natch3z

How to use POP3 to read email in Hotmail accounts

2009-03-14T00:23:00.002+07:00

Microsoft has just announced on March 12, 2009 that now everyone can connect to Hotmail account to check email using POP3 protocol. Before this service in announced, for example, if you need to connect to your Hotmail using Microsoft Outlook you will need to install Outlook Connector. By providing POP3, you can now use your favorite email client (such as Evolution; your mobile phone: iPhone, Blackberry, etc.; or even other web-based email: Gmail, Yahoo, etc.) to check your email.

To use your favorite email client to connect to Hotmail using POP3, you will need to set up the following configurations:

POP server: pop3.live.com (Port 995)
POP SSL required? Yes
User name: Your Windows Live ID, for example yourname@hotmail.com
Password: The password you usually use to sign in to Hotmail or Windows Live
SMTP server: smtp.live.com (Port 25 or 587)
Authentication required? Yes (this matches your POP username and password)
TLS/SSL required? Yes

Note: If you are using Outlook Connector, keep using it. Outlook Connector is a better way to connect to Hotmail from Microsoft Outlook.

For more information: Windows Live Hotmail Blog

OSSPAC 09 Day 2

2009-02-18T13:02:00.016+07:00

The second day at Open Source Singapore Pacific-Asia Conference & Expo. (First Day : OSSPAC 09 Day 1)

Python - Bring Fun Back into Programming

In this session, I learned some basic Python and got to know how easy Python is. For example, to read web page as HTML text in Python, you would write:


import urllib2
site = urllib2.urlopen("http://www.google.com")
lines = site.readlines(2000)
print lines

First, you import urllib2 from the standard library included in Python. Then, read it by calling urlopen. After that read at a maximum of 2000 lines and put it in lines. Finally, print them out to the console.

The speaker (Mervin Beng) used Pyshell to write and run all his codes.

PHP in Enterprise

This session provided basic overview of PHP.

Getting Started with Google Android

Sean Sullivan really gave us a great overview of Android. I think this session is one of the most popular session here. If you want to look at his slides, click here. His website is here.

Exhibition Hall

IBM

Sun Microsystems

redhat

Oracle

Novell (OpenSuse Linux)

Tersus : Software for developing web based application without the need to write a single line of code. Tersus website.

A team from Taiwan
DBRL : A tool that let you boot linux remotely similar to thin client scheme but all the computation are executed locally at each client. All the files are stored on servers, so the clients don't need to have their own hard drives.
Clonezilla : An opensource hard drive cloning tool similar to Norton Ghost.

OpenBravo : Opensource Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP)

Zend : PHP framework

Evening reception

Android G2 has arrived

2009-02-17T22:40:00.005+07:00

Android G2 / HTC Magic is officially launched at Mobile World Conference 2009. Here is its specification:

CPU Qualcomm 528 MHz
ROM 512 MB, RAM 192 MB with microSD slot supporting SDHC
Weight 118 grams (Battery included)
3.2 inches touch sensitive screen (not sure whether it supports multitouch or not) Resolution: 320x480
There is a trackball
Quad-band GSM, HSDPA/WCDMA 900/2100 MHz
GPS, Electronic Campass, WiFi B/G, Bluetooth 2.0 EDR, Accelerometer
Camera 3.2 m. Pixel AF
No more physical keyboard

Source : http://news.cnet.com/rumor-has-android-g2-in-the-works/

OTimeline : your personal timeline

2009-02-17T15:17:00.006+07:00

What is a timeline?

A timeline is a graphical representation of a chronological sequence of events, also referred to as a chronology. It can also mean a schedule of activities, such as a timetable.
(wikipedia)

20th century timeline from Microsoft Encarta (C) Microsoft Corp.

Have you ever think of creating your own timeline so that you can record memorable events?

OTimeline provides each and every user to create a chronology of their history in the Internet. As each person has their own interesting tale to tell for every passing day, we want to capture their beautiful and meaningful moments in life with our unique timeline gadget that can be easily installed and implemented whether it is in your blog, facebook account or any other web 2.0 application.

See for yourself : http://www.otimeline.com/

Wiki Simple Explanation

2009-02-17T14:59:00.004+07:00

Simple explanation of Wiki - Content Management System (CMS)
(I saw this for the first time at OSSPAC. It's quite fun.)

OSSPAC 09 Day 1

2009-02-16T22:09:00.002+07:00

After waiting for a long time, IBM representative contacted me saying that I won a trip to OSSPAC from dW Game Challenge. IBM sponsors air transportation (Singapore Airlines), hotel (Traders Singapore) and OSSPAC conference fee for me. After all the confusion about travel arrangements, finally I am here.

Open Source Singapore Pacific-Asia Conference & Expo

Registration Desk

IBM Session : Extending Open Source Capabilities For Enterprise Environments

Exhibition Hall (open on Day 2)

Lunch Buffet

Wondering why they put those plastic rings on the side of plates? It is used for holding wine glass.

Change Voicemail number in iPhone

2009-01-18T20:50:00.005+07:00

How to change Voicemail number in iPhone?

Call : *5005*86*123456789# where 123456789 is the number you want to call when you press the Voicemail button.

For example, you can set your Voicemail number to your own iPhone telephone number. When pressing it, you will always get a busy tone. Thus, this will prevent accidentally calling Voicemail number.

Credits : http://janandjanuary.multiply.com/journal/item/68/68

Read Request Body in Filter

2009-01-11T11:19:00.015+07:00

Is it possible to intercept HTTP Request in order to read HTTP Request Body (HTTP Request Payload) before it is served by target servlet or JSP?

The answer is yes. You can use Servlet Filter to read, "filter" or modify ServletRequest (HTTPServletRequest) object before the request object is sent to and serve by the final servlet.

What if I read a request body within a servlet filter, is the body still going to be available to be read again by the servlet, or can it be read only once?

Yes, but it is a little bit tricky. Because of the fact that the request body can be read only once. If you read the body in a filter, the target servlet will not be able to re-read it and this will also cause IllegalStateException. You will need ServletRequestWrapper or its child: HttpServletRequestWrapper so that you can read HTTP request body and then the servlet can still read it later.


public class MyRequestWrapper extends HttpServletRequestWrapper {
 private final String body;
 public MyRequestWrapper(HttpServletRequest request) throws IOException {
   super(request);
   StringBuilder stringBuilder = new StringBuilder();
   BufferedReader bufferedReader = null;
   try {
     InputStream inputStream = request.getInputStream();
     if (inputStream != null) {
       bufferedReader = new BufferedReader(new InputStreamReader(inputStream));
       char[] charBuffer = new char[128];
       int bytesRead = -1;
       while ((bytesRead = bufferedReader.read(charBuffer)) > 0) {
         stringBuilder.append(charBuffer, 0, bytesRead);
       }
     } else {
       stringBuilder.append("");
     }
   } catch (IOException ex) {
       throw ex;
   } finally {
     if (bufferedReader != null) {
       try {
         bufferedReader.close();
       } catch (IOException ex) {
         throw ex;
       }
     }
   }
   body = stringBuilder.toString();
 }

 @Override
 public ServletInputStream getInputStream() throws IOException {
   final ByteArrayInputStream byteArrayInputStream = new ByteArrayInputStream(body.getBytes());
   ServletInputStream servletInputStream = new ServletInputStream() {
     public int read() throws IOException {
       return byteArrayInputStream.read();
     }
   };
   return servletInputStream;
 }

 @Override
 public BufferedReader getReader() throws IOException {
   return new BufferedReader(new InputStreamReader(this.getInputStream()));
 }

 public String getBody() {
   return this.body;
 }
}

The first step is to create a class that extends HttpServletRequestWrapper. Then, use the constructor to read HTTP Request body and store it in "body" variable. The final step is to override getInputStream() and getReader() so that the final servlet can read HTTP Request Body without causing IllegalStateException.

Here's how to use RequestWrapper in the filter.


public void doFilter(ServletRequest request, ServletResponse response,
  FilterChain chain) throws IOException, ServletException {

  Throwable problem = null;

  MyRequestWrapper myRequestWrapper = new MyRequestWrapper((HttpServletRequest) request);

  String body = myRequestWrapper.getBody();
  String clientIP = myRequestWrapper.getRemoteHost();
  int clientPort = request.getRemotePort();
  String uri = myRequestWrapper.getRequestURI();

  System.out.println(body);
  System.out.println(clientIP);
  System.out.println(clientPort);
  System.out.println(uri);

  chain.doFilter(myRequestWrapper, response);
}

IBM ASEAN dW Game Challenge

2009-01-11T10:29:00.013+07:00

IBM ASEAN dW Game Challenge (IBM ASEAN DeveloperWorks Game Challenge) is a maze-quiz game sponsored by IBM. During the game, you will need to navigate King Darwin out of the maze and to his castle. If you encounter a yellow box, you will need to answer an IT-related multiple-choice question in which its answer can be found on IBM developerWorks website. Once answer correctly, you will gain 300 points. If you answer it wrong, you will lose 150 points. When you start the game, you will have 3000 points. Each seconds during the play, except when you are attempting to answer each question, will cost 1 point.

This is the official rules and description from the website:

About the Game

King Darwin is trapped in a maze and needs to find his way back to the dW Castle. Your challenge is to help him out in the shortest time possible, through pushing of crates and tackling of quiz questions whereby answers can be found within the IBM developerWorks portal.

So are you up to the ASEAN dW Game Challenge? Play the game now to find out!

How to Play

•	Your task is to help King Darwin maneuver through the maze by pushing crates out of his way. There will be metal boxes along the way that cannot be moved.
•	You are required to answer a multiple-choice quiz question whenever King Darwin steps on a glowing golden tile, which could be exposed or hidden under the crates.
•	Answers to the quiz questions can be found within the IBM developerWorks portal. A hint will be provided for each question.

Scoring System

•	You will own 3000 gold coins at the start of each game, whereby 1 gold coin represents 1 second.
•	The timer will be activated once you start the game and one gold coin will drop for each second that passes.
•	The timer will be paused when King Darwin steps on a glowing golden tile and you are prompted to answer a quiz question. The timer will resume upon submission of your answer to the quiz question.
•	If a quiz question is answered correctly, the bonus will be an addition of 300 gold coins to your total number of gold coins at that point of time.
•	If a quiz question is answered incorrectly, the penalty will be a deduction of 150 gold coins from your total number of gold coins at that point of time.
•	The objective of the game is to collect the most number of gold coins at the end of the game.
•	You can play the game multiple times and submit your best scores with your personal information for a chance to be one of our top 3 winners.

The top 3 winners at the ASEAN level will be awarded with the following prizes.

The ASEAN dW Game Challenge was opened till 31 December 2008.

I played the game and as of December 31, 2008, luckily, I am the first place. Until final announcement, I hope it won't change. :)

Most Popular Search Terms on Google in 2008

2009-01-04T12:00:00.008+07:00

Google has published most poppular search terms in 2008 on Google Zeitgeist 2008. According to dictionary.com, Zeitgeist means

the spirit of the time; general trend of thought or feeling characteristic of a particular period of time

It is pronounced like "sai-gai".

Google Zeitgeist 2008 published many interesting stats. Here is one of them.

During April-July, the gas around the world was the most expensive ever in the history. From the graph we can conclude that people are interested in seeking for alternative energy source: solar, energy efficient cars and lamps (cfl : Compact fluorescent lamp). As the price dropped, trends started to fade away for hybrid car and solar panel probably because hybrid car is quite expensive nowadays and building solar panels on house roof can be troublesome. And, the most easiest way to save energy cost in the house, without the need to spend too much time and money, is to change your light bulb into a more energy efficient one.

Reading HTTP Request Body in Servlet

2008-11-19T22:04:00.026+07:00

Suppose you are writing a program using Java on Java EE platform to create a web application, dynamic web pages or Java Web Service, you probably come to the point that you need to read HTTP request body, especially if you want to use Servlet Filter to intercept and manipulate ServletRequest / HTTPServletRequest before it is served by targeted servlet / JSP.

Reading HTTP Body is easy. You can use either the following methods to get HTTP Request Body (HTTP Request Payload). Both methods is useful only with HTTP POST message. If you try to read HTTP GET body, you will not get anything (except a null String). This is because HTTP GET message has empty body.

getReader()
This method is defined in Interface ServletRequest. It returns a BufferedReader object. Here is an example on how to read HTTP Request Body using getReader() method.


// inside service(ServletRequest req, ServletResponse res)
// of a class that implements Servlet
// or
// inside doPost(HttpServletRequest req, HttpServletResponse resp)
// of a class that implements HTTPServlet

BufferedReader buff = req.getReader();
char[] buf = new char[4 * 1024]; // 4 KB char buffer
int len;
while ((len = reader.read(buf, 0, buf.length)) != -1) {
 out.write(buf, 0, len);
}

getInputStream()
This method is defined in Interface ServletRequest. It returns ServletInputStream which is an InputStream object.


// inside service(ServletRequest req, ServletResponse res)
// of a class that implements Servlet
// or
// inside doPost(HttpServletRequest req, HttpServletResponse resp)
// of a class that implements HTTPServlet

StringBuilder stringBuilder = new StringBuilder();
BufferedReader bufferedReader = null;
try {
  InputStream inputStream = request.getInputStream();
  if (inputStream != null) {
   bufferedReader = new BufferedReader(new InputStreamReader(
inputStream));
   char[] charBuffer = new char[128];
   int bytesRead = -1;
   while ((bytesRead = bufferedReader.read(charBuffer)) > 0) {
    stringBuilder.append(charBuffer, 0, bytesRead);
   }
  } else {
   stringBuilder.append("");
  }
} catch (IOException ex) {
  throw ex;
} finally {
  if (bufferedReader != null) {
   try {
    bufferedReader.close();
   } catch (IOException ex) {
    throw ex;
   }
  }
}
String body = stringBuilder.toString();
System.out.println(body);

Note that by reading HTTP Request Body by using either of the above method, you cannot read the body again. Also, you can only call getReader() or getInputStream() only once and not both; otherwise you will get IllegalStateException.

If you want to use getReader() or getInputStream() in Filter to intercept, manipulate or reconstruct HTTP Request Body, you must use ServletRequestWrapper to reconstruct or preserve HTTP Request Body. See ServletRequestWrapper example here.

Use Internet Explorer (IE) in Firefox

2008-11-17T00:05:00.005+07:00

Quick Answer : Install Firefox Plugin - IE Tab.

Firefox is great but there are some web pages out there that Firefox cannot render the page properly. One of the cause is that some web pages use HTML code or some script that can be rendered by Internet Explorer. Such a very nice example comes from my university registration website.

REG CHULA is the nickname of the website as called by most students here.

This is actually a menu on the left side of the page seen on Firefox. Pretty messy, eh?

There are some solutions to this problem. 1. Use Internet Explorer (obviously!) 2. Since my friends and I are computer engineering students (Geeks!), we are pretty addicted to Firefox. My friend, Teerapap, developed a Firefox plugin called "FireRegChula". He wrote a script that can be run from Greasmonkey. This solves the problem from REG CHULA well.

But, if you want a true IE inside Firefox, you will need this plugin: IE Tab.

After you install and restart Firefox, notice the lower right corner Firefox logo. Click on it to switch to IE. Click again to switch back. You can also configure it to activate IE automatically for a preconfigured website.

How to read and send Hotmail in Outlook

2008-11-16T22:53:00.012+07:00

If you want to use Microsoft Outlook to connect to your Hotmail account, there are two ways to achive this. If the first one doesn't work, try the second one. (Personally, I think the second method provide more reliable connectivity with hotmail server, but you will need to install a plugin.)

First method

Microsoft Office Outlook, Outlook Express, Windows Live Mail already have a functionality to connect to any Windows Live mail accounts (@hotmail.com, @windowslive.com, @msn.com, etc.) It will use an HTTP as a protocol to connect to hotmail server. To read / get and send email from Outlook, follow these steps:

1. Open Microsoft Outlook. Open the menu "Tools" > "Account Settings". This will open a dialog box.

2. Click "New" in "E-mail" tab.
Fill in your name as it will appear on the top of every e-mail message you sent from Outlook later.
Then, fill in your email address such as someone@hotmail.com; follow by your account password.
Uncheck "Manually configure server settings or additional server types", if it is checked.

3. Click Next.
Outlook will try to establish to Hotmail server. If it fail, click retry. After failing twice, it will ask you to provide additional informaion for server settings. Just ignore it, click back to the step 2 above, retype your password and click next again.

Second Method

If the first method doesn't work or Outlook shows a message states that you need to pay for Hotmail Plus to let you use Outlook to access Hotmail, you will need Microsoft Office Outlook Connector.

As describe on Microsoft website

With Microsoft Office Outlook Connector, you can use Microsoft Office Outlook 2003 or Microsoft Office Outlook 2007 to access and manage your Microsoft Windows Live Hotmail or Microsoft Office Live Mail accounts, including e-mail messages and contacts for free!

Follow these steps.

1. If you already add your hotmail account to Outlook, I suggest you should delete it first.
Go to "Tools" > "Account Settings", then click on the email account and click delete.

2. Download and install Microsoft Office Outlook Connector. As of the time I write this article the current version can be found here. Please also check here for newer version. Don't forget to close Outlook before you install Outlook Connector.

3. Restart Microsoft Outlook.

4. Click "Outlook Connector" > "Add a new Account"

5. Fill up your information. Restart Outlook.

Searchable Java Documentation / javadoc

2008-11-11T23:04:00.000+07:00

If you are a beginner starting to learn how to program in Java, you probably already used the plain HTML-framed javadoc avalable on Sun's website as an online and downloadable zip file. This HTML javadoc is useful but it doesn't really gives you an opprtunity to search it using keywords and index. Fortunately, an HTML help format is available. It lets you search the entire Java Documentation using keywords / class name / method. Very convenient!

Try it out here.

Convert String to InputStream

2008-11-11T22:53:00.001+07:00

If you want to create InputStream from String in Java, the following code might help.

String text = "simple string";
ByteArrayInputStream byteArrayInputStream = new ByteArrayInputStream( text.getBytes());

Since ByteArrayInputStream is a concrete class extends from InputStream, you can instantiate it using the new keyword and use it in place where InputStream is expected i.e. use it as an argument passed to another method.

SOAP XML Schema

2008-11-11T21:43:00.000+07:00

Recently, I have been working on a web service project which involves SOAP message processing. Something strange is that I cannot find SOAP schema posted anywhere on the web. I tried googling "soap schema" and "soap xml schema" but found nothing. Anyway , I managed to get it from the WSDL message generated automatically when I created a web service using JAX-WS and NetBeans IDE 6.1. If anyone wanted to get a soap schema, here it is.

http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/envelope/

Read a text file using java.util.Scanner

2008-11-11T10:45:00.009+07:00

Scanner is a utility class that comes with Java SE since version 5.0. It lets you read a plain text file just like BufferReader, but more flexible. It can be customized so that you can read the contents line-by-line, word-by-word, or customized delimiter.

The readFileByLine method reads a plain text file one line at a time.


 public static void readFileByLine(String fileName) {
  try {
   File file = new File(fileName);
   Scanner scanner = new Scanner(file);
   while (scanner.hasNext()) {
    System.out.println(scanner.next());
   }
   scanner.close();
  } catch (FileNotFoundException e) {
   e.printStackTrace();
  }
 }

The following method does the same as above except that it use a new line character as a delimiter.


 public static void readFileByLine(String fileName) {
  try {
   Scanner scanner = new Scanner(new File(fileName));
   scanner.useDelimiter(System.getProperty("line.separator"));
   while (scanner.hasNext())
    System.out.println(scanner.next());
   scanner.close();
  } catch (FileNotFoundException e) {
   e.printStackTrace();
  }
 }

What if you want to read the entire text file at once? You can do so by setting the delimiter "\\z".


 public static void readFileByLine(String fileName) {
  try {
   Scanner scanner = new Scanner(new File(fileName));
   scanner.useDelimiter("\\z");
   System.out.println(scanner.next());
   scanner.close();
  } catch (FileNotFoundException e) {
   e.printStackTrace();
  }
 }

scanner.useDelimiter("\\z"); means the same as
scanner.useDelimiter(Pattern.compile("\\z"));

By using the "\\z" delimiter, you can read the entire web page as an HTML string.


 public static void readWebPage(String url) {
  URLConnection connection;
  try {
   connection = new URL(url).openConnection();
   Scanner scanner = new Scanner(connection.getInputStream());
   scanner.useDelimiter("\\z");
   String text = scanner.next();
   System.out.println(text);
  } catch (MalformedURLException e) {
   e.printStackTrace();
  } catch (IOException e) {
   e.printStackTrace();
  }
 }

You can also use Scanner to read a semi-structured text file which stores data separated by tabs, commas, or semi-colons. For more information read this.

Consult java.util.regex.Pattern javadoc for other delimiters.