Opportunistic locking is part of the Windows client file caching mechanism. Samba implements opportunistic locking as a server-side component of the client caching mechanism. Samba/CIFS doesn’t play nice with NFS, so if you’re in a mixed environment where some windows machines access and modify the same files that Linux or Solaris touch through NFS, then disable the oplocks. This is important for things like database files to avoid corruption!

After your done building your wx objects and you’re ready to show it and call MainLoop(), wrap your main loop where you actually instantiate your gui objects in try/accept statements so that you can really catch any errors by calling the “show_errors()” function to launch a new message window where the errors will get displayed. This lets you catch errors before your whole program dies (causing errors to get lost).

Tail a file in Python

def tail( f, window=20 ):
f.seek( 0, 2 )
bytes= f.tell()
size= window
block= -1
while size > 0 and bytes+block*1024 > 0:
…

Tools such as language, and then the written alphabet are now taken for granted, and we see no problem with relying on these tools, and being dependent on them to live. The next step in this evolution may involve encompassing everything around us into the Internet. But where’s the privacy, and why doesn’t the idea of losing all control of privacy scare the jeebies out of everyone?

Microsoft built 7 from the ground up to be a secure computing environment and retained the key security features that helped protect Vista, such as Kernel Patch Protection, Data Execution Prevention, Address Space Layout Randomization, and Mandatory Integrity Levels, but Windows Vista and Windows XP are equally at risk to viruses and exploits and overall Vista brings only marginal security advantages over XP. Net gain, zero.

I didn’t find a glade template for this one, but I’m starting to lean away from using a gui builder. It seems more trouble than it’s worth.

I like wxPython a lot more than the other gui tooltkits i’ve tried. I’m finding it really easy to keep it from getting cluttered, and it’s easy to pick up and run with, but there’s some demo’s like this one below, that i’ve seen in various forms all over the place now, that I think are a waste of time. Why would you have a app that has nothing but a menu bar? You wouldn’t, so doesn’t it make sense to get the confusing parts of gui code out of the way? Namely, layout and events.

The Uruguay programme has cost the state $260 (£159) per child, including internet connections, equipment repairs, maintenance costs, and training for the teachers, but the extent to which they use the laptops in the classroom is up to them. Meanwhile, pilot programs in Ethiopia with the OLPC XO laptop are stalling. Teachers resent the device and consider it a toy.

The one microsoft application I always come back to because it’s actually the best offering in its field is Visio. There are replacements, but they don’t fill in any missing gaps or fix broken functionality - they’re just replacements. There is, however, one thing missing from my Visio, and that’s being able to share it easily.

I joke, I joke, but what will they do? Perhaps it will just mean an even cheaper price point as microsoft takes a loss like they did with the original Xbox. When netbooks first came out, they only ran Linux, and microsoft got scared and changed their mind about ditching XP. It’s too bad the consumer demand for XP over Vista never influenced their decision. That would be out of character for microsoft.