Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Computing/2012 July 25

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July 25

Verifying Android app publishers

Hi, at the Android market, or Play or whatever it's now called, the apps' publishers are all listed under the app name, but how do I know that these are genuine? For example, if I see the publisher "XYZ Inc.", then XYZ Inc. may be a company that I know and trust, but how do I know that this is the "real" XYZ Inc. and not someone masquerading as them? Who does that checking, and is it reliable? 86.129.16.51 (talk) 02:25, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

There is hardly any checking. You give Google your $25, think up a name, and you're in. (In contrast, Apple requires developers to send in some proof of (corporate) identity) Unilynx (talk) 06:45, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

So I could pay $25 and publish apps under the name Adobe, for example? 86.128.4.88 (talk) 11:40, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

You could try, but Adobe would certainly protest~this trade mark infringment. OsmanRF34 (talk) 12:16, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

But only if after they noticed or found out, and even then such things can take ages to resolve. Meanwhile, there could be a fake app that purported to be from Adobe sitting there for weeks? So basically I can't trust any publisher names on the Google app store? When it says "Adobe" or "BBC", or any other well-known name, the app could actually be made by any impersonator, assuming the peeople impersonated have not yet noticed and managed to successfully go through the process of trying to get someone to remove it? 86.128.4.88 (talk) 13:23, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

I would personally suspect Google to have some sort of automated process to weed out the odd names, because that's what they're good at (automating everything to avoid the need for human intervention) - hopefully they block auto-approval but forward to the relevant department any attempt to "use a company name where any part of the name matches a .com name in our top 10000 of sites", which should probably block your attempt from signing up as Adobe Inc. But if even the SSL certificate providers can't get the process of vetting people right [1], I definitely would view a mostly-automated system like Google Play's developer approval with suspicion. Unilynx (talk) 17:15, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

I somewhat doubt it will take ages once someone in BBC or Adobe or some other well known name takes action. On the other hand, if you have a company and fairly worldwide trademark for IP86Anon for selling computer software or portable devicxe applications and someone uses your company's name on Google Play, I wouldn't be surprised if it does take ages. Nil Einne (talk) 04:00, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

ISO = VMware?

If some software (Backtrack, for example) is offered in an ISO version and a VMware version to download, can you just download the ISO and use it through VirtualBox? OsmanRF34 (talk) 12:12, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

If you mean .iso extension, no it's not vmware, iso it's just the image of a CD, see ISO_image — Preceding unsigned comment added by 65.49.68.173 (talk) 13:20, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

I just wanted to know if they are equivalent. Now it's clear that VMware have its own file format. But I can run this ISO through VMware?OsmanRF34 (talk) 15:46, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

Virtualbox supports the .vmdk format which VMware uses, so you should be able to use both the ISO and the VMware version with virtualbox. You would need to create a new virtual machine and have it use the .vmdk file as its hard disk. AvrillirvA (talk) 15:34, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

Why does VMware have its own file format? Isn't the program meant to mount ISOs? Wouldn't issuing an ISO be always the best choice? If you don't have VMware or prefer to use Virtualbox or prefer to run it from the live CD, the ISO would work just fine. OsmanRF34 (talk) 15:51, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

VMware does mount ISOs, but .vmdk is a different format. An ISO is a CD image, but .vmdk is a hard drive image. The .vmdk is presumably for testing how the OS behaves when installed to a hard disk, which is different from running it as a live CD. They are offering both the ISO and the VMware version, so if you don't need the VMware version then just use the ISO, it will still work in VMware AvrillirvA (talk) 16:23, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

They are different things.

The VMware version is a complete installation of Backtrack in a VMware virtual machine (done by someone else). If you have the VMware product installed, you can then bring it up and running with the minimum fuss, without having to do any installation, although you will be stuck (maybe at first) with the virtual hardware configuration and OS configuration that the person who created it decided on when they installed it.

With the ISO version, you will need to do your own installation whether on real or virtual hardware. You then get to choose all the settings (language, keyboard, disk partitioning, and so on). It will take a lot longer to get going but might be more suited to your intended purpose. Additionally, some virtulization software is able to mount an ISO file as if it was an optical drive; otherwise you will need a disk burner to create the physical optical media.

Astronaut (talk) 17:23, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

What is this bar?

When you type

 lspci -v | grep Network

in Linux, how do you call this |? OsmanRF34 (talk) 16:33, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

The vertical bar is generally known as a "pipe"; see pipeline (Unix). Incidentally, you've been asking a lot of questions -- could you try to limit yourself to one or two per day, please? Looie496 (talk) 16:37, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

What are you talking about? Can't you count? Just look at my contribution and you'll discover that if I ask 1 or 2 questions/day that would INCREASE the number of question that I'm asking. If you don't feel like answering there is no need to it. Besides that, you should know by now that such comments belong on talk pages. OsmanRF34 (talk) 16:49, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

"...that would INCREASE the number of question that I'm asking..." :D Try taking a look at the "advanced bash scripting guide"[tldp.org/LDP/abs/abs-guide.pdf][tldp.org/LDP/abs/html/]. I found it awfully useful as a beginners (:P) guide too. It has detailed explanations, exercises and examples. "The linux documentation project" has several other good guides too.Staticd (talk) 05:01, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

32/64 bit problem when running an ASP.NET web application in Microsoft IIS

I faced an interesting problem today at work. I had been developing an ASP.NET web application on Windows 7 on a 64-bit computer. When running the web application directly from Visual Studio, everything worked fine, but when I installed it under Microsoft IIS and accessed it from there, I got an error about an invalid architecture or something. It turned out that setting "Allow 32-bit Applications" to True in the application pool properties in Microsoft IIS solved the problem. I thought that this was because the web application was 32-bit code, but the computer was 64-bit, so IIS had been set to run 64-bit code by default. But now my coworker said that it's not because of that, .NET code should be compiled to MSIL and run under an MSIL interpreter, so it should be bitness-agnostic. He said that the reason was that a server process, which the web application communicates with through WCF, is 32-bit code, because it calls Managed C++ libraries compiled as 32-bit code, which in turn call Windows native C++ libraries. But isn't WCF communication simply sending SOAP messages through TCP? There isn't a direct procedure call involved anywhere. This way the client and server processes can even be on separate computers. What is the reason here? JIP | Talk 18:06, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

Windows seven start menu replacement

I replaced my old XP machine with a Windows 7 box about six months ago. I'm mostly happy with it, many improvements, but I sorely miss the user-customizable XP start menu, i.e. being able to edit the Start-menu folder, and create a logical folder hierarchy with links to the applications that I have installed. It is especially those applications that I use rarely that are difficult to locate in the "improved" start-menu. Now I have to resort to creating a folder on the desktop with subfolders "Audio", "Graphics", "Internet", etc., with links to the applications. I've tried to find out if it is possible to activate this functionality in Win 7, and the answer apparently is "No": In this thread, Microsoft support engineer Diana D says that "Unfortunately, there is no way that you can customize the Start Menu in Windows 7 to have Windows XP like functionality".

My question: is anyone aware of an application that can be installed in the system tray or pinned to the taskbar, which implements XP-like start menu functionality? Thanks, --NorwegianBlue ^talk 18:11, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

I use and recommend Classic Shell. -- BenRG (talk) 18:44, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

Thanks a lot, BenRG. I'm setting up my start menu now, and like the solutions for some other minor annoyances too (like no longer needing to tap the alt key to see the toolbar in windows explorer). Much appreciated! --NorwegianBlue ^talk 21:08, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

I'm surprised at the answer you have got. Windows 7, like XP, has got 2 start menus laid over one another - one for the currently logged in user and one for 'all users'. In XP these were in 'c:\documents and settings\<user>\start menu\' and 'c:\documents and settings\all users\start menu\' (I think ... working from memory here). On Windows 7 the user's menu is at 'C:\Users\<user>\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu' while the all user's menu is at 'C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu'. On XP anyone can edit anything by default. On Windows 7 you need admin rights to modify the all users menu. Many applications install their menu entry in the all users menu so everyone who uses the computer can access it. Windows Vista (and subsequently 7) introduced a fixed panel that you initially see when you click the start button, but you can modify what you see in there too by adding and removing (or pinning and unpinning) items, and there are settings to modify how many entries are shown and what other things are visible (links to control panel, documents, etc.). Pretty flexible in my opinion. Astronaut (talk) 19:05, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

Astronaut, I think you may have misread my question. BenRG gave precise answer to my question, with a solution that was better than anything I had hoped for! -NorwegianBlue ^talk 08:51, 27 July 2012 (UTC)

Sorry you thought that. I did read your question and I understood you asked about modifying the start menu. I was surprised someone suggested additional software when I think similar functionality is already present in Windows 7. For example, my own Windows Vista machine has a highly customised start menu grouping programs into menu folders such as "software development", "media tools", "internet", and so on. The Windows 7 PC I use at work, also has a customised start menu. Both use the Aero skin, but I assumed you already knew about the "windows classic" theme since it was mentioned in the Microsoft Answers forum page you linked. And all that is available without downloading some other software, it is just that maybe it doesn't go far enough towards being XP like for your tastes. Oh well, never mind. Astronaut (talk) 16:12, 27 July 2012 (UTC)

My apologies, what I was asking about is exactly what you describe. When using the Win 7 start menu, I have ended up writing the beginning of the name of the application in the text box, and following the links that appear. That is, if they appear, and if I remember the name of the application I installed two months ago, and only have used a couple of times. When clicking the "All programs" item above the text box, the menu (pinnable items) is replaced with a scrollable list which is a mess of directories and root-level links to programs. I realize now, after a (perhaps temporary) uninstall of the program BenRG suggested, that the list is a tree control, and that modifications I made with the ClassicShell program still are there, now as part of a tree control instead of nested menus. I was under the impression that modifying the "All programs" list was not possible with Win 7, and interpreted the Microsoft answer I linked to as a confirmation of that. I shall explore this a little further, before I decide if I need the additional software, or if Win 7 does what I need. Thanks! --NorwegianBlue ^talk 20:02, 27 July 2012 (UTC)

aa3

Will aa3 run on win 7 64-bit with intel pentium 2.7 ghz and 5 mbo/s internet and intel HD graphics card.TheAnnoymousUser (talk) 18:15, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

Presuming you mean America's Army 3, you can find the system requirements at http://www.americasarmy.com/support/requirements_aa3.php. Looie496 (talk) 18:35, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

HTC Rhyme browser?

What's the... I dunno, "platform," I guess, of the default browser (entitled "Internet") that comes with the HTC Rhyme? It supports WikEd, if that helps at all. - Purplewowies (talk) 21:00, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

The Rhyme runs Android, and that article describes the standard Android browser as "based on the open-source WebKit layout engine, coupled with Chrome's V8 JavaScript engine." One might be tempted to call that "Mobile Chrome", but Google also has (on Google Play) a full Chrome for Android. So if one wanted to characterise the standard browser, I think the best one can say is WebKit+V8. -- Finlay McWalterჷTalk 21:06, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

Thanks! - Purplewowies (talk) 03:31, 29 July 2012 (UTC)