Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Computing/2013 September 11

Welcome to the Wikipedia Computing Reference Desk Archives
The page you are currently viewing is an archive page. While you can leave answers for any questions shown below, please ask new questions on one of the current reference desk pages.

September 11

Free/Cheap, effective ways to get around YouTube videos' restrictions by country?

Hi, I tried using ProxMate and MediaHint. It didn't help me get around YouTube's restriction of videos in the "AlJazeeraEnglish" channel not being available to watch from the United States any longer. (I used to be able to watch them until recently.)

I also would like to access a prior comment I posted to one of their videos at the time, so I hope that any app you suggest to help me get around the regional restriction will also let me see my old comment. Please help me any way you can somehow. Thanks. --2602:30A:2EE6:8600:BCB6:8AEB:5731:581E (talk) 07:48, 11 September 2013 (UTC)

I'm in the US and it seems to load just fine for me, is there a specific video you could link to? I can't test anything since I can't seem to find anything to test it on.Phoenixia1177 (talk) 08:56, 11 September 2013 (UTC)

I can't find it on the search through their channel anymore. Weirdly enough, some other video on that same channel was viewable by me. However, here is the video in question. By the way, my username there is EgaoNoGenki, so if you could please paste my comment that I made about cancer treatment here, that would be great because it would refresh my memory about what all I typed about it. Thanks. --2602:30A:2EE6:8600:BCB6:8AEB:5731:581E (talk) 09:08, 11 September 2013 (UTC)

That one is blocked for me, nothing I do goes around it either. Sorry. I'm curious now, though, let me know if you find a solution; I'll keep looking too.Phoenixia1177 (talk) 09:56, 11 September 2013 (UTC)

I take it you mean Egao No Genki. Anyway all comments there post by that username from oldest to most recent:

Extended content

“ Tell her to stay away from refined salts and refined sugars. Also, to start on an alkaline diet. (Diets with more acids PROMOTE cancer, diets with more alkalis WEAKEN them, and help in the fight against cancer.) And please, PLEASE get her some cannabis oil. Treatments with cannabis oil has been known to significantly improve the fight against cancer. Good luck, and let me know how it goes! ” — Egao No Genki 2 months ago “ What a troll. Let us ALL live long, and vertical farming would allow more to be fed. ” — Egao No Genki 2 months ago “ She can possibly get fed alkalines intravenously. And cannabis oil is still possible with her. Please, look into it, somehow. ” — Egao No Genki 2 months ago

Nil Einne (talk) 12:52, 11 September 2013 (UTC)

Thank you so kindly, Nil. I can now remember all that it takes (holistically) to fight cancer. I guess you're able to see the vid because of having a New Zealander's IP? Well, do you happen to know the best proxy that lets me "borrow" a New Zealand IP address so I can circumvent this regional restriction? Thanks again! --2602:30A:2EE6:8600:F93B:503A:D99D:541F (talk) 00:55, 12 September 2013 (UTC)

Here's some proxy servers from New Zealand listed on proxynova. Hope this helps! --.Yellow1996.^(ЬMИED¡) 03:16, 12 September 2013 (UTC)

Cheap, streamlined phone?

This probably isn't the place to ask a question of this sort, but the Reference Desk has always proved the most helpful and clever resource i know, and this is a special situation, so i hope you might be willing to indulge me.

A couple of days ago, i had my iPhone stolen out of my bag (FindMyiPhone yields nothing, if you're wondering, whoever it was must know what they're doing) and my insurance isn't playing ball. I'm due for an upgrade in about a year, so i'm looking at getting an interim phone for the meantime. it'll have to be handset only - i'm on contract - and cost is obviously a factor. I've been with iPhone since the 3G and don't really know the market: i've felt rather locked-in to using Apple devices by various purchases (a common complaint, i suspect). But i've had it forced on me now, so i felt i would do well to ask for help.

I'm in the UK, and with Vodafone. What i would really like is a streamlined, rugged phone: i don't particularly need features and apps (i've been thinking about downgrading for a while...). But i would need a useable internet browser (including 3G and Wi-fi), push email and push facebook messenger, and ideally a QWERTY keyboard (on-screen is fine, if it's fairly useable). Crucially (and i don't even know if this is possible), i would need the capacity to store and play at least 16GB of aac format music, a great deal of which was bought through iTunes. I'm prepared to faff about with a format converter, or even have a separate iPod, if that's the only way to do this, but because this is probably temporary that's far from ideal. And obviously, i'd like to meet all those criteria as cheaply as possible.

i would be extraordinarily grateful if you guys and girls would be able to help me out with this: i'm sorry if this question is an abuse of the Reference Desk. Thanks much for your attention. Dan Hartas (talk) 15:01, 11 September 2013 (UTC)

Tesco sells an unlocked HTC Desire C with no SIM for £140 online, other shops for about the same. It takes a MicroSD card up to 32GB. It won't, it seems, play AAC without an external converter, but there are plenty of pages online showing you how that's done. I've used its bigger brother the Desire S for over two years and I couldn't be happier with it; when O2 wanted to update it to some lumbering Samsung tombstone I told them to shove off. -- Finlay McWalterჷTalk 15:24, 11 September 2013 (UTC)

Some people claim to have luck with offbrand phones from discount/import sites like Deal Extreme.

Never tried them myself. APL (talk) 17:15, 11 September 2013 (UTC)

I've read good reviews of the Huawei Ascend P1. Cheap, powerful, and should easily get the job done. Zunaid 12:49, 13 September 2013 (UTC)

power failure during Windows update

This morning we had an extended power failure. The computers are on UPSs and I went to shut them down. When I did that, one of them started installing a Windows update and it said to not turn off the power. There was only one update and it finished before the UPS gave out, but what happens if it loses power during that process? Will it leave the computer in an unbootable state? Bubba73 ^{You talkin' to me?} 15:06, 11 September 2013 (UTC)

It shouldn't, no. A power failure isn't that unusual an occurrence, so for the system to be broken if one happened during an update would be a shoddy state of affairs. In the worst case, it should have saved a system restore point just before the update, so if the system doesn't work properly, you should be able to boot into safe mode and roll back to the restore point. From there you can reapply the updates again. -- Finlay McWalterჷTalk 15:12, 11 September 2013 (UTC)

Right - Windows will detect that the update didn't finish, and try to clean things up. It is probably possible that with very bad timing and the right update it could get cut off in the middle of writing an important boot file, but I think (it may be possible to dig up a reference) that Microsoft uses NTFS's transactional features to ensure that a half-written update gets rolled back to a consistent state automatically. If the drive is caching aggressively and lies about if things are flushed (this does happen with some drives), then the transaction logic may not actually be power-fail safe. Katie R (talk) 15:18, 11 September 2013 (UTC)

Resolved

Thank you both. Bubba73 ^{You talkin' to me?} 15:25, 11 September 2013 (UTC)

Automatic colour blending.

I compile a drawing in XP Paint. The particular colours for the various parts are as per my choice. I save the document. Later on re-opening I find that the borders of the various colours have been melded with the colours of the other sections. How does one ensure that the programmed does not change what has been done.

What format are you saving the file in?

If you're saving it as a jpeg with compression turned all the way up, that could cause what you're seeing. Try saving as .png or .tif. APL (talk) 17:11, 11 September 2013 (UTC)

I agree with APL - you're probably saving them as JPEG files (often the default on WinXP Paint); I personally prefer working with PNGs. If this happens to be an issue with Paint itself (probably not) there are other free alternatives like Paint.net and such. --.Yellow1996.^(ЬMИED¡) 03:19, 12 September 2013 (UTC)

… Microsoft is prompting me to contact you guys!!!

So… I just buy a new hdd and install win8 and office 2013, everything fine as always, but now I have realized that any time I receive a notification from Wikipedia or any mail with links and I try to fallow the links, ms outlook give me this error:

“Your organization’s policies are preventing us completing this action for you. For more info, please contact your help desk” (and “ok” is the only option)

So I can’t fallow the links, instead I have to select the links, right clip copy and paste it in the chrome’s directions bar

How can I fix this???

The help from Microsoft is useless

Thanks!

Iskánder Vigoa Pérez (talk) 15:13, 11 September 2013 (UTC)

This article suggests that this is caused by a situation where there is no default browser on your computer. (Possibly because you installed a browser and then uninstalled it.)

The easiest solution would probably just be to install Firefox or Chrome, but if you don't want to do that, the article I just linked has an alternative solution. APL (talk) 21:24, 11 September 2013 (UTC)

haha... I uninstalled ie and installed chrome... what could be the problem here?... now I'll checky our link

Thank you very much — Preceding unsigned comment added by Iskander HFC (talk • contribs) 23:53, 11 September 2013 (UTC)

Problem resolved!

I had and old firefox version an put it as default browser and then put chrome again as default

thanks again

Iskánder Vigoa Pérez (talk) 01:07, 12 September 2013 (UTC)

Glad to hear it! APL (talk) 03:19, 12 September 2013 (UTC)

Resolved

StuRat (talk) 11:59, 12 September 2013 (UTC)

Font similar to Gaelic type

Sometimes they use it in English texts simulating Irish language... I am trying to design some banner for a website I am working on and I need the name. Can you guys pointing it out? Thanks. Miss Bono ^[zootalk] 19:13, 11 September 2013 (UTC)

You mean something that is not Gaelic/ Irish uncial, but sort of looks like it, right? Try one of these [1], the first looks closest to my eye. Also, I'll point out that some people really dislike this sort of thing. To understand why, you might be interested in this article "Is your business font racist?" [2]. SemanticMantis (talk) 20:02, 11 September 2013 (UTC)

I can see how pseudo Hebrew and Chinese fonts might offend, but you can see "Gaelic" typefaces in signs all over Ireland (except maybe the Protestant bits in the North).[3] [4] I wouldn't worry too much about it. Alansplodge (talk) 21:17, 11 September 2013 (UTC)

Those pictures you linked are Gaelic typefaces used to write Gaelic. I don't think it's a practice that compares with the pseudo-Chinese writings you'll find on Chinese restaurant. I'm not sure where Miss Bono's intent lies on the "racist" spectrum but I'll venture it's pretty benign. In other news, this website appears to be an excellent ressource for such things, having sections for legitimate gaelic fonts as well as pseudo-gaelic fonts and extensive documentation - but since Miss Bono generally does not have access to the Internet outside of Wikipedia, I have to ask: in what way to you intend to procure those fonts? One solution could be to use a regular font that has full support for Gaelic diacritic marks (such as Tahoma or Arial which are both quite common) and to add random Gaelic diacritics to your text - which is probably even more racist but in the absence of downloadable fonts could be a reasonable solution - although inputting the text would then itself be an issue. Effovex (talk) 22:58, 11 September 2013 (UTC)

I saw a user named The Irish Warden or something that had that kind of font in his signature, that's all I want, the name of the font. I am not a racist... :'( I just wanted to write a text and English with a font that resembles Gaelic texts. Like if you are a fan of Harry Potter and you want to write your name using the font used in the movie, to print it and put it in the walls of your bedroom. Miss Bono ^[zootalk] 13:18, 12 September 2013 (UTC)

Nobody said you were racist, don't worry about it. In fact, I probably didn't need to mention the whole thing, but I thought it was interesting, and others might be like to see the article. I do think we should all think twice or more before using "fake Hebrew" or "fake Chinese" fonts... Anyway, the names of the fonts I linked above are "YY Uncial Most Irish" and "Irish Uncialfabeta" -- but those specific fonts may not be installed on the systems you are using. SemanticMantis (talk) 14:43, 12 September 2013 (UTC)

Just becauseI don't like being proved wrong, here are some English language signs in Gaelic script in Ireland... [5] [6] [7] [8]. Alansplodge (talk) 17:52, 12 September 2013 (UTC)

Samsung Galaxy S2 Screenshot function

I have the S2 with the required OS upgrade to have the screenshot function. Everywhere I've looked says that a screen shot can be taken by holding down the volume down and home button or the volume down and power button. I have not been successful with either of these options. Is there something I need to turn on in settings so this button mapping returns a screen shot?

Once the screenshot is successfully taken, will I see a confirmation message on screen? Where will it save in the gallery? Thank you in advance63.95.64.254 (talk) 19:45, 11 September 2013 (UTC)

Aha! Never mind, I figured it out. It's actually the home button and the power/lock button and it takes a second or so longer than I was expecting. Issue solved! :)63.95.64.254 (talk) 21:25, 11 September 2013 (UTC)

Resolved

StuRat (talk) 11:58, 12 September 2013 (UTC)