An amazing collection of scene crackmes; if you ever thought you were good enough to represent – this is where to start.

Being an infant, I stuck with the tutorials. Even then I struggled. For hours.

My *working* solution to CrackMe1 is below. To make it a little more difficult for myself, I thought I would give C++ a spin.
I was bitterly disappointed that my keygen was larger than the original crackme.

#include <cstdlib>
#include <iostream>
 
using namespace std;
 
int main(int argc, char *argv[])
{
    //declare local variables
    string _name;
    int i = 0;    
    int char_sum = 0;
    int _first, _second;
    char c, d;
 
    //ask user to input name, store it in local variable
    cout << "name: ";
    cin >> _name;
 
    //put the name variable to uppercase
    while(_name[i])
    {
         c = _name[i]; //create char from current index on string
         d = toupper(c); //put char to upper
         char_sum = (int(d)) + char_sum; //increment the count         
         i++;          
    }  
 
    //http://www.woodmann.com/RCE-CD-SITES/Quantico/mib/crack10.htm
    _first = char_sum ^ 22136;
    _second = _first ^ 4660;    
 
    //output the serial!
    cout << "serial: " << _second << endl;
 
    system("PAUSE");
    return EXIT_SUCCESS;
}

Competition sites often will employ SEO specialists who receive their money once the site has hit the top results of google.

The real secret is building content rich websites, with specific and relevant information.
This is a lot harder to do in practice, but there are some website seo tips that make a bit difference.

One thing I try and do is constantly research techniques, and analyse other websites code.
How did I end up getting on this site? The information is/isn’t relevant – what did they do?
Often I will watch fast rising websites to see how long they stay high in the results; if I notice sudden drops, then I dismiss the technique.

One seo technique that has me bemused at the moment is the new style link farming.
Here is how it works:

You buy a website which caters as some kind of service, say, seo-solutions.com.au.
You then setup LOTS of sub-domains; melbourne.seo-solutions.com.au, collingwood.seo-solutions.com.au, easy.seo-solutions.com.au
You then setup webpages on each of these subdomains, addressing specifically what is in the title.

SEO companies are doing this very cheaply – they buy one domain, then sell hundreds of sub-domains (which cost them nothing) to unwitting service men and women.
How long will it last? I don’t know. At the moment it has really messed up the Google search results in some industries.

This leads into my concern about this kind of link farming. Apart from being terrible for the integrity of search results, I am also concerned about the impact this kind of web marketing would have on brand value, and dilution.
If a customer can’t search for anything except you, then after a while, they will hate your brand.
I want Tech guys to flash back to the early days of experts-exchange. SO annoying. (although now its “free”, so so handy)

One article I was reading to help consul myself was the link dilution: links and pages on Google Answers.

The poster slawek-ga made an amazing reply (where did he find the time???) Nice.

In order to continue installation, please close the following application:
iTunes

Literally, the most annoying messagebox I have ever seen. iTunes was definitely not running.
What the error should have been was

In order to continue installation, please close the following application:
iTunes Helper

Thanks to http://www.macosxtips.co.uk/index_files/fix-xcode-instsaller-please-close-itunes.php for the step by step article on getting past this simple problem, made complex by poor error information.

Here is one way of doing it.

using System.IO;
using System.Xml;
Using System.Xml.Serialization;
 
class Product
{
string pName;
}
 
class doit()
{
List<Product> p = new List<Product>();
 
//put in the string
XmlSerializer xms = new XmlSerializer(p.GetType());
StringWriter sw = new StringWriter();
xms.Serialize(sw, _aList);
string myString = sw.ToString();
 
//read from string back into class
StringReader sr = new StringReader(myString);
Product List<myClass> = xms.Deserialize(sr) as List<Product>; //there are a lot of ways to cast type, do this however you feel.
}

Motorola GP328 Programming Software.

Works a treat, I’ve only tested it on the GP328. Let me know if you get it working with any other radios.

Its important that you DO NOT share connections. The database is designed to take multiple connections and pool them. Sharing a connection between users is only going to create conflict that will have to be controlled in your application with code.

I decided to actually test Microsoft Access and see how it stood up to the same treatment as I gave MySQL.

The function I used is below, you’ll be able to implement it almost perfectly into the earlier example.  You’ll obviously need to duplicate the below function so that both threads have their own unique database function to run.

using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Linq;
using System.Text;
 
using System.Data;
using System.Threading;
using System.Data.OleDb;
 
static class AccessClass
    {
        public static void access1()
        {
            OleDbConnection conn = new OleDbConnection(@"Provider=Microsoft.ACE.OLEDB.12.0;Data Source=world.accdb");
            OleDbCommand command = new OleDbCommand("INSERT INTO helloworld (pname) VALUES ('user1')", conn);
 
            try
            {
                Console.WriteLine("Connecting to Access Database...");
 
                int i = 0;
 
                do
                {
                    conn.Open();
                    command.ExecuteNonQuery();
                    conn.Close();
                    i++;
                } while (i < 100);
            }
            catch (Exception ex)
            {
                Console.WriteLine(ex.ToString());
            }
 
            Console.WriteLine("Access1 Routine Done.");
        }

You’ll notice the conn.Open and conn.Close are now repeated everytime the loop runs… That leads me into my conclusion.

Running the connection timing the same as I did in the MySQL example always lead to locking problems. Ultimately, if the database connection attempted were properly managed I would end up with 200 new items in the database each time I run it. The reality is quite a bit more unpredictable than that. So make it throw less errors, I made it close the connection between each iteration. This slowed it down immensely. Still, the results were unpredictable, sometimes 212 new items would be added, other times 218.

Instead of investigating why this happens, for the simplicity of not having to worry about database locking, I’ll stick to using MySQL for multiuser environments.

NOW.

When I close Form2, I want the original Form1 to become Visible again NOT instantiate a new Form1.
After a bit of playing around and googling, I found exactly what I was looking for at StackOverflow.

The answer on the question i-would-like-to-control-form1-from-form2 was exactly the solution I was looking for. Rather than repost it here, I encourage you to frolic over to stack and have a read!

I wanted the program to use a Microsoft Access 2007 Database, mostly because it would be very portable, rapid development that would be easy to backup when it went into operation. Performance isn’t so much an issue, seeing as there will 4 or 5 users maximum.

I had difficulty determining whether or not this could done. I don’t know why. I guess its obvious to most people.

The simple answer is it can be done. In both Microsoft Access and MySQL. Before I lept into development, I wanted to see how the database behaved in C#, so I thought I’d write a quick application to test whether or not I actually can write by multiple users.

(As it turns out, it can be done in Microsoft Access but I found it very problematic in my testing)

You’ll want an SQL database that is made to look like this:

CREATE TABLE helloworld(
id INT NOT NULL AUTO_INCREMENT,
PRIMARY KEY(id),
name VARCHAR(30));

And then compile this short c# program. Don’t forget to change the various settings that affect you.
You’ll need the MySQL .NET Connecter, and include a reference in your project.

using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Linq;
using System.Text;
 
//the additional references you'll need
using System.Data;
using MySql.Data;
using MySql.Data.MySqlClient;
using System.Threading;
 
namespace mySQLTest
{
    ///
<summary> /// This program is written to prove that multiple threads or users can simulatenously access the MySQL data base and write. /// The MySQL connector handles the lockout or connection attempts automatically. /// </summary>
 
    class Program
    {
        static void Main(string[] args)
        {
            //declare two threads to act like users
            Thread thread1 = new Thread(new ThreadStart(DatabaseClass.doStuff));
            Thread thread2 = new Thread(new ThreadStart(DatabaseClass.doOtherStuff));
 
            //start the threads running
            thread1.Start();
            thread2.Start();
 
            //the current 'main' thread, should run in a loop until the other two have finished.
            while (thread1.ThreadState != ThreadState.Stopped &amp;&amp; thread2.ThreadState != ThreadState.Stopped)
            {
                Thread.Sleep(200);
            }
 
            //once the threads are finished, notify us through the console.
            Console.WriteLine("End");
            Console.ReadLine();
        }
    }
 
    static class DatabaseClass
    {
        ///
<summary> /// this function is quite well documented in the MySQL manual, the section that talks about .NET connectors. /// </summary>
 
        public static void doStuff()
        {
            string connStr = "server=192.168.3.11;user=root;database=world;port=3306;password=password;";
            MySqlConnection conn = new MySqlConnection(connStr);
            try
            {
                Console.WriteLine("Connecting to MySQL...");
                conn.Open();
 
                //i want to enter a thousand items
                int i = 0;
                do
                {
                    string sql = "INSERT INTO helloworld (name) VALUES ('user1')";
                    MySqlCommand cmd = new MySqlCommand(sql, conn);
                    cmd.ExecuteNonQuery();
                    i++;
                } while (i &lt; 1000);
            }
            catch (Exception ex)
            {
                Console.WriteLine(ex.ToString());
            }
            conn.Close();
            Console.WriteLine("Done.");
        }
 
        public static void doOtherStuff()
        {
            string connStr = "server=192.168.3.11;user=root;database=world;port=3306;password=password;";
            MySqlConnection conn = new MySqlConnection(connStr);
            try
            {
                Console.WriteLine("Connecting to MySQL...");
                conn.Open();
 
                int i = 0;
                do
                {
                    string sql = "INSERT INTO helloworld (name) VALUES ('user2')";
                    MySqlCommand cmd = new MySqlCommand(sql, conn);
                    cmd.ExecuteNonQuery();
                    i++;
                } while (i &lt; 1000);
            }
            catch (Exception ex)
            {
                Console.WriteLine(ex.ToString());
            }
            conn.Close();
            Console.WriteLine("Done.");
        }
    }
}

If you were to shoot into MySQL Console right now, and ran:

SELECT * FROM helloworld;

You’d be delighted (like I was), to find your two users have simultaneously written to the database.

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• Mornington Peninsula

The OLE DB provider “Microsoft.ACE.OLEDB.12.0″ has not been registered.

Was the message I recieved from Visual Studio 2008 as I tried to use an Access database with my new application.

I protested quietly – knowing that the OLE DB providor WAS installed and WAS referenced in my project… I’d come across the problem before but couldn’t remember how I fixed it.
Getting Error “The OLE DB provider “Microsoft.ACE.OLEDB.12.0″ has not been registered”. when importing excel file. had the answer (a fair way down the page).

The Microsoft.ACE.OLEDB.12.0 is for x86 architecture – by default Visual Studio was compiling in x64.

Build > Configuration Manager > Platform > “New…” > x86

And it works!