Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Computing/2009 April 28

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April 28

Quick MySQL question

If I create a database on MySQL on WinXP, are there going to be any "gotcha" issues if I want to use this database on a linux installation of MySQL? (i.e. is it as simple as just copying the database file(s) from one OS/filesystem to the other, and mounting/attaching the database, or would I have to script a bulk INSERT via SQL or something along those lines?) Thanks!! 68.40.217.217 (talk) 00:38, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

You'll want to do a database dump on Windows, and then load that dump onto the Linux MySQL install. Databases often provide very few guarantees about their on-disk formats when moving across platforms or (even minor) version numbers. Read about mysqldump and/or mysqlhotcopy. --Sean 12:18, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

Thank you! 68.40.217.217 (talk) 04:09, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

Changing pitch in WMP 11

Is there a way to alter the pitch of tracks in Windows Media Player v11 (Vista) – possibly involving some sort of slider control? I think there may be plugins that do it, but I'm not sure how to add those on. 137.205.74.169 (talk) 00:59, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

I don't know about pitch control, but there is a playback speed slider already in WMP11 which might change the pitch as a side effect. From WMP's menu choose View -> Enhancements -> Play speed settings. Astronaut (talk) 02:56, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

HELP! Tried to reinstall Windows XP...

Hi, I removed Ubuntu 8.10 in preparation for 9.04, and got rid of the partition it was installed on. That uninstalled GRUB, making the computer unbootable. So I put in the XP recovery disc, and now it has a dual-boot with two Windows XP's... Easeus Partition Manager doesn't show a partition, neither does the Disk Management thing in Administrative Tools... how do I get rid of this second XP? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.40.181.237 (talk) 01:30, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

This happens when you choose to reinstall XP without formatting the partition it was previously installed on. To prevent the dual-boot menu from showing up, you can [edit your boot.ini file] to delete the "Windows XP" entry that you don't want. Make sure to back it up! Indeterminate (talk) 04:28, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

search the refdesk archives for "attack of the undead boot.ini file!" I had this same problem and this worked for me.  Buffered Input Output 13:01, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

What's new in Firefox 3.5b4?

I could only find the list that lists the new features compared to 3.0.x. What's new in Firefox 3.5b4 compared to 3.1b3? 121.72.172.232 (talk) 13:20, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

Until 3.1 is released, I doubt you'd find an official list. Your best bet is to compare the changelog of 3.1 vs 3.0 to 3.5 vs 3.0 and work out what features are in 3.5 that aren't in 3.1 Nil Einne (talk) 14:45, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

Okay I just realised 3.5 is basically 3.1. Well in that case, the release notes or changelog should say what's new in this beta Nil Einne (talk) 14:47, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

Actually surprisingly you seem to be right, the info seems to be missing. Maybe ask someone their suppor forums or whatever Nil Einne (talk) 15:08, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

Actually looking more carefully none of the 3.1 betas have the info either. Only the 3.0 betas seemed to offer some explaination of the differences between betas. Your best bet appears to be [1] if you're desperate Nil Einne (talk) 21:51, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

Trying to understand why others use the IP address I've used

I think I'm understanding this right, but let me know if I'm off.

I understand that DHCP, because it's dynamic, is what causes my IP address to change. I read on an answer from the archives that AOL, in fact, has it change every time I load a new page. My question is, why do I see on here occasionally that someone else has used the IP address I used only last week, for instance? Even to the piont of it being blocked a number of months back.

My theory is that AOL only has a limited number of IP addresses; it's large enough that it's still rather rare for it to happen. But, if two people have AOL, it is possible for each to happen to have the same IP address at different times when they load this page. Am I right? Close? Way off? Thanks.209.244.30.221 (talk) 13:48, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

AOL does change IP addresses for users at a much higher rate than most internet service providers. The probability that someone else using AOL has used your current IP address (whatever it is) is very high. The probability that someone else on AOL has caused the IP address to be blocked is also high enough to note. It is very easy to avoid this problem. Create an account and log in when using Wikipedia. Your "identity" will always be the same and only you will be responsible for behaviour that could get it blocked. -- kainaw™ 13:53, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

They certainly reuse your old IP after they assign you a new one. They would be out of business if they didn't. They could not possibly assign a fresh, single-use IP every time you log on. There aren't enough IPv4 IPs in existence, let alone allocated to AOL. APL (talk) 14:19, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

And what is the advantage for the ISP of changing the IP of one specific user? I understand that if the user is not connected anymore, they could assign his old IP to a new users.--Mr.K. (talk) 14:49, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

If requests from AOL users are showing a different IP address for every request, then it's probably not the user's DHCP-assigned IP address changing that frequently, but rather AOL using a pool of proxy servers to cache web pages. The IP address that the web server sees depends on which proxy is handling the request. -- Coneslayer (talk) 17:57, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

The whole point of DHCP is so that they can have more users than they have IP addresses available - hence it's very likely that the address you had not long ago will have been given to someone else sometime later. The odds of you getting the same address back again sometime later are harder to estimate...but it certainly happens. Probably they allocate a block of addresses to a particular DHCP server - which might maybe only serve a few hundred addresses. It's easier for them if they don't hand them out totally at random - for example so that it's easier to track ill-behaved net users down to a smaller subset of people than "All of AOL".

Complicating the matter still further is the meta:XFF project - which AOL are (kinda) supporting. This might explain an unusual amount of constistency of address when editing Wikipedia.

But hold on a minute. If we go to our OP's Talk: page (where there are a ton of vandalism complaints) we see that someone did a check on this IP address and it resolves to Level 3 Communications - not AOL. Anyway - the range of addresses they use goes from 209.244.0.0 to 209.247.255.255 - which is something like half a million addresses - so the odds of getting the same one again by pure chance is VERY small. SteveBaker (talk) 05:34, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

Level 3 is a Tier 1 provider, i.e. an ISP's ISP. I don't really know how the system works, but presumably AOL contracts its proxy service out to Level 3 in some way. -- BenRG (talk) 13:03, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

To clear things up, the entire "ip changing" thing with AOL is nothing to do with DHCP - it's to do with proxying and caching as mentioned above. 78.110.170.207 (talk) 21:40, 4 May 2009 (UTC)

Windows Portable Executable

I know that when using Visual Studio it is compiled into the .NET Common Intermediate Language and not machine code. But when I compile a C++ or C program for example is it compiled into CIL or straight into machine code and CIL is just for programs made using the .NET framework? --Melab±1 ☎ 14:12, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

.Net executables are PE files, but mostly contain IL data sections. They are JITed before execution. C/C++ executables, even those compiled via Visual Studio .Net, are also PE files, but contain machine code instead of IL. They are executed directly without need for JITing. (There is also C++/CLI, which I will ignore since your question does not seem to be asking about it.) Regards, Bendono (talk) 15:33, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

Firefox 3.0.10

Just days after letting my one surviving Windows machine update Firefox to 3.0.9, I've just let it update to 3.0.10. The latter seems to be a turkey, Firefox often deciding not to "respond", as even Windows points out. (This prompts the three-finger salute.) Is it a turkey, or is it more likely that there's something wrong with this ageing system? (A Ubuntu replacement is already on its way to me, so I don't particularly care; but I'm curious.) I really don't have to describe the symptoms to you: Firefox here is so obviously "off" that if it's like this for you as well then you will very soon realize it. -- Hoary (talk) 14:43, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

I've been running 3.0.10 and have not even noticed the update, so you're going to have to discuss individual symptoms. Tempshill (talk) 00:42, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

Yeah - I caught the automatic update on my work machine this morning - I've been using 3.0.10 under WinXP all day with no problems whatever. My SuSE 11.0 Linux box here at home is running last night's nightly build of Firefox 3.5 beta 5...so 3.0.10 is quite a way back from the 'bleeding edge' ! :-) SteveBaker (talk) 05:17, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

Automatic updates can get damaged if they happen while you are doing something else (one good reason to do them manually, when YOU want to). One possibility is a corruption in the cookies. First use Tools - Options to clear all your cookies and caches, and restart the browser. If that makes no improvement, then the containing file itself is corrupt. Change your folder view settings to show hidden files, then go to C:\Documents and Settings\(your-name)\Application Data\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\<profile folder and find a file called cookies.sqlite. Delete it. This is the actual file that controls your cookies. After you delete it, restart the browser, and it will create a new clean version. If it's still no go, try downloading and installing the latest available FF (though this involves the nuisance of having to get all the add-ons again....use Tools - Add-ons to record what you have before you start the upgrade). KoolerStill (talk) 08:42, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

Thank you, but no, it wouldn't be cookies.

I use Firefox, then I use OOo, then I return to Firefox: it doesn't respond. Closing Firefox often (but not always) brings the Windows message that the program isn't responding. Today for the first time ever I got the message Windows - Virtual Memory Minimum Too Low / Your system is low on virtual memory. Windows is increasing the size of your virtual memory paging file [...] Well, my system is low on everything (notably resale value), but it was pretty happy with FF 3.0.9.

Not that I mind much, but it is odd. -- Hoary (talk) 15:45, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

K-Meleon

I'd hoped, even half presumed presumed, that FF 3.0.11 would be out in days. Well, it hasn't come out. Using FF 3.0.10 was like walking deeper into a bog. Not that 3.0.9 had been all that great; indeed, I was regretting having upgraded from 0.9.2 (I think it was), which seemed much faster and only had a few irritations, which I knew very well. (A notable one was that any attempt to access worldcat.org would cause it to terminate.)

Firefox is fine with the other computers I use, horrible with this single Windows holdout. I thought I'd try K-Meleon. In particular, I thought I'd try K-MeleonCCF ME. That wouldn't even start up, so I deleted it, but running plain K-Meleon (ver. 1.5.2) after Firefox (or anyway after Firefox after the latter has been running for half an hour) feels like being out of a cast. -- Hoary (talk) 11:19, 2 May 2009 (UTC)

I'm still using ff 2.8 or something. Oh and I've found K-Meleon to be quite resource hungry and takes ages to start up, but a good solid and reliable browser for the most part —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.44.54.169 (talk) 12:06, 2 May 2009 (UTC)

Sorry I didn't think of the virtual memory/paging file possibility (probability??). Go to System, Advanced,Performance,Advanced, Virtual Memory. Turn off Windows management, choose user management, and set it up to be 20Mb minimum and 100Mb maximum. Apply, save and reboot. This will kill the existing swap file, which might be enormous (full of things from last month and last year it will never be able to access anyway) and give it a small faster-loading swap file to work with. Every week or two, change back to let Windows manage it for a few days. This keeps killing off the enlarged swap files and making new, smaller, usable ones. Firefox itself also has memory leaks, causing it to hold on to real (RAM) memory, which makes more swapping necessary. To partially control this, into the address bar type 'about:config' then right click anywhere on the page. Choose "New, Boolean" and into the resulting dialog type 'config.trim_on_minimize' then in the next box select "true". Restart the browser. Every time you minimise your open windows, excess memory will be released and returned to the pool. Try to do it while the usage is under about 170,000kb (as seen in Task Manager) as above that it seems to return a lot less. (This is about 3 hours with 30 tabs open and infrequent new pages; opening and closing 40 new tabs in 10 minutes might be enough to push it over. Most of the leakage is from holding data for the Re-open Closed Tabs and Recover from Crash features).KoolerStill (talk) 12:15, 2 May 2009 (UTC)

Now that does sound like the fix to my FF problems. FF assuredly does have memory leaks, as is plainly visible in Win2k's task manager (Ctrl-Alt-Del) after FF has been (it has seemed) closed down. Yes, the amount of stuff this program remembers is staggering, and it's no surprise that it's a slug on this machine (192MB RAM).

In the same spirit, I've just told OOo to be prepared to undo not the last 100 (!) edits but merely the last five. (I'm not sure I've ever undone more than three, and if only XyWrite, with no undoing whatever, could handle UTF-8, I'd swap it for OOo in an instant.)

At least in the short term, I'll continue to use K-Meleon. (As I need no add-ons, I don't see what I'm missing.) It now has a pile of pages open, and is as spritely as if it were Netscape 3. But I'll keep your advice for future reference. -- Hoary (talk) 13:24, 2 May 2009 (UTC)

Hoary, you should have mentioned your OS and RAM limitations in the first place. Never upgrade to software newer than your OS; they'll limp instead of running. You'd do better with FF2 (from www.oldversion.com) which I've 'run' with Win98 and 64Mb RAM.(But K-Meleon is great). Two small fast UTF-8 compliant text editors you could try are [CrimsonEditor] and [Superedi]; both WYSYGIG and no choice of fonts, but good project management and syntax highlighting. Largest choice of langauge formatting is in [Notepad++]with a million text manipulation features.I happily under-utilise all three.KoolerStill (talk) 14:37, 4 May 2009 (UTC)

Harddisk problems on a laptop

The hard disk shows damaged sectors using a diagnostic tool. when I try to partition it, it shows 1555 error. I run chkdisk and that does not solve anything. Do you have any solutions please?

Iam also thinking about buying a larger HDD as the older HDD seems to be dying. This laptop ( ZE5700 by HP )supports ATA-100 according to some parts resellers on the internet. Iam trying to buy a HDD in ebay as it is cheaper. IDE/P-ATA is the only option in ebay.de, would that be compatible with this laptop?.

131.220.46.33 (talk) 15:37, 28 April 2009 (UTC)HDDdeath

If the size of the hard disk and the connector type are the same as your old hard disk, then yes. "PATA" is a synonym for the old-style "ATA" (and an antonym for "SATA"). Tempshill (talk) 00:41, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

By size, you mean the 2,5" form factor?. How to find out the connector type? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 131.220.46.24 (talk) 14:20, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

Klein bottle gnuplot

I found the following gnuplot script in the Commons for a Klein bottle. I don't understand what the colons indicate (example: sin(u): sin(u)), so could someone "translate" this into, say, Mathematica syntax or something more standard?

x(u,v)= v<pi ? (2.5-1.5*cos(v))*cos(u): \
        v<2*pi ? (2.5-1.5*cos(v))*cos(u):\
        v<3*pi ? -2+(2+cos(u))*cos(v): -2+2*cos(v)-cos(u)
y(u,v)= v<pi ? (2.5-1.5*cos(v))*sin(u): \
        v<2*pi ? (2.5-1.5*cos(v))*sin(u): \
        v<3*pi ? sin(u): sin(u)
z(u,v)= v<pi ? -2.5*sin(v): v < 2*pi ? 3*v-3*pi:\
        v<3*pi ? (2+cos(u))*sin(v)+3*pi: -3*v+12*pi

Lucas Brown (talk) 17:39, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

I think the syntax is the same as the conditional operator in C and related languages. a ? b : c evaluates to b if a is true; otherwise, it evaluates to c. I don't know Mathematica very well, but it looks like you can translate a ? b : c to If[a,b,c]. -- Coneslayer (talk) 17:49, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

Yes - so if you look at that first line:

x(u,v)= v<pi ? (2.5-1.5*cos(v))*cos(u): \
        v<2*pi ? (2.5-1.5*cos(v))*cos(u):\
        v<3*pi ? -2+(2+cos(u))*cos(v): -2+2*cos(v)-cos(u)

...it translates to:

 if ( v<pi )
   x(u,v) = (2.5-1.5*cos(v))*cos(u)
 else
   if ( v<2*pi )
     x(u,v) = (2.5-1.5*cos(v))*cos(u)
   else
     if ( v<3*pi )
       x(u,v) = -2+(2+cos(u))*cos(v)
     else
       x(u,v) = -2+2*cos(v)-cos(u)

Ditto for each of the remaining lines. SteveBaker (talk) 05:11, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

You could try with the switch statement or its Mathematica equivalent (if available). This would make reading the code significantly easier. --Pero-- 93.136.110.115 (talk) 12:47, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

Mathematica has a Switch construct, but what is desired here (the equivalent of if-else-if-...-else in C) is Which. You'll need to provide it a True condition to get a default value at the end. --Tardis (talk) 20:22, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

Blu-Ray player needed for Ubuntu 8.10

I've installed a Blu-Ray drive, and now I'd like a player, or better yet a ripper. Any recommendations ? StuRat (talk) 18:14, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

I don't understand the question; I know nothing about Blu-Ray but isn't a Blu-Ray drive also a Blu-Ray player, and you can rip the disk contents with it? Am I missing something here? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.44.54.169 (talk) 20:31, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

The Blu-Ray drive came with PowerDVD for Windows, which is a player only. What I need is a player for Blu-Ray under Linux, and preferably also a ripper under Linux (although a ripper under Windows would also work). StuRat (talk) 13:35, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

You can't rip BD movies yet, the format hasn't been cracked. Hideki (talk) 20:54, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

What about AnyDVD? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.44.54.169 (talk) 21:16, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

To explain it in a better way, you can easily rip BD movies. Go to any torrent site, search eMule or usenet or whatever if you don't believe me. I don't believe there is anything for Linux yet and Blu-Ray is not permanently broken since they could change various things and you'd need a new version of AnyDVD but it's sufficiently broken on Windows for now. Note you may still need a commercial software player which often have silly restrictions imposed by the studios (e.g. refusing to work with BluRays in folders) since some BluRays only come with TrueHD or DTS HD MA audio streams, neither of which are supported by any free solution at the moment AFAIK. Anyway presuming you are talking Windows, there are basically only 4 commercial software suites I'm aware of that have more or less full support of BluRay. WinDVD, PowerDVD, Total Media Theatre and Nero ShowTime. Nero doesn't seem so popular. The other 3 are more popular. Bear in mind you may need specific versions for BluRay playback and that silly limitations imposed by the studios due to DRM are common. The folder one for example (most used to support it but it was removed) and many no longer provide DirectShow accessible/usable codecs so you can't use the codecs that come with them for any other purpose. From memory, WinDVD and TMT and probably Nero are available as free trials which at least support BluRay. PowerDVD trial lacks BluRay playback I believe. Bear in mind as well compatibility issues are not uncommon largely due to the DRM. WinDVD and TMT were recently updated with new releases but old versions are usually updated for disc compatibility AFAIK. You may end up finding using AnyDVD HD rather then worrying about the software updates, I've heard it tends to provide better compatibility. If you can't decide for BluRay reasons alone you may want to consider other issues like DVD upscaling. As already mentioned with AnyDVD HD you can in theory use something else, like MPC except for the audio codec issue. I don't believe there's any current solution but haven't looked in to it that well. Edit: Well I was wrong. TrueHD is supported by FFDShow. DTS HD MA is to a limited extent (it supports the DTS portion not the lossless additional portion). I believe it should be possible to play back BluRay with something like MPC and AnyDVD HD and with no other commercial software suite but I'm not certain if this requires an intermediate ripping step (and you also won't have menus [2]). It also works with VLC but I'm pretty sure you need to rip the disc first in that case. BTW if you live in the US, bear in mind AnyDVD HD probably violates the DMCA so depending on various things you may or may not be breaking the law. P.S. There are rumours of a SlySoft Player coming but the details are slim and it's unlikely to be any time soon [3] Nil Einne (talk) 22:18, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

well that was an epic post! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.44.54.169 (talk) 08:37, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

Thanks. Which of those products will rip Blu-Ray for free (and how much do they charge for the rest) ? Overall, what would you recommend for ripping Blu-Ray under Windows or Linux ? StuRat (talk) 13:55, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

Unfortunately I'm not aware of anything which will reliably rip Blu-Ray for free (although I emphasise it's not something I've looked in to much, I don't have a Blu-Ray drive and I only know a bit primarily because of stuff I've come across when assembling a PVR without a Blu-Ray as well as once when I wanted to test a Blu-Ray rip). Any-DVD HD appears to be a good solution for ripping and the most recommended but far from free, EUR79.99 currently including a 2 year subscription (I believe it was lifetime a while back but changed possibly because they realised maintaining it was going to be a lot more work then they realised). However there's a fair chance the FLOSS people would have caught up by the end of the 2 years anyway. The other stuff is quite expensive as well (if your using Any DVD HD you can probably go with the cheapest Blu Ray compatible commercial software player you can find since you won't have to worry so much about software updates and other such stuff, WinDVD 7 appears to be a common recommendation, it also has the advantage of not suffering the silly 'won't play folders' limitation of new players I believe). But if you're primarily going to rip, I'd recommend you see how AnyDVD HD + free codecs + MPC (or something) first and only worry about commercial players if you have problems. Indeed you should be able to do your rips under Windows and playback under Linux (I believe both Mplayer and VLC should be fine). Any DVD HD does have a 21 day trial so you can see how it performs first (although that's not going to tell you if it will suddenly break with new disks 6 months from now). I don't think you have much chance of getting it to work in WINE BTW since it integrates at a fairly low level. The only issue here is you may need to rip every time (in Windows) and obviously wait for it to finish. You may want to take a perusal of the Doom9 forums particularly [4] (note it isn't updated for a year) and [5], they tend to IMHO be the best forums for this higher level video related stuff ([6] are good for more general PVR stuff). Bear in mind Doom9 does have strict rules, I wouldn't recommend you mention anything about timeshifting Netflix/rented Blu-Rays if you're going to ask questions. P.S. I didn't notice the Ubuntu part in your topic so sorry if I completely ignored it in my post. (I tend to ignore topics and only read the question even though ironically I'm pretty sure I'm often guilty of neglecting to mention something from the subject in my questions elsewhere.) P.P.S. You may also want to check out BD+ and [7]. As I understand it this is the big problem for rippers (or for that matter playback on unauthorised players) at the current time. Any DVD HD appears to be ahead of everyone else although even they still have problems [8] [9]. The current effort in the FLOSS movement appears to be at [10] P.P.P.S. I believe BD+ may still be somewhat rare [11]. You could try something else like MakeMKV [12] which is free at the current time because it's in beta and has a Linux version Nil Einne (talk) 20:01, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

Recording from HDMI

Now for a completely different approach to the problem. Is there any product which will take input from an HDMI cable (up to 1080p) and record it, as is, no questions asked, and then send the same HDMI output back out, exactly the same, at a later time ? (I'm assuming here that what goes over the HDMI cable is basically the pixels that display on the screen, not some encrypted data that needs to be decrypted to get the pixels.) StuRat (talk) 13:55, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

It is encrypted, see HDCP. -- BenRG (talk) 18:21, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

Thanks. So much for that idea. StuRat (talk) 10:11, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

There are products that are capable of converting data from a HDMI output to component and other analog formats including [13] HDfury. There may be more but it's not something I've look in to much. And it's possible that these devices may break in the future without firmware upgrades as HDMI operates under a handshake system, the device outputting (video card or player) is supposed to identify the receiving device and refuse if it's an unauthorised/disallowed. And there are also devices capable of recording a 1080i source from component [14]. You will get some quality loss due to the DADC but it may not be great enough to notice. So you can effictively record up to 1080i from HDMI. It's possible there are devices capable of recording analog 1080p but I'm not aware of any (again not something I've looked in to much). There are I believe also other HDCP strippers (since the HDfury is also effectively one) [15] and in theory these devices should be able to convert the video portion into DVI without HDCP. But again I'm not aware of any device capable of recording either DVI or HDMI even without HDCP. One of the issues is there's little point, how often do you want to record a DVI stream? And since HDMI without HDCP isn't even supposed to exist... Clearly these devices will be targetting those trying to do what you want to do which is a somewhat risky market to openly target and given that's it's probably not that easy to develop (the HDfury I believe largely use pre-existing parts with some additional code). The HDfury and HDCP strippers are of course already probably of questionable legality in some jurisdictions [16] but they're at least sold, and have a less 'legally questionable' raison d'être of being for display devices that lack HDCP. There may eventually be devices but it may take a while. Plus at the current time it's not necessarily that interesting since Bluray rippers are working fine so it's likely to be a small market (mod chips for gaming probably operate in a similar environment but have a much larger target audience). It's probably a similar reason why there's no device capable of recording 1080p. The HD PVR, and other devices like it are targetted primarily at those with cable/satellite box with component output and since for transmission standards, 1080i is the maximum there's no reason why most people would want to record 1080p. Nil Einne (talk) 18:45, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

Recording from video stream

Now for a final approach (to time-shifting Netflix Blu-Ray movies, so I can return them before I watch them): Is there any way to intercept the video stream, say with a video capture card, and record that ? I know it can be done for TV, but how about Blu-Ray ? And can it be captured at full resolution, color depth, and frame rate ? What products come closest ? StuRat (talk) 14:37, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

I am not a lawyer, but I am pretty confident that "time shifting" only applies to broadcasts, in particular video broadcasts. Suggesting that you are going to "time shift" a movie in full definition is a pretty long way from the legally accepted definition; what you are doing is simply copying (and breaking the law.) Nevertheless, good luck with that! --66.195.232.121 (talk) 17:26, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

I semi answered the question above Nil Einne (talk) 20:01, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

Replace sort-values with names in PostgreSQL view

I have a PostgreSQL view whose definition is:

CREATE OR REPLACE VIEW unique_card AS 
SELECT card.name AS name,
   array_to_string(array_accum(card.set), ','::text) AS sets,
   max(rarity.sortvalue) AS greatest_rarity,
   min(rarity.sortvalue) AS least_rarity,
   sum(card.foil_copies) AS foil_copies,
   sum(card.nonfoil_copies) AS nonfoil_copies,
   sum(card.foil_copies) + sum(card.nonfoil_copies) AS total_copies
  FROM card
  LEFT JOIN rarity ON card.rarity = rarity.abbr
  GROUP BY card.name;

How can I change this query so that instead of containing values from rarity.sortvalue, it returns the corresponding values from rarity.abbr? (rarity.abbr is the primary key in rarity, and rarity.sortvalue is also constrained to be unique.) I've tried replacing max(rarity.sortvalue) with the nested query

(SELECT abbr FROM rarity WHERE sortvalue = max(rarity.sortvalue))

but this yields an error message saying that WHERE clauses can't contain aggregate functions. Note that min(rarity.abbr) and max(rarity.abbr) won't do it because the rarities don't ascend alphabetically. NeonMerlin 20:25, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

Subqueries, while slow, are easy to work with: select abbr from rarity where sortvalue = (select max(sortvalue) from rarity) -- kainaw™ 07:00, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

Hide columns in a PostgreSQL view

In a PostgreSQL view, is it possible to select columns to use in the ORDER BY clause, but then exclude them from the view's output? NeonMerlin 22:24, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

You can wrap a query in a query, such as: select a from (select a, b, c from table order by a, b, c) -- I don't remember if Postgres requires to you name the subquery. -- kainaw™ 07:01, 29 April 2009 (UTC)