Free book of the day: Essentials of Metaheuristics

Here’s a cool free book for those like me that love messing in the metaheuristics world.

.NET OpenID

Here’s a cool library: DotNetOpenAuth:

This C# library adds OpenID 2.0 Provider and Relying Party, OAuth Consumer and Service Provider, and InfoCard Selectorsupport to your web site both programmatically and through convenient drop-in ASP.NET controls. Use as much or little of the functionality as you want.

Download it now

Download the latest version

or Get the latest source

All downloads include both the library, samples, and tools to help you get started.

We use GIT for source control, click here to find out more

Features

• Compiled library that adds support for your site visitors to login with their OpenIDs by just dropping an ASP.NET control onto your page. It's that easy. An AJAX-style login control is also included for a slick, streamlined user experience.
• Give your site members their own OpenIDs with the provider support included in this library.
• Sample relying party and provider web sites show you just how to do it.
• Easy access to all the functionality so you can customize how OpenID will operate on your site, whether you use ASP.NET or not.
• Classic ASP support
• Full support for custom extensions. Plus built-in support for Simple Registration, Attribute Exchange and PAPE.
• Works in partial trusted shared hosting environments.
• Support for web farms where state persistence, front-facing web servers and ASP.NET may not be standard or even available.
• OpenID 2.0 and 1.x
• OAuth 1.0 and 1.0a
• Superior support for multi-byte Unicode identifiers.
• Lots of security features
• 490+ unit tests to verify correctness.
• Library behind the OSIS OpenID interop testing
• About 1500 downloads per month. See who's using DotNetOpenAuth

Google Chrome just got fatter

Yeap, Google Chrome now has extensions! We can say bye bye to the minimalist approach, but hello to many goodies.

Here are some of the most popular extensions – yes, there’s a basic ad blocker:

Google Mail Checker

(698)

-  115,343 users

Displays the number of unread messages in your Google Mail inbox. You can also click the button to...

AdThwart

(327)

-  70,693 users

Blocks ads on websites. Includes the EasyList ad filter list as of 9 Dec 2009.

Google Translate

(180)

-  69,760 users

This extension translates entire webpages into a language of your choice with one click. By the...

RSS Subscription Extension

(227)

-  49,322 users

Adds one-click subscription to your toolbar

Google Wave Notifier

(123)

-  37,235 users

Displays number of unread Waves.

Xmarks for Chrome Beta

(211)

-  35,478 users

Xmarks for Chrome Beta is a beta preview of Xmarks for Chrome

 

Please note: you’ll have to install version 4 beta.

Windows 7 Sensor and Location Platform Overview

Uau, I want to play with this!

The Windows Sensor and Location platform, new for Windows 7, enables your computer and applications to adapt to their current environment. With location sensors -- including GPS devices, WWAN radios, and even triangulation technology -- your applications and gadgets can know exactly where they are, enabling them to provide more locally relevant content and functionality. Join Dan Polivy, Gavin Gear, product team PMs, and Yochay Kiriaty, Technical Evangelist, as they explain what the Windows 7 Sensor and Location platform is, what underlying architecture supports its functionality, and how developers can take advantage of this new and exciting platform.

 

Installing ESXi 4.0

Here are my notes on my last ESXi installation:

1. Download and burn CD from VMWare – the Dell customized version for a PowerEdge 2950

OPTIONAL BINARY
VMware ESXi 4.0 with Dell Customization
Version 4.0.0 | 181792 - 08/07/09
Binary (.iso) (417 MB)
Image for ESXi Installable that includes Dell customization.
md5sum: 0ff898e830a095abb2275181175e065e

2. Installing ESXi

Not much to say here. Basically set the password and configured the 1st network adapter.

3. Activated SSH (here’s where I’ve learned about this)

• At the console, hit ALT-F1
• type unsupported and hit <enter> (NOTE: you won’t see what your typing until you hit enter…)
• login
• edit /etc/inetd.conf
• uncomment the ssh line
• restart the services (services.sh restart)

We can now get the hell out of the datacenter :)

 

4. Install vSphere client

• HTTP the server, downloaded and installed vSphere client to my workstation
• On Windows 7 you have to fix it. Here the long and the short version

 

5. Install ftp server (here’s where I’ve learned about this)

• Downloaded OEM.tgz
• Uploaded to the datastore using the datastore browser
• On an SSH session, copied it to /bootbank/oem.tgz
• Added to /etc/inetd.conf:
• ftp stream tcp nowait root /usr/sbin/proftpd proftpd
• Reboot

And there you go, you’ve got an ftp server on your ESXi! For client ESXi has native support as:

• wget: wget ftp://user:password@source_ESXi_IP/path/file
• ftpput & ftpget

 

6. Install some precious tooling

• Your favorite ftp client
• VMWare Converter

 

Please remember:

• by default, VMWare Converter chooses flat files
• after uploading to the server your VMWare Server or Player versions, you’ll have to convert it: vmkfstools -d thin -i source.vmdk destination.vmdk.

 

Thanks for the support Rasteiro :)