How To Play DIVX / XVID On Android 4.3 / 4.2.2 On Google Nexus 7 Tablet – VLC Media Player For Android In US United States North America – MediaHouse UPNP DLNA Browser

VLC Media Player is currently one of the most popular and versatile media players on many platforms, and now that includes Android 4.2 or less (your results may vary with Android 4.3, although VLC v1.3 seems to be working acceptably now). Just be aware these releases are in BETA, and can be obtained via the Google Play Store. That is, with one caveat – you can’t get it in North America (Canada, United States, Mexico, etc).

However, if you are willing to risk a potentially less stable build, and are handy enough to understand how to change a security setting temporarily, you can manually download one of VideoLan’s “Nightly Build” copies of VLC Media Player for Android.

To do this, you must perform the following steps:
1) First you must go to your Android device’s SETTINGS>SECURITY(‘Personal’ group)>UNKNOWN SOURCES option and turn it on. 
2) Open your Android device’s browser, and browse to  http://nightlies.videolan.org/build/armv7-android/  NOTE:  the Google Nexus 7 has an ARM7 instruction set NVidia Tegra 3 processor – other devices may require the ARM6 package!
3) Select one of the build entries – generally the most recent one will be at the bottom of the list, for example today’s most recent is named VLC-debug-20130726-1426.apk. It will download the file, but not install it. Select your downloaded file from the status panel when it completes.
4) If prompted for the application to use against the file, select the Google Package Installer, click the JUST ONCE button, and let it install.
5) If prompted, decide if you want to let Google ‘periodically check your files’ for suspicious activity or something like that.
6) Lastly, you must go back to your Android device’s SETTINGS>SECURITY(‘Personal’ group)>UNKNOWN SOURCES option and turn it back off.

Once installed, you can find the VLC player icon in the main icons screen, but it did not load onto the home screen for me. Also, when playing video files from the file explorer or from launcher applications, it may now prompt you to select between the Android Video Player or VLC – I suggest using the JUST ONCE option for VLC until it comes out of Beta testing.

Also – another fun App to install is the DLNA on Android application MediaHouse UPnP / DLNA Browser found here:
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.dbapp.android.mediahouse&hl=en
This will allow you to stream content from any device on your home network that is set up to share. Works beautifully! And with VLC on your Android, it should play virtually everything now!

Advertisements

Microsoft Visual Studio 2012 Update 3 Is Out!

Update 3 is provided as Knowledge Base item KB2835600.
Link: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2835600

What’s in this update:
Improvements –
Team Foundation Server

• Build settings can be preserved when you upgrade a TFS 2012 instance.
• Improvements are made in the New Build Definition UI for the Continuous Integration (CI) build in Git-based team projects.

Issue Fixes in categories –

Windows 8.1 compatibility issues
Visual Studio 2012 and Visual Studio 2013 Preview roundtrip
Debugger
Visual Studio IDE
Windows Form
C++
LightSwitch
Visual Studio Test
F#
Team Foundation Server
Web Tools
Office Collaboration
Team Explorer
Windows and Connected Application Tools
Portable Library
Profiler
Help Viewer

Solutions To Two Microsoft Visual Studio 2012 Errors: (1) This version of SQL Server Data Tools is not compatible with the database runtime components installed on this computer. An incompatible DacFx version is installed. – and – (2) WebForms UnobtrusiveValidationMode requires a ScriptResourceMapping for ‘jquery’. Please add a ScriptResourceMapping named jquery(case-sensitive).

I wanted to share the solutions to two frequently encountered errors for ASP.Net developers using the Microsoft Visual Studio 2012 development environment:

Error 1:
This version of SQL Server Data Tools is not compatible with the database runtime components installed on this computer
[followed by]
An incompatible DacFx version is installed

Solution 1:
The only way I was able to resolve this was by upgrading to the latest version of both Sql Server Data Tools (SSDT) and DACFx via the following links (the main MSDN links didn’t fix it for me – same problem persisted):
SSDT: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/data/hh297027
DacFx: http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=35756

Error 2:
WebForms UnobtrusiveValidationMode requires a ScriptResourceMapping for ‘jquery’. Please add a ScriptResourceMapping named jquery(case-sensitive).

Solution 2:
First, understand that  UnobtrusiveValidationMode means that the scripting logic for the validation controls is utilized from the server versus in-page scripting. This means you must have the server side script paths defined within your Web application.
However, there are two ways to fix this. Either add the server side script paths, or you can simply turn off unobtrusive validation and utilize the all-client-side in-page (obtrusive) validation scripting.
(1) Adding the jquery script path:
Add the following (Visual Basic .Net code) to your application’s Global.asax class/file (if missing, right-click your web project in Solution Explorer and select ADD>NEW ITEM>select WEB>select GLOBAL APPLICATION CLASS to add it) in the Application_Start event handler:
C#:
ScriptManager.ScriptResourceMapping.AddDefinition(“jquery”, new ScriptResourceDefinition
{
     Path = “~/scripts/jquery-1.7.2.min.js”,
     DebugPath = “~/scripts/jquery-1.7.2.min.js”,
     CdnPath = “http://ajax.aspnetcdn.com/ajax/jQuery/jquery-1.4.1.min.js”,
     CdnDebugPath = “http://ajax.aspnetcdn.com/ajax/jQuery/jquery-1.4.1.js”
});
VB:
Dim oSRD As New ScriptResourceDefinition
With oSRD
     .Path = “~/scripts/jquery-1.7.2.min.js”
     .DebugPath = “~/scripts/jquery-1.7.2.min.js”
     .CdnPath = “http://ajax.aspnetcdn.com/ajax/jQuery/jquery-1.4.1.min.js”
     .CdnDebugPath = “http://ajax.aspnetcdn.com/ajax/jQuery/jquery-1.4.1.js”
End With
ScriptManager.ScriptResourceMapping.AddDefinition(“jquery”, oSRD)

(2) Disable UnobtrusiveValidationMode –
Add the following to your application’s Web.Config file:
<add key=”ValidationSettings:UnobtrusiveValidationMode” value=”None” />

Happy coding!

Access & Format EXT2 or EXT3 File System From Windows (XP Vista 7 8) Directly – Free & WITHOUT Using a Boot Disc! (For USB Flash Drive On Asus RT-N56U)

Those of you utilizing Asus‘ fantastic RT-N56U wireless router for a file / media  server via the 2 USB ports and flash drives are aware that you have few options if your flash drives are >32gb and you run Windows 7 as your primary OS on your main PC or laptop.

While the Asus router does recognize the NTFS file system, I’ve found it to be a VERY buggy experience with files frequently becoming corrupt and the media server often failing to index newly added files. Windows 7 GUI does not provide the FAT32 file system as another drive format option, opting instead for the exFAT file format (enhanced / extended FAT file system not subject to the FAT32 32gb limitation). But the exFAT file system is apparently not supported or recognized by the Asus router as of firmware version 3.0.0.4.360.

So what to do? Well, since the kernel of the Asus router OS is a flavor of Unix, it will recognize the EXT2 and EXT3 file systems without a hitch. But Windows does not have built-in support for the file system, and cannot read, write or format the implementation. This is where 2 products come in to save the day!

The first – a free open-source EXT2 / EXT3 Windows driver for reading these file systems like any other NTFS or FAT drive you add to your Windows machine – EXT2FSD ( http://www.ext2fsd.com/ ). With this driver added, and after a reboot, you can plug in an EXT2 or EXT3 formatted flash drive and start reading / writing files straight away. However, the ability to format a flash drive – WITHOUT EXITING WINDOWS AND USING A BOOT DISC – comes from a second product. EaseUS‘s Partition Master software ( http://www.partition-tool.com/personal.htm ) performs the EXT2/3 formatting right from the Windows application, and the functionality exists in their Freeware version too!

Between these two free tools, you can quickly get your >32gb drives (or smaller too for that matter) formatted to the best file system for your Asus RT-N56U router. Good luck!

Microsoft SQL Server 2008 SQL Quirk – When Using TOP 1 In Query With Correlated Subquery

I found this quirk in Microsoft SQL Server 2008 T-SQL tonight – thought I’d pass it along to spare you the grief it gave me for nearly 2 hours:

SELECT TOP 1 CAST(ad.id_acct_biztax_detail AS INTEGER) AS id_acct_biztax_detail

      ,ad.dte_due_taxes

      ,ad.dte_received

      ,(SELECT SUM((ad2.amt_due_regular_tax + ad2.amt_due_excess_tax) –(ad2.amt_paid_regular_tax + ad2.amt_paid_excess_tax))

                  FROM tb_acct_biztax_detail ad2

                  WHERE ad.id_acct_biztax_detail IN(ad2.id_acct_biztax_detail, ad2.num_return)) AS amt_bal_tax1

FROM tb_acct_biztax_detail ad

WHERE ad.id_acct_biztax_detail = @id_acct_biztax_detail

I was expecting the inner subquery to return 600 (amt_bal_tax1) for ID 1027409, but it was returning 0.
What I found was the TOP 1 limiter on the outer query was also limiting the inner query by default.
To get around it, you can tack on your own arbitrary TOP [n] to the inner correlated subquery:
,(SELEC TOP 50 SUM((ad2.amt_due_regular_tax + ad2.amt_due_excess_tax) –(ad2.amt_paid_regular_tax + ad2.amt_paid_excess_tax))

                  FROM tb_acct_biztax_detail ad2

                  WHERE ad.id_acct_biztax_detail IN(ad2.id_acct_biztax_detail, ad2.num_return)) AS amt_bal_tax1

There is probably a better way to approach the issue – maybe a server variable setting or something – but for the moment I’ve burned out on the issue and haven’t the energy to go through MSDN or Google right now.

Java Update 21 For Version 7 SE Breaks Palo Alto / Cisco Network Systems Net Connect / NetConnect & Global Desktop / GlobalDesktop VPN Products With Unknown Compatibility Issue | UPDATE: Fixed With Java 7 Update 25!

UPDATE 7/6/2013: This issue has been resolved with Java 7 update 25!

The recent Java 7 Update 21 has some form of change that interferes with the functioning of Palo Alto / Cisco Systems NetConnect & GlobalDesktop products.

I had uninstalled all previous versions of Java and also uninstalled NetConnect, which removes the PAN Service and the desktop shortcut. When I updated the Java Virtual Machine to version 7 Update 21 Build 11 ( B11 ), the installer .msi would no longer extract properly (would create the installer msi but with a file size of 0kb) and an error “could not extract installer msi: null” would pop up.

The only way around this was to remove update 21 and go back to the previous public Java 7 release of update 17, which Oracle foolishly removed from their website but is thankfully still available from OldApps.Com:

Java 7 update 17 32-bit (x86 / i586): http://www.oldapps.com/java.php?old_java=11930
Java 7 Update 17 64-bit (x64): http://www.oldapps.com/java.php?old_java=11931

Hopefully either Oracle or Palo Alto will identify what the compatibility issue is and get it resolved soon.

Visual Source Safe VSS ‘ Show Differences ‘ Function Not Work – Says ” Binary Files Differ “

This “Binary Files Differ” error/message was annoying the heck out of me, but I had been able to fix it by checking out the the offending file, opening it in TEXTPAD and saving it as format PC / ANSI, then checking it back in.

Even this work-around, however, had failed to fix one file this past week so I had to dig further. I’ve finally located an answer / fix:

“Visual source safe doesn’t always recognize text file types properly. when checking-in files using ‘auto‘ type — it treats them as binary.

“So when you compare two .sql files you might see ‘binary files differ‘ — and nothing more. (that’s how vss treats binary files).

“The solution is to change the file type using the properties context menu for the file in source safe. Change the type to text, you should be able to perform the visual comparison. You can also click on the ‘advanced’ option when checking-in the file, and manually change the selection to ‘text‘ then.

“To avoid in the future – you can add file type settings under the options menu in visual source safe, to set the default behavior for various file types there.”