Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Computing/2012 July 13

= July 13 =

cursor keeps flicking up to top or down to bottom of screen
this is on my desktop Mac - I'm wondering if it's some sort of setting that's kicked in, but I can't see what it is. Can anyone help? Thanks Adambrowne666 (talk) 09:54, 13 July 2012 (UTC)


 * Sounds like a mouse problem. Have you tried thoroughly cleaning the mouse and the mouse pad? Or using a different surface for the mouse?--Shantavira|feed me 14:11, 13 July 2012 (UTC)


 * Classic mouse gone bad....I have had that happen twice....Only thing to do is get a new mouse. Zeno333 (talk) 15:04, 13 July 2012 (UTC)Zeno333
 * Check your mouse sensitivity.--v/r - TP 19:43, 13 July 2012 (UTC)


 * Thanks, all - i used to be a pc user, now a mac user, I face the issue of expense - replacing a mouse on my crappy old pc was a simpler matter - anyway, no worries - will try the other measures suggested here and see how i go Adambrowne666 (talk) 23:59, 14 July 2012 (UTC)
 * I have a MAC also..replacing the mouse on a MAC is really not more expensive than on a PC....I got a plain HP LED optical Mouse to replace a broken one, and the HP mouse said it was for PCs only, but it works fine on my MAC, including left and right clicks, the scroll wheel and the "control-key" scroll wheel web page zoom option. 24.170.135.182 (talk) 22:32, 15 July 2012 (UTC)zeno333

Issues in playing 90 minute CD-Rs
I recently bought a pack of the rare and special 90 minute blank CDs on ebay instead of the typical, mainstream 80 minute blank CDs that are sold on many stores. I burned 23 songs to one the 90 minute CDs through Roxio Creator DE 10.2. Then I played it on a digital radio CD player and a normal radio CD player and they were able to play 1 ½ songs, which means that on the middle of the second song on the CD, it stopped and both CD players tried to read it and then they gave up trying to read them, so the radio screens went back to displaying the number 23 like when I put the CD in the CD players of my 2 radios before I pressed play. That means that the CD players did recognize that there were 23 songs on the CD. So, that is the story of the first CD. In total, I burned 4 CDs. CDs number 2 and 4 for I put 22 songs instead of 23 to see if it would make any difference in how the CD players would play the CDs. Also to see if it would make any difference in how the CD players would play the CDs, for CDs number 3 (23 songs) and 4 (22 songs), I used the “overburn by sectors” option, which increased the space for burning by about 2 minutes, the maximum option, so instead of 90 minutes, the CD space became 92 minutes for burning. Both CD players were able to play every song except song number 23 on CD number 3, which was good. However, the CD players could only play the first 4 songs on CD number 4. So, is the problem the CD players that are having trouble reading parts of the four of the 90 minute CDs I burned or is problem the CDs themselves when I burned those songs to them? If the problem is the CD players, what kind of CD players should I get that will be able to play a 90 minute CD? Willminator (talk) 18:33, 13 July 2012 (UTC)
 * I'm almost sure that 90 minute CDs violate the CD standard, not because of the number of minutes but because the tracks and perhaps the bits on each track are too close together. It's understandable that a player might be able to read the beginning of the disc (which is on the inside) but find the rest of it just a little outside the bounds of readability. There's probably no way to tell which players will reliably read non-compliant discs except actual testing. The total track count is stored in the table of contents at the beginning of the disc, so that's not evidence that the players could read anything from the rest of the disc. -- BenRG (talk) 20:37, 13 July 2012 (UTC)


 * Most likely the problem isn't with one or the other, per se, but rather the combination. For example, the pits in the CD may be too small or close together for the CD player to read.  The simplest solution is to give up on 90 minute CDs and settle for 80 minutes, which might mean two CDs instead of one per album (or you could just leave off your least favorite songs).  (Even if you do find a CD player which can play those correctly, do you really want CDs that don't work on most other CD players ?)  And, since CD seems to be a dying format (being replaced by flash drives and streaming music), I wouldn't invest much more money in it, in any case. StuRat (talk) 20:41, 13 July 2012 (UTC)


 * So, does that mean that I might have wasted my money buying a pack of 90 minute CDs? Also, why does the CD description on the ebay page say that if I put 80 minutes or less of music to a 90 minute CD, it would work on all CD players? Is it that the bits in the 90 minute CDs are normal when there are 80 minutes or less of music? Willminator (talk) 22:08, 13 July 2012 (UTC)


 * Update: I checked CD nmumber 3 again since it was the one that played 22 out of 23 songs. It turns out that if I click next to play the next song, it will not go play song 23 even though the screen will display "23." However, if I let song 22 play, it will go to 23 and number 23 will play, thankfully. However, after 23, it will not go next back to song 1. 90 minute CDs are weird. Willminator (talk) 23:54, 13 July 2012 (UTC)


 * In that case, instead of putting smaller pits closer together, it sounds more like it's putting those pits (for minutes 80-90/92) into an area that's normally not used. If they work fine with 80 minutes, I'd just use them that way, in which case you only lose the difference in price between those and standard blank CDs (plus the cost of those CDs you've already turned into coasters).


 * In the future, you might want to ask yourself why something like that is so rare, since, obviously, everyone would like to have 10 extra minutes on their CDs, if it worked properly. At the very least, I'd do some online research before hitting the BUY button. StuRat (talk) 00:15, 14 July 2012 (UTC)


 * Ok, thanks for your helpful advice. Willminator (talk) 12:16, 15 July 2012 (UTC)


 * You're welcome. Can we mark this resolved ? StuRat (talk) 03:22, 16 July 2012 (UTC)

Need help with CSS
On my user page, I am trying to use some CSS boxes. I know a good amount of CSS, but I am stumped here. I want the boxes on the left to take up whatever room is left over after the size of the infobox. Unfortunately, when the screen gets too small, everything shifts to the bottom. Please help!--v/r - TP 19:51, 13 July 2012 (UTC)


 * You had your left side tables set to a width of 75% (that's 75% of whatever their parent is), and the infobox, user infobox, (by way of infobox) has a width of 22em, which not only will vary based on browser but also based on font availability, and also probably whatever zoom level a person is using. You'd want 75% plus 22em (which varies) [plus whatever extra margin the infobox has] to add up to no more than 100%, and you can't rely on it to, because trying to reconcile two different units of measurement like that is just not something that can be done.  One simple solution is to change the widths of the left-side boxes to 100% (since they're tables, which collapse their border, padding, and outside margins inside their width) and then place them all in a single containing div with a margin-right that is big enough to accommodate the infobox, which is what I've gone ahead and done for you . ¦ Reisio (talk) 00:58, 15 July 2012 (UTC)


 * Slightly better would be using div elements instead of table elements, as the table elements are technically (meaningfully) inappropriate; and div elements (meaningless organizational block elements) take up as much horizontal space as possible by default, which means that: once your infobox on the right ends, should your left-side content continue, it can go ahead and take up all the space including the extra space on the right that the infobox is no longer monopolizing. ¦ Reisio (talk) 01:22, 15 July 2012 (UTC)

May I somehow toggle a Filtered view off and on in LibreOffice Calc ?
I use "Auto Filter" and "Standard Filter" in LibreOffice Calc 3.5.4.2 to view, analyse and edit various subsets (parts) of a spreadsheet. Very often I need to take a quick peak at (and edit) the UNFILTERED spreadsheet BEFORE I AM FINISHED working with the filtered view. Q: Is there some way to do this? (Removing the filter and then Typing in the filter criteria anew, time and time again, is far to cumbersome).89.9.213.91 (talk) 23:21, 13 July 2012 (UTC)