Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Computing/2009 December 15

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December 15

Dell 1110 printer + PowerPC G5

When my wife's company went out of business, she was allowed to take away a PowerPC G5 and a Dell 1110 laser printer. The printer had been used with some other computer, not the G5 we have. What do I need to get the printer to work? A driver? If so, how do I get one, and how would it be installed? Thank you. --Halcatalyst (talk) 01:22, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

Googling has suggested the Dell 1110 is a clone of the Samsung ML-2010 - you can find a Mac driver for that here [1]. Exxolon (talk) 03:24, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

Wheel warring outside Wikipedia

Is there a phrase used to describe wheel warring outside of Wikipedia, as in two IRC admin kicking and banning each other etc? ----Seans Potato Business 02:31, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

The phrase "wheel war" pre-dates Wikipedia, so you can probably use the same phrase with regards to IRC. Wheel (Unix term) discusses the origins of the phrase. --Tango (talk) 02:51, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

"Can't read from the source file or disk"

I just upgraded to Windows 7, but I am having trouble copying over some large files that I backed up onto an external USB hard drive. The files are completely intact (I can access them as they are on the drive) but when I try to copy them over, I get this error. This only happens with files larger than 100 MB. What's going on? Thanks —Akrabbim^talk 04:22, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

I've got this problem with my one XP Pro computer (so it's not a Win7 problem), but only when the source of the copy (or CAB extract or whatever) is on that computer. It can be a pain to install applications, as I have to "skip" all those 100M files, wait until the application writes to the registry, then copy all the missing files over from another computer. If you have a LAN setup, I suggest copying those USB-HD files to another location, then copying them from there. I would also love to know what causes this (google is no help). Sandman30s (talk) 14:29, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

I have another data point. I thought that I could work around it by using 7-Zip to zip the file into a zip file on my hard drive, and then just unzip it afterwards. However, after about 45 seconds, it fails with the message "Data error: cyclic redundancy check." I get the same error with WinRAR. —Akrabbim^talk 15:34, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

A "cyclic redundancy check" error is an indication that one of your hard drives is failing -- I would run the Windows check disk utility on both of your hard drives and see whether it report any errors. I would highly recommend making an immediate backup of your most important documents and files. Rjwilmsi 22:55, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

Local events only on Facebook news feed

Can I configure my News Feed and Live Feed on Facebook so that events will only appear if they're in a specific city? NeonMerlin 04:45, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

If that city is in your networks you should see a button to the left of the news/live feed with the name of a city. Samineru (talk) 04:25, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

Cannot delete a registry entry for Macrogaming SweetIM

I have XP, including IE8. IOBit Security360 reports that I have SweetIM on my computer. According to the internet SweetIM is difficult to get rid of. It is some intrusive add-on for Messenger, which I never use. In fact when I tried to find Messenger recently in the Programs Menu or Add/Remove Programs I could not (was considering uninstalling it) although FileHippo Update Checker reports that it is still there.

Using Regedit to search for SweetIm and Macrogaming I found an entry "00000..... REG_SZ C:\Program Files\Macrogaming\SweetIM\data\contentdb\cache_indx.dat". However when I deleted it it just returned soon afterwards. The Macrogaming directory in the Program Files does not exist, or at least I cannot see it.

The left hand pane of RegEdit showed a lot of folders with long alphanumeric folder names. I don't knowe what one SweetIM is in, but the section of the registry is Windows\CurrentVersion\Installer\UserData\5-1-5-18\Components\...lots of folders with long alpha-numeric names.

1) How can I remove all traces of SweetIm and Macrogaming from my registry and everywhere else please? 2) If the Macrogaming program files folder is hidden, how can I reveal it please? 89.242.85.95 (talk) 13:20, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

Update: I used Regedit to search for and delete everything in the registry called "sweetie", "sweetim", or "macrogaming"; then used the 2005 freeware program ToolBarCop to remove a SweetIM toolbar and two or three unnamed toolbars (which were probably connected with SweetIM); and then searched through the registry again. It is now fully removed and killed, I hope. 78.146.245.134 (talk) 16:26, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

Dead link to a Sunday Times article

This link to a Sunday Times article titled "Hidden Agenda to IRA hits on drug dealers" from February 1998 seems to be dead. Can anyone help me in finding the text of the article? Stu ^{’Bout ye!} 14:55, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

Might it be the text at the very bottom of http://www.marijuanalibrary.org/980215.html ? - Jarry1250 ^{[Humorous? Discuss.]} 17:16, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

It is, thanks for that. Stu ^{’Bout ye!} 19:51, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

Answerbag has left me and my fellow AB’ers, possibly for Facebook—what am I gonna do?

"So are you leaving or staying on Answerbag?"
http://www.answerbag.com/q_view/1860806
I like a place where one can be anonymous, have multiple accounts, and the questions are always open; one that has minimal advertisements, avatars are big, and glitches are few.
We had that in Answerbag several days ago. Now what?
Civic Cat (talk) 15:28, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

Do you have a question for the Reference Desk? Comet Tuttle (talk) 19:27, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

"what am I gonna do?"
What alternatives to the old Answerbag are there? The Reference Desk seems a good one, but the questions are only open for a week.Civic Cat (talk) 19:30, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

yahoo answers? google answers? I prefer YA but sometimes it feels I have to sift through scores of rubbish before I find a good question... Sandman30s (talk) 22:05, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

For the whole wiki-vibe, there is both WikiAnswers and Wikianswers (aka answers.wikia.com, depending on who you ask). The former from Answers.com, the second from Wikia. -- 128.104.112.87 (talk) 20:36, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

I like forums where you get points for correct answers, like Yahoo! Answers. The Oracle and Adobe forums also give out points, but they're more specialized.--Drknkn (talk) 21:16, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

Freebox box freezes

Not sure if I should post this here or at WP:RD/S but here goes. I've recently obtained a pretty old Freeview box to use at university and it works okay most of the time, giving a clear image with no jumping/freezing of images. However, I notice during adverts or during programmes that feature white backgrounds/overlays, it seems to start jumping the images as if it can't process them in time or something. This only ever happens with white backgrounds, kind of bizarre. It doesn't bother me that much but I'm curious for any explanations! Thanks :) Regards, --—Cyclonenim | Chat  17:47, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

Intermittent Network Problems under Windows 7

Since I upgraded to Windows 7, my internet connection has been inconsistent. It seems that whenever I'm putting a lot of strain my connection (say: even two or three torrents with more than 100 "half-open" connections) it tends to die every 15 to 20 minutes. The network status icon in the system tray goes to the little yellow caution triangle and I no longer have an IP. It usually takes 30-45 seconds for it to come back.

At first I would power-cycle my network hardware during this time, but I soon learned that it took just as long if I just waited. The lights on my router and cable modem seem to continue flashing normally during the 'outage.'

I suspect that it's the number of connections that is causing the problem, not the total bandwidth as I am often able to sustain download speeds of > 1 MBps. The problem could have nothing to do with the number of connections at all, of course. It just feels like it only tends to happen when I am downloading several simultaneous torrents.

My Setup:

Windows 7 Ultimate RTM version 6.1 (Build 7100) (NVidia nForce Networking Controller) The network "Card" is on the system board (Gigabyte something) Dlink DI-524 Router Motorola Cable Modem

Is there a network error log or any other diagnostics anyone could suggest? 174.6.8.42 (talk) 18:00, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

How could my friend do this?

Here is what he wants to do... He'd like to know how he could have a drop down menu, and it would says something like... "Select Theme"... And the drop down would show Spring, Summer, Fall, and Winter. And when someone clicks on one, then clicks the "Apply" button... How would he make it so that it would change the images?

He has his image set currently for winter. So it's in /images/season_winter/ How could he make so that the images change from that to say /images/season_spring/ for spring?Accdude92 (talk to me!) (sign) 19:12, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

You really need to give us more information as to what you are even talking about. Is this a web page? What language is it being developed in? --Mr.98 (talk) 19:25, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

Server-side scripting is the easiest way. Select a theme. Then, on the server side, replace "/images/season_spring/" in all the image addresses to something like "/images/season_".$_GET["season"]."/" (a PHP example). That is one of at least 20 ways that I can think of off the top of my head. The best way is limited to your friend's knowledge. If he doesn't know PHP, then a PHP method is not a good way. -- kainaw™ 19:27, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

Text messages.

Companies, such as the AA, manage to text their customers who don't have the namber saved on their phone and have the phone show the company name and not the number it actually came from. For example, when I called the AA after a breakdown, they texted to say an engineer was on their way - the text showed it was from "<*_AA_>". How is this done? And is there any way I can have my name shown when I text people who don't have my number saved. Thanks in advance. Chocolate muffins in a basket 20:17, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

SMS messages are preceded by a standard GSM SMS message header which contains a TYPE_OF_ADDRESS field. If that's set to b101 the subsequent SERVICE_CENTER_NUMBER is encoded in the default alphabet, which contains digits, letters, punctuation, and a limited number of accented letters. This page shows composing a raw message when connected to a GSM modem with the GSM AT additional command set; if your phone has this feature you may be able to do likewise. Large organisations like the AA get a (almost certainly online) SMS bridging service wholesale, and so inject SMS messages into the network without actually being connected to a GSM modem themselves. Google found this UK company (not a recommendation, just the first thing I found) which allows sending of SMS messages by HTTP, FTP & XML (I rather think by XML they mean SOAP or something SOAPy); one of the features they offer is "Customisable sender ID", which will I'm sure work as above. -- Finlay McWalter • Talk 22:15, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

To give a slightly less technical explanation this is known as spoofing the caller ID. For example using Skype it is possible to register your phone against your Skype account such that SMS messages sent via Skype appear to be from your phone, but the Skype help guide explains that this is done by spoofing the caller ID, and not all networks support this. If the phone is not registered then your Skype username is used instead. Therefore I think you could use Skype, or a similar service, to achieve what you're looking for. Rjwilmsi 23:01, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

AntiMalware malware

There's some malware called AntiMalware that uses the Windows Security Centre symbol, it has downloaded itsself on my computer - I think as i tried to watch 90210 on Megavideo, when I clicked the green play symbol it opened its usual new window for advertising and installed the malware - and now I need to remove it. I have used Add/Remove Programs to remove it, now t still exsts, just Add/Remove Programes can't find it. I have gone to the C Drive, into programe fles and removed the Antimalware folder, but it still lingers on my PC. Please tell me how to get rid of it if you know. Thanks. Chocolate muffins in a basket 21:43, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

Try Malwarebytes. You generally cannot use "Add/Remove Programs" for malware. --Mr.98 (talk) 21:48, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

(ec) Not a computer genius but in the past I've turned off the computer completely and turned it back on. During, the startup process hit F8 and go to "Safe Mode". When the Safe Mode loads up go to the start button (I think that's it) and find the program that will back your computer up to an earlier date. After that, let the computer handle it and the malware should be completely removed plus it saves your money which is alwatys a bonus. ;)--Giants27(Contribs|WP:CFL) 21:49, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

Just run Malwarebytes -- it's free for home users. Rjwilmsi 23:03, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

Mapping Wikipedia

Hi,

For a college computer science project, I would like to generate a map of the english pages on wikipedia, ie what links to what. My code works fine, but I was wondering if Wikipedia has policies specifying the maximum rate I can crawl through the site. I certainly don't wish to do anything against the terms of service, but I couldn't find anything. If this is the wrong section, I would appreciate any info telling me where I should ask!

Thanks, John —Preceding unsigned comment added by Prodigenius (talk • contribs) 23:51, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

The policy is that you should not crawl a large number of Wikipedia pages.

However, you can get what you need more efficiently here : Wikipedia:Database download

Hope this helps. APL (talk) 00:10, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

Note that Wikipedia:Database_download is not policy and you crawl as many wikipedia pages as you like without fear of having your account or ip banned, at least not on the wikipedia level (you might get banned on the server level if you're causing a problems equivalent to a DOS attack) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.43.88.54 (talk) 14:32, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

I doubt that's accurate. I agree your account probably isn't going to be blocked. But it's unlikely you have to reach DOS levels for your IP to be blocked on the server level. If the server admins feel you're hitting the server too hard, even if it isn't really causing problems to end users, they almost definitely have the right to block you. It's their domain and they have eminence and don't need anyone permission to take action they see fit. (I'm sure if you ask the WMF the'll give you a similar answer.) Indeed, if they've already given a warning in an appropriate place or set something up in an established way (e.g. robots.txt) then it's entirely resonable they may block those who ignore it regardless of whether it causes immediate problems. This is the case with all internet servers BTW. Net etiquette of this sort isn't just good practice it's highly advisable. If you annoy server admins don't be surprised if they block you regardless of whether you think you were behaving okay. Ultimately it's their right to manage them as they see fit (i.e. even if they don't warn you they can block you). In some cases they may start to tell people about you or you might even end up on some sort of blocklist and then lots of people will block you. Even worse they may complain to your ISP or perhaps the ISP will notice you're on a block list and then you may even lose your internet service. Worst case scenario the server admins may be able to sue you for the costs you incurred to them.

Speaking from personal experience, I once ran a crawler to keep a personal copy of a website (www.pricespy.co.nz) because I was annoyed at the time it didn't have a way for me to check price histories other then the most recent (now it does but has other issues). (Archive.org does index it but it's obviously at least 6 months old and was even worse at the time because they were having issues I think.) Anyway I chose a well behave bot ([[Heritrix] IIRC)and set it up to crawl at what I felt was a slow pace (I was using a 2mb down, 128k up connection so was limited in what I can do and it was already a very popular site so it wasp probably unlikely I could do much to it) and I only ran it at offpeak times (partially because I had extra ISP data quotas at those times). And this was local traffic obviously. I ensured it obeyed robots.txt and I set up an appropriate user agent ID with IIRC a contact e-mail (but no webpage explaining what it was for). I ran it perhaps once every 2 days IIRC (perhaps a bit extreme I admit) indexing I think hundreds of pages (no media I think). In other words I was careful to try an ensure my bot behaved resonably. But after a few days I thought the website was down since I kept getting I think a blank page. Eventually after a week or two I worked out it wasn't (accessed it from another place) so realised I must have been blocked. So I emailed the server owner mentioning that I realised I had probably been blocked, explaining that I had been running a bot and why, apologising for any problems caused and promising not to do it again etc. I was unblocked and told not to run it again which I didn't.

In the WMF case I suspect they'll be much more generous. If you obey robots.txt and any instructions in the appropriate pages you'll be fine. If they do have problems and you've provided a way to contact you they may or perhaps they'll just modify the robots.txt to block your bot (and presuming your bot is obeying it, only your bot will be blocked). I suspect blocking your IP will only come if you're ignoring robots.txt or they can't find a way to contact you or block your bot specifically. Note that the robots.txt specifically says they may block you Nil Einne (talk) 19:26, 17 December 2009 (UTC)

For questions on Wikipedia specifically, the Wikipedia:Help desk is a good place to ask - more people who know the technical details and minutiae of Wikipedia hang out there than do here. -- 128.104.112.87 (talk) 20:32, 16 December 2009 (UTC)