Logic Quest

2005-05-10T16:52:00.000+08:00

N dates on the go from DUAL

select * from (select TO_DATE ( '1-feb-04') + level from dual connect by level < 100)

2005-05-10T16:49:00.000+08:00

N numbers on the go from DUAL

select * from (select level from dual connect by level < N)

2005-05-09T14:25:00.000+08:00

loving skype

been using skype for a while now.
I am finding using skype increasingly more delightful after I bought a labtec headpiece.
no more bending over the tucked in microphone on my laptop.

good sound quality
amazing call rates !!

cool !!

2005-05-09T14:24:00.000+08:00

2005-05-04T15:22:00.000+08:00

loving Firefox more and more

My favorite browser used to be Avant Browser because I thought it had these features that firefox did not have
1. tab reorder
2. multiple home page

Today I learnt how to
1. tab reorder in firefox
2. you can open multiple home pages in Firefox by entering multiple URLs delimited by | eg http://my.yahoo.com|http://www.google.com

And with Greasemonkey, Firefox is my favorite browser

2005-04-09T10:41:00.000+08:00

Cheap sales site disguised as help site

Subscribe to te list and you will get emails like:

To celebrate, and as a special promo to my subscribers, I
had earlier dropped the price of my signature ebook, 5
Steps to a Saner Life, from US$99 to US$29.

I just realised I forgot to raise the price back up again!

That is really no way to run a business. Sigh.

And I have to rush out for a client meeting now, so I can't do
anything about the price for awhile.

I'll change the price back up to normal in a little while, but
you're welcome in the meantime to take advantage of my
carelessness.

Rajen has time to compose the lengthy mail but no time to raise the price ?

I would not trust the value of this guy's books at all unless I am interested to write sales letter like the above.

2005-04-08T12:16:00.000+08:00

Bloglines vs Newsgator

Recently, I had some issues with client Pluck and I looked for a web-based rss reader.

I tried Newsgator Online for many weeks. It's better than Pluck web edition, but it was slow.
That was the reason I used client Pluck - faster aggregation and response.

And I had to click on all the pages to mark all the blogs read.
Otherwise the unread blog count just keep increasing.
This became a tedious housekeeping task.

I looked further and found Bloglines.
It's faster than Newsgator.
It has a convenient 'Mark all read' feature - no more housekeeping.
And it has 2 unsynchronised panes - one for the folders, one for the blogs.
This is a bonus - in Newsgator, the Folder pane and the blog is synchronized. This means as I scroll down a blog, the folders also scroll out of view.

For now I am keeping Bloglines.

2005-04-08T10:30:00.000+08:00

Best of both search engines

Google + Yahoo in one search !!

2005-03-03T11:09:00.000+08:00

When you are planning strategically with any company--online or offline--it is useful to complete an analysis that takes into account not only your own business, but your competitor's businesses and the current business environment as well. A SWOT is one such analysis.

Completing a SWOT analysis helps you identify ways to minimize the effect of weaknesses in your business while maximizing your strengths.

Ideally, you will match your strengths against market opportunities that result from your competitors’ weaknesses or voids.

Basic SWOT

You can develop a basic SWOT analysis in a brainstorming session with members of your company, or by yourself if you are a one-person shop. To begin a basic SWOT analysis create a four-cell grid or four lists, one for each SWOT component:

Then, begin filling in the lists.

Strengths - Think about what your company does well. What makes you stand out from your competitors? What advantages do you have over other businesses?
Weaknesses - List the areas that are a struggle. What do your customers complain about? What are the unmet needs of your sales force?
Opportunities - Try to uncover areas where your strengths are not being fully utilized. Are there emerging trends that fit with your company's strengths? Is there a product/service area that you could do well in but are not yet competing?
Threats. Look both inside and outside of your company for things that could damage your business. Internally, do you have financial, development, or other problems? Externally, are your competitors becoming stronger, are there emerging trends that amplify one of your weaknesses, or do you see other threats to your company's success?

Advanced SWOT

A more in-depth SWOT analysis can help you better understand your company's competitive situation. One way to improve upon the basic SWOT is to include more detailed competitor information in the analysis.

Note Internet-related activities such as trade organization participation, search engine inclusion, and outside links to the sites. This will better help you spot opportunities for and threats to your company.

You can also take a closer look at the business environment. Often, opportunities arise as a result of a changing business environment.

Some examples are:

A new trend develops for which demand outstrips the supply of quality options. For example, early on, the trend toward healthy eating coupled with an insistence on good-tasting food produced a shortage of acceptable natural food alternatives.
A customer segment is becoming more predominant, but their specific needs are not being fully met by your competitors. The U.S. Hispanic population experienced this phenomenon in the late 1990s and early 2000s.
A customer, competitor, or supplier goes out of business or merges with another company. With the demise of many pure-play dot-coms, examples of this abound. As each went out of business, opportunities arise to gain the defunct business--customers.

You can also enhance a SWOT analysis through surveys. You can learn more about your own as well as competitor sites and businesses. Areas you can research include 1) customer awareness, interest, trial, and usage levels; 2) brand, site, and/or company image; 3) importance of different site or product attributes to your customers; and 4) product and/or site performance.

Whether using a basic or more advanced approach to SWOT analysis, you are sure to come away with newfound insights. Use these to increase your company's effectiveness and as input into your business or marketing plan.

Bobette Kyle is creator of WebSiteMarketingPlan.com and author of the marketing plan guide "How Much for Just the Spider? Strategic Web Site Marketing."

source: MarketingProfs

2005-03-03T09:27:00.000+08:00

How to write a good proposal

Create a powerful, but concise executive summary.

Focus on results, which matter more than methods and processes. Clients buy methods and approaches only when they know you can deliver results.

Be generous with your ideas; don't hoard them. Show clients how innovatively you think.

The length of the proposal doesn't win, but quality does. Projects are not awarded because proposals pass a weight test.

The proposal content must be about the client, not the consultant. Take a back seat and focus on how you will solve problems.

Your liberal use of "best practices" will label you as uncreative. Find the blend of outstanding practices and innovative solutions that fit your client's needs, not answers that worked for someone else.

Accuracy is essential. Validate all data and double-check to make sure it's right before you present it.

Sweat every small proposal detail, watch for typos, use high-quality materials and make sure the right people receive the proposal on time.

Rewrite your resume for every proposal. Highlight the skills in your resume that demonstrate your qualifications. Your boilerplate resume is rarely up to the task.

Let your proposal sit for a day and then reread it completely before sending it out.

Let your personality shine through your proposals. Give clients a sense of the firm and your style of working.

Don't let your proposal claims outdistance your true capabilities. Write an honest proposal, or you'll pay dearly in the future with blown budgets and unhappy clients.

The consulting proposal is a necessary evil. A great proposal can be decisive in winning a project; a poor one can cause you to lose a project, even if everything else in the sales process has gone flawlessly. Use these guidelines to a write a killer proposal every time.

MarketingProfs.com

2005-02-28T10:43:00.000+08:00

Does Anyone know marketing - This author surely does not

This 10 page article can be summarized into:
"You are your own marketing"
with no substantial/convincing proof or argument.

2005-02-25T10:31:00.000+08:00

Using Aspects as a Test Coverage Tool

got this from rants.
This author has moved to a new site. So keeping this snippet here in case the contents disappear.

I was working on the Groovy project and I wanted to know what tests covered a method I was modifying. I tried to use clover to do this but it gave me way too much information and most of it wasn't that useful. Maybe AspectJ could help?

We are using JUnit for Groovy so all tests happen to extend a particular base class and each test method has a particular naming convention. My initial design was simple:

1) define a pointcut for test methods
2) define a pointcut for all methods in the test methods call stack
3) keep track of which methods are called for which tests

This is actually quite easy in AspectJ:

    private static final boolean enabled = Boolean.getBoolean("groovy.aspects.coverage");
    pointcut inTestClass(TestCase testCase) : this(TestCase) && execution(void test*()) && this(testCase);
    private Map coverage;

    before(TestCase testCase) : if(enabled) && cflowbelow(inTestClass(testCase)) && execution(* *(..)) {
      String testname = testCase.getClass().getName();
      String methodSignature = thisJoinPointStaticPart.getSignature().toString();
      Set tests = (Set) coverage.get(methodSignature);
      if (tests == null) {
tests = new HashSet();
coverage.put(methodSignature, tests);
      }
      tests.add(testname);
    }

This gets me most of what I need. Unfortunately, in our Groovy build, each JUnit test is called in a separate VM so we can't just build up a big map and be done with it. I thought about a few different ways to deal with this. I could have an external persistence mechanism or I could have one output file per test. I didn't like the idea of having a million little files all over the place because it would be hard to search them quickly. So I downloaded Berkley DB got about 5 pages into the API and realized some sort of crazed non-Java C programmer wrote it. Well, that was out. Instead I brute forced it. I added two more pieces of advice:

    before(TestCase testCase) : if(enabled) && inTestClass(testCase) {
      try {
File file = new File("results.ser");
if (file.exists()) {
ObjectInputStream ois = new ObjectInputStream(new FileInputStream(file));
coverage = (Map) ois.readObject();
ois.close();
} else {
coverage = new HashMap();
}
      } catch (Exception e) {
e.printStackTrace();
      }
    }

    after(TestCase testCase) : if(enabled) && inTestClass(testCase) {
      try {
File file = new File("results.ser");
ObjectOutputStream oos = new ObjectOutputStream(new FileOutputStream(file));
oos.writeObject(coverage);
oos.close();
      } catch (Exception e) {
e.printStackTrace();
      }
    }

Good old fashioned serialization to the rescue. Before running a test in a test case I load the old results, after running a test in a test case, I write the new results back out to disk. It can get pretty slow as you get towards the end of the run, but I figure that I can optimize it later. The easiest way to optimize it would be to append maps to the file and then crunch them all together when you load. That would save a lot of swapping it in and out of memory, but this is just a prototype. After making this exquisite gem, I apply it to the groovy.jar, the junit.jar, and the test classes. Notice that because Groovy compiles down to Java class files, this works for Groovy methods as well. Isn't having one bytecode format grand! So then I run all the tests and get my "results.ser" file. What to do with it? Well, process it with Groovy of course! Here is the simplest script I could come up with to do what I want:

import java.io.*;
map = new ObjectInputStream(new FileInputStream(args[0])).readObject();
map.findAll {
  if (it.key =~ args[1]) {
    return it;
  }
}.each {
  println it.key + ": " + it.value;
}

You pass it the "results.ser" file and a regular expression to match against method signatures and you get a list of signatures and all the tests that use them. Here is an example of the output once you are done:

Groovy:> groovy coverage.groovy results.ser bind
Object org.codehaus.groovy.sandbox.markup.StreamingMarkupBuilder.bind(Object): [org.codehaus.groovy.sandbox.markup.StreamingMarkupTest]
Object org.codehaus.groovy.sandbox.markup.BaseMarkupBuilder.bind(Closure): [DOMTest, org.codehaus.groovy.sandbox.markup.StreamingMarkupTest]
Object org.codehaus.groovy.sandbox.markup.StreamingDOMBuilder.bind(Object): [DOMTest]

So if I was changing the BaseMarkupBuilder.bind method, I would know that I have to run at least DOMTest and StreamingMarkupTest to make sure that I didn't regress. This feature is something that can readily go into an IDE like Eclipse. You modify a method, it looks at the call hierarchy of the tests or this runtime generated file, determines which tests need to be run, and the launches them in the background after you build. If anything happens you get the red squiggles on your method with the results of the test attached. Talk about iterative development! The XP people can even go the other way. Write all your tests and keep fixing the code till the squiggles go away and not only does it build, but it runs! I'm telling you, something like this is the next step the IDEs will have to take.

2005-02-24T11:00:00.000+08:00

Focus on specific tasks during project initiation

got this from TechRepublic

Focus on specific tasks during project initiation

Within each project management phase, there are tasks that are crucial to the project's success. This is especially true for initiation tasks because many of the decisions that you make during this phase are precursors for steps you'll take in later project stages.

Although all tasks you work on during initiation are important, you should devote extra attention to the following items:

Project manager selection: This may be the most important task of the project. The key factors to consider when making your decision include verifying appropriate knowledge, specialty skills, and experience that are commensurate with the perceived needs of the project.
Project team selection: This is perhaps the second most important initiation task, yet managers rarely put much thought into it. When choosing team members, keep in mind that you should identify which subject matter experts you'll need and then negotiate their availability.
Project charter: This gives legitimacy to the project and identifies its goals and objectives. The goals and objectives list is the first pass at the project scope. It's also important to identify the business needs and project deliverables--even if it's only at a high level. This gives weight to discussions with project stakeholders and may help identify project champions.
Financial analysis: The results of the initial financial analysis (which is conducted during the prioritization phase) set the standard for how the project will benefit the organization. The analysis needs to clearly demonstrate this benefit to potential project stakeholders.
Assumptions and constraints: You must create a document that identifies assumptions and constraints (to the extent that they can be documented). This document can be the key to further refining scope and deliverables during later project stages.
Project repository and historical information: The project manager should establish a common and easily assessable document repository for housing project documents and other information. Historical information from prior projects that are similar in nature can provide a treasure trove of useful information for your project.
Authority, roles, and responsibilities: The project manager is ultimately responsible for the project's delivery. Beyond that, project teams can take on a wide variety of organizational structures. You must identify and establish the project manager's authority, its source, and how to leverage the manager's authority. It's also imperative to identify other team members' roles and responsibilities in order to understand how they'll interact with the overall project team. Finally, it is always good for the project manager to work with the team members' functional managers to ensure resource availability when needed.

If you happen to be in the unfortunate situation where project initiation is fast tracked, you should focus your attention on selecting the right project manager and team for the job.

Project initiation is the time to be as task oriented as possible. The more thorough you can be with laying the groundwork for your project early on, the better off your project will be in the long run.

Scott Withrow has more than 20 years of IT experience, including IT management, Web development management, and internal consulting application analysis.

2005-02-24T10:48:00.000+08:00

Export or import with Oracle Data Pump

In Oracle 10g, exp and imp have been redesigned as the Oracle Data Pump (although Oracle still ships and fully supports exp and imp). If you're used to exporting exp and imp, the Data Pump command-line programs have a syntax that will look very familiar.

Data Pump runs as a job inside the database, rather than as a stand-alone client application. This means that jobs are somewhat independent of the process that started the export or import. One machine (say a scheduled job) could start the export, while another machine (such as a DBA's laptop) can check the status of the job. Since the job is inside the database, if you want to export to a file, the first thing that you must do is create a database DIRECTORY object for the output directory, and grant access to users who will be doing exports and imports:

create or replace directory dumpdir as 'c:\';
grant read,write on directory dumpdir to scott;

Once the directory is granted, you can export a user's object with command arguments that are very similar to exp and imp:

expdp scott/tiger directory=dumpdir dumpfile=scott.dmp

While the export job is running, you can press [Ctrl]C (or the equivalent on your client) to "detach" from the export job. The messages will stop coming to your client, but it's still running inside the database. Your client will be placed in an interactive mode (with Export> prompt). To see which jobs are running, type status. If you run expdp attach=, you can attach to a running job.

Data Pump doesn't necessarily have to write to files. Now there are options to allow you to export database objects directly into a remote database over SQL*Net. You simple specify the remote option with the connect string of the remote database. This is something like a one-time database replication job.

Data Pump is much faster than the old exp and imp client commands. One new feature that really helps make it faster is the "parallel" option. With this option, the Data Pump will pump data in four different threads. For example, I ran the following job, pressed [Ctrl]C, and queried the status of the background jobs:

expdp scott/tiger directory=dumpdir dumpfile=scott2.dmp parallel=4
job_name=scott2

Export: Release 10.1.0.2.0 - Production on Friday, 31 December, 2004 14:54

Copyright (c) 2003, Oracle. All rights reserved.

Connected to: Oracle Database 10g Enterprise Edition Release 10.1.0.2.0 -
Production
With the Partitioning, OLAP and Data Mining options
FLASHBACK automatically enabled to preserve database integrity.
Starting "SCOTT"."SCOTT2": scott/******** directory=dumpdir
dumpfile=scott2.dmp parallel=4 job_name=scott2
Estimate in progress using BLOCKS method...

Export> status

Job: SCOTT2
  Operation: EXPORT
  Mode: SCHEMA
  State: EXECUTING
  Bytes Processed: 0
  Current Parallelism: 4
  Job Error Count: 0
  Dump File: C:\SCOTT2.DMP
& &  bytes written: 4,096

Worker 1 Status:
  State: EXECUTING

Worker 2 Status:
  State: WORK WAITING

Worker 3 Status:
  State: WORK WAITING

Worker 4 Status:
  State: WORK WAITING

Not only is the Data Pump running inside the database, but also, most of the command-line features are exposed from inside the database through a PL/SQL api, DBMS_DATAPUMP. For example, you can start the export job from a PL/SQL package with the following PL/SQL code:

declare
& &  handle number;
begin
& &  handle := dbms_datapump.open('EXPORT','SCHEMA');
& &  dbms_datapump.add_file(handle,'SCOTT3.DMP','DUMPDIR');
& &  dbms_datapump.metadata_filter(handle,'SCHEMA_EXPR','= ''SCOTT''');
& &  dbms_datapump.set_parallel(handle,4);
& &  dbms_datapump.start_job(handle);
& &  dbms_datapump.detach(handle);
end;
/

Check out Data Pump to learn about many of its other great new features. For instance, Data Pump contains features with the ability to rename datafiles, move objects to different tablespaces, or select schema objects or schemas using wildcard patterns or expressions. The Data Pump can also act as an interface to external tables (i.e., a table can be linked to data stored in a data pump export file like the Oracle Loader interface available since Oracle 9i).

Scott Stephens worked for Oracle for more than 13 years in technical support, e-commerce, marketing, and software development.

interesting way to achieve high GoogleRank

2005-02-12T10:41:00.000+08:00

this is an interesting way to achieve high GoogleRank

forgetable ride on the hughtrain

2005-01-18T10:37:00.000+08:00

I have arrived.
The answer to great business is so f**king obvious.
Yo world listen to me

The above pretty much sums up what Hugh wants to say in smug and abundant f**k words.

Mozilla Thunderbird

2004-12-31T11:02:00.000+08:00

tried out Thunderbird today again.

Still do not like it better than Outlook Express.

I use Outlook Express with Popfile for mail classification.
Popfile classifies my incoming mail and prefixes the mails with the classification.
When I receive mail, OE files them into folders according to the prefix.

So [spam] mail is automatically deleted as per my message rules.

When I tried Thunderbird for a short while, I did not like it because:

1. I could define the Message filter but it did not run on receiving mail ? I expected it to but a spam sat in my Inbox.
2. the date sort on mail is buggy. I tried to sort so that my most recent mail is on top but instead got a mail that I receive in 2001 on top. Next was my 2004 mail. At the bottom was some mail in 2002. I remember having the same problem when I used Netscape mail too.

I tried to get some help by clicking on Help - not very helpful.

After the above, I did not want to use it any longer and uninstalled it.
Uninstall was clean.

Browser printing problem

2004-12-21T19:31:00.000+08:00

For certain web pages, Internet Explorer truncates the right edge.
Firefox prints them well.

Try printing this page with Internet Explorer and Firefox.

Email productivity tips

2004-12-20T10:41:00.000+08:00

Tyranny of Email is a good article about using email productively.

Amongst the takeaway tips, I like this the most:

1. Switch off your email client
Check mail only at designated times and for the rest of the time, switch it off. Email is a very big distraction and productivity minus if not managed.

Desktop Search

2004-12-17T10:02:00.000+08:00

I have long been interested in Desktop Search products.
It's great for finding stuff on my PC without doing the Explorer find which can take a very long time.

These are the Desktop Search products I have tried and my take on them:

1. Copernic Desktop
  My favourite desktop search because it can index any type of text file. I have text files with .java, .sql, .jnl extensions and I can set up Copernic to index these files too
2. msn toolbar suite
  indexes only common files like microsoft excel, word, text files.
3. Google Desktop
  familiar interface but indexes only common files but not pdf
4. blinkx
  not stable, occasionally crashes on windows xp

How To Be Creative manifesto at ChangeThis

2004-12-03T17:29:00.001+08:00

Always interested to learn more about how to be more creative, I read this from ChangeThisChangeThis.

It does not live up to the promise of teaching anyone to be more creative in art, business or whatever.

The author shares a lot of his experience of becoming a professional cartoonist but his advice is more relevant to someone who wants to be a cartoonist.

And his use of expletives does not add to this article.

Logic Quest's blog site

2004-08-30T09:32:00.000+08:00

Launched