Recent Posts

17426

General Software Discussion / Re: software to draw network map

« Last post by mouser on December 27, 2009, 12:46 PM »

This is probably overkill (and costs $90): LanFlow
http://www.pacestar.com/lanflow/desc.htm

I've used their very friendly flow charting software in the past (Edge Diagrammer).

17427

N.A.N.Y. 2010 / MINI-NANY 2010 Release: World Cup Predictor FIFA 2010

« Last post by mouser on December 26, 2009, 10:19 PM »

MINI-NANY 2010 Entry Information

Application Name	World Cup Predictor FIFA 2010
Version	v2010
Short Description	This is an online javascript tool that uses Markov Chain Monte Carlo statistics to predict the best monetary bets to place on the FIFA 2010 Tournament
Supported OSes	Online (firefox,IE)
Web Page	https://www.donationcoder.com/wcp
Author	mouser and crono
Screencast	http://donationcoder...010/sc/wcp/wcp3.html YouTube: http://www.youtube.c.../watch?v=Q8bt1o-s_Dw

This is an online tool to help predict the most profitable bets on the winner of the FIFA World Cup 2010 (soccer).  It uses Markov Chain Monte Carlo statistical methods to simulate tens of thousands of tournaments, using expert-provided pairwise game score estimates, and then calculates the expected payoffs of bets based on current odds.

Description

MCMC works by leveraging simple single-event probabilities, that you can easily estimate, into long-range predictions involving many interactions. There's no magic involved. It's basically a way of estimating the probabilities of complex multi-step outcomes through brute force simulation.

In the case of the World Cup, this amounts to simulating complete tournaments by playing each game from round one through the final, choosing winners based on simple pairwise expectations of how the teams pair up against each other.

The pairwise match-up probabilities are the key to being able to simulate entire tournaments autonomously, and must be provided by an expert or from records of previously played games. You can create your own pairwise estimations using WCP'10 or use one of the probability estimation tables generated by an expert.

Obviously, the accuracy of this pairwise match-up table is critical to getting good results from the Tournament Simulator. The key to the power of MCMC methods is that they let you convert simple known (or relatively easily estimable) probabilities, and by simulating full sequences of outcomes over and over again, arrive at an estimate of the probabilities of different long-term highly-interactive final outcomes.

You can read more about the statistical methods involved on the wcp page: https://www.donationcoder.com/wcp

History

This tool was originally written for the 2006 world cup, and DC member Crono was instrumental in helping me code it.

It is borderline inappropriate for NANY since it is not a complete rewrite -- but I am hoping it will be ok with everyone to submit it because it is a whole new tournament event.

Screencast

Screenshots
From the 2006 tournament:

17428

WorldCup Predictor / Re: FIFA 2010 coming up.. should we update the World Cup Predictor?

« Last post by mouser on December 26, 2009, 10:10 PM »

Update:
I've loaded it up with some current betting odds found on the web.

So it's ready to roll.. Though it's missing any expert ratings so it's not going to be of much use until then.


However, if you want to get a feel for how this tool for calculating betting advice differs from a tool to predict the winner -- select the "Uniform Ratings" from expert ratings list, click Load, then Start the simulation.

What you should see over time is now every team equally likely to win the tournament.  Now look at the Expected Profit columns.  Red entries are expected profitable bets, the higher the better.  Note that Honduras is the highest expected payoff -- which makes sense since it's the team that has the highest payoff odds and we are assuming for this experiment that all teams are equally likely to win.

[LOCKING TOPIC -- PLEASE REPLY ON ONE OF THE ACTIVE WCP 2010 THREADS]

17429

N.A.N.Y. 2010 / Re: NANY 2010 Teaser: FarrSpell

« Last post by mouser on December 26, 2009, 10:06 PM »

Here's how it works: When you type in a word, it finds 2 dif kinds of synonym lists:

1. The type is shown all on one line -- that's what you have in your result, and it happens when the word youve typed is not a "head word" but merely in a list with others.  So your word is IN that list shown.
2. If you word is a "head word" then you get all of the results listed individually.  The easiest way to see this is to click (or arrow down and hit enTer) on that second result, which by default will change the word in the search to the head word, thus showing all the synonyms listed individually.

17430

WorldCup Predictor / Re: FIFA 2010 coming up.. should we update the World Cup Predictor?

« Last post by mouser on December 26, 2009, 09:48 PM »

Pretty much done updating it for 2010.
Odds aren't correct because I haven't written scraping code yet.
And the there are no good expert ratings yet (please add some!).

Should be ready by Jan 1, 2010.

Now the trick is going to be finding some people to put in some good pairwise score estimates (see here for more info).

17431

N.A.N.Y. 2010 / Re: NANY 2010 Teaser: FarrSpell

« Last post by mouser on December 26, 2009, 09:43 PM »

by the way if you get sick of typing fspell you can go to advanced options for a plugin and change the alias trigger to something like fsp or even fs or s

17432

N.A.N.Y. 2010 / Re: NANY 2010 Teaser: FarrSpell

« Last post by mouser on December 26, 2009, 09:42 PM »

yes, you have large mode result mode.. it will look better once we get some better icons.

17433

N.A.N.Y. 2010 / Re: NANY 2010 Teaser: FarrSpell

« Last post by mouser on December 26, 2009, 05:53 PM »

The icons suck at large size -- i'm hoping hamradio or someone else will make some new .icon files with 32x32 and 16x16 resolution.

17434

N.A.N.Y. 2010 / Re: NANY 2010 Teaser: FarrSpell

« Last post by mouser on December 26, 2009, 05:52 PM »

Preview release posted -- download at link specified above, and unpack into a subdirectory of farr Plugins folder (Plugins\FarrSpell).

17435

N.A.N.Y. 2010 / Re: NANY 2010 Teaser: FarrSpell

« Last post by mouser on December 26, 2009, 12:18 PM »

updated with screenshot teasers.

17436

N.A.N.Y. 2010 / Re: NANY 2010 Teaser: FarrSpell

« Last post by mouser on December 26, 2009, 08:37 AM »

that it would spell in English English as well as American English (maybe show both even?)

you will be able to choose your dictionary, same as Clipboard Help+Spell does it.

17437

N.A.N.Y. 2010 / Re: NANY 2010 Teaser: UQ

« Last post by mouser on December 26, 2009, 07:00 AM »

UQ will not be done in time for NANY, but will be coming soon..
It was a little ambitious to try to get it out the door by Jan 1, but we will aim for Feb 1 instead.

I will pledge one or two other smaller NANY projects (see here).

17438

N.A.N.Y. 2010 / NANY 2010 Release: FarrSpell

« Last post by mouser on December 26, 2009, 06:55 AM »

NANY 2010 Entry Information

Application Name	FarrSpell - Spellchecker+Thesaurus Plugin for FARR
Version	v1.03.01
Short Description	A plugin for Find and Run Robot which will spellcheck words and list synonyms
Requires	Find and Run Robot
Early Download Link	FarrSpell.zip v1.03.01
Screencast	http://donationcoder...c/fspell/fspell.html YouTube: http://www.youtube.c.../watch?v=iGSUdFCjX4w

Description
This will be a plugin for Find and Run Robot to help people who quickly need to spell a word or look up synonyms.

Screencast

Screenshots

17439

Find And Run Robot / Re: FARR will not run

« Last post by mouser on December 25, 2009, 11:09 PM »

if you double click the tray icon, does it show farr normally?
if so, the first task will be identifying whether another program has taken over the break hotkey maybe..
try opening up farr options and go to hotkey tab and add another hotkey and see if that hotkey works.

when you say beep.. are you hearing the farr sound? the same sound as when you double click on the tray? or is it the system beep?

17440

FARR Plugins and Aliases / Re: FScript Javascript SDK - Write FARR plugins in javascript and more.

« Last post by mouser on December 25, 2009, 11:06 PM »

Do we have a python and ruby example somewhere?

17441

N.A.N.Y. 2010 / NANY 2010 xmas regifting

« Last post by mouser on December 25, 2009, 06:45 PM »

I thought maybe i would start a thread where people who have stuff to give away could give it to NANY participants as a way of saying thanks.

I have some Graphic Novels to give away.
Here they are, some I loved (Criminal series), some I hated (The Filth):





Sorry for not providing links, you'll have to search amazon for more info.


So who wants them? You must be a participant in NANY2010, and I will give priority to anyone who is willing to send all or most of them to someone else after they finish reading).
I think maybe best to send them all as a set, to someone in the US because of postage.  Some of these have adult/violent subject matter.

17442

Announce Your Software/Service/Product / Re: Library Management System 0.7 -- A tool for keeping track of your books!

« Last post by mouser on December 25, 2009, 05:40 PM »

Hey isn't this a candidate for entering into NANY 2010?

17443

Find And Run Robot / Re: Cannot get FARR to search as expected

« Last post by mouser on December 25, 2009, 05:30 PM »

Another question: FARR sometime will find 30+ entries.  It will display only a few of them.  Is it possible to scroll thru the entire list?

you can change the # of results farr lists by default from the "Display Options" tab, or you can leave it how it is and add "+sall" to your search to show all results.

After discussion on the forum, I've agreed we need a faster way of showing all resutls -- that is on my todo list.


ps. if you haven't seen them, there are over 3 dozen FARR screenscast videos showing how different features work:
https://www.donationcoder.com/3ds

17444

Find And Run Robot / Re: Cannot get FARR to search as expected

« Last post by mouser on December 25, 2009, 05:27 PM »

Welcome econdoc  

1. In order to try to understand how FARR searches, I switched off all the virtual folders except %FARRDIR%\scripts.  I then searched for 'excel'.  It returns one item: C:\Program Files (x86)\FindAndRunRobot\scripts\Control Panel (cpanel)\Printers and Faxes (cpanel).lnk.  Nowhere in that path is the string 'excel'.  Why did it find this?

By default FARR has enabled "non-contiguous matching", which will match (albeit with a low score) against strings where the given letters are found in the right order but not next to each other, so for example: "Printers and Faxes (cpanel)"

You can disable this if you like from the "Search Behavior" tab.


I think you are going about this the right way, trying to simplify in order to understand what FARR is finding, so disabling non-contiguous search can help.  You can also turn on FARR's display of subfolders as it searches, which is in the "Display Options" tab.

One thing to keep in mind is that FARR tries hard to find lots of matches, but score them in a way so that the one you are most likely to want is listed at the top.  You can alter the scoring heuristics in the "Heuristic Scoring" tab.  Note also that once you launch a file once, it goes into your history list where it will be found instantly, and scored higher, the next time.  So even if the file you were looking for wasn't at the top position the first time you launched it, it will be higher and faster next time.

17445

Clipboard Help+Spell / Re: DBISAM errors with Clipboard Help+Spell on Windows 7 System

« Last post by mouser on December 25, 2009, 03:31 PM »

Ok let me see if i can track down the cause..

Here's a thought -- if one of you feels comfortable sending me your "corrupted" clipboard history data file from CHS, then zip up the Clipboard Help+Spell \ Database directory in your MyDocuments area and mail it to: [email protected]

I will treat it with utmost privacy but i also understand if you'd rather not send it.

17446

LaunchBar Commander / Re: LATEST LaunchBar Commander VERSION INFO THREAD - v1.110.01 - Dec 25, 2009

« Last post by mouser on December 25, 2009, 08:58 AM »

Minor Update:
v1.110.01 - December 25, 2009

• [Feature] Some people were getting error about missing drives when LBC tried to resolve paths for items that no longer had valid paths; such resolution is now not enabled by default, but can be enabled in the main Options page.

17447

Older Newsletters / Re: --> Newsletter for December 22nd, 2009 - "NANY EVE"

« Last post by mouser on December 25, 2009, 08:37 AM »

 glad to help distract you with a little bit of distraction

17448

Screenshot Captor / Re: Links to Reviews and Comments - Add yours!

« Last post by mouser on December 25, 2009, 05:19 AM »

"But the surprises do not end with the capture of the desired object, on the contrary - just beginning... "

http://www.esoft.web...m-your-computer.html

17449

Screenshot Captor / Re: LATEST MiniCap VERSION INFO THREAD - v1.17.01 - December 25, 2009

« Last post by mouser on December 24, 2009, 11:28 PM »

v1.17.01 - 12/25/2009

• Added commandline options for printing.
• Added print button.
• Hitting Escape key in main form will now exit.

v1.16.01 - 3/12/2009

• Added commandline options for resizing

v1.15.01 - 12/08/2008

• Added commandline option -postrun "commandline" to run a post processing program on the captured image (use $file$ to replace saved image filename in commandline)

17450

Living Room / Re: Best. Shop. Ever.

« Last post by mouser on December 24, 2009, 10:56 PM »

can't wait to see the pictures