Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Computing/2008 August 31

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August 31

Breaking into IT

What would be the minimum education required to attain an entry level IT (networking) position? Should a person start with a CCNA or A+ certification? Thanks. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.123.238.50 (talk) 01:15, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

What country are you in? Algebraist 01:16, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

I live in Canada, but am moving to Japan next year and figured it would be a good time for a career change. Plus there seems to be a lot of IT jobs in Tokyo. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.123.238.50 (talk) 01:20, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

Asking for best way is just a request for random opinions from strangers who could easily be trying to mess with you. Please try to rephrase your question such that it is a request for references, such as "How many entry level IT positions in Singapore require at least a 2-year college degree?" -- kainaw™ 01:22, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

^^done.

TO work in Japan you should be really able to communicate in Japanese. To switch countries you really need to prove yourself at home with experience before any employer will risk employing you. CCNA with a couple of years working experience would be a good start. Useful knowledge could be programming, project management and how to use spreadsheets and other electronic office tools. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 21:56, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

Extra large headphones?

Are there any makers or models of extra large headphones? Even at maximum extension, most headphones (AKG, Audio Technica, Sony, Bose) barely reach around to cover my ears. I find earbuds too uncomfortable to wear and would like a pair of reasonably high-end on-ear or over-the-ear headphones for my big head. Like what would fit giant dudes Yao Ming, Shaq, or Michael Phelps? --70.167.58.6 (talk) 01:38, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

eDimensional AudioFX Pro 5+1. They're huge. They're also 5.1 surround sound (really a gimmick unless you game heavily). · AndonicO ^Engage. 01:40, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

Are there any XL non-gaming or non-USB headphones? Just for reference, I wear a size 7 3/4 cap (62cm) and going from earlobe-to-earlobe over the top my head is 49cm. (yikes!) --70.167.58.6 (talk) 01:49, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

I have educational headphones I nicked from my school IT center similar to this which are massive, and they have extra room to extend too! The old ones are the best I think because most modern headphones are designed for iPods and traveling so are small and break easily. I'd look in second hand shops for some real old school ones and they will probably be bigger than stuff you can buy in the shops nowadays; just make sure not to get ones with DIN or XLR connectors as nothing uses that now. JessicaThunderbolt 14:06, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

• Beyer DT100 are pretty large 217.43.3.84 (talk) 20:11, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

I also wear a 7 3/4 hat and my Sennheiser HD212 Pros fitted well. They are medium end (~$60) so you may want to consider them.--droptone (talk) 12:01, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

Missing menu bar

I use Internet Explorer. In attempting to find something else, I accidentally went to the list that shows which menus are visible/invisible, and clicked the Main Menu one, thus dissapearing my Main Menu. I'd like to get it back, but I can't because the Main Menu is missing, which has the Show/Hide list. Is there an alternate way of getting my menu back? --Ye Olde Luke (talk) 05:31, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

Press F10.--Birdsusing nnn (talk) 05:53, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

Woah. That was too easy. Thanks! --Ye Olde Luke (talk) 20:31, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

Wiki users > dial-up vs broadband

Is it possible to determine what percentage of Wikipedia users access it through dial-up and how many through broadband? --71.158.215.87 (talk) 05:56, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

Not really -- or, rather, not without conducting a comprehensive survey. There's no way for Wikipedia to determine whether an IP address is on a broadband or dial-up connection. (I suppose some ISPs might designate a certain range of IP addresses to dial-up users, for example, and make that information public, but I think those would be the exception, rather than the rule.) Furthermore, identifying unique anonymous users would also be impossible, since there are undoubtedly people who use broadband at work and dial-up at home. -- Captain Disdain (talk) 11:10, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

No, but I figure it would probably be somewhere close to how many people have dial-up, which the article puts at 10 percent of American adults. JessicaThunderbolt 14:07, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, I guess that might be a reasonable approximation. Of course, the English Wikipedia is used by people from a whole lot of countries other than America as well, so you would need to first get the percentages of visitors by country and then find out the ratio of dial-up users to broadband users in that country, and then do the math based on that... Though now that I think more about this, I'm a little skeptical; in a lot of places people with broadband might be more computer savvy than dial-up users, and thus more familiar with the things the internet has to offer, such as Wikipedia, so that might skew the results, for example. (Or, you know, it might not, but I'd be a little hesitant to draw too many conclusions from this...) -- Captain Disdain (talk) 14:35, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

c programming

I have written a program and it is working well but since I modified it eventhough it works it does not work well with the goto function is there any solution to use instead of goto. If yes please be kind enough to e mail me to (email removed) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.115.29.238 (talk) 11:46, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

While loop and For loop. No, I am not going to email you. -Unknown IP

It's part of the language, see [[1]] for example, so should always work. Note its limitations though - you can't 'goto' just anywhere. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.13.226.238 (talk) 12:15, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

If you have to use goto, there's a good chance you're doing it wrong. Whiles, Fors, and the occasional switch are good for just about (or exactly) everything. 206.126.163.20 (talk) 00:16, 1 September 2008 (UTC)

What's asdf?

Does asdf stand for something, or is it just because the people who write asdf are right-handed so they use their left hand to write random stuff like asdfasdfasdfasdfasdf...

Well see ASDF but your idea about random stuff seems to be likely to come up far more than any of the genuine acronyms / abbreviations. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.13.226.238 (talk) 11:59, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

Our article on QWERTY implies it was a result of trial and error - the inventor of the typewriter fiddled around with different layouts until he found one that worked, and the layout that worked happened to have asdf on the left side of the home row. Xenon54 12:00, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

I don't know if left or right handedness has to do with the randomness of it. Do people who are left handed write random stuff differently? That would be interesting if true. Personally I suspect it's just easier to hit actual letter with your left hand; my right hand pinky is usually hovering near the Return key and in that position the random typing wouldn't be all that interesting( ;';lk). --98.217.8.46 (talk) 14:55, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

For what it's worth, I'm left handed. I often have to type in a fake name to test our software at work. When I'm sitting at one of the common "testing bays" I almost always enter "asdf". I noticed a while back, looking at the logs, that that when I'm sitting at my own desk, with my left-handed mouse, I'm just about equally likely to enter "Asdf" as I am "hjkl" or something similar. Why do I sometimes go with asdf even at my own desk? I have no way of verifying this, but I'll bet that the "Asfd" logins correspond to times I started the software with the keyboard as opposed to clicking on an icon. APL (talk) 19:14, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

ASDF also works due to most users' rights hands being busy switching from mouse to keyboard. Most systems are set up as righties, so even left-handed users end up using the keyboard/mouse that way at times. Matt Deres (talk) 16:56, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

Get rid of Yahoo! sign in seal on Linux

Resolved

Yahoo's new feature called “sign-in seal” is meant to help prevent phishing attacks by allowing users to upload a custom logo to the Yahoo login page. This article shows how to clear it on Windows but I would like to know how to do it on Linux. Another question - If I do not create any sign in seal in the first place, will Yahoo still give me that mysterious "shared object" in order to track me?

Thanks -Abhishek (talk) 14:52, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

I found the directory at "~/.macromedia/Flash_Player/#SharedObjects/%some random number%/" on my Linux; dunno if it's the same on others. --Spoon! (talk) 18:46, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, found it. Being a paranoid, now cookies are not the only thing I will be deleting regularly.-Abhishek (talk) 02:50, 1 September 2008 (UTC)

Though honestly, there are better ways to try and guarantee your security and your privacy than worrying about cookies. --98.217.8.46 (talk) 15:41, 1 September 2008 (UTC)

Like what? -Abhishek (talk) 15:30, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

Three Well, lets make it six words, Pretty Good Privacy Tor (anonymity network)

. Kushal (talk) 22:46, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

Thanks -Abhishek (talk) 14:39, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

HDMI to VGA

I would like to connect my PS3 to my VGA monitor - there are leads and converters available, anyone have any experience with these? What's the best way to transmit audio?

thanks 80.229.160.127 (talk) 15:01, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

Your monitor comes with speakers? --antilived^{T | C | G} 23:14, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

Question about Nokia Music Manager

Just wondering, would I be correct in thinking that the "M4A" option in Nokia Music Manager is HE-AAC, or HE-AACv2? Would I also be correct in thinking that the "AAC" option is AAC-LC? Thanks in advance - ^Estoy_Aquí^{(t • c • e)} 18:17, 31 August 2008 (UTC)