Micro Mart Forum / Micro Mart Diploma / Micro Mart Forums

Partition Editing

Bruce R — Sat, 03 Nov 2007 12:26:45 GMT

Why isn't there a perfect, reliable drive partition editor ?
(Tools like 'PartitionMagic' can fail to work.)

Designed by PowerQuest, PartitionMagic was re-badged by Symantec/Norton.
Good as its design was, it couldn't be tested against every possible make of
drive, BIOS, Operating or File System or combination thereof, so it was
bound to fail one day.

There are other, operating system-embedded tools, like Windows XP Disk
Management (Control Panel, Administrative Tools, Computer Management),
but they are limited. The most popular alternative tool has been Linux Gnome
Partition Editor or GParted, in LiveCD form.
Progressively revised and issued on stand-alone LiveCDs using different Linux
kernels, specific versions have failed to perform reliably for specific hardware.

However, some good news. The recent PartEdMagic 2.2 LiveCD seems to work
well on many different machines, as a result of using a 2.6-series Linux kernel.
By default it loads into RAM, ejects the CD and continues working, promptly
displaying 'drive' icons for all detected partitions with dual Linux/Windows labels.
Double-clicking them invokes Windows Explorer-like Thunar File Manager for file
recovery, whilst its Gparted 0.3.7 also has dual labeling and very comprehensive
partition editing. There is also a screen capture and save to zip file capability,
plus a recent copy of a character-graphics command-line PartImage.
[url]http://partedmagic.com/wiki/PartedMagic.php?n=PartedMagic.Downloads[/url]
(Free - but donations welcomed.)
All-in-all, a great tool that can even fit on an 8cm mini-CD !

(Re-Edited from thread dialogs and more recent experience - 19th July 2008.)

Hicks753

nitrowing — Wed, 02 Jan 2008 23:54:48 GMT

Ooops! :ermm:

Partitions, Physical & Logical Drives

Bruce R — Wed, 02 Jan 2008 02:38:41 GMT

Noticing a lot of confusion about 'drive' letter assignments and their use, I hope that this will help.

As a continuing legacy from the creation of early Disc Operating Systems, first for floppy and then for hard drive use, the BIOS limits the number of main partitions to four for each physical hard drive. These can be visible or hidden primary, bootable or extended, non-bootable partitions, further sub-divided into logical data drives. I have yet to see a drive that overcomes this old limit, but as extra drives are now cheap or better value for money, and multiple SATA drive interfaces now quite common, that's unlikely to be a real problem.

When visible or hidden Operating Systems are installed they need a primary partition and during installation or re-installation, Windows USUALLY assigns that partition as its C: drive and automatically assigns other A-Z letters to the other visible drives, which can include other operating system drives. So, a Vista C; drive may re-appear with a different drive letter in WinXP, and vice versa. (It NOW appears that re-installation CAN change the C: drive letter assignment, but for a fix see http://support.microsoft.com/kb/223188, found by Brum.)

(Note that a proprietary recovery system can simply be a custom Win2K installation, hidden at the end of the drive, using up one of the four partitions. Also note that a given BIOS or make of hard disk drive can impose different limits on operating system boundaries, even limiting the overall physical drive size.)

In WinXP (or Vista), right clicking on My Computer (or Computer), Manage can provide access to Computer Management to select Disk Management, where by right clicking on 'drives', their initially assigned drive letters can be changed and then shuffled around (with the exception of the assigned system's drive). Initialisation, naming and formatting of partitions is also possible.

Partition Magic can offer a simpler display of visible and hidden DOS or Windows partitions and of extended partition logical data drives, but has Linux partition limitations, especially when used for editing, post Linux installation. Recent Linux LiveCD variants of GnomePartitionEDitor (gparted) provide more Linux information and can achieve better editing results. (See Partition Editing.)

Edited with later post contributions - thank you folks !

GIMP or X

the_capt — Sat, 24 Dec 2005 01:14:36 GMT

Don't know about every one that has done the first diploma stuff but I found using The GIMP program a hell of a lot harder than Photoshop (the norm for me), and to be honest I struggled using it. Anyways learnt sommit new (to a point) so it ain't all bad.

Finished my Site(s)

the_capt — Mon, 22 May 2006 00:30:34 GMT

I have finished my web sites, I made two but not for micromart diploma but for my degree course work. One is made with XHTML and Flash the other just with XHTML. They both use CSSs.

The content is about the Internet but as I was only to demonstrat some flash and html for my course work(infact most of it was designing the pages in a report rather than the actual sites) the content didn't matter so I ripped it off various sites. Wikipedia being the main source.

[url]http://www.thecapt.co.uk/Flash/theInternet.htm[/url] Flash Site
[url]http://www.thecapt.co.uk/HTML/home.htm[/url] XHTML Site

DotNukeNet

DigitalDuster — Thu, 28 Jun 2007 20:56:12 GMT

Hello,

I have recently bought The Design Of Sites, by Van Dauyne Landay Hong.

I have putting off designing layout for a website for months because i do not know how to design it correctly until i ve come across to your MicroMart review on this book. It is eye opener and how to design effectively.

Also there are almost unlimited spoilt of choice on programming languages and tools which put me off even further.

I am wondering if anyone got this book on their book shelf or near their computers.

What is the best way to learn all the tools required to be able to web designs guided by this book?

What is the all of tools required to do able to this? So i can plan to learn one tool a time.

What about DotNukeNet?

What is so special about DotNukeNet? Does DotNukeNet got all the tools required to do anything enough in The Design of Sites book?

I ve got lot of time on my hand.

M

a way to learn css

cartoony — Thu, 04 May 2006 08:05:01 GMT

If anyone else is struggling to get to grips with css, I've just found a book title that looks promising;
Integrated HTML and CSS: A Smarter, Faster Way to Learn
Virginia Debolt
ISBN: 0-7821-4378-4
Paperback
377 pages
January 2005
$30
Sybex

Sybex books are well written and easy to follow.

There's also CSS web design for dummies
Richard Mansfield
isbn: 0-7645-8425-1
£16

Whatever has happened to them...

Tom Morton — Thu, 20 Apr 2006 15:48:38 GMT

Well the DIploma's seem to have coughed and died! What went wrong? Not much response or something? or have you run out of ideas?

It's a shame because I thought they were a great idea!!

If you have run out of Ideas then I have a load you could happily use - I could even write them!

1) Following on from the html guide how about one for PHP, or for Javascript. Both of which are easy languages to pick up and are really useful.
2) One I couldn't wirte but a graphics design one - making buttons, fancy effects etc.
3) Building a computer (altho I realise that would probalby not get alot of response)
4) Another one I couldn't write: Start using linux - set up linux and learn how to use it!

Just some ideas! I tohught is was a great idea to get people doing different things!

Graphics tablet

cartoony — Sat, 20 May 2006 12:13:27 GMT

:D I just bought a graphics tablet for less than £30 new and its the best thing since sliced bread!
No more struggling with the mouse, no more using a layer for every element cos I'll mess it up. I can now do more natural looking paintings as well as the more graphicky stuff. I can trace my cartoons in to the pc instead of scanning them.
The pen takes a bit of getting used to but I reckon if you can draw a bit you'll get along with it.
I'm off to play.

Colour Coding

ziggeri — Thu, 11 May 2006 20:52:02 GMT

Hi all,

I've just read the section of the Micro Mart Diploma called Colour Coding and decided to write a simple little program in VB which will enable you to easily obtain the hex values for the full range of RGB colour mix.

I've attached a .zip file of just the compressed .exe file to this msg. (I think??)

I'm not sure if the .exe file alone will run if you don't have Visual Basic installed so I have uploaded a Packaged version to my website which can be downloaded at the following address http://homepage.ntlworld.com/robert.burns43/ (Both Files can be d/l'd from here).

This file is approx 1.3mb.

Please send some feedback if you find it to be any good or useful :o)

Thanks

Rob

How do I learn HTML?

cartoony — Sat, 08 Apr 2006 13:50:38 GMT

Last year I did the City & Guilds in web design and got interested in web design. My problem is that we didn't really go into cascading style sheets or anything in any depth, we just learned basic html. And now from reading other threads in this forum it seems that I'm even further behind than I realised.
So lets say I'm a complete beginner, stuck at home with some access to the web and able to get hold of books. Where do I start? I'd really like to go further but there aren't any more advanced courses locally. I'm a single parent so I'm always skint.
I learn best when someone explains step by step what to do and why, then gives some examples to work with.
If anyone can suggest a good book for beginners I'd be grateful.
Cheers!

When's it for?

chris999998 — Sun, 04 Dec 2005 17:35:04 GMT

I've been planning to do the diploma, but missed the issue with the assignment in it - shop ran out of MM, I was most disappointed - anyway, I'v elooked at the assignment on http://micromart.co.uk/diploma but I couldn't see when you wanted it done by, have I missed something? or is the a deadline?

Cheers for a great Mag,

Chris

Are the HTML tutorials really valid?

chris999998 — Fri, 24 Feb 2006 20:13:16 GMT

This is probably slightly controversial, but:

I am slightly concerned as to the usefulness of teaching HTML in this manner. HTML standards are created by the WWWC, World Wide Web Consortium. The most recent HTML standard is HTML 4.01, this, as with most previous ones, requires a Document Type Definition - this tells the computer reading it what language it is written in - much like a file extension. The HTML examples given in the tutorials make no reference to this, a key problem. Next, the tags in the tutorials are written in uppercase, this is not compliant with the most recent version of HTML.

I don't want to cause trouble, but I'm sceptical as to the use of "half-teaching" this, I have nothing against learning, but I dislike simplification to the extent that things are wrong.

I may be missing something, and I hope I am as I find the MM mag a great read and everyone on the forums are great people.

Chris

EDIT: on rereading, I am glad to see the emphasis on the proper closing of tags and the use of stylesheets. More worried by the inclusion of the font tag, I believe this was removed from the standard in HTML version 3!

How will we know?

cartoony — Tue, 28 Feb 2006 09:10:13 GMT

I know you don't get paid for this and you're busy, but I wondered if there could be a topic added to this thread for each of the diplomas to let us know that our stuff reached you and how we're doing?
Cheers

HTML Diploma test

Novice User — Mon, 13 Feb 2006 13:06:43 GMT

Ok so I've started on the assignment and all is going well. However when I place a hyperlink on my gallery picture it turns the outline purple which really screws up the overall image of my page. Obviously I could just make the text under the image linked to a bigger image but ideally I would like to make the whole data cell (picture and text) a hyperlink to the new window but without affecting the colour.

Help please!

HTML Tutorials

the_capt — Thu, 09 Feb 2006 14:33:45 GMT

I showed a mate the last tutorial/assignment in last weeks micromart. He thought he have a go so I told him that he could get the weekly tutorials at www.micromart.co.uk/dipolma but they don't seem to be there, only the digital editing stuff. Will the HTML stuff be online any time soon??

Micro Mart Diploma 2

PhilK — Mon, 13 Feb 2006 14:07:54 GMT

Micro Mart Diploma

Basic HTML - Part 1/8: Mark-up

It's the first part in our second diploma and this time, we're going to be looking at basic HTML programming.

So, why bother to learn HTML when there are so many good packages around that let you design your pages directly onto the screen without any code? Because by understanding what goes on behind the scene, you'll be better placed to move on to more advanced web programming such as PHP or .NET languages. You'll also be able to tweak your pages when the design program doesn't get it quite right.

Firstly, although the 'L' in HTML stands for language, it is not a programming language. It is a collection of mark-up codes that describe the structure of a document. The tags tell the computer that at a certain point in the flow of the text it needs to do something, such as start displaying text in bold or insert an image etc.

Get Coding

We're assuming you don't have a website design package or an HTML editor. All you need to get started is any old text editor - we'll use Windows Notepad. Watch out for notepad adding a '.txt' extension to your filenames though. HTML documents must have a '.html' or '.htm' extension, otherwise your HTML tags won't be interpreted.

To view your saved document, simply choose 'Open file' from your browser's menu. This is the way in which you view documents on your own computer. We'll see the different way in which you view documents on the Internet later.

All HTML documents should have the following basic structure:

<HTML>
<HEAD>
<TITLE>
My web page
</TITLE>
</HEAD>
<BODY>
Welcome to my web page
</BODY>
</HTML>

The code above simply displays 'Welcome to my web page' on the browser screen. You will notice a lot of words enclosed within angled brackets (e.g. '<HTML>') - these are known as tags. Tags are elements of HTML and usually come in pairs. A pair of like-tags is known as a container and bounds the area of the document to which it applies. A tag with a '/' before the word is a closing tag and one without is an opening tag. Notice the opening tag <HTML> at the start of the document and the closing tag </HTML> at the end of the document - the whole document is 'contained' within them.

Within the <HTML></HTML> container are two other containers: <HEAD></HEAD> and <BODY></BODY>. Within the <HEAD></HEAD> container is yet another container <TITLE></TITLE> etc.

Tags Explained

The <HTML></HTML> tags contain the whole web page. The <HEAD></HEAD> section contains information about the document. An important piece of information is the <TITLE></TITLE> section. The text enclosed in this container is displayed in the browser's title bar while the page is being viewed and it's also important to search engines. The <BODY></BODY> section contains the content of your document. The majority of HTML elements are found within the <BODY></BODY> section.

Notice how each new nested section is indented by a space. This is just for readability as browsers ignore multiple spaces, tabs and carriage returns.

However, 'nesting' tags is vitally important. Look at how the <TITLE></TITLE> section is completely contained within the <HEAD></HEAD> section and that the <HEAD></HEAD> section is, in turn, completely contained within the <HTML></HTML> section.

Now look at this wrongly nested version of our sample document:

<HTML>
<HEAD>
<TITLE>
My web page
</HEAD>
</TITLE>
<BODY>
Welcome to my web page
</BODY>
</HTML>

The problem is that the <TITLE></TITLE> container also contains the closing tag </HEAD> in addition to the title text. The </TITLE> closing tag should appear before the </HEAD> closing tag. In other words, the containers overlap rather than being nested.

Put simply, the rule is this:

You cannot close a container if there is another open container within it.

Now I'll introduce a couple of new tags just to further illustrate container nesting. Let's say we want the simple message 'Welcome to my Web page' to appear in italic. We would simply contain the text within italic tags <I> and </I>, like this:

<I>Welcome to my Web page</I>

Now, say we want to emphasise the word 'my' by making it bold. We would use the bold tags <B> and </B> to contain just the word 'my' like this:

<I>Welcome to <B>my</B> Web page</I>

Try it. Notice that the whole sentence is still in italic, including the word 'my'. The <B> and </B> tags are completely nested or contained within the <I> and </I> tags so the whole sentence is shown in italic.

So how would you make the bold 'my' non-italic, while keeping the rest of the sentence italic?

Like this?

<I>Welcome to <B></I>my<I></B> <I>Web page</I>

or like this?

<I>Welcome to</I> <B>my</B> <I>Web page</I>

The second is correct.

The first example is incorrect because the first </I> tag is attempting to close the <I> container, which in turn contains an open <B> tag.

The heading tags <H1> to <H6> can be used to create headings with text in one of six sizes - 1 being the biggest and 6 the smallest. Normal text is equivalent to <H4>. Heading tags can be used to show text of roughly a certain size, anywhere within your document. However, the prime purpose of HTML is to describe the structure of your document and not its look. That may seem a little strange as almost all tags impart a certain look on the area of the document that is bound by them. That default look though, is subject to change by both the users' browsers and the user themselves. I'll explain more later but for now, it is safe to assume that a <H1> tag gives large text but you really should only use it where you are actually describing a major heading within your document.

Using Paragraphs

An important tag is the paragraph tag - <P>. The browser will usually show a paragraph separated from the preceding text by a blank line. The <P> tag is unusual in that it does not strictly need a closing </P> tag but it is always good practice to add one - it will help you to nest correctly.

A common mistake is to try to use multiple <P> tags together to open up blank lines. This does not work because the <P> tag describes the structure of the document and the fact that it separates its content from the preceding text in most browsers is incidental. The <BR> tag, which does not have a corresponding closing tag, can be used to force a line break and to open up a blank line.

<P>Here is paragraph 1.
<P>Here is paragraph 2 and I'm going to break to another line here...<BR>There I'm on another line now!

<CENTER></CENTER>, (note the American spelling), is a container that causes anything within it to be centre justified within the browser window.

<CENTER>
<H1>Welcome to my website</H1>
<H2>Last updated: 10th June 2005</H2>
</CENTER>

Don't forget everything to be displayed goes between the <BODY></BODY> tags, I'm simplifying it here to save space.

Horizontal Rule

Now to separate the headings from the text. The <HR> tag stands for horizontal rule and simply draws a horizontal line across the browser screen at the point at which it appears in the document. Like <BR> it's a single tag and does not have a corresponding closing tag. By default, it draws a neat line, one pixel in width (a pixel being the smallest point that can be referenced on the screen), extending the whole width of the browser screen. We can change this by applying 'attributes' the <HR> tag.

Attributes

All tags accept attributes. Their purpose varies but they either describe the tag (the HTML element) or they modify its behaviour. Some tags have mandatory attributes whereas others are optional and a default is applied if they are not specified. Attributes are specified within the angled-brackets of the tag after the tag name. They are always specified on an opening tag and not on the closing tag. The syntax is as follows:

For example, the <HR> tag accepts an attribute called WIDTH. This specifies how far across the browser window the line will be drawn. You would specify the WIDTH attribute with the <HR> tag as follows:

This tells the browser that it should draw a horizontal line extending across 60% of the width of the browser window. If the user resizes the browser window, the browser will adjust the length of the line accordingly. The value of the WIDTH attribute of the <HR> tag can either be a percentage (which varies with the size of the browser window), a fixed number of pixels (e.g. 10px) or a measurement (e.g. 50cm).

In the latter cases, the line will be a fixed width. If the number of pixels specified is larger than the browser window, the browser will add a scroll bar automatically.

<CENTER>
<H1>Welcome to my website</H1>
<H2>Last updated: 10th June 2005</H2>
<HR WIDTH="80%">
</CENTER>

In this example, I've added a <HR> with a width of 80% and because I nested it within the <CENTER></CENTER> container, it was also centralised.

Another attribute of the <HR> tag is SIZE. This specifies the thickness of the line in pixels (the default is one pixel). To make a nice chunky line, extending half way across the browser window, you would write:

Look Around

A great way to learn HTML is to look at other people's code. To do this, while you are viewing a web page, select the 'View' menu then select 'Source' (in Internet Explorer - other browsers may differ). Copy and paste this into your editor and try to see what's going on. Play about with any new tags you find. In the next chapter, I'll introduce more text formatting tags and explain the difference between physical and logical tags.

I've posted mine!

cartoony — Sun, 22 Jan 2006 21:36:03 GMT

I e-mailed my entry today; here's hoping it arrived ok. If theres not enough work on your horrific schoolyard photo can you let me know and I'll do a bit more? Or is that cheating?!

edge selection, intelligent scissors

cartoony — Thu, 12 Jan 2006 11:57:23 GMT

I can get a neat line all the way around a selection using the intelligent scissors; unfortunately I can't figure out what I'm supposed to do next! Is this the same thing as magnetic lassoo?
Once I've closed the selection, what do I do?

who going to do em

ToRReVeZ — Thu, 20 Oct 2005 19:17:47 GMT

so who here is going to have a go at the new diploma

i might have a go

tell me what you think

Danny

wheres the tutorials?

cartoony — Sat, 03 Dec 2005 21:22:53 GMT

Gormless is my middle name. I laughed like a drain when I saw I'd somehow become an advanced member of the forum. That just means I talk a lot. Not that I know a lot.
Heres my problem. I don't buy the mag each issue. I know that you put the tutorials on the d@mn website somewhere, but I've forgot where they are.
Please, someone take pity and tell me how to get to them.
And whens the diploma stuff coming out? Will that just be in the mag, or will you put it on the site too?
Yours Humbly, etc.

Do what

the_capt — Tue, 25 Oct 2005 15:20:53 GMT

Right this may sound daft but I have read both articles and so far it hasn't ask for the reader to produce anything. It just really states how to do something. The only thing it has said is get GIMP and that is only optional. I have followed the tutorials and produced images from images I got from the net and other resources.

Graphics & Gimp - How do you...

cartoony — Sun, 13 Nov 2005 15:14:56 GMT

I keep hearing that the Gimp's as good as Photoshop. That's a lot to live up to...so How do you;
Find the Histogram & does it have seperate colour channels? And I do not mean "click the Histogram button" cos I already guessed that, it's just that I have a wierd perception problem that makes navigating new programs a hassle. I'll be alright once I figure out where the heck everything is. Like the Histogram button.
Can you use Photoshop plug ins like Eye Candy or Flaming Pear, brushes,shapes, gradients & the like? How do you add them?
Can you make brushes & shapes in The Gimp like you can in ps? Will they work in ps?

Also, if anyone else out there likes Project Dogwaffle say Hi. Cos at the moment I'm the only person I know who's heard of it, and the pro version's out soon. I'd be really interested to know if its worth £50.