package-9999 ** dans package.keywords pour éviter l'erreur missing keyword.

SpiderMonkey

package.use : dev-lang/spidermonkey threadsafe

Last version of SpiderMonkey in current portage tree is 1.7.0-r1. This version does not support JSVERSION_1_8. We need to create our own ebuild for version 1.8.0.

Create a local overlay to host this ebuild :

mkdir -p /usr/local/portage/profiles/
echo "local_overlay" > /usr/local/portage/profiles/repo_name
Add at the end of /etc/make.conf :
PORTDIR_OVERLAY="${PORTDIR_OVERLAY} /usr/local/portage/"

Create spidermonkey ebuild :

mkdir -p /usr/local/portage/dev-lang/spidermonkey
cp /usr/portage/dev-lang/spidermonkey/spidermonkey-1.7.0-r1.ebuild /usr/local/portage/dev-lang/spidermonkey/spidermonkey-1.8.0.ebuild
cp -R /usr/portage/dev-lang/spidermonkey/files /usr/local/portage/dev-lang/spidermonkey/files
Edit ebuild :

SRC_URI="ftp://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/js/${MY_P}-rc1.tar.gz"
...
#epatch "${FILESDIR}/${PN}-1.5-build.patch"
epatch "${FILESDIR}/${P}-build.patch"
#epatch "${FILESDIR}/${PN}-1.6-header.patch"
epatch "${FILESDIR}/${P}-threadsafe.diff"

spidermonkey-1.8.0-build.patch :

diff -rupN js.ref/js/src/Makefile.ref js.new/js/src/Makefile.ref
--- js.ref/js/src/Makefile.ref  2009-02-25 14:24:29.000000000 +0100
+++ js.new/js/src/Makefile.ref  2010-05-09 00:02:50.000000000 +0200
@@ -363,3 +363,16 @@ TARFILES = files `cat files`
SUFFIXES: .i
%.i: %.c
 $(CC) -C -E $(CFLAGS) $< > $*.i
+
+DESTDIR :=
+PREFIX := /usr
+BINDIR := $(PREFIX)/bin
+MY_LIBDIR := $(PREFIX)/$(LIBDIR)
+INCLUDEDIR := $(PREFIX)/include/js
+INSTALL := install -g 0 -o root
+install:
+ $(INSTALL) -m 755 -d $(DESTDIR)$(INCLUDEDIR) $(DESTDIR)$(MY_LIBDIR) $(DESTDIR)$(BINDIR)
+ $(INSTALL) -m 755 $(SHARED_LIBRARY) $(DESTDIR)$(MY_LIBDIR)
+ $(INSTALL) -m 644 $(LIBRARY) $(DESTDIR)$(MY_LIBDIR)
+ $(INSTALL) -m 755 $(OBJDIR)/js $(OBJDIR)/jscpucfg $(DESTDIR)$(BINDIR)
+ $(INSTALL) -m 644 $(HFILES) $(DESTDIR)$(INCLUDEDIR)

ebuild spidermonkey-1.8.0.ebuild digest
package.keywords : ~dev-lang/spidermonkey-1.8.0 **
emerge -va spidermonkey

Elixir setup :

Appliquer le patch basé sur les indications du blog de zigazou :

diff -rupN elixir-0.1.24.ref/src/modules/bindings/ecore/ecore_module.c elixir-0.1.24.new/src/modules/bindings/ecore/ecore_module.c
--- elixir-0.1.24.ref/src/modules/bindings/ecore/ecore_module.c 2010-05-09 00:36:48.000000000 +0200
+++ elixir-0.1.24.new/src/modules/bindings/ecore/ecore_module.c 2010-05-09 00:37:37.000000000 +0200
@@ -905,7 +905,7 @@ elixir_ecore_thread_run(JSContext *cx, u

   elixir_function_stop(cx);

-   result = ecore_thread_run(_elixir_func_heavy, _elixir_func_end, new);
+   result = ecore_thread_run(_elixir_func_heavy, _elixir_func_end, new, NULL);

   elixir_function_start(cx);

Setup elixir :

./configure
make
# sudo make install
# ldconfig

Il est toujours possible de supprimer elixir en faisant :

# make uninstall
# rm -rf /usr/local/lib/elixir

Tester :

elixir Simple.js

Liens / Références :

Notes sur gentoo :

L'overlay installe media-libs/edje-9999 qui contient edje_player (qui remplace edje_viewer)

Avertissement : edge ne semble pas fonctionner avec cette installation :( Seuls les exemples basiques passent. Il est peut être finalement préférable d'utiliser l'image virtualbox...

Asus U30JC-QX010X

2010-05-08T00:07:00.011+02:00

Quick summary :

Intel core i5-430M
4 GB memory DDR3 1066 MHz
13.3" WXGA 1366 x 768 TFT LED
nVidia® GeForce™ G310M 512 MB
320 GB SATA 5400 rpm
Webcam 0.3 MP 640x480
RJ 45, 3 USB, VGA, HDMI, wifi n, bluetooth, card reader
DVD burner
8 cells battery 5600 mAh
Windows 7 Professional 64 bits
2 years warranty

Can't wait !

voyage-prive.com : Attention !

2009-10-13T20:25:00.012+02:00

Les offres de voyage-prive.com ne sont pas toujours intéressantes. Assurez-vous de toujours bien vérifier les prix en direct sur les hôtels proposés !

En ce moment, est proposé le prestigieux Warwick Champs Elysées. Si on essaye avec voyage-prive, on nous fait miroiter 69 % de réduction : 190 euros pour deux personnes au lieu de 610 euros pour une chambre standard en petit déjeuner : Je ne compte pas les 5 € de réductions sur le menu à 35 €.
Si on va sur le site de l'hôtel, on trouve à la même date une chambre standard à 227 € pour deux personnes : Le prix avant réduction correspondrait plutôt à la suite (et encore, elle est moins chère!) :A mon avis, c'est à la limite de l'arnaque ces fausses réductions qui passent pour de la publicité mensongère.

Les offres commencent à devenir intéressantes quand on prend l'avion pour aller au bout du monde... mais bon, pour une nuit romantique dans un hôtel de luxe dans les proches capitales européennes, ça reste à prouver...

How to import a yahoo agenda to another (yahoo) account ?

2009-10-07T22:27:00.023+02:00

Even if this post is written in English, it targets French people. As a French, I use the French yahoo web site, which is slightly different from the American version.

EXPORT

In France, you do not have access to Import/Export functions. You need to go to your Agenda options and hack the url. The url has two parameters v (id of current page) and pv (id of previous page). You must change the v value to 81. Thanks a lot BarrJo for this info.

This will show a new page with Import/Export functions to/from Palm Desktop and Outlook.

Simply export in Outlook format.

PATCH & IMPORT

The exported agenda cannot be handled by yahoo (this might explain why yahoo hides this functionnality).

Here is what you need to fix :

Carriage returns : all carriage returns are missing. You must add one after the header line (just after the "Description" title). You can deal most of the lines with a decent text editor with search and replace (you need to add a new line after "true";"" or "false";""). Then, only the rows with a non-empty description remain.
HTML entities : for example, ", & and ', etc. must be respectively replaced by ", & and '.
Commas : Yahoo gives you a file with values separated by semicolons. You need to replace them with commas. Be careful of other semicolons (in descriptions for example).

Now you can import the patched csv file.

Note : I have exported again the imported agenda and checked that all events were taken into account. I have just noticed a few updates from true to false in the antelast column.

LIMITS

Some yahoo specific info is lost (kind of event defaults to meeting, reminder, etc.)
Repetitions are lost : if you update the repetition period of an event, you will end with two events in the future (the imported one and the repetition). So I advise you to remove all repetition starting from next year for yearly events (like birthdays). Then you will just need to set the repetition period to all birthdays.

OTHER POSSIBLE BUGS

Date formats
Encoding : UTF8 / ANSI / etc.

Fringe c'est mieux en VO

2009-06-25T21:32:00.006+02:00

Avec la censure de TF1 sur ses forums, je poste finalement ici.

Ayant adoré le premier épisode (malgré les deux coupures pubs), je n'ai pas pu attendre. J'ai donc regardé la série en VO (même si je n'ai pas encore fini la saison 1 à ce jour). Hier soir, je tombe par hasard sur l'épisode 4 sur TF1. C'est encore frais dans ma tête, je constate avec surprise que la version française a été censurée : 2 minutes ont été supprimées. Entre la 31è et la 33è environ, une scène a été presque entièrement coupée, quand le gus au bonnet force Peter à parler.

Je trouve ça complètement nul que l'on censure des scènes de la série. Cela nuit à l'intrigue. En plus, vu l'heure à laquelle ça commence, je ne vois pas qui risque d'être choqué.

Bref : boycottez TF1, choisissez la VO, c'est mieux. Vous ne risquez pas de rater une miette de l'histoire et ça vous fera bosser l'anglais.

Le Vélib' c'est pourri

2009-05-21T02:33:00.004+02:00

2h du mat. Une petite flemme. On décide de tester le vélib' pour la première fois. On passe alors 5 bonnes minutes à créer un compte pour un pass court de 1 à 7 jours. Je prends un vélo. Il me propose le 21, je préférais le 37 mais bon, pas trop le choix apparemment. Au tour de ma chérie, et là plus de vélos ! Evidemment, les autres vélos sont sur le trottoir d'en face, inutilisable pour les non-habitués.

On décide de patienter jusqu'à la prochaine station. Je roule lentement et elle marche à mes côtés. Une fois arrivés, on trouve plein de vélos. Mais tous sont marqués rouge : comprendre indisponibles.

On continue jusqu'à la station suivante. Comme on pouvait s'y attendre, son numéro d'abonné temporaire n'est pas reconnu. Dégoûté, je rends mon vélib'. Après 20 min de marche à pied, ça valait le coup.

Résultat, on a mis 30 minutes alors que d'habitude on trace en 1/4 h... Le vélib', ça marche pas. C'est pas demain la veille qu'on va retenter l'expérience.

WPF Cover Flow Tutorial : Part 7 (source)

2009-04-20T21:35:00.010+02:00

Before disclosing sources of Part 7, here a few notes.

I provide a sample ThumbnailManager, working with an IsolatedStorageFile.

public class ThumbnailManager : IThumbnailManager
{
    #region Fields
    private readonly IsolatedStorageFile store;
    #endregion
    public ThumbnailManager()
    {
        store = IsolatedStorageFile.GetUserStoreForAssembly();
    }
    public ImageSource GetThumbnail(string host, string path)
    {
        string thumbName = Path.GetFileName(path);
        if (store.GetFileNames(thumbName).Length == 0)
        {
            using (var stream = new IsolatedStorageFileStream(thumbName, FileMode.CreateNew, store))
            {
                byte[] data = GetThumbnail(path);
                stream.Write(data, 0, data.Length);
            }
        }
        using (var stream = new IsolatedStorageFileStream(thumbName, FileMode.Open, store))
        {
            var image = new BitmapImage();
            image.BeginInit();
            image.CacheOption = BitmapCacheOption.OnLoad;
            image.StreamSource = stream;
            image.EndInit();
            image.Freeze();
            return image;
        }
    }
}

I deal with host names because I am also working on an implementation dealing with many shares on the network. The GetThumbnail method just resizes pictures.

    private byte[] GetThumbnail(string path)
    {
        Image source = Image.FromFile(path);
        source = AmazonCut(source);
        int height = source.Height;
        int width = source.Width;
        int factor = (height - 1) / 250 + 1;
        int smallHeight = height / factor;
        int smallWidth = width / factor;
        Image thumb = source.GetThumbnailImage(smallWidth, smallHeight, null, IntPtr.Zero);
        using (var ms = new MemoryStream())
        {
            thumb.Save(ms, ImageFormat.Png);
            ms.Flush();
            ms.Seek(0, SeekOrigin.Begin);
            var result = new byte[ms.Length];
            ms.Read(result, 0, (int)ms.Length);
            return result;
        }
    }

For the sample videos on youtube, I downloaded many covers from amazon. That's why I need the helper function that removes the blank frame around the picture:

    private static Image AmazonCut(Image image)
    {
        if (image.Width != image.Height)
            return image;
        var bmp = new Bitmap(image);
        int size = image.Height;
        int white = System.Drawing.Color.FromKnownColor(KnownColor.White).ToArgb();
        int i = 0;
        while (i < size / 2)
        {
            if (bmp.GetPixel(i, i).ToArgb() != white)
                break;
            if (bmp.GetPixel(i, size - 1 - i).ToArgb() != white)
                break;
            if (bmp.GetPixel(size - 1 - i, i).ToArgb() != white)
                break;
            if (bmp.GetPixel(size - 1 - i, size - 1 - i).ToArgb() != white)
                break;
            i++;
        }
        if (i > 0)
        {
            i += 8;
            var zone = new Rectangle(i, i, size - 2 * i, size - 2 * i);
            return bmp.Clone(zone, System.Drawing.Imaging.PixelFormat.DontCare);
        }
        return bmp;
    }

Well this whole class is not perfect code, but it is sufficient for a demo.

If you do not know innerings of IsolatedStorage, you will find the thumbnails in a folder like C:\Documents and Settings\ded\Local Settings\Application Data\IsolatedStorage\0ypqvhod.rll\j4pydd3v.g4v\StrongName.alr3sbzvfezz2fk22sd5g0b5dxbwzr0b\AssemFiles.

Here is the source.

WPF Cover Flow Tutorial : Part 7

2009-04-15T21:44:00.030+02:00

After some improvements in the Cover class, let's describe how virtualization works.

We do not keep all covers in memory. Remember the drawing in Part 2. At a given time, we only keep a few covers on both sides of the current cover (at position index). This means that every time we browse through the covers, we create and destroy one or more covers. If we do not keep all covers in memory, we have to keep enough information to rebuild covers : image file path and position. We also need to remember which covers are currently built.

public const int HalfRealizedCount = 6;
public const int PageSize = HalfRealizedCount;
private readonly ICoverFactory coverFactory;
private readonly Dictionary<int, ImageInfo> imageList = new Dictionary<int, ImageInfo>();
private readonly Dictionary<int, ICover> coverList = new Dictionary<int, ICover>();
private int index;
private int firstRealized = -1;
private int lastRealized = -1;

HalfRealizedCount is the number of covers created before and after current cover
I use the same value for the PageSize (we could choose a different value) when we will move by more than one cover at a time
imageList will map cover positions to image paths
coverList will be used as an array to keep realized covers
firstRealized and lastRealized are the positions of respectively first and last realized covers

There will be two ways to browse covers : by less than a page with animation or jumping by more than a page without animation.

    private void RotateCover(int pos, bool animate)
    {
        if (coverList.ContainsKey(pos))
            coverList[pos].Animate(index, animate);
    }
    private void UpdateIndex(int newIndex)
    {
        if (index != newIndex)
        {
            bool animate = Math.Abs(newIndex - index) < PageSize;
            UpdateRange(newIndex);
            int oldIndex = index;
            index = newIndex;
            if (index > oldIndex)
            {
                if (oldIndex < firstRealized)
                    oldIndex = firstRealized;
                for (int i = oldIndex; i <= index; i++)
                    RotateCover(i, animate);
            }
            else
            {
                if (oldIndex > lastRealized)
                    oldIndex = lastRealized;
                for (int i = oldIndex; i >= index; i--)
                    RotateCover(i, animate);
            }
            camera.Position = new Point3D(Cover.CoverStep * index, camera.Position.Y, camera.Position.Z);
        }
    }

I'm not sure if the test in RotateCover is still needed. Here is how the new UpdateIndex function. We compute the animation boolean like described before. The UpdateRange function deals with cover realization : it will create and destroy covers as necessary and updates both realized indexes. Then, for all realized covers between old and new index, we rotate the covers. Finally, like before, we update camera positions.

    private void RemoveCover(int pos)
    {
        if (!coverList.ContainsKey(pos))
            return;
        coverList[pos].Destroy();
        coverList.Remove(pos);
    }
    private void UpdateRange(int newIndex)
    {
        int newFirstRealized = Math.Max(newIndex - HalfRealizedCount, 0);
        int newLastRealized = Math.Min(newIndex + HalfRealizedCount, imageList.Count - 1);
        if (lastRealized < newFirstRealized || firstRealized > newLastRealized)
        {
            visualModel.Children.Clear();
            coverList.Clear();
        }
        else if (firstRealized < newFirstRealized)
        {
            for (int i = firstRealized; i < newFirstRealized; i++)
                RemoveCover(i);
        }
        else if (newLastRealized < lastRealized)
        {
            for (int i = lastRealized; i > newLastRealized; i--)
                RemoveCover(i);
        }
        for (int i = newFirstRealized; i <= newLastRealized; i++)
        {
            if (!coverList.ContainsKey(i))
            {
                ICover cover = coverFactory.NewCover(imageList[i].Host, imageList[i].Path, i, newIndex);
                coverList.Add(i, cover);
            }
        }
        firstRealized = newFirstRealized;
        lastRealized = newLastRealized;
    }

In the UpdateRange method, we first compute realized indexes. Then, we remove necessary covers (might need all covers if we move by more than HalfRealizedCount. Finally, we create missing covers.

    public void GoToNext()
    {
        UpdateIndex(Math.Min(index + 1, imageList.Count - 1));
    }
    public void GoToPrevious()
    {
        UpdateIndex(Math.Max(index - 1, 0));
    }
    public void GoToNextPage()
    {
        UpdateIndex(Math.Min(index + PageSize, imageList.Count - 1));
    }
    public void GoToPreviousPage()
    {
        UpdateIndex(Math.Max(index - PageSize, 0));
    }

Navigation methods are self explanatory.

Possible improvements :

Slider
Events
Tags (e.g. album names to jump to covers)

Source is available in next post.

WPF Cover Flow Tutorial : Part 6 (bis)

2009-04-14T23:42:00.017+02:00

I'll start with some Cover refactoring :

Class becomes internal

I add the ICover interface, mainly for unit testing with a fake class implementing ICover :

public interface ICover
{
   void Animate(int index, bool animate);
   bool Matches(MeshGeometry3D mesh);
   void Destroy();
}

You may notice the new Destroy method. This is useful to be able to create or destroy objects at will. Relatively, covers now know about the containing ModelVisual3D.
I also add a static IThumbnailManager to put elsewhere all the code dealing with thumbnails (like managing an IsolatedStorageFile for example)
Animation is slightly modified : in some cases, no rotation is needed to allow faster browsing.

Here are the changes since Part 5 :

public interface IThumbnailManager
{
    ImageSource GetThumbnail(string host, string path);
}
internal class Cover : ModelVisual3D, ICover
{
    ...
    private static IThumbnailManager thumbCache;
    private readonly ModelVisual3D visualModel;
    ...
    private readonly string imageName;
    ...
    private static ImageSource LoadImageSource(ImageInfo info)
    {
        if (thumbCache == null)
            throw new InvalidOperationException("No thumbnail cache.");
        return thumbCache.GetThumbnail(info.Host, info.Path);
    }
    ...
    public Cover(ImageInfo info, int coverPos, int currentPos, ModelVisual3D model)
    {
        pos = coverPos;
        imageName = new FileInfo(info.Path).Name;
        visualModel = model;

        imageSource = LoadImageSource(info);
        modelGroup = new Model3DGroup();
        modelGroup.Children.Add(new GeometryModel3D(Tessellate(), LoadImage(imageSource)));
        modelGroup.Children.Add(new GeometryModel3D(TessellateMirror(), LoadImageMirror(imageSource)));

        rotation = new AxisAngleRotation3D(new Vector3D(0, 1, 0), RotationAngle(currentPos));
        translation = new TranslateTransform3D(TranslationX(currentPos), 0, TranslationZ(currentPos));
        var transformGroup = new Transform3DGroup();
        transformGroup.Children.Add(new RotateTransform3D(rotation));
        transformGroup.Children.Add(translation);
        modelGroup.Transform = transformGroup;

        Content = modelGroup;

        visualModel.Children.Add(this);
    }
    public static IThumbnailManager Cache
    {
        set { thumbCache = value; }
    }
    public void Animate(int index, bool animate)
    {
        if (animate || rotation.HasAnimatedProperties)
        {
            var rotateAnimation = new DoubleAnimation(RotationAngle(index), AnimationDuration);
            var xAnimation = new DoubleAnimation(TranslationX(index), AnimationDuration);
            var zAnimation = new DoubleAnimation(TranslationZ(index), AnimationDuration);
            rotation.BeginAnimation(AxisAngleRotation3D.AngleProperty, rotateAnimation);
            translation.BeginAnimation(TranslateTransform3D.OffsetXProperty, xAnimation);
            translation.BeginAnimation(TranslateTransform3D.OffsetZProperty, zAnimation);
        }
        else
        {
            rotation.Angle = RotationAngle(index);
            translation.OffsetX = TranslationX(index);
            translation.OffsetZ = TranslationZ(index);
        }
    }
    public void Destroy()
    {
        visualModel.Children.Remove(this);
    }
    public override string ToString()
    {
        return string.Format("{0} {1}", pos, imageName);
    }
}

I also add an ICoverFactory (mainly for testing purposes) :

public interface ICoverFactory
{
    ICover NewCover(string host, string path, int coverPos, int currentPos);
}
internal class ImageInfo
{
    public ImageInfo(string host, string path)
    {
        Host = host;
        Path = path;
    }
    public string Host { get; private set; }
    public string Path { get; private set; }
}
internal class CoverFactory : ICoverFactory
{
    private readonly ModelVisual3D visualModel;
    public CoverFactory(ModelVisual3D visualModel)
    {
        this.visualModel = visualModel;
    }
    #region ICoverFactory Members
    public ICover NewCover(string host, string path, int coverPos, int currentPos)
    {
        return new Cover(new ImageInfo(host, path), coverPos, currentPos, visualModel);
    }
    #endregion
}

The FlowControl class is greatly refactored to implement virtualization.

WPF Cover Flow Tutorial : 6 months intermission

2009-04-14T22:50:00.003+02:00

Well, sorry guys for not posting since October... I didn't have enough time to go on this tutorial. Less time available for coding and I've been working on a wider project where my Flow assembly was just a small GUI component.

There will be quite a jump in the source code. But I'll try to describe what is the main idea behind virtualization...

Coming soon !

WPF Cover Flow Tutorial : Part 6

2008-10-24T22:52:00.005+02:00

After building a standalone component in Part 5, I wanted to improve performance.

I've read many blogs about IScrollInfo, ItemsContainerGenerator, Generator, Selector and ItemsControl classes. I also digged into WPF source code through Reflector. But eventually I realized that this was all about 2D. And here, we are dealing with 3D. Therefore, we have to create our own solution...

To be continued... here.

WPF Cover Flow Tutorial : Part 5

2008-10-18T19:24:00.023+02:00

After Part 4, we will partly refactor the code to build a custom component.

We define a new assembly called FlowComponent where we will move most of the code. First, the c# code will be part of a new class called FlowControl. This class herits from UserControl :

using[...]
namespace Ded.Tutorial.Wpf.CoverFlow.Part5.FlowComponent
{
    public partial class FlowControl : UserControl
    {
        #region Fields
        private int index;
        private readonly List<Cover> coverList = new List<Cover>();
        #endregion
        #region Private stuff
        private void RotateCover(int pos)[...]
        private void UpdateIndex(int newIndex)[...]
        private void viewPort_MouseDown(object sender, MouseButtonEventArgs e)[...]
        #endregion
        public FlowControl()
        {
            InitializeComponent();
        }
        public void Load(string imagePath)
        {
            coverList.Clear();
            var imageDir = new DirectoryInfo(imagePath);
            int doneImages = 0;
            foreach (FileInfo image in imageDir.GetFiles("*.jpg"))
            {
                var cover = new Cover(image.FullName, doneImages++);
                coverList.Add(cover);
                visualModel.Children.Add(cover);
            }
        }
        public void GoToNext()
        {
            if (index < coverList.Count - 1)
                UpdateIndex(index + 1);
        }
        public void GoToPrevious()
        {
            if (index > 0)
                UpdateIndex(index - 1);
        }
    }
}

The code from the TestWindow constructor is included in a new method called Load. It will build covers with the images from one directory. We also provide two new methods GoToNext and GoToPrevious to navigate between covers.

This is the same in the xaml code : we migrate the Grid (its background) and the Viewport3D to our custom UserControl :

<UserControl x:Class="Ded.Tutorial.Wpf.CoverFlow.Part5.FlowComponent.FlowControl"
    xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
    xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"
    Height="282" Width="490">
  <Grid ClipToBounds="True">
    <Grid.Background[...]>
    <Viewport3D x:Name="viewPort" Grid.Column="0" Grid.Row="0" ClipToBounds="False" MouseDown="viewPort_MouseDown">
      <Viewport3D.Camera[...]>
      <Viewport3D.Children[...]>
    </Viewport3D>
  </Grid>
</UserControl>

We can set the size we want. It will be overriden in the owner component. We set the ClipToBounds property to True to avoid covers from exceeding the bounds of our component.

The Cover class is also moved to the FlowComponent assembly.

As we are creating a CoverFlow component, it is a good idea to deal with rectangle images. We update the Point3D coordinates with the ImageSource size. The ImageSource will be stored as a class attribute.

private readonly ImageSource imageSource;
private double RectangleDx()
{
    if (imageSource.Width > imageSource.Height)
        return 0;
    else
        return 1 - imageSource.Width / imageSource.Height;
}
private double RectangleDy()
{
    if (imageSource.Width > imageSource.Height)
        return 1 - imageSource.Height / imageSource.Width;
    else
        return 0;
}
private Geometry3D Tessellate()
{
    double dx = RectangleDx();
    double dy = RectangleDy();
    var p0 = new Point3D(-1 + dx, -1 + dy, 0);
    var p1 = new Point3D(1 - dx, -1 + dy, 0);
    var p2 = new Point3D(1 - dx, 1 - dy, 0);
    var p3 = new Point3D(-1 + dx, 1 - dy, 0);
    ...
}
private Geometry3D TessellateMirror()
{
    double dx = RectangleDx();
    double dy = RectangleDy();
    var p0 = new Point3D(-1 + dx, -3 + 3 * dy, 0);
    var p1 = new Point3D(1 - dx, -3 + 3 * dy, 0);
    var p2 = new Point3D(1 - dx, -1 + dy, 0);
    var p3 = new Point3D(-1 + dx, -1 + dy, 0);
    ...
}
public Cover(string imagePath, int pos)
{
    ...
    imageSource = LoadImageSource(imagePath);
    ...
}

With this new improvement, it is possible to use the component to browse photos :
There is nothing much left in the TestWindow class. In the xaml code, after we've referenced our component assembly, we just use our FlowControl as main Content :

<Window x:Class="Ded.Tutorial.Wpf.CoverFlow.Part5.TestWindow"
    xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
    xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"
    Title="WPF Coverflow" Width="512" Height="320" KeyDown="Window_KeyDown"
    xmlns:flow="clr-namespace:Ded.Tutorial.Wpf.CoverFlow.Part5.FlowComponent;assembly=Ded.Tutorial.Wpf.CoverFlow.Part5.FlowComponent">
  <flow:FlowControl x:Name="flow" Margin="0"></flow:FlowControl>
</Window>

In the C# code, we just keep the Window_KeyDown method and the constructor :

using System.Windows;
using System.Windows.Input;
namespace Ded.Tutorial.Wpf.CoverFlow.Part5
{
    public partial class TestWindow : Window
    {
        #region Private stuff
        private void Window_KeyDown(object sender, KeyEventArgs e)
        {
            switch (e.Key)
            {
                case Key.Right:
                    flow.GoToNext();
                    break;
                case Key.Left:
                    flow.GoToPrevious();
                    break;
            }
        }
        #endregion
        public TestWindow()
        {
            InitializeComponent();
            flow.Load(@"c:\_covers");
        }
    }
}

That's it ! We've built a CoverFlow component reusable in other WPF applications. But this component needs improvements. We will add virtualization in the next part...
Download source. Continue with Part 6.

WPF Cover Flow Tutorial : Part 4

2008-10-17T21:15:00.003+02:00

We can improve the HCI from Part 3 with some mouse handling.

We add a MouseDown handler method to our Viewport3D :

private void OnViewportMouseDown(object sender, MouseButtonEventArgs e)
{
    var rayMeshResult = (RayMeshGeometry3DHitTestResult)VisualTreeHelper.HitTest(viewPort, e.GetPosition(viewPort));
    if (rayMeshResult != null)
    {
        for (int i = 0; i < coverList.Count; i++)
        {
            if (coverList[i].Matches(rayMeshResult.MeshHit))
            {
                UpdateIndex(i);
                break;
            }
        }
    }
}

This method uses the VisualTreeHelper to find which mesh was hitten by the mouse click. If there is a match, we update the index like we did before. Matches are found with this new Cover method :

public bool Matches(MeshGeometry3D mesh)
{
    foreach (GeometryModel3D part in modelGroup.Children)
       if (part.Geometry == mesh)
           return true;
    return false;
}

We also modify the TestWindow constructor to load all the pictures from a sample folder :

public TestWindow()
{
    InitializeComponent();
    var imageDir = new DirectoryInfo(@"c:\_covers");
    int doneImages = 0;
    foreach (FileInfo image in imageDir.GetFiles("*.jpg"))
    {
        var cover = new Cover(image.FullName, doneImages++);
        coverList.Add(cover);
        visualModel.Children.Add(cover);
    }
}

Mouse click may increment or decrement the index by more than one cover. That's wy we need to fix the UpdateIndex method :

private void UpdateIndex(int newIndex)
{
    if (index != newIndex)
    {
        int oldIndex = index;
        index = newIndex;
        if (index > oldIndex)
            for (int i = oldIndex; i <= index; i++)
                RotateCover(i);
        else
            for (int i = oldIndex; i >= index; i--)
                RotateCover(i);
        camera.Position = new Point3D(.2 * index, camera.Position.Y, camera.Position.Z);
    }
}

It is now time to play with more covers. Let's try the current application with a sample folder containing 500+ covers. These covers are usually between 400x400 and 500x500 pixels. The next Process Explorer capture shows that the application needs a lot of cpu and memory resources :

Loading all covers brings the cpu to 100%.
Browing all covers with the Right key pressed also needs a lot of cpu. Moreover, this rises the cache size from 300 MB to more than 1 GB.

It is possible to improve performance if we use thumbnails for all covers. We will store thumbnails in a subfolder.

private ImageSource LoadImageSource(string imagePath)
{
    var imageFile = new FileInfo(imagePath);
    var thumbnailDir = new DirectoryInfo(Path.Combine(imageFile.Directory.FullName, "tn"));
    if (!thumbnailDir.Exists)
        thumbnailDir.Create();
    var thumbnail = new FileInfo(Path.Combine(thumbnailDir.FullName, imageFile.Name));
    if (!thumbnail.Exists)
    {
        Image source = Image.FromFile(imageFile.FullName);
        int height = source.Height;
        int width = source.Width;
        int factor = (height - 1) / 250 + 1;
        int smallHeight = height / factor;
        int smallWidth = width / factor;
        Image thumb = source.GetThumbnailImage(smallWidth, smallHeight, null, IntPtr.Zero);
        thumb.Save(thumbnail.FullName);
    }
    return new BitmapImage(new Uri(thumbnail.FullName, UriKind.RelativeOrAbsolute));
}

Thumbnails improve performance while browsing, but it is still slow at startup. We will try to improve this later.

Continue with Part 5. Download source.

WPF Cover Flow Tutorial : Part 3

2008-10-16T21:48:00.003+02:00

In Part 2, we miss the animation part of the flow.

In the main TestWindow, we save all the covers in a List :

private readonly List<Cover> coverList = new List<Cover>();
public TestWindow()
{
    InitializeComponent();
    var assembly = new FileInfo(Assembly.GetExecutingAssembly().Location);
    var image = new FileInfo(Path.Combine(assembly.Directory.FullName, "Katy Perry.jpg"));
    for (int i = 0; i < 10; i++)
    {
        var cover = new Cover(image.FullName, i);
        coverList.Add(cover);
        visualModel.Children.Add(cover);
    }
}

We add an handler for the KeyDown event on the Window element. We will only deal with the Right and Left keys. Once one of these keys is pressed down, we animate the old current cover and the new one.

private void RotateCover(int pos)
{
    coverList[pos].Animate(index);
}
private void UpdateIndex(int newIndex)
{
    if (index != newIndex)
    {
        int oldIndex = index;
        index = newIndex;
        RotateCover(oldIndex);
        RotateCover(index);
        camera.Position = new Point3D(.2 * index, camera.Position.Y, camera.Position.Z);
    }
}
private void Window_KeyDown(object sender, KeyEventArgs e)
{
    int newIndex = index;
    switch (e.Key)
    {
        case Key.Right:
            if (newIndex < coverList.Count - 1)
                newIndex++;
            break;
        case Key.Left:
            if (newIndex > 0)
                newIndex--;
            break;
    }
    UpdateIndex(newIndex);
}

Currently, we do not animate covers. We just move them from one place to another. In order to get a real animation, we have to deal with Animation objects. In this new version of the Animate method, we ask the engine to animate the covers. As we have saved the translation and rotation objects in two Cover attributes, we can directly update their parameters (angle and offsets).

public void Animate(int index)
{
    TimeSpan duration = TimeSpan.FromMilliseconds(500);
    var rotateAnimation = new DoubleAnimation(RotationAngle(index), duration);
    var xAnimation = new DoubleAnimation(TranslationX(index), duration);
    var zAnimation = new DoubleAnimation(TranslationZ(index), duration);
    rotation.BeginAnimation(AxisAngleRotation3D.AngleProperty, rotateAnimation);
    translation.BeginAnimation(TranslateTransform3D.OffsetXProperty, xAnimation);
    translation.BeginAnimation(TranslateTransform3D.OffsetZProperty, zAnimation);
}

Download source. Continue with Part 4.

WPF Cover Flow Tutorial : Part 2

2008-10-16T19:03:00.002+02:00

Since Part 1, we now know how to display a cover in 3D.

In order to display a reflection mirror, we add another GeometryModel3D to our Model3DGroup. This new element will be based on these points :

using Point2D = System.Windows.Point;
private Geometry3D TessellateMirror()
{
  var p0 = new Point3D(-1, -3, 0);
  var p1 = new Point3D(1, -3, 0);
  var p2 = new Point3D(1, -1, 0);
  var p3 = new Point3D(-1, -1, 0);
  var q0 = new Point2D(0, 1);
  var q1 = new Point2D(1, 1);
  var q2 = new Point2D(1, 0);
  var q3 = new Point2D(0, 0);
  return BuildMesh(p0, p1, p2, p3, q0, q1, q2, q3);
}

We define the Point2D alias because of the conflict with System.Drawing.Point.

For the texture, we use a VisualBrush object and we apply a LinearGradientBrush to the image OpacityMask :

using MediaColor = System.Windows.Media.Color;
private Material LoadImageMirror(ImageSource imSrc)
{
   var image = new System.Windows.Controls.Image();
   image.Source = imSrc;
   MediaColor startColor = MediaColor.FromArgb(127, 255, 255, 255);
   MediaColor endColor = MediaColor.FromArgb(127, 255, 255, 255);
   image.OpacityMask = new LinearGradientBrush(startColor, endColor, 90.0);
   var brush = new VisualBrush(image);
   return new DiffuseMaterial(brush);
}

There are two possibilities to browse the covers :

Keep the camera at the very same place and translate/rotate all covers as we are browsing.
Transform only a few covers (e.g. the one currently selected) and move the camera.

The second solution will ensure better performance.The current cover will be put in front. The other covers will be rotated and placed on each side of the current cover. When the camera will move, the current cover will be moved back with the unselected ones, and the newly selected cover will be put in front.

There are two transformations : a rotation and a translation on X and Z axes. The rotation angle will be 90, 0 or -90 degrees. The Z translation will be 0 or 1 for the current cover. The X translation will be 0 for the current cover, or proportional to the distance from the origin. For each cover, we will save its position. We will compare the cover position with the current index to compute the transformation parameters. This gives us :

private readonly int pos;
private double RotationAngle(int index)
{
    return Math.Sign(pos - index) * -90;
}
private double TranslationX(int index)
{
    return pos * .2 + Math.Sign(pos - index) * 1.6;
}
private double TranslationZ(int index)
{
    return pos == index ? 1 : 0;
}

Applying the transformations to our Model3DGroup is easy. We create the transformation in the constructor with a default index of 0 :

private readonly AxisAngleRotation3D rotation;
private readonly TranslateTransform3D translation;
public Cover(string imagePath, int pos)
{
    this.imagePath = imagePath;
    this.pos = pos;

    ImageSource imSrc = LoadImageSource();
    modelGroup = new Model3DGroup();
    modelGroup.Children.Add(new GeometryModel3D(Tessellate(), LoadImage(imSrc)));
    modelGroup.Children.Add(new GeometryModel3D(TessellateMirror(), LoadImageMirror(imSrc)));

    rotation = new AxisAngleRotation3D(new Vector3D(0, 1, 0), RotationAngle(0));
    translation = new TranslateTransform3D(TranslationX(0), 0, TranslationZ(0));
    var transformGroup = new Transform3DGroup();
    transformGroup.Children.Add(new RotateTransform3D(rotation));
    transformGroup.Children.Add(translation);
    modelGroup.Transform = transformGroup;
    Content = modelGroup;
}

Then, we will call the Animate method the transform the cover :

public void Animate(int index)
{
    rotation.Angle = RotationAngle(index);
    translation.OffsetX = TranslationX(index);
    translation.OffsetZ = TranslationZ(index);
}

If we create three covers, we realize that only one is visible :We need to replace our single light source with two different ones :


<ModelVisual3D>
  <ModelVisual3D.Content>
    <DirectionalLight Color="White" Direction="1,0,-3" />
  </ModelVisual3D.Content>
</ModelVisual3D>
<ModelVisual3D>
  <ModelVisual3D.Content>
    <DirectionalLight Color="White" Direction="-1,0,-3" />
  </ModelVisual3D.Content>
</ModelVisual3D>

Continue with Part 3. Download source.

WPF Cover Flow Tutorial : Result

2008-10-14T21:40:00.000+02:00

Here is a sample video that shows the power of WPF :

These poor videos were done with Windows Media Encoder. CamStudio actually performs much more better. I will use the latter for the next screencasts.

WPF Cover Flow Tutorial : Part 1

2008-10-13T22:09:00.006+02:00

Disclaimer : if you don't know anything about WPF, you should read this excellent tutorial. This should be considered as Part 0.

Now, I will describe how to develop a Cover Flow component in WPF.
The z-axis is not visible here. Actually, it is going in your direction.

The first basic task will just display one cover in the middle of the screen.
In 3D, we usually work with triangles.
So we simply cut the square in two :

Let's start with the code. We create the 4 points :

var p0 = new Point3D(-1, -1, 0);
var p1 = new Point3D(1, -1, 0);
var p2 = new Point3D(1, 1, 0);
var p3 = new Point3D(-1, 1, 0);

Then we create a MeshGeometry3D object. This object will contain our model. In order to build a model, we need to set all the points. Then, for each triangle, we define the point indices and the normals. To calculate the normals, I use the same method as the one defined in Part 0.

private Vector3D CalculateNormal(Point3D p0, Point3D p1, Point3D p2)
{
var v0 = new Vector3D(p1.X - p0.X, p1.Y - p0.Y, p1.Z - p0.Z);
var v1 = new Vector3D(p2.X - p1.X, p2.Y - p1.Y, p2.Z - p1.Z);
return Vector3D.CrossProduct(v0, v1);
}

For the first triangle, we take the first 3 points. The normal is OK with these points (going towards us, in the positive direction of the z-axis). We need to pay attention to the second triangle. If we simply take the points in the same order (e.g. 1, 2 and 3), the normal will be inverted, in the negative direction of the z-axis. So we choose the points 0, 2 and 3.

var mesh = new MeshGeometry3D();
mesh.Positions.Add(p0);
mesh.Positions.Add(p1);
mesh.Positions.Add(p2);
mesh.Positions.Add(p3);

var normal = CalculateNormal(p0, p1, p2);
mesh.TriangleIndices.Add(0);
mesh.TriangleIndices.Add(1);
mesh.TriangleIndices.Add(2);
mesh.Normals.Add(normal);

normal = CalculateNormal(p2, p3, p0);
mesh.TriangleIndices.Add(2);
mesh.TriangleIndices.Add(3);
mesh.TriangleIndices.Add(0);
mesh.Normals.Add(normal);

As far as texturing is concerned, I strongly advise you to read Daniel Lehenbauer's Blog. We need to deal with 4 points, but in 2D this time :

var q0 = new Point(0, 0);
var q1 = new Point(1, 0);
var q2 = new Point(1, 1);
var q3 = new Point(0, 1);

As you've read in Daniel's post, there is a big difference between 3D and 2D texture conventions. In 3D, you have :

But 2D texturing uses :

So the coordinates associations are :

p0 <-> q3
p1 <-> q2
p2 <-> q1
p3 <-> q0

We just need to add the texture points to the mesh for each triangle point :

mesh.TextureCoordinates.Add(q3);
mesh.TextureCoordinates.Add(q2);
mesh.TextureCoordinates.Add(q1);

mesh.TextureCoordinates.Add(q0);
mesh.TextureCoordinates.Add(q1);
mesh.TextureCoordinates.Add(q2);

The mesh will be frozen for performance reasons. In the future, we will only need to transform this mesh with rotations and translations. We will not need to move the points.
This gives us a Tesselate method that will return the mesh :

private Geometry3D Tessellate()
{
var p0 = new Point3D(-1, -1, 0);
...
var mesh = new MeshGeometry3D();
...
mesh.Freeze();
return mesh;
}

This method will be part of a Cover class. This class will be the main class to deal with covers. Here are two more methods that will help us to load the texture image :

private ImageSource LoadImageSource(string imagePath)
{
Image thumb = Image.FromFile(imagePath);
return new BitmapImage(new Uri(imagePath, UriKind.RelativeOrAbsolute));
}
private Material LoadImage(ImageSource imSrc)
{
return new DiffuseMaterial(new ImageBrush(imSrc));
}

We finish the class with its constructor :


using ...
namespace Ded.Tutorial.Wpf.CoverFlow.Part1
{
class Cover : ModelVisual3D
{
#region Fields
private readonly Model3DGroup modelGroup;
#endregion
#region Private stuff
private Vector3D CalculateNormal(Point3D p0, Point3D p1, Point3D p2)...
private Geometry3D Tessellate()...
private ImageSource LoadImageSource(string imagePath)...
private Material LoadImage(ImageSource imSrc)...
#endregion
public Cover(string imagePath)
{
 ImageSource imSrc = LoadImageSource(imagePath);
 modelGroup = new Model3DGroup();
 modelGroup.Children.Add(new GeometryModel3D(Tessellate(), LoadImage(imSrc)));
 Content = modelGroup;
}
}
}

Let's load this class in an empty WPF application.

We place the camera at (0, 0, 3). We add a light source so that we will not see black objects.

We also add an empty ModelVisual3D object that will contain our single cover (for now).

Here is the xaml code :

<Window x:Class="Ded.Tutorial.Wpf.CoverFlow.Part1.TestWindow"
 xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
 xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"
 Title="WPF Coverflow" Height="320" Width="512">
<Grid>
 <Viewport3D x:Name="viewPort" Grid.Column="0" Grid.Row="0" ClipToBounds="False">
   <Viewport3D.Camera>
     <PerspectiveCamera x:Name="camera" Position="0,0,3"
       UpDirection="0,1,0" LookDirection="0,0,-1"
       FieldOfView="100" NearPlaneDistance="0.125"/>
   </Viewport3D.Camera>
   <Viewport3D.Children>
     <ModelVisual3D>
       <ModelVisual3D.Content>
         <DirectionalLight Color="White" Direction="0,0,-4" />
       </ModelVisual3D.Content>
     </ModelVisual3D>
     <ModelVisual3D x:Name="visualModel">
     </ModelVisual3D>
   </Viewport3D.Children>
 </Viewport3D>
</Grid>
</Window>

This simple application will display :This can be prettier if we add some background :

<Grid.Background>
 <LinearGradientBrush StartPoint="0,0" EndPoint="0,1">
   <LinearGradientBrush.GradientStops>
     <GradientStop Color="Black" Offset="0"/>
     <GradientStop Color="#696988" Offset="1"/>
   </LinearGradientBrush.GradientStops>
 </LinearGradientBrush>
</Grid.Background>

Continue with Part 2. Download source.

Edit 2011.06.07 : Only one normal is needed per triangle. Source code has not been updated.