MSConfig - System Configuration UI

Very helpfull tool.


(*1) "Some of its functionality varies by Windows versions:

• In Windows 98 and Windows Me, it can configure advanced troubleshooting settings pertaining to these operating systems. It can also launch common system tools.
• In Windows 98, it can back up and restore startup files.
• In Windows Me, it has also been updated with three new tabs called "Static VxDs", "Environment" and "International". The Static VxDs tab allows users to enable or disable static virtual device drivers to be loaded at startup, the Environment tab allows users to enable or disable environment variables, and the International tab allows users to set international language keyboard layout settings that were formerly set via the real-mode MS-DOS configuration files. A "Cleanup" button on the "Startup" tab allows cleaning up invalid or deleted startup entries.
• In Windows Me and Windows XP versions, it can restore an individual file from the original Windows installation set.
• On Windows NT-based operating systems prior to Windows Vista, it can set various BOOT.INI switches.
• In Windows XP and Windows Vista, it can hide all operating system services for troubleshooting.
• In Windows Vista and later, the tool gained additional support for launching a variety of tools, such as system information, other configuration areas, such as Internet options, and the ability to enable/disable UAC. An update is available for Windows XP and Windows Server 2003 that adds the Tools tab.^[1] It also allows configuring various switches for Windows Boot Manager and Boot Configuration Data."

Read more about it here - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MSConfig

To activate it, WIN+R (or Start-->Run), then run 'msconfig'.

Result

Resources

• (*1) MSConfig - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Bad experience: Reasons why the last project was a disaster.

Usually I try my best to work in an ordered manner.
This means:

1. Interview the project manager (the person responsible for the success of the project) for the story.
2. Convert this story to requirements.
3. Present the project manager with the requirements.
4. If approved go to the next level.
5. Do a High Level Design (HLD) 
6. Present this HLD sidelong the requirements and estimate roughly the solution time in human days labor.
7. If approved go to the next level.
8. Breakdown the HLD to low level design (LLD).
9. Estimate LLD and present estimated more accurately time  in human labor.
10. If approved go to the next level.
11. Implement the LLD and stick to it (no time for adventures).
12. Do unit test, system test as much as i can (depends, sometimes not possible).
13. Present a working machine.
14. Be happy and relax.

This time, everything went wrong! Why?

Here were the flow of things:

1. Pressure to implement as fast as possible (reasons: no time, no budget).
1. I broke and agreed to 'be fast'.
2. Skip HLD + LLD, start implement! ==> no thoughts of risks, everything looks easy when you don't think about it deeply.
3. Implementation got some problems I didn't see in advance (and frankly, none can think that deeply).
4. More and more problems arose ==> delivery time breaks ==> more pressure.
5. No one is happy, all is waiting for the delivery => more pressure ==> shorter code, less secure code, BAD CODE!
6. ... The test-bench is too complex to operate... Catastrophic :-)

Next time - Do it right! 

If the project manager don't want to do it right, ignore him :), take your time, design it, show him the design, say 'i thought about it and found some problems' (when doing the hiding HLD + LLD).

You only get an advantage in the start, when things get rough (and they do!) you will cross the break-point and start to be slow (because you can't load all the HLD into your head).

In the end the project worked, the code, barely, but did managed to work, the time for this project took much longer then 'fast and short' (twice if not more the time it should take), and a bad taste was in the mouths.

New blog: ProjectEuler solver

I've decided that if i'm going to solve 332 problem's it's best be in a separate blog, so i'm opening a new blog, i think i'll call it: 'ProjectEuler solver'

Here it goes... http://projecteulersolver.blogspot.com/

Project Euler - Problem 2 - Tcl

#Each new term in the Fibonacci sequence is generated by adding the previous two terms. By starting with 1 and 2, the first 10 terms will be:
#1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, 34, 55, 89, ...
#By considering the terms in the Fibonacci sequence whose values do not exceed four million, find the sum of the even-valued terms.
proc problem2 {} {
 set term  2
 set term-1  1
 set sum  0

 while {$term <= 4000000} {
  if {($term % 2) == 0} {
   incr sum $term
  }

  set tmp  ${term-1}
  set term-1  $term
  set term  [expr $term + $tmp]
 }
 
 return $sum
}
# solution-2: 4613732

Project Euler - Problem 1 - Tcl

# If we list all the natural numbers below 10 that are multiples of 3 or 5, we get 3, 5, 6 and 9. The sum of these multiples is 23.
# Find the sum of all the multiples of 3 or 5 below 1000.
proc Problem1 {} {

 set items {}

 for {set idx 3} {$idx<1000} {incr idx 3} {
  lappend items $idx
 }

 for {set idx 5} {$idx<1000} {incr idx 5} {
  if { [lsearch $items $idx] < 0 } {
   lappend items $idx
  }
 }

 set rval 0
 foreach item $items {
  set rval [expr $rval + $item]
 }
  

 return $rval
}
# solution: 233168

Project Euler - Very nice problems for every programmer.

Just found this very nice site - http://projecteuler.net/ while searching for some nice math/SW problems to sharpen my knowledge.

I intend to practice through them, very nice job guys!! Very nice idea!!

One problem for a week, ~54 weeks a year, lots of problems to solve :).

Anyway it looks fun, there are around 332 problems as I write.

When I'll solve a problem, I'll post it here...