Programming Language - The Mentor of your Computer

Hi Readers!
Dixplore presents you with an exclusive set of internet resources which will help you to understand the world of programming language better. Here I present you with ebook 'Programming Language - The Mentor of your Computer' to help you polish your understanding of computers. This book begins with understanding of simple concepts like algorithms, software development cycle and then moves on to concepts of higher understanding like Parallel programming, threading etc. I have also included descriptions of some of the important programming languages like C++, C#, BASIC etc. Web programming languages and .NET framework are also included.


Click below to view the book in fullscreen

How to make a really hidden folder?

Do not skip this article if you want to make a really hidden folder. Here really hidden means that you can not reveal it even after using ‘Show hidden files and folders’ check box. Yes! That’s what I’m talking about. Just follow these steps and then you’ll create a really hidden folder!

• Right click the space where you want to create a really hidden folder.
• From the pop up context menu, point to ‘New’ and then click ‘Folder’.

Finally, Microsoft is launching the 2010s. Make sure you don't miss it!

Finally, Microsoft is launching it! Yes, After all this hype, Microsoft is finally launching all the 2010's which are Microsoft Office 2010, Microsoft Sharepoint 2010 and Microsoft Visual Studio 2010.

Do you want to join the launch event? Here's what Microsoft has got for you. Microsoft allows you to choose from all day or half day in person events in your area! If not, you can still join it from virtual events on the internet which can be checked out anytime!

And what's more? It's free and is designed to fit your interests!

Are we a Virus of this planet?

Before we begin this topic, let me ask you a question. What is a Virus? Something that destroys your computer is called virus. A Virus is nothing but a software program that harms other softwares, replicates and keeps itself intact. Remember, two viruses of same type never affect each other. Their main objective is to replicate and spread infection. What are softwares? Programs that never harm each other and contribute towards some productive or fruitful results are called softwares.

Software Analysis - Microsoft Fix it Center

Friends! I’m telling you! Open a new tab, log on to http://fixit.support.microsoft.com and download Microsoft Fix it Center. It’s Amazing and I’m just speechless about it!

Microsoft has finally gathered all its individual fix it tools and created a suite that covers all fix it tools necessary for your computer. When I saw it for the first time, I was thinking of the download size. There are hundreds of fix it tools available on the internet! Download them? I was wondering how long it was going to take. Three hours? Four? Or maybe five? But hey, there was nothing to worry about. It offers a web installer for download which is of very small size. The web installer then downloads Microsoft Fix it Center and installs it. After completion of the download, it then analyzes your computer and finds the critical locations/hardware where the problems could breed. Like CD/DVD drive, or the sound or audio driver. It downloads only those fix it tools which are necessary for your computer. In my computer, it downloaded 11 necessary fix it tools.

Artificial Intelligence - Part One

Artificial intelligence refers to making computers, devices and robots as ‘smart’ or ‘intelligent’ as humans. This is pretty huge task because computers are dumb beings. You give it a command and irrespective of its consequences, it executes it. It has no real thinking. If you type wrong, it will type wrong. However, you might say that it ‘suggests’ you the correct spelling but that suggestion routine has been programmed into it. It is not its own thinking.

The concept of artificial intelligence is pretty hard to understand because it was hard for me too. I was thinking of making a software program with a lot of exceptions, event handlers and error handlers so that it ‘looks like’ the computer is thinking. Consider a case in which you are a typist. Now, let’s say, you daily start the computer, open Microsoft Word, type your thing, and take a print out. Suppose you are given a highly intelligent computer with ‘so called’ artificial intelligence. You log on and the computer, based on what you’ve been launching frequently, immediately opens Microsoft Word and puts your cursor on the first line. You start typing. Then you quit. The computer asks you if you want to print the document you just typed. This is also based on the past experiences you’ve had with your computer. You tell ‘yes’ and your thing is done.

Neuroprogramming

Neuroprogramming – the term itself suggests programming the neurons. Neurons are inside our brain which controls most of our activities. These are controlled by natural biological software. Not only is this software amazing, the technology over which it runs is also amazing. Neuroprogramming is a new section of my blog within which I am now going to compare about workings of our brain and that of a computer. I’ll be analyzing the difference between technology inside us and that made by us. Please behold yourselves as this new section brings you a lot more to know and understand about these complicated technologies.

What is Cloud Computing?

Cloud computing is entirely new concept. Normally, you buy CDs and DVDs containing the software to install the software or games on your computer. That would require space in your house as well as on your hard drive. Also, sometimes, installing and removing them is tedious task. In order to solve this problem, computer scientists came up with an entirely new concept of Cloud Computing. 

The word Cloud Computing itself tells a lot. You join to a cloud, share things and disconnect. Simple isn’t it?  A cloud is, in reality, a group of servers that provide data to you. The point here is that you can access all tools, softwares, games and almost everything online. So, that saves disk space, storage space and time. There’s no need to install anything except, in case they recommend you for a plugin; but that’s pretty simple.

Let me give you an example. Are you familiar with Google Docs? If not, get familiar here. You log on the Google Docs with your ID and password, and you are served with Office online. Google Docs provide you with a word program, spreadsheet and many more similar to the office suite. Now, you know how much time Microsoft Office takes to launch. Also, installing it requires a lot of disk space and consumes your time. It’s expensive too. On the contrary, Google Docs is a free-of-cost online software that requires no installation. It’s online and follows the Cloud Computing principle. You can make documents online, download them in various formats and you can also convert them to PDF. It also offers you a facility to upload documents, which you can then edit. To make it short, you can do anything that Microsoft Office Word can do.

How to optimize DSL and Broadband connections?

The following is an adapted article. Hence there is not guarantee or warranty associated with it.

These settings allow you to boost the speed of your broadband Internet connection when using a Cable Modem or DSL Router with Windows 2000 and Windows XP.

Open your registry and find the key below.

Create the following DWORD values, as most of these values will not already exist you will need to create them by clicking on 'Edit -> New -> DWORD Value' and then set the value as shown below.

DefaultTTL = "80" hex (or 128 decimal)

Specifies the default time to live (TTL) for TCP/IP packets. The default is 32.

Why Linux has an advantage over Windows?

Linux, as you all know, is a free-open source operating system. Inspite of having number of advantages over Windows, Linux is still free and of course open source. Now, you might be thinking why I'm using terms 'free' and 'open' source separately. 'Free' means that linux is freely available and downloadable from internet. Some of the vendors like 'Ubuntu' offer Cds loaded with linux absolutely free of cost. Open source means that if you know kernel programming and mechanics of operating system, then you can actually tweak linux and also program linux from a scratch. That's open source and linux provides that flexibility. Unlike linux, Windows is not open source. It does not allow user to modify it's kernel or components. This is one of the reasons why linux is hot favourite among young developers.

What separates them?

The main difference between linux and windows is their build. Practically, Windows is created only by Microsoft Corporation while Linux has been created and tweaked by entire world! Why entire world? Because, it's open source. If I have linux and I find a bug, then I can tweak and remove that thing myself. I also tell the organization about the bug which I fixed. So, they verify it and tell their rest of the consumers about the fix. So, that's how it all works. With windows, it is not like that. I must appreciate microsoft's efforts in improving windows because in new versions of windows – The Vista Series – they have put an improved version of error reporting like Problems Report and Solutions. With that you can just submit the error report. You cannot tell them how to fix that even if you know. Of course, you cannot fix grave errors in windows even if you think because it's not open source!

Who's better on performance?

Practically, on considering stable releases of Linux offered by several organizations like Ubuntu, Debian, Fedora, etc, no doubt linux outperforms Windows. Windows has always been a bulky operating system taking several minuted to boot up, then a minute to get stable and so on. While with linux, running on an average PC, booting up is a child's play for linux, 10 – 15 seconds is a limit. Even if 'background processing' indicator on mouse cursor is on, you can still get your stuff by clicking. Exploring your computer is just with double-click of a button. You'll never find this speed on Windows!

Also, shutting down your PC is another a matter of 5-6 seconds for linux. And what's more? Linux works on a 1 Ghz PC with 128 MB RAM and even 10 GB Hard Drive!

What's your color today?

Unlike Windows, Linux provides a lot of customization features. It is so flexible that you can customize almost everything. From changing your wallpaper to behaviour and animation of minimizing/maximizing a window, you can change and tweak everything. Linux also provides various desktop effects – some of which even require a 3D card – which are uber cool.

For linux, wallpapers are billions, themes are millions, and yet there are thousands of programs that help even more to customize linux. Also various types of desktop environment are available on linux like GNOME(Most common with cool GUI), KDE(High end graphical interface), Xfce(Fastest of all). These desktop environments not only handle the look and feel of the linux environment but also provide you with lot of other flexibilities. Instead of trying out new desktop environments, I prefer to GNOME and it's cool Compiz-Fusion Desktop effects which tweak almost all aspects of the operating system. In customization, Linux easily overcomes Windows.

Applications?

This is where linux gets outperformed. Almost 91% of the applications available in the market run on windows. 5% work on Mac OS X, 3% of it in Linux and the rest are for other OS. Windows has it's roots wide-spread all over the world because it was the first OS to offer the idea of multi tasking and a lot more new features that were not even thought of at that time. While Linux – which is not that old but still is not as old as windows – has relatively very less number of applications available world wide. Linux is rapidly getting wide spread in the world of computing because it is a lot more flexible and offers a lot more possibilities than Windows. Linux offers it's developers great flexibility of working with applications. Previously, linux was called non-userfriendly because it was difficult to operate but now that it has been tweaked and is available in several forms, linux has removed this badge of dishonour from itself.

Organizations like Ubuntu etc. Have made linux user friendly and ease of use operating system that provides it's users with number of options which makes it easy to use.

Running Windows On Linux?

Also, now you can run Windows applications on Linux. With 'Wine' – an application for linux – you can run windows applications and programs on Linux. Wine uses its DLL library to run Windows applications. If you dualboot Windows and Linux, then it'll be better. Wine uses Windows library and it's own library in combination to run the application smoothly. Wine also has configuration screen where, you can select in which mode Wine should work. There are several modes available based on Windows OS Released. On my Linux, there are following modes:

•                     Windows Vista

•                     Windows XP

•                     Windows Me

•                     Windows 98

•                     Windows 3.0

and several others including server editions which I cannot recall right now.

Each of these modes create a separate environment for the application to run smoothly. Here, environment does not mean that your linux look would change. You won't even notice that! So, are you thinking of running Windows Games on your linux? Don't dream that! It won't run. Games are called as hefty softwares that require large amount of resources and also they have some of functions which are accessible to them in Windows but not in Linux. However, these people are trying a lot to make each and every application of Windows run on Linux. Good luck to them!

Where's the security?

Linux has security from viruses. Don't think that an antivirus system has been integrated to it. It isn't in this case. Because, Linux does not support viruses! Yes, Viruses don't run on linux because they find it hard to harrass you while you are logged in. Surprised? Ok, lets be frank. There's one virus on linux and that's – Bliss. But just think of it. Linux has just one virus to support while Windows is entirely surrounded by viruses. Viruses for Windows – maybe billions – Viruses for Linux – Just One!! and that too is not going to do any big thing to your computer! So, here we have arrived to the point where we must say that linux is too stout to respond to viruses. Consider a case where a burgler has entered a bank, he shows a gun, fires in the air and expects people to panic. But what happens? People ignore him! He shoots at the cashier but finds that his guns does not work against him. Bullets just fall down touching the cashier! This is the case when virus enters into linux. Virus would try hard to do harm but linux won't execute any operations that virus has told. Virus will try to infilterate your files but that also would not work because unlike windows, linux is not having applications chained.

Little things that matters!

Yet, there are a lot of little things offered by linux that provide great advantage over Windows. First of all, linux has a 'Force Quit' feature. If you find anu misbehaving application(Though you'll rarely find) or an application that's taking too long to respond, you can use Force Quit. Force quit is a utility provided in linux which immediately exits a non-responding application. So, you won't need to wait minutes for a non-responding application to end. Sometimes, you'll find that in windows, when an application does not respond, then your computer will also not respond. This happens because in windows, all applications are chained. When running applications are chained, they all get affected if one of them stops responding. This is not the case in linux, In linux, applications work independently, meaning, that they are not chained. So, if any damn application gets 'hanged' your computer and other applications will continue working in full swing. Second advantage in linux, that it has an in-built archive manager. With archive manager, you can handle multiple types of archives without installing a separate program for it. Linux also has a highly advanced calculator with three extended modes which are 'Advanced', 'Financial' and 'Programming'. And what more? Linux also comes with Password and Encryption key manager which allows you to create passwords for applications and folders. It also allows you to create encryption keys whose strength ranges from 2048 bits to 4096 bits. With that, you can encrypt archives, files and folders to ensure that they are safe. Many linux editions also allow you to change the way login screen looks and behavior of the bootloader and its appearance. Linux also allows you to scale CPU usage. Meaning, you can set how much of the CPU power linux should use. This helps you a lot in saving power. Suppose, you are reading an ebook on your linux PC during a journey, If you were using windows, and even in power saver mode, you'll drain a lot of battery. But in linux, it dims the display automatically. Now, reading an ebook does not require processing power. So, you can set the value to least mode. In this way, linux will stop most of background processes which drain battery and will ensure that the battery is saved. Now, as were are discussing about battery, it reminds me of an amazing feature that linux provides. Linux has an in-built system that provides detailed information on the battery installed on your laptop. It includes details like your battery model, version, status, vendor. These details are common in windows. Excluding these, it also tells you details about battery technology, serial number, current charge capacity of battery(in %), current charge(in watt-hour), last full charge(in watt-hour) and design charge(in watt-hour). It also provides you with information based on graphs too! I'm sure that these features are not available on windows.

If you refer to new versions of windows, in Vista line, youll find that they are having preview panes. The moment, you select an item, it's preview(if available) is shown in the preview pane. Previews are available for pictures, music, videos and some other types. Suppose, I click a music file. If my computer or rather Windows media player has that plugin, then it will show a mini media player in the preview pane with a play button. If I click play button, it will search the plugin in Windows Media library and then it will play the file. On my VAIO BZ, windows music preview does not work correctly. For the first file I play on starting the computer, it takes a lot of time in loading the preview pane. After that it plays the file. Now, Ubuntu Linux 9.04 has something new to offer. Now, unlike windows, ubuntu has a 'Movie Player' as default player. While exploring my computer, if I stumble upon a music file which I want to preview, I simply hover my mouse over it and immediately, it'll start playing the file. But unfortunately in this technique, pausing is not possible. If I unhover(or dishover) my mouse from that music file, the file immediately stops playing. Ubuntu also does not offer a seek bar!

Also, there's one thing where Linux surrenders. It's Silverlight Experience! At Windows, you have silverlight integrated in Windows Internet Explorer as well as many other web browsers like Firefox. But, in Ubuntu (or I assume in most of linuxes) silverlight isn't available. Yes, if you do visit a website featuring silverlight, it'll tell you to download an alternative version of silverlight as moonlight but even after downloading moon light, I can't get silverlight experience – It still says that silverlight is missing.

So, what do you learn from this? Most of all high-end Microsoft technologies aren't shared by Microsoft.

For all photoshop editors, linux is a disappointment because there's probably no linux edition for adobe photoshop.

Now, linux also has an in built application called Disk Analyser. It is an application which tells you what folder has been eating, rather reserving your disk space. It is very useful application in that way because it lets you know what to delete to free your space. It not only tells you about your filesystem but tells you the 'free space sharing' on any other device that you connect. In this case, windows falls back. It's not having an in built application for this, so, you'll have to wander-on-the-web to get one!

I've heard that linux produces outstanding graphics but I haven't seen it in action and therefore I tell you about that so sure. But I think that it would be able to produce out-standing graphics because it's swift. Windows and other operating system themselves allocate very high memory and therefore they have relatively less to dedicate for graphice. Whereas in linux, this case is totally different. Linux itself allocates very less of your RAM ans as well as your hard drive. So, it can dedicate more graphics to your games and all that stuff. This is just a guess and I am not so sure about it. Built-in games of linux are very abstract – sort of only two-dimensional and therefore, you cannot judge it's actual capacity. However, some of real 3D games are available but aren't satisfactory because they aren't developed that passionately. I purely do not mean to discourage or hurt the linux game developers but despite of such nice capabilities of linux to handle the resources you won't get any game on linux that can compete the one on windows. This might be because the real 'expert' game developers are looking for money and hence they are moving towards development of games for windows as most of the high-end games in windows aren't free. Now, you might be wondering about 3D modelling software like Maya? As of now, I haven't encountered any such software but I am still looking for it. There must be some sort of software available on linux. Don't worry, you'll obviously find one.

Speed with appearance?

This is very easy question to answer – You compromise speed, you'll get speed. But after you use linux, you'll probably disagree with this. Even after using themes and effects, you'll observe that your working speed has been little affected. Shocked? I was too but I soon discovered this myself on my computer. Of course, you might suffer from a sort of decrease in speed at first but this decrease in speed will be rather unnoticed by you unless you are using a computer that's got a configuration which is just on the minimum system requirements of linux. Now, if you know this, then there are different window managers in linux. Most popular and used is GNOME. Still, there are two other types called KDE and Xfce. GNOME is for a computer user who wants both speed and appearance. KDE is for one who wants very cool appearance. Mostly for high-fi users. Xfce us mostly used by users who have very low system requirements and want speed. Now, this is not always true because some users who just don't care about appearance even after having a high-end system use Xfce. Another one, which is not a window manager (Though most of users think it is.) is Compiz Fusion. It accelerates the appearance of your system and allows you to perform a lot more tweaks like changing the open/close/minimize/maximize animations, window borders, various effects and things like modifying the application switcher method. All these will be better understood by you if you use a hands on approach and get atleast a Live CD of ubuntu Linux. Different window managers provide their own options of modifying the appearance on linux while on windows? You know, you'll have to stick to the like or not Windows own window manager. Now this is mostly attracting to users but if you consider old versions, then they weren't attractive. But now, considering Windows Vista and Windows 7, they seem to be cool. Still, you don't get options of really 'modifying' them. Don't tell me about the 'themes' option. That's of no use. If you want to change desktop background and other sorts of things without affecting the real appearance, then it's better to do it yourself rather than depending on it.

Still thinking of Windows? Think again! Because Linux is used by huge servers and supercomputers. It's their choice because they rely on the usability, flexibility and resource management of linux. Shouldn't you rely on it?

3 Golden Rules for enhancing the performance of your PC

Here are some of the best ways to enhance the performance of your PC. These tips and tricks and tricks work best on Windows Vista. So, if you are unable to buy Windows 7, and you want to make your Windows Vista as fast as Windows 7, then follow on these:

• Defragment your PC regularly. This is the best option to quicken your PC because it reduces the time that the needle of your hard drive takes to move around for searching the data on it. Let me tell you what this thing actually is.
  

Best Keyboard Shortcuts

All of these might not work on your PC because some of the functionality might be outdated.

Getting used to using your keyboard exclusively and leaving your mouse behind will make you much more efficient at performing any task on any Windows system. I use the following keyboard shortcuts every day:

Windows key + R = Run menu

This is usually followed by:

cmd = Command Prompt

iexplore + "web address" = Internet Explorer

compmgmt.msc = Computer Management

dhcpmgmt.msc = DHCP Management

dnsmgmt.msc = DNS Management

services.msc = Services

eventvwr = Event Viewer

How to change text of Start Button in Windows XP?

This is adapted article and I have not made it. Hence I do not guarantee any resulting consequences.

Step 1 - Modify Explorer.exe File

In order to make the changes, the file explorer.exe located at C:\Windows needs to be edited. Since explorer.exe is a binary file it requires a special editor. For purposes of this article I have used Resource Hacker. Resource HackerTM is a freeware utility to view, modify, rename, add, delete and extract resources in 32bit Windows executables and resource files (*.res). It incorporates an internal resource script compiler and decompiler and works on Microsoft Windows 95/98/ME, Windows NT, Windows 2000 and Windows XP operating systems.

Get this from http://delphi.icm.edu.pl/ftp/tools/ResHack.zip

The first step is to make a backup copy of the file explorer.exe located at C:\Windows\explorer. Place it in a folder somewhere on your hard drive where it will be safe. Start Resource Hacker and open explorer.exe located at C:\Windows\explorer.exe.

Why PCs Crash?

Fatal error: the system has become unstable or is busy," it says. "Enter to return to Windows or press Control-Alt-Delete to restart your computer. If you do this you will lose any unsaved information in all open applications."

You have just been struck by the Blue Screen of Death. Anyone who uses Microsoft Windows will be familiar with this. What can you do? More importantly, how can you prevent it happening?

1. Hardware conflict

The number one reason why Windows crashes is hardware conflict. Each hardware device communicates to other devices through an interrupt request channel (IRQ). These are supposed to be unique for each device.

For example, a printer usually connects internally on IRQ 7. The keyboard usually uses IRQ 1 and the floppy disk drive IRQ 6. Each device will try to hog a single IRQ for itself.

How Direct X works?

Ever wondered just what that enigmatic name means?

Gaming and multimedia applications are some of the most satisfying programs you can get for your PC, but getting them to run properly isn't always as easy as it could be. First, the PC architecture was never designed as a gaming platform. Second, the wide-ranging nature of the PC means that one person's machine can be different from another. While games consoles all contain the same hardware, PCs don't the massive range of difference can make gaming a headache.

To alleviate as much of the pain as possible, Microsoft needed to introduce a common standard which all games and multimedia applications could follow – a common interface between the OS and whatever hardware is installed in the PC, if you like. This common interface is DirectX, something which can be the source of much confusion.

DirectX is an interface designed to make certain programming tasks much easier, for both the game developer and the rest of us who just want to sit down and play the latest blockbuster. Before we can explain what DirectX is and how it works though, we need a little history lesson.

How multi tasking works?

In this decade, it would be very silly to ask someone whether his/her operating system multi tasking? It would be silly too is asked in the mid 1990’s. The concept of windows was originally developed by Xerox PARC. Surprising isn’t it because the very developer of the concept isn’t in this field today. Everybody has in their minds Bill Gates or someone else when asked about the inventor of multi tasking operating systems. Now, when the computers were first introduced, single tasking systems were just in the developmental stage. Single tasking refers to the ability to carry out not more than one task at a time. This was rather annoying for users because, since the computers were not too fast and the abilities were limited, users had to waste much of their time carrying out single tasks. For an instance if a user had to copy a really large file (500 KB was considered a really huge file in those times) to some destination, type a letter to the department and do some analysis, then he’ll first copy the file to that location, wait for really long period and then resume other activities. Now, this really wasted a lot of time because other tasks which ordered sequentially were left pending because the first task in the order was taking too much time to complete. Therefore, a need to carry out various tasks simultaneously arose. Lets skip the historical facts and head straight to what multi-tasking really is.