Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Computing/2008 April 17

Welcome to the Wikipedia Computing Reference Desk Archives
The page you are currently viewing is an archive page. While you can leave answers for any questions shown below, please ask new questions on one of the current reference desk pages.

April 17

e-mail etiquette

As I am new at e-mailing, some friends have suggested I read up on e-mail etiquette. But I don't know where to find out about this subject. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.153.67.219 (talk) 02:25, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

You can find out by searching Google. Here's a good link: http://www.emailreplies.com/ ~EdGl (talk) 04:22, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

I had some guidelines about email when I joined my company. Basically, it came down to: Don't put anything in an email that you wouldn't put in a letter, and watch who you send it to. Just remember that an email can be easily forwarded to someone else without your knowledge or consent. However, that doesn't mean that you need to be very formal. Oh, and lastly, just because the email software lets you create sparkling letters and purple backgrounds, that doesn't mean it is a good idea to actually use it (unless you are an 8-year-old girl sending out birthday invites). Astronaut (talk) 12:07, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

There is an unresolved argument about the proper way to reply: Above or below the text. You MUST include the text sent to you. Otherwise, the person may have no idea what you are replying to. I feel that replying above the text is best. Most people don't want to scroll down to see your reply. They want your reply at the top - easily visible. Others feel it should be below the text because that is how it was done before email.

I second the argument against colors, pictures, animations, and sounds in email. Adding anything other than plain text to your email makes it look like you were typing it up at a pretend tea party on your Little Princess plastic table with help from your My Little Pony. When given the option, select "plain text" as the format for your email. You can add to this a few more rules:

• Never forward anything that people haven't asked for. That photo, joke, or animation is not really that funny. Bill Gates is not giving anything away. Disney will not send you free tickets. You are not going to win any lottery.
• Never attach more than one photo to an email (unless you know how to shrink the FILE SIZE of the images). Nobody cares enough about you to wait three days for the email to load.
• Never click on Reply to All when you are replying to one person - especially when your only message is "Why did I get this?"

OK. Don't get me started. I could be here all day harping about the idiocy of people in this workplace alone. -- kainaw™ 12:30, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

I pressed "Reply All" once back in prehistoric times when I was new to email. The sender of the email was kind enough to gently nudge me about it in person and I did not make that idiotic mistake again. I hope I never do that again, unless I am out of my mind. Then again, if I am out of my mind, it should automatically 'save draft' and not 'send mail'. Kushal 20:48, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

The Jargon File recommends bottom-posting, i.e. putting replies below quoted relevant parts of the original message. 89.76.165.87 (talk) 14:16, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

Where I work, people seem to have the mistaken idea that shipping around an Excel spreadsheet or a 13MB Word document is the equivalent of "communication". For myself (like other replies above), I prefer plain text in the common vernacular. And remember, "brevity is the soul of wit" so be terse, but not too terse. -- Atlant (talk) 13:31, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

What really annoys me is the opposite. If you need a document that is fine, but some people just send an attached word document containing a few lines of text. The usual culprits are secretaries sending messages on behalf of high-level managers, I suppose they just work in word all the time. I would also agree with the above comment about avoiding unnecessary colours.

That actually was my point. I frequently get mail messages that have an empty body, but have a Microsoft file attached to them. As if I want to open Word to read "Come to my very important meeting." or "Here, look at these three screen-shots of my Excel spreadsheet." The other situation is the Excel spreadsheet itself, where apparently I'm supposed to divine the meaning that the sender is trying to convey amidst all those rows and columns.

Atlant (talk) 16:50, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

I would also add make sure your email is relevant to everyone concerned. Recently in our organisation an email asking for the person who stole a chocolate bar to ensure it was replaced in the lunch break. This was sent to everyone. One of the many responses pointed out that people in London were unlikely to travel to Leeds (200 miles) to take a chocolate bar. -- Q Chris (talk) 14:37, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

Yes, but if the evil fiend is ever discovered he might well be sent to Coventry. StuRat (talk) 15:31, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

I also find people using e-mail like it's a bulletin board. Offers of free puppies, solicitations to buy girl scout cookies, etc., really don't belong on e-mail at work. I suppose I can stand some personal matters, though, like setting up a birthday party for a coworker. StuRat (talk) 15:31, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

And, while formality is not required, I'd avoid writing like you talk: "Are y'all comin to da confrance then ya gonna go ta da staff meetin ?". StuRat (talk) 15:35, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

Since I like work with like a lot of like doctors and stuff, you would like think that like there was a certain like word that they wouldn't like use over and like over when they like send a like email. I bet you like can't guess what that like word would like be - like can you? -- kainaw™ 17:06, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

Whatever that word is, I'm sure it's totally tubular. StuRat (talk) 03:48, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

zOmg!! u mus avod txt spk. (Translation: Don't use mobile text abbreviations - it makes you sound like an idiot). C U l8r. Astronaut (talk) 10:23, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

Another bone of contention is upper and lower case letters. Some people type emails as though their keyboard doesn't have a Shift key (DYSWIDT?). In informal emails between friends this may be just about tolerable, but it should never be done in the work environment. --Richardrj ^{talk email} 11:15, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

Animated Pictures and Sounds

Hi, I've been playing around with imageready and I was wondering if I could get a picture (like a .gif) to react to mouse rollovers and clicks by animating, is it possible to also make it react by playing sounds? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.76.248.193 (talk) 05:09, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

I think you'd need some kind of script or html. You certainly can't do it with a *.gif. George D. Watson (Dendodge).Talk^Help 07:47, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

You need something like Adobe Flash to do the things you mentioned. Although it can probably be done using Java script and other software as well. - X201 (talk) 10:14, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

It is possible to do this with CSS. First, you have to make the image the background or border of a link (because IE is flaky when the :hover is applied to anything but the "a" tag). Now, for the a, set the static gif. For the a:hover, set the animated gif. You can do sounds in CSS on :hover. All in all, I think using JavaScript will be a better solution. -- kainaw™ 12:22, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

Javascript or CSS can do this. Don't know about getting ImageReady to export it automatically, though, but it's probably possible. I feel obliged to note that having sounds triggered on a mouse rollover on an image is a terrible idea in general, though. --140.247.248.34 (talk) 16:41, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

Linux related disk management

Suppose I have 4 disk partitions, and I'm going to fill the three partitions with different linux distros. Could I make the 4th partition into /home directory for the three distros? If it's possible could you gave me links to page on how to do that. Thanks in advance. roscoe_x (talk) 13:17, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

Yes. It is not complicated. First, you need to ensure that all three distros have a format they can use. Most likely, it will be ext3. Install the first one and set /home to be the 4th partition in ext3. Install the second one and do the same. It will probably format the /home partition again. Install the third one. It will likely format the 4th partition yet again. Now, when you boot, all three will see /home as expected. -- kainaw™ 13:21, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

There's the added complication of all three distros wanting to set up the boot sector for themselves. You'll have to be careful with that. If you're familiar enough with Linux to get the boot loader to do what you want, then you're probably able to work with the /etc/fstab file, too. I'd install the first one with a /home, the second and third without. Then I'd add a line to the /etc/fstab on the other two so that they're also using the same one. --Mdwyer (talk) 22:43, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

One thing to watch out for is user IDs — if you want to have the same username and home directory for all three distros, you'd better make sure that username maps to the same numeric user ID in all cases. Otherwise you may find that you're not allowed to access your own home directory. If the distros you're installing are similar enough, they just might all assign the same numeric UID to the first user account created, but you may not be that lucky — for example, Debian-based distros will number "real" user accounts starting from 1000, while Red Hat-based distros will apparently start from 500 and some others from 400 or even 100. Thus, while poking around /etc/fstab, you may also need to edit /etc/passwd, and possibly also /etc/shadow and /etc/group. (Hint: It's probably best to choose a user ID that exceeds UID_MIN for all the distros you're installing.) —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 23:57, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

webcam driver

Is there any webcam vendor that release their driver's source code? Or maybe a popular webcam brand that has open source driver. Thanks in advance. roscoe_x (talk) 13:19, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

There's a guy in France who has written Linux drivers that support over 200 webcams. I don't know of any open source Windows drivers. --LarryMac | Talk 14:00, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

Turning link color

After visiting a Wikipedia link, that link changes color from blue to purple on my computer screen. This is related to browsing history. Is there a way to change the colors of the links on Category:Non-article Agriculture pages as the appear on my computer screen without having to visit each of the links? Thanks. GregManninLB (talk) 15:10, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

You could set the "unvisited link color" preference in your web browser, or you could edit your personal wikipedia style settings to change just that page's colors. If you add the following text:

addOnloadHook(function () {
  if (document.title == "Category:Non-article Agriculture pages - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia")
      for (var i = 0; i < document.links.length; i++)
          document.links[i].style.color = "orange"
})

to the end of the following page: monobook.js, it will do what you want (assuming you want all links on only that page to be orange, which might not be the case). --Sean 16:09, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

Hi Sean. Here is a more detailed explaination of what I am looking for. After visiting a Wikipedia link, that link changes color from blue to purple on my computer screen. To tag pages with categories, I've been opening all the pages at Category:NA-Class articles, for example, to turn the links purple. Then I use the All pages with prefix. Those pages for which the link still is blue need a Category:NA-Class category tag. It takes a lot of time to initially open all the pages within a particular category to turn the link from blue to purple. Is there a way to change the colors of the links in Category:NA-Class articles as the appear on my computer screen without having to visit each of the links? I tried editing my temporary internet file (browser history) and tried using the 'Print all linked documents' option of windows print feature to printing to a file (that I then deleted). I wasn't able to edit my temporary internet file (browser history) and the 'Print all linked documents' option didn't result in making the category links purple. Can you create me a script that causes all the links on a page (e.g. Category:NA-Class articles) to change color to show that I visited the page (without actually opening the linked page)? I am open to other methods as well. Thanks. GregManninLB (talk) 16:30, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

Hmm. You're really getting into bot territory with those requirements. Perhaps if you asked at Wikipedia:Bot requests someone could write up an "add category-na tag to all articles starting with 'non-article ...'" bot. It could also just list the ones you want to remain blue in your scheme, for you to add them by hand. It shouldn't be difficult, and this kind of drudgery is definitely work for a machine. --Sean 19:06, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

Internet Explorer proxy scripts

Is there a script/boot options I can configure internet explorer with which will enter in a username and password automatically when internet explorer is opened each time? Ty. Tomayres (talk) 15:26, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

Downloading a file with Firefox

When I download a file, such as a Word document or Excel spreadsheet, with Firefox, the default behaviour seems to be to save the file to the desktop. The preferences allow me to change the location to which the file is saved, but don't seem to allow me to change the behaviour itself. I would prefer that the file be immediately opened in the relevant application. Is there a preference setting that allows this? Many thanks. --Richardrj ^{talk email} 15:40, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

When I click on a link to a word document in Firefox, I get a dialogue box asking me whether I want to open or save. If you don't get this dialogue, it might be because you've clicked through it before with the 'do this automatically for files like this' button checked. If so, your decision can be modified at tools/options/content/file types/manage. Algebraist 16:25, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

If you are using that fruity operating system, it is Firefox > Preferences >> Content >>> Manage There you can change the behavior for each filetype as Algebraist said. Kushal 18:47, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, I had a look at that (I'm using Windows XP), but it didn't help. Clicking 'Manage' brings up a box called 'Download actions', but the box is empty, so I haven't created any rules. Ah well, never mind. --Richardrj ^{talk email} 07:54, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

Are you left- or right-clicking on the file? Left-clicking should pop-up the dialog box that User:Algebraist mentions, which only allows you to save or open, it does not allow you to change the save destination, unless you have modified the default behavior on the options/main dialog. If you right-click and select "save link as", then you can select the destination, but can't choose to open the file after. --LarryMac | Talk 14:08, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

is iBook's 'boot into "target" disk mode' possible only for firewire or USB too?

So I read iBooks have a "target" disk mode you can boot into where they just ack like a dumb hard drive and you can connect them with a cable to another ("host") computer which will just see it as a connected external hard-drive...

so, two questions....

1... could this work with USB too or only firewire?

2... could my windows pc be the host?

thank you.

1. No (only firewire), 2. No (only other Macs). SEE BELOW. I don't know exactly why but I do know that the Target Disk Mode is something that is hard-coded into the logic board of the Mac (it isn't software) and as such is pretty inflexible (which makes sense, given that its main purpose is to work even if the software components on the drive have totally failed). --Captain Ref Desk (talk) 20:30, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

thank you for your prompt and complete answer to both of my questions! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.122.24.31 (talk) 11:07, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

Extending Captain Ref Desk's comments a bit, I think saying "no" to the second question isn't quite correct/complete. Any FireWire-equipped computer that supports FireWire disks should be able to connect to a Mac running in Target Disk Mode. But whether or not that computer can access the "disk" is another question. Mac disks are typically formatted in HFS Plus (with some older ones being formatted in UFS). Most Windows PCs won't be able to access those disks without additional software. But if they had such software, then Target Disk Mode should work with them as well. Captain Ref Desk, do you agree? NB: In the near future, Apple also promises support for ZFS.

Atlant (talk) 15:53, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

OK, I've looked into it further and I revise my above answer. Your Windows PC could be the host, provided it has 1. a firewire port, and 2. third party utilities for accessing HFS+ formatted drives (like MacDrive). --Captain Ref Desk (talk) 00:33, 19 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for confirming that, Captain Ref Desk!

Atlant (talk) 12:42, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

I-Scream MP3 players

Hi; I saw one of these on the HMV website but I can't seem to trace either reviews of it, or the company's web-page. Am I missing something, and can anyone offer any advice? Thanks! —TreasuryTag—t—c 20:14, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

I was able to track down the company - SOSMP3. I can not find much else at all, except this single mention on Yahoo Answers (Ireland & UK version). For what it's worth, the domain is registered to the FJRP Partnership in Sutton, GB. I get the impression that "I-Scream" is a house brand for HMV, but I have no direct knowledge of that, it's just a feeling. --LarryMac | Talk 00:54, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

H-809A MP4 Player

I have purchased an H-809A MP4 player, and it works well so far, but I want to know who makes it so I can update the firmware later if necessary.

Or, even better, I'd like to know how it works so I can create my own firmware, as there are several user-interface problems I'd like to fix.

Does anyone have any information of this kind? --Zemyla^t 20:55, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

Well, if you want to create something yourself, why not take a look at ... um ... Rockbox? Kushal 02:18, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

Averaging Dates in Excel

I have two columns, each with over 800 dates. Column B has a list of start dates, such as 4/17/06, and column C has a list of end dates, such as 5/20/08. I need find the average time taken between start dates and end dates. Ultimately, I need to say, "For all 800 entries, the avarage completion time is x months and x days."

131.194.79.108 (talk) 20:56, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

Typing the equation =B1-A1 into cell C1 should give the completion time in days. Select cell C1 and drag the blob on the bottom-right of the cell to copy the equation to all of column C. --h2g2bob (talk) 22:07, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

Note that you will probably need to specify that the final form is a "Number" (Cell > Format) not a Date (it'll otherwise assume the final number is a date code serial number, which is not the case!). --Captain Ref Desk (talk) 01:16, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

You can also take the average of each range and subtract the two averages:

${\frac {\sum _{i=1}^{n}(b_{i}-a_{i})}{n}}$

what you want

is average(b - a)

${\frac {\sum _{i=1}^{n}b_{i}-\sum _{i=1}^{n}a_{i}}{n}}$

addition is associative

${\frac {\sum _{i=1}^{n}b_{i}}{n}}-{\frac {\sum _{i=1}^{n}a_{i}}{n}}$

division is distributive

is average(b) - average(a)

--Random832 (contribs) 16:10, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

I was considering posting that advice re. associativity (ideally it could be done in a single cell), but I realized Excel dates might not add very well. The differences used to get a duration rather than a date might be essential in this case. --Prestidigitator (talk) 18:19, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

Excel dates are just numbers - total days since January 0, 1900 00:00, typical values are about 30-50K: today for example is 45622 so taking the average is fine. --Random832 (contribs) 19:21, 21 April 2008 (UTC)