Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Computing/2008 September 25

= September 25 =

Temporarily disabling Spotlight
I use OS X 10.4. I've found that when I use some (actually very memory intensive) applications, specifically FinalCut Pro, my Mac decides that I'm not doing anything of consequence and starts to index things with Spotlight, sometimes hogging +90% of the CPU resources. Of course this drive me bananas since what I'm actually doing (watching video and figuring out where to cut it into little pieces) is quite intensive and having it occasionally be jerky on account of Spotlight is a little ridiculous.

Is there any way that I can selectively disable Spotlight? On Google most of the results I've found are about totally disabling it all the time and often about deleting your Spotlight cache. That's not what I want -- I just want to be able to turn it off for an hour here or there while I am doing something that I don't want disturbed by its little "mdimport" process.

Any thoughts? --98.217.8.46 (talk) 00:22, 25 September 2008 (UTC)

gave me this website. Does it help any? Kushal (talk) 19:59, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

Cat5 to fiber optic to cat5
Hello. I have difficult residential internet installation I’m struggling with. My wireless service provider only has cat5 cable installs and needs to have “line of sight” to get a signal. Well, in order for me to get “line of sight” I have to run the cat5 cable about 340 feet. I’m not only too far for cat5 to work but I have to run through woods full of wildlife that like to chew on it. Is it possible to start with cat5 at the antenna, switch to fiber optic for the long distance and the back to cat5 into the computer? Wiini (talk) 00:31, 25 September 2008 (UTC)


 * It appears you are mixing things up in your description. "Line of sight" is used in wireless connections.  Cat5 is a cable.  So, it sounds like you have a wireless connection about 340 feet from your house and there is a Cat5 cable running from the wireless tower to your house.  If so, this is a terrible design.  Cat5 begins to lose dependability beyond 300 feet.  However, that are solutions.  You can get a Cat5-to-fiber converter.  They are common (and not extremely cheap).  The catch is that fiber cable is prone to cracking if twisted, bend, stepped on, driven over, etc... It isn't as bad as it was back in the early 90s (when it would crack just because it didn't like the way you looked at it).  But, it is still more fragile than a wire.  Another solution is to use a repeater at the tower.  Repeat the signal, wirelessly, to your house.  At your house, begin the cat5.  You will be using a short-range wireless signal, which can be blocked, but isn't truly line-of-sight.  Best of all, the animals can't chew on the wireless signal. -- k a i n a w &trade; 01:48, 25 September 2008 (UTC)


 * To use fibre optic fibre, you need a pair of fiber optic transceivers. These will cost about $300 each, but at 100 meg you can have a range of 2000 meters. And of course you will need power to operate them. For the one out in the woods, this could cost more than the pricey transceiver. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 02:49, 25 September 2008 (UTC)


 * Why bother with such a complicated set up? Unless I'm mistaken (and supported by wikipedia articles) properly constructed ethernet cabling should work up to 100 metres total (given that you will usually add patch cables, the distance of the permanent cabling is often limited to 90 metres according to Category 5 but the total distance allowed should still be 100 metres). 340 feet is slightly over that but according to ethernet over twisted pair with high quality cabling you can generally get away with 150 metres particularly for 10BASE-T. So you could probably get away with keeping it completely passive particularly as I doubt your wireless internet connection is going to be faster then 10BASE-T so you can just limit it to that (although I suspect 100BASE-TX should be fine). Since this is a residential connection, I would say it doesn't really matter if you're breaking the spec if it works. If it doesn't work or you don't want to go this route, you could just install a ethernet repeater (or a switch) somewhere along the loop to ensure neither segment is longer then 100 metres (remember it could be something like 70+35). You will need to find a way to protect and power the repeater (which shouldn't be that hard, I'm sure I've heard of people putting switches [and APs] on rooftops and stuff before) but I personally suspect it'll be cheaper then adding fibre to the mix. If we were talking about over 200 metres say, looking at fibre may start to make sense. Nil Einne (talk) 09:51, 26 September 2008 (UTC)


 * One very good reason you might want to go optical is for lightning protection. In my area, if I were to run a copper cable 340 feet through my woods, I'd be just begging for a lightning strike to fry my equipment sometime over the course of maybe ten years or so. (Remember, the strike doesn't have to be close; lightning discharges can induce current over a wide area and also travel in the ground in rather willy-nilly, unpredictable ways.) But if I ran optical cable, I'd be relatively safe from that hazard. Outside, over that sort of distance, I'd definitely go optical or wireless.


 * Atlant (talk) 12:00, 28 September 2008 (UTC)

problem in running a software
whenever I try to run a software(newton) a message appear "msvcp71.dll is not found".also when I try to run an other software (springcharts) a message appear" msvcr71.dll is not found .please install java 1.5" .plz tell me what is java 1.5 and how i can istall it from internet. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Khubab (talk • contribs) 01:34, 25 September 2008 (UTC)


 * You need the Java Runtime Environment. You can download it from http://www.java.com . &mdash; QuantumEleven 09:01, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

Replacing long string of if/thens in VB.Net?
There's certainly a more elegant way to convert named-months to numbered-months than the following: Dim Number As String If Month.Text = "January" Then Number = "01" End If       If Month.Text = "February" Then Number = "02" End If       If Month.Text = "March" Then Number = "03" End If       If Month.Text = "April" Then Number = "04" End If       If Month.Text = "May" Then Number = "05" End If (etc) What exactly would this more elegant manner be? ("Month" is a ComboBox control in DropDownList style) Badger Drink (talk) 05:11, 25 September 2008 (UTC)


 * Have you tried a DateTimePicker control? Drag one of those onto the form and try this code:

Dim monthName As Date = DateTimePicker1.Text Dim monthNumber As String = monthName.ToString("MM") --Tree &#39;uns 5 (talk) 06:01, 25 September 2008 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Tree 'uns 5 (talk • contribs)
 * This would be perfect, but as far as I know, the DateTimePicker pops up that horrible shitty little calendar selector. Since most of the dates I'd require would be from the 1970s, the calendar selector would be a horrid mess of obnoxious clicking - and even setting the starting date wouldn't help too much, since the dates I'd need would fluctuate within a twenty-year period or so. =( Badger Drink (talk) 06:15, 25 September 2008 (UTC)


 * Doesnt' VB.Net have some kind of switch/case statement? --LarryMac  | Talk  12:15, 25 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Select Case. --98.217.8.46 (talk) 01:19, 26 September 2008 (UTC)
 * You could replace it in numerous ways. For one, an using elseif statements for all but the first would make the Block more efficient. A "Select Case" statement would look prettier. The best way of course would be to use an associative array though, with the months being the Identifiers of their Values. - Jimmi Hugh (talk) 12:27, 25 September 2008 (UTC)


 * Check out the DateTime object, specifically the various Parse methods (probably TryParse is best for what you want). It lets you parse strings into DateTimes which can then have the month extracted as a string. --98.217.8.46 (talk) 12:31, 25 September 2008 (UTC)


 * I don't know how to do this specifically in VB, but to solve this problem generally (mapping a string to another string, or really mapping anything to anything else), you'd use a hashtable (see associative array for the general data-structure). In many languages hashtables are built in (like PHP or Python), but in many languages this is part of the standard library. I googled it, and found this nice article that helps you do this in Visual Basic 2005. There might be specific solutions that work better in this case (like using specialized Date-objects), but for the general problem, this is how you do it. 90.235.30.211 (talk) 14:46, 25 September 2008 (UTC)
 * That sounds way overkill. If there wasn't a specialized function to do this, I'd just use a SELECT CASE or something like that. It's a lot easier and a lot less overhead. I'm not sure I see the advantage of using a hashtable for something this simple. --98.217.8.46 (talk) 01:19, 26 September 2008 (UTC)


 * Here, incidentally, is how you'd do it with Select Case:

Dim MonthText as String Dim MonthNumber as Integer MonthNumber = 0 MonthText = Month.Text Select Case Ucase(Mid(MonthText,1,3)) 'make it case insensitive and only get the first three letters, to make it easy on the user Case "JAN": MonthNumber = 1 Case "FEB": MonthNumber = 2 Case "MAR": MonthNumber = 3 (repeat) Case "DEC": MonthNumber = 12 End Select If MonthNumber = 0 Then Msgbox("Your month name was not accurate, try again") Exit Sub End Select

Or something like that. It's still a little over a dozen lines of code but it's pretty straightforward. --98.217.8.46 (talk) 01:26, 26 September 2008 (UTC)


 * I'm not terribly familiar with VB, but there should be a "getSelectedIndex" or something similar for the combobox control. Also, why have a varible called number of type string. That's incredibly counter-intuitive... My guess would be it should be something like this:

Dim monthNumberAsString as String If Month.getSelectedIndex <= 9 and Month.getSelectedIndex > 0 Then monthNumberAsString = "0" + Month.getSelectedIndex.toString Else If Month.getSelectedIndex > 0 'Implied >= 10 and <= 12 monthNumberAsString = Month.getSelectedIndex.toString Else MsgBox("Please select a valid Month value") End If


 * Note that it's been years since I've programmed in VB, I'm not sure the toStrings exist or are even necessary. Also, If I remember correctly, getSelectedIndex returns a 1 based value, so the code above should be correct once you find the correct method to call, whether it be getSelectedIndex or some other method. If you have to have the leading zero there, this is about as small as I can think of making the code. If you have a leftpad function that can pad your string, even better. It would reduce your code to the below, obviously switching out the left pad function with your own with it's own parameters

Dim monthNumberAsString as String If Month.getSelectedIndex > 0 Then monthNumberAsString = LeftPadToLengthOfTwoWithZeroes(Month.getSelectedIndex.toString) Else MsgBox("Please select a valid Month value") End If


 * As far as readability and clarity goes, the other solutions would be better. As far as number of lines, this is nearly optimal I think 98.209.96.165 (talk) 14:37, 27 September 2008 (UTC)


 * Well, I don't know about that specific implementation, but you are right that if possible, a ComboBox would be a better choice for something like this where there is a limited allowed vocabulary. --98.217.8.46 (talk) 19:58, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

xbox 360
will a normal xbox 360 hard drive work on a 360 elite? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jwking (talk • contribs) 05:56, 25 September 2008 (UTC)


 * Sure. The Elite drive is just larger, but the interface is the same. -- Captain Disdain (talk) 07:14, 25 September 2008 (UTC)


 * I thought Microsoft discourages swapping hard disks. ?? Kushal (talk) 12:39, 25 September 2008 (UTC)


 * That may be, but that doesn't mean it doesn't work. I mean, am I offering a guarantee that absolutely nothing can go wrong? Nope. But have I ever experienced a problem when swapping Xbox 360 hard disks? Nope. -- Captain Disdain (talk) 20:37, 25 September 2008 (UTC)

Encryption on Windows XP
Is there any way of decrypting files with a signature algorithm of sha1RSA? I won't go into details but an encrypted file's certificate became deleted from on my Windows XP. -- penubag  (talk) 06:24, 25 September 2008 (UTC)


 * Uh what did you encrypt it with in the first place? --antilivedT 07:49, 25 September 2008 (UTC)


 * I just used MS's default encryption option. The right-click, file properties, encrypt contents. I hate Microsoft, they can't get anything right. -- penubag  (talk) 07:55, 25 September 2008 (UTC)


 * So you marked it as encrypted, then reinstalled your computer or otherwise lost your original profile/keys? This seems like a nice article on this subject. --antilivedT 08:35, 25 September 2008 (UTC)

Um... They seem to have got this right. You don't have the key to the files, therefor you can't get at them. I'd be more worried if you COULD get at your encrypted files without the key. Anyway unless you want to spend a few months brute forcing the key chances are your SOL 88.211.96.3 (talk) 09:12, 25 September 2008 (UTC)


 * Quoting from the article: "The Recovery Agent is a mechanism that allows the administrator to recover encrypted files when the user’s keys are lost." So depending on his situation, he might well be able to decrypt his files. --antilivedT 06:08, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

Laptop Issues
I am having problems with my laptop (A ThinkPad T23). Recently, it's taken to actually booting up at a time I'd prefer to call "two seconds left in the game" and BSoD'ing about 60-80% of the time it *does* boot, and this past weekend two curious things happened, a day apart: For clarity, I'm using Windows XP, the laptop (and its parts) is secondhand, and I have not added or removed any hardware (except for a mouse in order to play Diablo II without getting frustrated at the trackpoint; the mouse's addition or removal does not affect booting as far as I have observed). Any ideas as to the nature of the gremlins haunting the system? -Jéské (v^_^v Kacheek!) 09:00, 25 September 2008 (UTC)
 * The laptop lost track of both date and time (Saturday)
 * The laptop couldn't find a necessary file to boot up, but booted normally when I rolled the system back a few weeks (Sunday)


 * Loss of ability to keep track of date and time suggests a failure of the motherboard battery. You mentioned that the laptop is second hand. Unless you never let your ThinkPad run out of batteries (the regular ones), you might want to replace the small button cell in your motherboard. But wait, lets see what others have to say on this issue.


 * It could be malicious code infecting your computer that is causing the problems. I do not have much faith in the system rollback feature in Windows XP. You might need to reinstall your operating system. Lets wait and see what other wikipedians have to say. Kushal (talk) 12:37, 25 September 2008 (UTC)


 * My first reaction was also "dead motherboard battery". For those who don't know - even when you disconnect your laptop from the charger AND pull out the battery pack, there is a teeny-tiny rechargable "lithium cell" on the motherboard that holds just enough charge to allow the on-board clock to keep good time until you replace/recharge the main battery.   If that goes kaputt, your computer loses track of time when you turn it off.  The battery usually lasts longer than the computer - but when it fails, this is exactly the kind of thing that happens.  That certainly explains the first symptom - and could possibly explain the second.  It's a general rule with computers that you should always "fix the bug you can find" before you worry too much about the others...very often, fixing the obvious problem also fixes the not-so-obvious ones.  Sadly, this may mean dismantling your laptop - which is always a tricky and stressful thing.  If you were born lucky, your computer may have a little plastic flap underneath somewhere - held down with a tiny screw or snap-connection - that's specifically designed to let you get at the battery.  If so then PLEASE make a sketch or take a close-up photo of the battery BEFORE you take it out - so you'll be 100% sure how to put the replacement back into the machine!  Then you can remove the old battery - and find a replacement (most decent computer stores will have them) and you'll be good-to-go.  If you can't get at the battery easily - you might want to take the machine to a professional...it's really easy to yank off a flimsy ribbon cable or lose a screw inside or something. SteveBaker (talk) 00:53, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

IBM has always made the Thinkpad maintenance manuals freely available. The manuals contain step-by-step instructions for common maintenance procedures, with clear pictures. Searching for the exact model number (found on the bottom of the machine, it looks something like 2647 or 2628-FX1) should produce the most accurate information, but apparently Lenovo keeps a generic T-series maintenance manual available [here]. It is quite possible that Lenovo still sells all the replacement parts - you just need the FRU number which you can find the maintenance manual. 130.188.8.13 (talk) 13:06, 26 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Thanks, Steve. I've also been getting BSoDs from "Page Fault in Nonpaged Area" and "Memory Management"; could those also be related to a dead motherboard cell? Also, when I try and report the former BSoD's, I get corrupted error reports as a result. It's currently keeping track of the time and date; What I stated above was a one-off incident (i.e. it lost track once, and has not since). The manual I have here also suggests motherboard issues (a lot of beep errors: -, .., -., ..)-Jéské  (v^_^v Kacheek!) 07:25, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

Using print screen to create screenshots
I've been practising using the print screen button to crop screenshots from online videos on Microsoft Word, but when I cut and paste these into My Pictures it comes up as "scrap". It will not allow me to just paste the screenshot of a webpage directly there either to enable me to crop it in paint. Any way to work around this? Alientraveller (talk) 10:30, 25 September 2008 (UTC)


 * Print Screen (copy) and then paste into a photo editor (even MS Paint will work) and save the screenshot as a standard jpg or gif. You can easily edit a standard jpg or gif in any photo editor (even MS Paint will work). -- k a i n <font color='#3300cc'>a <font color='#0000ff'>w &trade; 12:08, 25 September 2008 (UTC)


 * When you use print screen you are copying the image to the clipboard as an image. If you paste it into a folder, it will come up as a "scrap" because that's how Windows recognizes raw clipboard data. Rather, as suggested above, you will need to paste it into an intermediary image program (MS Paint, Paint.NET, GIMP, whatever) and then save it as the image file you want it to be. --98.217.8.46 (talk) 12:39, 25 September 2008 (UTC)
 * If you only need to crop and resize it, you could just as easily paste it straight into MS Word and do the editing there. In the picture properties under the Size tab there will be a Compress button which allows you to delete the cropped portions of images to keep teh size of the document manageable. Of course with this method you don't have the picture available to use in other programs. Zunaid 16:05, 25 September 2008 (UTC)

Firefox: Inheriting history in new tabs?
An example: Using the same tab, I browse to sites A, B and C in that order. On site C, I open a few links in new tabs, and later close the original tab with site C. Now there is no way for me to go "back" to sites B or A without creating a new tab and navigating there myself. Is there some way (extension/setting or such) that makes new tabs inherit the history of their parent tab, so that I can go back to sites visited in the previous tabs? -- Aeluwas (talk) 12:06, 25 September 2008 (UTC)


 * This isn't quite what you want, but you could just re-open the closed C tab, and all of its history should be there, allowing you to go back to B and A. --<font color="#3EA99F">LarryMac <font color="#3EA99F"> | Talk  12:11, 25 September 2008 (UTC)


 * LarryMac is right. Go to History > Recently closed tab >> ... . Alternatively, if you just closed it, you can press Shift + Command (Control on non-Macs) + T to get to it. Cheers, Kushal (talk) 12:54, 25 September 2008 (UTC)


 * Hmm yes, thanks; unfortunately I already knew that (but hadn't really thought about it to be honest). Well, it's surely better than nothing. :) -- Aeluwas (talk) 18:04, 25 September 2008 (UTC)


 * Duplicate Tab Jessica   Thunderbolt   19:11, 25 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Perfect!! Thanks a lot! :) -- Aeluwas (talk) 12:05, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

MATLAB: Solving system with unknowns in multiple matrices
Hello,

I was wondering if anyone knows a clever way to solve a system Ax=b (using MATLAB) where:
 * A = some nxn matrix
 * x = some nx1 matrix where some amount (<= n) of the entries are unknown
 * b = some nx1 matrix where some amount (<= n) of the entries are unknown

Also, x and b are subject to the following condition:

If the entry in row i of x is unknown, the entry in row i of b must be known, and vice versa.

An example of this sort of system could be:


 * A = [1 2 3; 4 5 6; 7 8 9]
 * x = [2 y 5]'
 * b = [a 6 c]'

where y, a, and c are unknowns (this particular example may not actually have a solution, and I'm pretty sure this particular A is singular, but it demonstrates the general form of the problem).

For a normal case where all the entries in x are unknown and A and b contain only known elements, it's easy to just execute
 * x = A\b (or x = inv(A)*b, if you like)

but I'm not sure how to solve the type of system described above due to unknowns being in both x and b. I'm sure there's probably a way to solve it using the MATLAB symbolic toolkit, but I'd prefer not to use that since not all versions of MATLAB have it.

Any suggestions, ideas, or code would be much appreciated.

H. J. Hackenbacker (talk) 12:43, 25 September 2008 (UTC)


 * Partition A, x & y so that the known x's are in one partition and the unknowns in the other. It will be easier to tell what to do next and the partitions of A will probably no longer be singular.  Saintrain (talk) 14:38, 25 September 2008 (UTC)

Download to Pdf
I noticed that on wikieducator.org in their toolbox, they have a "Download as Pdf" option which downloads the current wiki page to a pdf.

I have a wiki and wanted to see if I could perhaps add a tool similar to this. What I want to accomplish is for the user of the wiki based site to be able to download a pdf of any page they please. I don't necessarily want to "print to pdf" all my current pages one by one and post the link up since the page will be edited constantly. A tool such as the one wikieducator has, either in the toolbox or elsewhere, to download to pdf would be extremely useful.

How would I do this?

18:12, 25 September 2008 (UTC)18:12, 25 September 2008 (UTC)


 * It'll involve adding some custom PHP. This page seems to describe one MediaWiki plugin that can accomplish something very similar. There may be others as well—if you google "wiki2pdf" you'll find a lot of little code snippets. --98.217.8.46 (talk) 22:41, 25 September 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia icon
How can I put a Wikipedia icon on my computer screen for faster access to search the files of Wikipedia? I though there was one on another computer I used some time ago, but I have been searching Wikipedia for over an hour and I cannot find anything about this.

If there is an icon available for download, Wikipedia should make this feature easier to find. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 4.245.15.66 (talk) 19:09, 25 September 2008 (UTC)


 * On Windows, you can simply drag the favicon (the one near the addressbar) onto your desktop.
 * If you use Firefox or Opera, you can use the integrated Search feature.
 * --grawity 19:20, 25 September 2008 (UTC)
 * You can also use the inegrated Search Function with Internet Explorer... in exactly the same way. But, you don't sound biased, at all. - Jimmi Hugh (talk) 10:48, 27 September 2008 (UTC)
 * I don't think he's referring to search toolbars, but rather the feature of searching using keywords in the address field. Wikipedia doesn't specify what Opera calls it, but Mozilla calls this feature smart keywords. If Internet Explorer has this feature, wikipedia fails to mention it... -- Reep (talk) 23:43, 27 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Oh, well that's not integrated search, so he's wrong, as well as biased. Integrated Search, is search, integrated into the browser, exactly as all Major browsers allow. Hey, I even had to use less words to be unbiased, it doesn't even take effort to not be childish and ignorant on a matter. - Jimmi Hugh (talk) 14:11, 28 September 2008 (UTC)

A site I can't remember
Hi Wikipedians:

I came across a site a while ago that let's you use this Java Applet, which turns out to be a Java-based Windows Server 2003 terminal software that gives you a complete Windows Server 2003 desktop (including a full Office 2003 suite) right inside the browser (I was using Firefox at the time) for free. A lot of other people used it and left some signature files behind. With this site, I can use Office 2003 on any platform provided it has a browser that can run Java.

I find the site to be sooooo cool. But now I can't find it any more. I think I stumbled across it while searching for "online office". But the site no longer seems to show up in Google.

Any ideas?

Thanks,

128.100.122.154 (talk) 20:17, 25 September 2008 (UTC)


 * There are a few web desktops listed here. Was it one of those? Jessica   Thunderbolt   20:41, 25 September 2008 (UTC)


 * No, I think .154 was talking about some kind of Java applet-based remote access on a public server - like Remote Desktop. --grawity 15:27, 26 September 2008 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Grawity (talk • contribs)

Pro cons of java, c++ og assembly language
The question is simple. What is the pro and cons of java, c++ og assembly programming language? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 62.199.32.168 (talk) 21:09, 25 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Which language can you program in? This gives a great advantage to you!  Does your platform have a compiler or interpreter for the language?  gcc gives you c++ plus some more languages. Is this a homework question? Graeme Bartlett (talk) 22:01, 25 September 2008 (UTC)
 * If this a homework question, I should note, we do not answer such questions unless you have shown you have tried and need Help not Answers :P--<font color="0070FF">Xp54321 (<font color="4CBB17">Hello! • <font color="4CBB17">Contribs ) 22:54, 25 September 2008 (UTC)
 * og is the name of an object-relational database mapping library used in Nitro and written in Ruby. Ogg is a free, open standard container format. And or is Logical disjunction - do you mean any of these? Also see c++ assembly language or Java (programming language). Graeme Bartlett (talk) 03:27, 26 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Perhaps 62.199. mis-translated... "og" is Danish for "and". Astronaut (talk) 04:57, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

Fingerprint Reader
Hey y'all! The laptop I'm using has a fingerprint reader but there doesn't appear to be any software on it to make use of it...Is there any freely available software out there I can use? Thanks.--<font color="0070FF">Xp54321 (<font color="4CBB17">Hello! • <font color="4CBB17">Contribs ) 23:26, 25 September 2008 (UTC)


 * How about the UBEK driver: . Worth a try. Fribbler (talk) 23:31, 25 September 2008 (UTC)
 * I'll see if it's any good.:)--<font color="0070FF">Xp54321 (<font color="4CBB17">Hello! • <font color="4CBB17">Contribs ) 23:51, 25 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Wait, I'm on Windows, the requirements say GNU/Linux...?--<font color="0070FF">Xp54321 (<font color="4CBB17">Hello! • <font color="4CBB17">Contribs ) 23:52, 25 September 2008 (UTC)
 * So it does. The same for "fprint" (another one I found). Back to the googleboard! Fribbler (talk) 11:43, 26 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Heh, for some reason I can no longer boot up Ubuntu as well! It gave me a system error message!:(--<font color="0070FF">Xp54321 (<font color="4CBB17">Hello! • <font color="4CBB17">Contribs ) 01:14, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

How to download FreeBSD?
I want to install and use FreeBSD because it is genetic Unix and it's BSD too. I'm currently using Ubuntu GNU/Linux but I want to dual-boot Ubuntu and FreeBSD. I'm having trouble downloading FreeBSD. The downloads on ftp://ftp.freebsd.org/pub/FreeBSD/releases/i386/ISO-IMAGES/7.0/ state this: 7.0-RELEASE-i386-bootonly.iso, 7.0-RELEASE-i386-disc1.iso, 7.0-RELEASE-i386-disc2.iso, 7.0-RELEASE-i386-disc3.iso, 7.0-RELEASE-i386-docs.iso, and 7.0-RELEASE-i386-livefs.iso. I'm so confuse what .iso should I download. Should I download all, 7.0-RELEASE-i386-disc2.iso, or the 7.0-RELEASE-i386-bootonly.iso? What is 7.0-RELEASE-i386-bootonly.iso? What .iso(s) of FreeBSD should I download? Jet (talk) 23:32, 25 September 2008 (UTC)


 * It certainly looks like you need to download them all and burn each one onto a separate disk. Then you should reboot your computer with the "bootonly" disk in the drive.  Hopefully, it'll prompt you to insert the other disks as needed. SteveBaker (talk) 00:34, 26 September 2008 (UTC)


 * Actually, you don't need the livefs or the bootonly. LiveFS is mainly intended to be used as a rescue disc. Bootonly is if you only want a disc to bootup with and plan to install from e.g. the internet. And depending on what you plan to install, you may only need disc1. Docs may be useful, but of course you can also access documentation directly from the internet (I don't believe you need it for an install even a full install). There is some brief description of the various discs at . And yes, you will be prompted to insert the discs as needed although at least last time I made a full install there was some extra disc swapping (putting CD1 back in and then CD2). You could of course combine the various discs into a single DVD, there are various guides for this available online and I did it myself without much problem or you could potentially I think only burn disc1 (to CD/DVD R/RW) and then mount the images stored on your computer (never tried this although I think it's possible). Nil Einne (talk) 09:02, 26 September 2008 (UTC)