Great directors and actors

Just a list for myself, because I keep forgetting names.

Directors

• Darren Aronofski: Pi, Requiem For A Dream, The Wrestler
• Christopher Nolan: Memento, Insomnia, Batman Begins, The Prestige, The Dark Knight
• Clint Eastwood: The Bridges Of Madison County, Mystic River, Million Dollar Baby, Letters From Iwo Jima, Changeling, Gran Torino
• David Fincher: Se7en, The Game, Fight Club, Zodiac, The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button

Actors

• Christian Bale: Empire Of The Sun, Equilibrium, The Machinist, Batman Begins, Harsh Times, The Prestige, 3:10 To Yuma, The Dark Knight
• Joseph Gordon-Levitt: Mysterious Skin, Brick, The Lookout

Oracle SQL Developer screen redraw glitch

Perform the following steps to fix the redraw, or screen refresh, bug that can occur in Oracle SQL Developer when used on Windows Vista and Windows 7. They occur for example when scrolling horizontally or vertically through the records of a table when the records don't fit the window.

Start with just the sqldeveloper.conf adjustment. If that doesn't fix it, then perform all steps.

Steps to solve the issue:

• Add or replace the attribute of the following config file.
  ..\sqldeveloper\bin\sqldeveloper.conf
  AddVMOption -Dsun.java2d.noddraw=true
• Install the most recent jdk.
  Last seen here: http://java.sun.com/javase/downloads/index.jsp
  Select the Java SE Development Kit (JDK). At this time, JDK 6 Update 16 is the most recent version. Install it in C:\Program Files\Java\jdk1.6.0_16
• Add or replace the attributes of the following config files.
  ..\ide\bin\jdk.conf
  SetJavaHome C:\Program Files\Java\jdk1.6.0_16
  ..\ide\bin\ide.conf
  AddVMOption -Xmx256M
  AddVMOption -Dsun.awt.keepWorkingSetOnMinimize=true

Remove visual rings / circles from pen tablet in Windows 7

When using a pen in stead of a mouse in Windows, rings or circles may appear when you click. This happens at least in Vista and Windows 7. I am using a Wacom Graphire pen and wanted to deactivate those. This is not as straightforward as it seems. The rings are part of the Tablet PC Input functionality of the OS - not of the Wacom drivers or application.

How to disable these rings in Windows 7?

• Disable the "Tablet PC Input Service".
  This solved the problem for me for a while... until the rings came back for no apparent reason. I suspect because of an automatic update or updated Wacom driver, that reactivated the tablet pc ring feature.
• Uninstall Tablet PC Components.
  Control panel -> Programs and Features -> Turn Windows features on or off -> uncheck Tablet PC Components. Windows needs to be restarted after this.
• Kill the wisptis.exe process, e.g. via taskmanager.
  Then 1) rename \windows\system32\wisptis.exe to wisptis.bak, 2) create a textfile called wisptis.exe with nothing in it. Alternatively: open properties for wisptis.exe, go to security tab and "deny full control" for the "everyone" account. If "everyone" is not visible, click edit, click add, type in "everyone" and click ok.

I am not using a tablet pc, so these actions might have a negative impact when using one.

UPDATE 20100305: The wisptis.exe process still comes up when running some .Net applications. Even when the above tip is applied. Most probably it is copied from the protected cache / version history Windows keeps. To prevent this, download the tool "process blocker":

http://www.processblocker.com/download.html

Configure it to block "wisptis.exe" and now the rings are REALLY gone forever.

UPDATE 20120718: There is a registry fix to disable the rings:

http://viziblr.com/news/2011/8/14/the-ultimate-guide-to-making-your-wacom-tablet-work-on-windo.html

Download the fix from step 5. Try this first and if it doesn't work, then use the process blocker application.

UPDATE 20130410: ... or disable it via a group policy:

1. Open Local Group Policy Editor:Run... gpedit.msc
2. Navigate to User Configuration - Administrative Templates - Windows Components - Tablet PC - Cursors
3. Enable the Turn off pen feedback setting.