Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Computing/2009 March 2

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March 2

What to look for in a media center PC?

If one is to buy a "mid range" media center PC, what features/spec should one look for? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.114.146.46 (talk) 02:05, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Many people want to play DVDs on their computers; ergo, computers are made for playing DVDs. They'll all do what most people want them to do. (If you have particular requirements on top of these, feel free to state them.)

Let's think dark thoughts for a moment. My office bought three computers just 11 months ago and last month the hard drive of one of the three died. That instantly rendered the computer less desirable than its crappiest competitor. Sure we got a new replacement drive under warranty, but we weren't compensated for the time we then lost in reinstalling a pile of software because we'd been too stupid to make a disk image. So one "feature" I'd look for is the combination of a Clonezilla CD (free) and a large external hard drive (cheap), in order to back up whatever's on whichever computer you buy. Luckily you can do this for any computer. Budget for it.

The rest? Well, it's partly a matter of taste. I happen to hate Apple's keyboards; others swear by rather than at them. Your kilometrage.... Hoary (talk) 16:38, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

If you want, you could simply buy an Xbox 360 or Playstation 3. They would serve your purposes as well as allowing you to play games and network with any other PC's in your home (I know this works very well with the Xbox and Windows PCs). If however you're not so much interested in games but need it for productivity, your options are almost endless. You need to tell us what else you plan to use the Media Centre for for us to give you a decent answer. Zunaid 08:35, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

how would i... (in CSS)

Say I have 4 div's, set like this:

<div class="top">
<div class="second"> content </div>
<div class="second"> content </div>
<div class="second"> content </div>
</div>

With a stylesheet that defines the "top" class as the a standard box (nothing special), and the "second" divs are at "display:none".

How would I say: "When you hover over the "top" div, the "second" divs expand to "display:block"? (without Java/Javascript). Thanks, flaminglawyer 03:12, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

See an example here. In your specific case, something like:

div.top:hover div.second { display:block; }

should work in your CSS. – 74  03:32, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Saving in safe mode

With my computer randomly not responding, I forced a shut-down while I had a document open. I decided to restart it in safe mode. I started Word back up, and thankfully enough, all of my work had been autosaved. I tried to save the document, but it wouldn't save. I don't think anything will save...I can't even print it out. I need some way to save it!--The Ninth Bright Shiner 03:23, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

You can obviously access the internet, so why not copy and paste the text to a webpage. You could, for instance, add it to your talk page as a "backup copy" while you try to figure out why you can't save the document. Emailing the text to yourself would also work. You'll lose any fancy editing/formatting, but you at least won't have to retype everything. – 74  03:37, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

0_0 I did not think of that. Thanks a bundle!--The Ninth Bright Shiner 03:40, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Another option would be copying everything into Notepad to see if it would allow you to save it there. ···日本穣^{? · Talk to Nihonjoe} 07:41, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Vista Wireless Connections

Let me begin by explaining that am a network administrator and programmer, but I have not used Windows since Windows 3.0. At home, I have a wireless router. It is secured and does not broadcast. My wife's new laptop has Windows Vista. Everything was great before we recently moved. She turned on her computer and it connected automatically using the built-in wireless connection. Now, we live in an apartment complex. When she turns on her computer, Vista automatically sees 20-30 unsecured wireless connections. It gets confused and refuses to connect to my router unless I create a new connection and type in the entire cryptic security key - EVERY TIME. Is it possible to get Vista to use one and only one wireless connection? Is it possible to tell Vista to completely ignore specific wireless networks? All I want is to have my wife's computer connect to my router when it turns on without any trouble at all, exactly as my Redhat laptop does. 64.251.148.141 (talk) 03:25, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Not broadcasting the SSID is pretty much completely pointless, and as you can see in this case, creates a lot more trouble. I know that some wireless connection management utilities do have the ability to do let you manually create a "profile" for your network that doesn't broadcast SSID, and set that profile as the highest priority or something. I am not sure if Windows Vista's built-in wireless network manager has this ability. --206.72.77.76 (talk) 03:47, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Address Book in Yahoo Messenger

In Yahoo Messenger 9 there is a new group named "Address Book" in my contact list. This did not exist (or at least not appear) in the version I previously used. What is it? 117.0.62.163 (talk) 12:26, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

If you have entered e-mail addresses for some of your contacts in the "contact details" dialog, they will appear there.--131.188.3.20 (talk) 13:39, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

But sometimes that "Address Book" group disappears. Why? And why some contacts are listed only in the "Address Book" group? I'm still confused. 117.0.22.44 (talk) 12:35, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

My own server at home - WWW/FTP/DNS? - possible?

Hello, Refdeskers. I'm getting closer and closer to setting up my own server at home. I know it will be very convenient, and I know it's useful and possible. I am prepared to dedicate a separate line/IP for it, and I am prepared to spend a lot of time setting it up. The server would ideally be a small and quiet standalone box sitting in the corner, with its own connection to the world, and LANned to my workstation to transfer files to and fro. Now, I know that the basic functionality I need, as listed below, is doable without sweat, but just to make sure I am listing the things I'd need it to do:

1. work as an FTP server to be able to host larger amounts of data easily
2. work as a WWW server to host my websites easily
3. work as a DNS server to keep my domain names on (I'm not that great with DNSs and domain names but I have two that I'd like to keep and use).
4. being able to use it to do my e-mail would be grand but if I manage the above three I'll already be very happy.

So, I know about Apache and that it's easy to install and I more or less know that this doesn't have to be a state of the art machine - my knowledge suggests to me that a Pentium II with a 20 gig hard drive and an ordinary monitor will do.

My questions, basically, are these:

1. Is setting this up really that easy, or are there any hoops that you have to jump through?
2. Is getting the functionality as listed above so straightforward?
3. Is it in effect possible to set up a server with functionality as described above, while at the same time using this computer as your workstation? It may be pointless because the machine would have to be more powerful, but I just want to know.

Brainstorming is welcome. To clarify, I have mastered the basics of Linux and am pretty knowledgeable with computers otherwise too. If there are guides out there or books I just need to buy and read, you can point me to them. Thanks in advance and cheers! --Ouro (blah blah) 13:40, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

If you plan on having other people visit it, see the discussion at #MoWeS to Real Server, above. Mimetic Polyalloy (talk) 13:50, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, I am planning to allow other people to visit my sites. Thankfully those don't require much in terms of bandwidth. And as for FTP speeds, even if they aren't that great, the slow speed will be offset in my eyes by the ease of storage. --Ouro (blah blah) 14:18, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

There are a ton of excellent books out there on this sort of thing, but I usually use online documentation. For FTP, there are a lot of server programs around, and they usually aren't too hard to set up. There's probably one configuration file for you to edit. Apache can be simple to set up, especially if you use a web interface like Webmin to configure everything, but it can also be a huge hassle if you're trying to do something complicated. BIND (for DNS) can also be very difficult to configure properly. The best thing I can suggest is to check out the Linux Documentation Project, which has HOWTOs on all of these subjects. Some are a bit old, but even then they usually still work. Also, look for documentation on the website of your distribution (Ubuntu, Fedora, Debian, SUSE, whatever) - they usually also have guides and tutorials that'll walk you through the steps. And to answer your last question, yes, it's very possible to use a server as a workstation. The power of the machine isn't really as much of an issue as the fact that if you mess anything up while browsing the web or gaming or whatever on your workstation, it'll take down your server until you fix the problem. As a result, most people like to keep them separate. Anyway, good luck! Indeterminate (talk) 21:41, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

I'll answer from the end to the beginning: That's one reason to keep those two machines separate. Another one is to set up the server to not be as power-hungry as your usual workstation machine. As for the documentation, I'll have a further look in the documentation when I have a little time. I am already looking forward to setting this machine up. Thanks, Indeterminate! --Ouro (blah blah) 06:53, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

You may be using "FTP" terminology loosely, but I highly recommend setting up SFTP rather than FTP. It is not any more difficult to set up or use, but it will prevent unauthorized data interceptions. Consider reading up on SSL, HTTPS, and other secure protocols as well (in my experience, HTTPS is a bit more complicated to set up, but tutorial/walkthroughs are plentiful). Is security important? It depends on many factors; in some sense, nobody will specifically target your machine, and if you have nothing sensitive on it, the "who cares" mentality may work for you. I don't run a "high-profile" website, but access logs on my personal-use system (open to the internet at large) regularly show more than 100 phishy ssh-login-attempts per minute (from spambots, presumably - with fictional login names from anonymous random source IPs...) - the internet's a scary place! Using naive protocols only helps spambots and network scanners. Standard secure alternatives are a simple, effective way to keep your system safe. Nimur (talk) 07:27, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Speaking of using terminology loosely, Nimur, check out that SFTP link. At least 3 protocols are commonly called SFTP. :) SCP (or file transfer with SSH) is great, but it's a little awkward with Windows. FTPS (never heard it called that before) is FTP with SSL, which works well, but I'm not sure whether it has a lot of client support. I think it does. And FTP over SSH would probably work fine, but it just seems silly to me. If you're going to all that trouble, might as well use SCP. Anyway, they're all more secure than FTP, so if you'll be sharing sensitive data, they would be a better choice. Indeterminate (talk) 08:36, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

I know, I know... What I call "sftp" is actually FTP over SSH, because that is what installs with the openssh server on Ubuntu. Your distributions may vary... my "sftp server" is tightly integrated into sshd. FTP has a long and awful history of non-standardization. As you say, SCP is really a better replacement... Nimur (talk) 17:40, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Heh, well, I call it SCP, but I'm talking about the same "ftp" functionality that's built-in to openssh. That's what I use most of the time, too. I don't think it actually uses that old FTP protocol, but fortunately most FTP clients have good support for it. "FTP over SSH" is different, it isn't built-in to openssh, exactly... it uses SSH tunneling to encrypt the traffic to/from a regular old FTP server. Anyway, the terminology is really confusing, which I guess is the point we're making here. :) Indeterminate (talk) 21:47, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Woops. I'll modify my earlier statement to: "What I call "sftp" is whatEVER installs with the openssh server on Ubuntu. Nimur (talk) 21:19, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

I'd mostly be planning on hosting my one professional website, which amounts to my curriculum vitae and references, and my hobby website with my photographs. I wouldn't call those really sensitive, but still I wouldn't want any given person to be able to write what they want to my server. As for hosting data (let's call this xFTP, you know what I mean in general), it's mostly going to be things I want to send to other people that are larger than average, which most of the time will mean any photos in bulk from parties or events that I go to with friends. This is the extent of functionality that I'd like my server to take over, and I'd be satisfied if I get this done - this would relieve me of burdens of having to store my data as mentioned above on external services.

It would seem as though it's all simple enough to set up and manage. That's good. Cheers, Ouro (blah blah) 10:19, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

I do this exact same thing. (See www.teraknor.net) That is hosted off my home cable modem and I run my mail server on there (with which I use IMAP over SSL), as well as ftp services so I can get to my files from anywhere as well as using this for hosting images as I post quite regularly on some forums and occasionally you want to put a picture up. I also host my own DNS records from there and there is one gotcha with doing that, whenever your IP changes you must update the nameserver record for your domain, and that usually takes ~24hrs or so to actually update. I also have a DynDNS setup so I can get back to my stuff in the case my IP has changed and I need to get back into one of my machines. If you can get a static IP for it then you wouldn't have that issue, which would be very nice. 204.16.236.254 (talk) 00:36, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

Slow Acer

I had installed few games like FIFA and a flight simulator somehow the FIFA was very slow hence i had to uninstall from my laptop and i also removed all the instances from the "REGEDIT" aswell. Now my computer takes more than 10 minutes to start completely which earlier used to take about 2 minutes. Can you suggest some measures to have it run normally. Done the Defrag and scan part. Please advice.Thanks in advance —Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.122.36.6 (talk) 14:05, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Editing the registry is a very risky way to remove unwanted programs. You SHOULD have stuck with the Add/Remove Programs facility and left it at that. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 62.232.221.34 (talk) 18:07, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Machine translation of flash websites?

And to a lesser extent, of pdf files.

Any way of extracting the text from a flash website? etc.. ThanksFengRail (talk) 15:12, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

I suspect you'd need to take a screen shot, then feed it into some OCR software, then feed the results into a translator. StuRat (talk) 16:16, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

You can translate pdf files if they're not encrypted, but I think you'll need to use libraries from Adobe or PDFTron (you can see the text if you open a pdf file with visual or notepad++, but there's so much meta-info I think just changing this text will break the file). Or is there a free alternative? As for flash files, Google can parse them, so it's obviously possible. yandman 16:24, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

There is a selection tool in PDF viewer that will allow you to select (actual) text and copy it to another document. Note that this will *not* work on images of text, such as scanned documents. – 74  16:53, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Hypothetically you could probably run a SWF through something that would translate the text, but I suspect it would be extremely clunky if it worked at all. --98.217.14.211 (talk) 17:10, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Microsoft Office Enterprise 2007 and Microsoft Office Professional 2007

What are the differences? Which one is better to use? 117.0.62.163 (talk) 15:19, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Enterprise has a few more tools (Grove, One Note, etc) - you can see a detailed comparison here. Hope that help ;) — Ched ~ ^(yes?) 17:26, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

xp installation issues

Hi! So I decided yesterday to reinstall XP on one of my machines, but it keeps crashing during the install. Thus far, it seems to crash at different points. Every attempt but one has been in the "installing windows" stage, with one stalling at "finalizing windows". Any thoughts? DaRkAgE7_[Talk] 18:34, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

First assumption - bad harddrive. Second assumption - bad memory. After swapping those two out, see if it works. If not, third assumption - bad power supply. -- kainaw™ 18:39, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Define "crashing". If the system is restarting semi-randomly it could be an overheating problem. If it's blue-screening, then one of Kainaw's suggestions is the most likely source. If it's hanging then it could be a number of different things (including Kainaw's suggestions). – 74  19:47, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

A faulty or scratched CD has caused similar issues for me. Try re-burning your WinXP installer disc, if you have a disk-image... Nimur (talk) 07:29, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Memtest86+ is a useful and free tool for testing the memory. Mitch Ames (talk) 07:15, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

OS X DNS/DHCP settings forgotten

It seems that my OSX computer (10.5.4) keeps forgetting the IP for the DNS server and the wireless router in my home network and resets itself to some wrong ones (in the 192.168.x.x range, however). Manually changing the settings and restoring the right IPs seems to help only for a short while. The Airport seems to work fine (ie. no hardware issues), it pings the correct IPs and it even finds all neighbours' networks (I won't connect, of course!). Firewall is not enabled. What could be wrong? --79.129.171.175 (talk) 20:58, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Well, if you haven't changed anything, then it should be picking up its DNS and gateway settings (along with its IP address) from a DHCP server on your network (presumably the Airport router). I would check the configuration on the Airport; if that looks okay, check your Wireless settings in OSX - you might be able to manually set them to the correct values; if that doesn't work, hmm. It could possibly be somebody leeching off your wireless who's running a rogue DHCP server, but this is very unlikely. I think it would be more likely that you missed a problem earlier 2 or 3 times in a row. Finally, if this is a laptop, try taking it to a different wireless network to see if the problem follows the computer or the Airport. That'll at least help narrow the problem down. Indeterminate (talk) 21:20, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

stock website

Is there a free website where I can type in the price of a stock issue and it will tell me the last time the stock was at that price? Example: When was the last time CAT was $20 a share? 65.167.146.130 (talk) 21:01, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

UpDown or Wikinvest (and pretty much any other stock-related websites) have a stock history in chart form, so you could just set the time to 5 years or something long like that and figure it out for yourself. In your example (CAT at $20), the last time was October 11, 2002, when its price was $18.29. The next day it jumped to $20.50, and it's never been back below $20 again (although it's getting pretty close nowadays). flaminglawyer 03:24, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Capabilities of netbooks

I need a new computer, but I don't want to spend more than a few hundred dollars on it. I recently thought about getting a netbook, but I don't know very much about them, so I have a few questions before I run out and buy one. First, what sort of capabilities do they have? I know they don't have CD drives (which isn't really an issue for me), but how are they for hard drive space and memory? Are they as customizable (in reference to graphics cards, etc.) as an ordinary desktop/laptop? I play a few video games, nothing too extensive (lately I've been playing Portal and the Half Life series), so would I be able to modify a netbook to run those smoothly? Could I even do it with a basic netbook? Like I said, I don't know very much about them or their capabilities, so I'm looking for some advice here. Any ideas (or even a suggestion of a different computer that's still cheap) would be greatly appreciated! --Alinnisawest,^{Dalek Empress} (extermination requests here) 21:14, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Um... no, you almost certainly couldn't play any recent games on them. Netbooks are great if you want something super-portable that doesn't need to do more than browse the web and check your email, but their processing power is about what desktops probably were 5 years ago. You can't really customize them, either. They are cheap, though: you can get a new Dell Mini 9 for less than $200: [1]

If you want to play games, I'd recommend a cheap desktop. If you already have a monitor/keyboard/mouse, you can usually get just the tower for pretty cheap, less than $500 probably. Indeterminate (talk) 21:31, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Rats, I figured that'd be how it'd turn out, but I was hopeful... well, I guess I'll have to look into desktops, then. Anyone have any suggestions of cheap ones? --Alinnisawest,^{Dalek Empress} (extermination requests here) 21:38, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Depending how PC literate you are, you could try to build one yourself. I actually think it's really fun and it ends up being the cheapest way to get a computer with exactly the components you want and need vs buying a prebuilt "closest match" computer. However if you do not have the time or inclination, get your local weekly computer classifieds which should lead you to reputable local computer stores who often have great bargains on inhouse built computers. They are also usually quite happy to configure it exactly to your liking only charging a relatively modest assembly fee. Vespine (talk) 23:54, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Speaking of capabilities of netbooks: I just bought a Lenovo S10e (slightly modified S10). Although its graphics capabilities are miserable, and I won't be playing any 3D games, my mind was blown away by the capabilities of this little 2-watt Intel Atom. I have been working on some computational research, and two-threaded 2D full-wave FDTD propagation simulation clocks in as fast as my 2.26 GHz Pentium 4 (and sometimes faster!) But who's counting megaflops!? Nimur (talk) 16:33, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

Change jpeg comments

Hi, are there any Windows programs that will let me change the summary comments (title, subject, keywords, comments, etc) for jpeg images without going right click -> properties summary tab? It's for a computer with restricted user access so can't right click. Thanks. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.43.88.87 (talk) 21:42, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Can you use the "properties" option on the "File" menu instead? Or the keyboard shortcut alt+↵ Enter? – 74  23:12, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

No, can't access anything more than the absolute basic user. No properties, no control panel etc. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.43.88.87 (talk) 19:03, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

But you can install/run an arbitrary program? That doesn't say much for your system's administrator… Perhaps ExifTool will work. – 74  20:32, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

lol yeah, I can run all my programs from my portable drive, can even use the command prompt! It just blocks programs that need system drivers and all options and settings menus. Anyway, thanks for the link, once again you've come to my rescue! It doesn't seem to show the comment and author stuff like from the Windows properties tab, but lots of cool info about pixels and stuff. I guess the comment settings are Windows specific. Anyway thank you. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.43.88.87 (talk) 22:26, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Access is Denied (Thumb Drive)

Hello. My teacher asked me to transfer my slideshow via thumb drive to her computer. When I inserted my thumb drive into her computer, a window said "Access is denied". I could however access my files by clicking on the Folders button in the My Computers window. I tried to consult other sources but the first website that Google provided me tried to install a security threat. How could I access my thumb drive normally? It has important files. Thanks in advance. --Mayfare (talk) 21:43, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Are you not able to access your files, or are you saying you can access your files but not in the usual way? I take it this is a school computer? They often have restricted access which might prevent accessing USB drives, so they only way to see the drive and files in by other means. If you're able to download stuff, try and download and install 7-zip (this is the portable version so doesn't require any administrative rights to install) which can act as a file manager and will sometimes be able to bypass restrictions set on Windows Explorer (My Computer) folders and drives. Then navigate to your thumb drive and see if you can access the files. Also it's good to know keyboard shortcuts for when right clicking is disabled. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.43.88.87 (talk) 21:58, 2 March 2009

I cannot access files in the usual way. This problem first occurred in school and is happening in home too. --Mayfare (talk) 02:32, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

PhotoRec. -- Hoary (talk) 02:57, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

If it's happening at home, it has nothing to do with permissions/security. Can you access your files using the Folders button? If you can, check if there's a file named autorun.inf on your USB drive. You have to enable "Show hidden files and folders" and disable "Hide system files". If there is, delete the file. --wj32 ^t/c 09:20, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

The icon looks like a folder instead of how Removable Disk should look like. --Mayfare (talk) 15:54, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Uggh. I'm getting annoyed now. I told you to how to fix your problem, and I'm 100% sure that will fix your problem. Show hidden files, Show system files, then delete autorun.inf. Please, try my suggestion or at least respond to it. --wj32 ^t/c 23:51, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

thepiratebay.org

is it just me or is there something wrong with the website? --212.120.245.203 (talk) 23:10, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Why can't it be both?   :-)   According to this article Pirate Bay is currently experiencing a DDoS attack. – 74  23:16, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Any idea how long 'til its back up? --212.120.245.203 (talk) 23:46, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Nope. I suspect the maintainers have other things on their mind at the moment. – 74  00:46, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Yep, the website is down for me. Damn media corporations. I hope they die. --wj32 ^t/c 05:36, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, heaven forbid someone should make money off their own hard work, eh? ;p ···日本穣^{? · Talk to Nihonjoe} 07:47, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

This is very off-topic, but I blame capitalism. Not that we have a better system though. --wj32 ^t/c 08:24, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

DownForEveryoneOrJustMe.com is a great resource for these types of questions.--droptone (talk) 12:28, 3 March 2009 (UTC)