Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Computing/2013 March 30

= March 30 =

Creating printed or PDF version of Wikipedia pages using custom style sheet
When creating a printed or PDF version of a Wikipedia page, is there a way to override the default styles? I want to change the fonts, spacing and a few other things to my own preferences. Thanks. --173.49.9.57 (talk) 13:34, 30 March 2013 (UTC)
 * You could click "Printable Version" in the sidebar, change your browser's settings to use the fonts you want, and save as PDF using a browser extension. But keep the attribution notices intact. Pokajanje &#124; Talk  20:38, 30 March 2013 (UTC)

Using two workspaces in GNOME 3 and Cinnamon
I recently got a second monitor for free from my father, so I set my system to use two monitors simultaneously. I'm running Fedora 17 with GNOME 3 and Cinnamon. This works OK, but I noticed that everything happens on the first monitor (workspace) by default. Unless I manually drag windows to the second workspace, it isn't doing anything. The second workspace doesn't even have a panel. How can I make some programs open up their windows on the second workspace by default? Or how do I add a panel to the second workspace, so that all windows from programs I launch appear on the workspace where I clicked the panel? J I P &#124; Talk 15:05, 30 March 2013 (UTC)
 * There are apparently some workarounds, but if I were you, I’d switch to Xfce with Compiz rather than wait for GNOME to un-betray its users to the point of providing all its previous functionality. ¦ Reisio (talk) 19:52, 30 March 2013 (UTC)
 * OK, thanks. However, I don't think it's worth the problem. I tried Compiz once, but it was apparent my graphics card didn't support it. As for GNOME betraying its users, I share your sentiment fully. It is only thanks to Cinnamon I'm still using GNOME. As far as I am aware even Linus Torvalds was critical of GNOME's recent developments. However, my brother-in-law has expressed interest in a second monitor, so I'm thinking of donating my older, smaller monitor to him and keeping the newer, bigger monitor my father gave me for my own use. J I P  &#124; Talk 19:56, 30 March 2013 (UTC)

What does a slow hard drive do slowly?
I feel stupid asking this, but I am considering buying this Samsung laptop but reviewers complain it has a slow hard drive. What exactly would happen slowly if your hard drive is slow? Does it take longer to save or recall files? Something else? Thanks. μηδείς (talk) 19:45, 30 March 2013 (UTC)


 * “take longer to save or recall files”


 * As compared to faster drives, yes. It says it has a 5400 rpm drive, which would be slower than a 7200 rpm one, and slower still than a solid state drive. You might not even notice it, however. The first comment I see on the drive being slow refers to an SSD, which means this person is already used to solid state drives and would obviously feel the “slowness” of older types of drives. If you’ve never used an SSD for internal storage, you probably will not notice the difference. ¦ Reisio (talk) 19:49, 30 March 2013 (UTC)


 * Excellent, thanks. I am looking at an ASUS with even better stats and an SSD (which, no, I have never seen) the only drawback being it is 2" thick. μηδείς (talk) 19:58, 30 March 2013 (UTC)


 * One thing to note is that reading and writing to the hard disk occurs all the time, not just when you pick Save or Open in an application. Most hard drives have a hard drive light to tell you when it's being used, and you will notice that it flickers periodically pretty much all the time.  Why so much hard drive access ?  Well, it has to load all the programs off the hard drive, has to store temporary files there, say when transferring things to and from the Internet, and, if you run out of RAM, it even uses the hard drive for memory paging space. StuRat (talk) 23:41, 30 March 2013 (UTC)


 * My own understanding is that people reviewing things like hard drive speed are probably gamers and so forth - these types depend on the capacity of their computers a lot more than we do. I think it sounds like someone complaining his Ferrari has ordinary tyres, for example. If it is for general use, word processing etc., you might never notice these things. I notice my Windows laptop's slowness on startup, and nowadays, whenever I right click on a file, but not otherwise. IBE (talk) 10:43, 31 March 2013 (UTC)


 * Thanks. I am looking at a gaming computer for other reason, I don't have a TV, I use my computer simultaneously often for various programs, with that causing occasional freeze-ups,  I want a high-end screen and sound and a Blu-ray r/w DVD. I was going to get a Mac PowerBook, but they don't offer the 17.3" screen any more. And I want something that will be powerful enough that I won't regret not having gone bigger in two years.


 * Let me ask a Follow Up question:


 * Am I right in assuming that if you have an SSD your programs and operating system would be stored on it, while files you don't access that often would go on the hard drive? Would the mechanics of this basically be the same as dealing with a partitioned disk?  The SSD article is hard to parse, and the applications section doesn't clearly answer to me what I want.  I am assuming I would normally run everything of the SSD and essentially use the hard drive as an onboard external hard drive.  And would the SSD communicate with the HD automatically, so that, say I were playing Sim City loaded on the SSD, and had saved a game onto the hard drive, would the computer know how to find it and use it without me dragging it back on the SSD?  Thanks for the help. μηδείς (talk) 17:11, 31 March 2013 (UTC)


 * Most laptops have only one bay to accommodate a disk drive, so if you have an SSD you won't have a hard disk. As you'll note from looking at prices, SSDs have much lower storage than hard drives of the same price. On a desktop or server machine, where there is more physical room, it's common to have an SSD for the OS, applications, and some user files, and have bulky stuff like music and movies on a hard drive.  You can get a hybrid drive, which incorporates a flash and hard drive in the same enclosure (and appears as the same logical device); some attempt to organise what's held in the fast flash memory vs the slower hard disk storage by themselves. -- Finlay McWalterჷTalk 17:37, 31 March 2013 (UTC)


 * The ASUS model I am looking at has "Hard Drive: 120GB SSD + 1TB 5400rpm HDD". I assume this counts as a hybrid drive?  Reading that article it would seem the SSD works as the cache?  If that is the case, does it mean one cannot, as one would in windows 7, go to the "computer" heading under the start menu, open it up, and drag objects between different partitions?  In other words, can you or do you decide which drive files go under, or does the computer do that for you?  Or am I totally off base? μηδείς (talk) 18:54, 31 March 2013 (UTC)


 * It sounds like a hybrid drive, but absent a datasheet from Asus themselves (not just details from some Amazon reseller) I don't know for sure. -- Finlay McWalterჷTalk 19:13, 31 March 2013 (UTC)


 * Let's say it is a hybrid. (I can't otherwise imagine what it would mean to say there's a 120 SSD and a 1TB HDD) Again, how would that work from a user perspective? Is it like a cache/memory system where programs and cache memory will be on the SSD and downloaded files will go on the Disk, without my decision?  Or will it work like a partitioned system?  I did just place the order for this ASUS. Thanks again for the help. μηδείς (talk) 19:23, 31 March 2013 (UTC)
 * To me, this sounds like it really has two independent drives, a 120GB SSD and a separate 1TB hard disk. In that case, the two will show up as two devices. How you organize them depends on your OS. I don't know a lot about windows, but typically, one would be associated with C:, and one with another drive letter. Typically, your OS files would live on the SSD at C:. Under a UNIX, I would have the OS live on the SSD (mounted as the root file system, "/") and mount the large disk somewhere under /home1 to use for large static files (movies, music, photos) and backups. "120 GB should be enough for anybody" (tm) ;-). I have a 256 GB SSD in my MacBook Pro, and no mechanical disk anymore. I highly recommend this if you travel - the SSD is a lot more robust, uses less energy, and is totally silent. The only drawback is price... --Stephan Schulz (talk) 20:03, 31 March 2013 (UTC)
 * Well, thanks. These have been excellent answers.  At this point it's a mere matter of curiosity, since I decided on and bought the model I wanted for other reasons.  I know how to deal with different drives, and except for my movie and music files I certainly don't need more than about 100GB.  If the computer comes before this thread expires I'll update. μηδείς (talk) 20:19, 31 March 2013 (UTC)


 * The ASUS arrived today. The SSD is the main drive and the HDD is assigned as a separate letter (E:) device under the Computer heading in the Start Menu. The computer boots and is web browsing within about 15 seconds, with the browser-internet connection being the slow factor. μηδείς (talk) 19:10, 2 April 2013 (UTC)

Smartphone
Apologies if I've asked this before, I've been thinking about this for over a year and I really can't recall if I have or not.

Is there a smartphone (or operating system) that will support where I can write and run a program on the phone in the field? Ideally basic, but perl, python, even javascript would do.

My previous phone ran Windows CE and NSBasic ran on it. The new version for Windows 8(?) needs to be desktop compiled and downloaded, and the newer windoiws won't run the old NSBasic apparently. -- SGBailey (talk) 20:16, 30 March 2013 (UTC)


 * Scripting Layer for Android works very nicely, and supports a variety of languages. I can't say editing program text with a phone keyboard is much fun, but apart from that it's just what you need.  One thing you need to make sure is that the specific phone you're buying allows loading apps from untrusted sources (as you load the APK files from the Google Code repository, not from the Google Play store). Most Android devices allow this (also called sideloading) but a few are locked down by the phone company and don't. -- Finlay McWalterჷTalk 20:47, 30 March 2013 (UTC)


 * As to practical matter of storage. On my Nexus 7, the SL4A app itself (which provides the basic framework, script browser and editor, and access to the existing Android shell) uses 2.6MB. The Python (cpython 2.6) system is another 5.3MB. That's really very modest (Plants vs. Zombies is, for example, 79MB). -- Finlay McWalterჷTalk 20:57, 30 March 2013 (UTC)


 * Thx -- SGBailey (talk) 21:41, 30 March 2013 (UTC)

Trouble with Blender
I'm working on an urgent Blender project that's due on Tuesday. I constructed a rig for the body, only to find that Armature Deform - with Automatic Weights had no effect whatsoever. In Pose Mode moving the bones had no effect on the body. So I deleted the whole armature and started over again (twice), but I forget to delete the old rig, and now it seems to be undeletable. You can get the 10 MB blend file at filedropper.com/groundhog. Is there anyway to get that critter animated? The boss is really going to be unhappy if this isn't in on time. Pokajanje &#124; Talk 20:56, 30 March 2013 (UTC)


 * So, your cheap-skate boss is using free software, and is going to get annoyed if you struggle on the  climbing the steep-learning-curve to learn Blender (which is brilliant)? Or any similar but  propriety 3D computer graphics software.  Find a better company to work for! - seriously! --Aspro (talk) 22:40, 30 March 2013 (UTC)


 * "The best answers directly address what the questioner asked ..." Additionally, I'm kind of stuck in this position. Pokajanje &#124; Talk  22:44, 30 March 2013 (UTC)


 * You might as well ask “how can I become an expert over-night.” That question too can be asked. Would you not agree, that if it could be answered – we could all become experts over-night? Yes, I can agree your stuck, but that is a rod your creating for yourself. --Aspro (talk) 22:57, 30 March 2013 (UTC)


 * P.S. Pointy-haired Boss's often-underestimate the tasks that they give subordinates to do.  If he didn't hire you as an expert in 3D computer graphics software then he should arrange for you to receive proper training. Me thinks, he asks to much and you should not be having to post  on Wikipedia in an effort to satisfy his  ill-grasped  demands. You are  making a rod for your own back. If by magic you pull this off by Tuesday he will expect even more miracles from you. It's  life.--Aspro (talk) 23:14, 30 March 2013 (UTC)


 * I am asking for help to fix one problem, after which I should easily be able to do the rest. I do not want cynicism. If you are not going to help me or add otherwise useful (repeat, useful ) commentary on the situation, then you have no reason to post. Pokajanje &#124; Talk  01:07, 31 March 2013 (UTC)


 * Aspro, WTF? You're not being helpful here. If you don't know the answer, just keep it under your hat. The OP is asking a really specific technical question and you're basically mocking him and his situation. --Mr.98 (talk) 15:20, 31 March 2013 (UTC)


 * I'd like to help, but have never used Blender. However, is there a way to go back further than the armature ?  All the way back to the beginning, if necessary ?  Once you get past this problem, I suggest constant saving of each version, after each small change, so you can more easily go back to the last safe point. StuRat (talk) 03:00, 31 March 2013 (UTC)


 * There's nowhere near enough time. It took me weeks to get to this point. Anyway, I figured out how to delete the old rig, and I managed to find that there's a "Generate" button that needs to be clicked under the Armature object data settings, but no order of clicking that button and the aforementioned Armature Deform - With Automatic Weights seems to work. The problem has been solved . I don't know what I was doing wrong, but fiddling with it long enough made it work. Pokajanje &#124; Talk  03:05, 31 March 2013 (UTC)


 * Glad it worked out. I don't have enough experience animating with Blender to be helpful, but my suggestion was going to be to look for the old rig under the Outliner, which is where things like that typically hide. --Mr.98 (talk) 15:23, 31 March 2013 (UTC)


 * And I did manage to pull this off, a day early. Pokajanje &#124; Talk  16:05, 1 April 2013 (UTC)


 * Very good. Glad you figured it out, and I apologize for Aspro.  I'll mark this resolved, but be sure to save your work more often, under a new name each save, to avoid this kind of panic when bad things happen in the future. StuRat (talk) 16:41, 1 April 2013 (UTC)

Any Google+ experts around?
Someone's set up a fake page - looks like part of an ongoing attack on me probably by another editor here (possibly a banned one). I've reported it to Google but would like to get the police on this, which they can't do at the moment as they don't have the information they need. Thanks. Dougweller (talk) 21:44, 30 March 2013 (UTC)
 * Turns out I have a fake YouTube account also with gay porn. Dougweller (talk) 21:45, 30 March 2013 (UTC)


 * Do you feel inclined to give us these links, it would be easier for us to then, to  look for patterns,  sources and things.--Aspro (talk) 21:54, 30 March 2013 (UTC)
 * It's fairly easy to find the accounts from a simple search. Nil Einne (talk) 23:49, 30 March 2013 (UTC)


 * I don't mean to be rude, but I"m not really sure what you are asking us to do here. What information do they need that you can't provide? Mingmingla (talk) 21:59, 30 March 2013 (UTC)
 * Look, it reads to me, that this editors has got the hebe-jebbies and hasn’t yet had time to stand back and look at this in cold analytical terms. In that state, knowing the right question to ask is difficult. Yet, surly we (most of us) can make contact with s/he's underlying issue. Use your intuition.--Aspro (talk) 22:09, 30 March 2013 (UTC)
 * I can't speak for the OP but my guess is it may be more complicated then that. I'm guessing in many jurisdictions, if an adult reports someone has been setting up fake accounts to impersonate and defame them but without other info or anything to push the harassment case into an area of concern (like a threat of violence), the police will tell them there's not much they can (or will) do although the person should report it to the providers involved. You could probably try and take legal action yourself but that's likely to be costly. If you are able to determine more details, in particular gather some evidence of who the person doing it is, they may more inclined to look in to the case. However gathering this evidence without a court order may be difficult or even impossible, it depends significantly on how careful the person behind it is. If there is evidence, someone with experience in the sites is most likely to be able to find it. Even if you can't gather any evidence of who's behind it, better documentation of what's going on is more likely to convince the police to look in to it. Nil Einne (talk) 00:00, 31 March 2013 (UTC)


 * What do you mean when you say you have a fake account? RudolfRed (talk) 22:05, 30 March 2013 (UTC)


 * Think s/he mean an account has been created that could be mistaken by others as originating and pertaining to him or her. If this has been 'intentionally' done by someone else, then this is a fake account.--Aspro (talk) 22:17, 30 March 2013 (UTC)
 * Sounds to me like someone is impersonating him on-line with malicious intent. This is unfortunately common. I don't think the police can do anything unless there are 1. Clear and legitimate threats of harm against you as a result the impersonation, and 2. You (or the police, through warrants) are able to trace the identity the real-life owner of the fake account.  If it is simply your WP reputation you are concerned about, I don't think you have much recourse...but if it is tied to your real life identity, and it is causing you distress, you will probably need to get a lawyer if Google/YouTube do not remove the account.  Ditch &#8733;  00:41, 31 March 2013 (UTC)
 * If you want it taken down, first contact Google. They have official procedures for this. Second, if you want to go further, contact a lawyer and look into suing (many will consult with you for free if they are contingency based). They can advise you on everything else as well. Shadowjams (talk) 04:12, 31 March 2013 (UTC)
 * Note that the OP already reported it to Google. Nil Einne (talk) 05:37, 31 March 2013 (UTC)
 * Thanks all. The pages are still up - when this was done to my FB account they were gone within an hour after my complaint. I don't have the heebie-jeebies, just a desire for revenge (and to get Google to move faster in the future), especially if it's the Wikipedia editor who wrote an article in Examiner.com attacking me or one of the banned editors trying to get at me (one of them has created a sock to deny it). I guess at the moment it's Google I'll have to sue. If it's still up on Tuesday when law offices open, I'll look into it. No one should have to put up with something like this on a major internet site. Dougweller (talk) 06:38, 31 March 2013 (UTC)
 * Hope you can get it down soon but I'd have to say having seen one of my uncles waste money on suing a newspaper for quite damaging lies and getting derisory compensation that going to the law isn't something I'd bother with unless totally and absolutely necessary. Personally I wouldn't even bother going to one of those reputation fixer outfits over something online but I guess other people are more worried about the internet. Dmcq (talk) 11:49, 31 March 2013 (UTC)
 * re-indent to break wall of text, @Doug If the imposter is claiming details more than just your name, such as using an actual picture of you as a profile, or biographical details like where you live, work, education, place of birth, etc (stuff that is beyond the scope of mere coincidence)...or if he/she is directly taunting you with the fake accounts, through e-mail or other communication...then you might have a stronger case. But if the imposter is simply usurping your first and last name, and the Google results associated with it, I could see how this would become complicated.  There are ~40 people with the name Douglas Weller in the U.S. and I'm sure that number grows when you include people outside the U.S.. I guess the point I'm trying to make is that even though we know what's going on here, Google doesn't know that you are you, and the burden of proving that you are you in this case might be more complicated than simply registering a complaint with them. Also, I'm not sure what good a lawyer can do other than take your money.  Maybe you need to find the equivalent of an Internet P.I. to see if you can find out who this person really is?  Ditch &#8733;  15:25, 31 March 2013 (UTC)
 * They are using a lot of accurate details, a few inaccurate ones. I found the links to Google to complain about impersonation and sent them the photo ID they want. What's more interesting is that the fake Google+ profile ranks higher in a search than the real one, and that the Metapedia attack biography is up around the top, which seems odd. Dougweller (talk) 16:36, 31 March 2013 (UTC)
 * My three cents: 1. I would be proud of being bashed at Metapedia. 2. There seems to be a legit, gay Doug Weller in Australia who hit the news in relation to homosexual adoption. 3. It's amazing that Facebook managed to delete a fake profile so fast. Note: why do you believe a Wiki banned user did that all? OsmanRF34 (talk) 00:01, 1 April 2013 (UTC)