Tag: Guides

Tips for Creating and Managing Strong Passwords

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Inf

Passwords. So annoying, yet so critically important. Without passwords, your friends would be spamming your Facebook wall with lolcat pictures. Or worse… So, we need passwords. Better, we need strong passwords. A weak password is guessable, and a potential attacker could compromise your online identity and access your personal data easily. I’m sure you’d like to avoid that. I say avoid, not prevent.

Prevention is not really possible since even a strong password could be compromised if the site you input it on is insecure, or has some undiscovered vulnerabilities, such as the one that recently affected the Gawker network: its users’ passwords were exposed to the world. If the site takes appropriate precautions, you’re pretty safe, but still, the risk is there.

Without further delay, let’s see what’s a strong password, how to create one, what you shouldn’t do with passwords, what the guidelines are and how you can manage your passwords. A lot, yes.

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Installing GLUT on Dev C++

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Inf

We are currently using the GLUT library at University in our Interface Design and Computer Graphics module. We were told to use Linux (Kubuntu) to write and compile our OpenGL/GLUT programs. But for ease of use, I wanted to install the GLUT library on Windows. I am a user of Dev C++ 4.9.9.2. I know it is no longer under active development, but it still remains my IDE of choice for C++ and C on Windows. And yes, I do know about Code::Blocks, so don’t flame me if I use Dev C++.

So here’s a guide if ever you want to install GLUT on Dev C++. Don’t worry, it’s easy.

Note, this guide is just about installing GLUT, not how to use it. I’ll probably have a small guide on that later on, but for now, this (and the Red Book) should get you started.

  • First, get Dev C++ if you don’t already have it. It’s available on bloodshed.net. Get version 4.9.9.2 (Beta).
  • Of course, install it. It’s pretty straightforward till now.
  • After installing it, go to Tools – Check for Updates/Packages.
  • In “Select Devpak server” dropdown menu, choose “devpaks.org Community Devpaks“
  • Click on “Check for Updates“. Wait a bit while the list downloads.
  • In the list, find “glut“, or a compatible GLUT package like freeglut or OpenGLUT (if you know how to use these, else stick to “glut”).
    • You might want to filter the results using “OpenGL” from the “Groups” dropdown menu. Else, you might click on the “Update” title bar in the list to sort entries alphabetically.
  • Then, check the small box on the left of “glut” or other compatible glut libraries. Finalize by clicking the “Download Selected” button. Wait for the package to download and install.
  • You will be prompted for an installer window. Just read instructions and click Next a couple of times.
  • Now, check if glut was correctly installed by going to Tools – Package Manager. See if you can see “glut” or other compatible libraries (whatever you downloaded) there.

After you install glut, you can do “File – New Project – Multimedia tab” and see that glut has created templates for you. Quite complex things if you ask me. I tend to stay away from those if I can.

Now, before you use any library, you need to link it, else you will get loads of “Linker errors” and “Undefined reference” errors. Here’s how to link the libraries: (read the Dev C++ FAQ!)

9. How can i use the OpenGL library and others ?

All the libraries that comes with Mingw reside in the Lib directory. They are all named in the following way: lib*.a
To link a library with your project, just add in Project Options – Parameters tab – Linker box:
-lopengl32 (including the – symbol)
This is for including the libopengl32.a library. To add any other library, just follow the same syntax:
Type -l (L in lowercase) plus the base name of the library (filename without “lib” and the “.a” extension). Or you can use the “Add Library or Object” button in the parameters tab for simplicity.

I have these libraries linked: “-lglut32 -lglu32 -lopengl32 -lwinmm -lgdi32” and it works fine for me. You can try removing some of the parameters and see if it still works for you. NOTE: The order in which these parameters are supplied is actually important! If you are using a library, and having “undefined reference” errors, try shifting that library’s link parameter to the front of them all.

That’s if you want to use projects. If you are using plain source files, you can put those link parameters in Tools – Compiler Options. Then put them in the “Add these commands to the linker command line“. Make sure the box is checked too. I’d advise you to create a compiler profile just for OpenGL and glut with those parameters. Don’t mess with the “default compiler” profile. You can create one using the small green “+” button there.

There is usually linking information in the header files (.h files) or the Readme files of libraries you download on the Internet.

Basically, to install a library, you will have to copy some files (ending with .lib or .a) to the “lib” folder and some .h files to the “include” folder in Dev C++’s install folder.

Now, to actually use glut, you have to include the header file with:

#include <GL/glut.h>

To know the exact path where glut.h is found, look inside the “include” folder, again in Dev C++’s install folder.

That’s it. You should now be able to compile and run glut code on Windows using Dev C++. The guide should be clear enough. If there is demand for it, I’ll include pictures too, but I don’t think they are really needed.

By the way, I’m not a glut or OpenGL expert or anything. I’m just studying it, and thought I’d share how I managed to get glut running on Dev C++. I might not be able to answer all your questions, and for that, Google’s here!