So I wrote the following code in C#.   class Test {     int a;     System.IO.StreamReader reader;      public Test()     {         a = 5;         reader = new System.IO.StreamReader(String.Empty);     } }   And the constructor of the class in IL looks like this  .method public hidebysig specialname rtspecialname          instance void  .ctor() cil managed {   // Code size       33 (0x21)   .maxstack  8   IL_0000:  ldarg.0   IL_0001:  call       instance void [mscorlib]System.Object::.ctor()   IL_0006:  nop   IL_0007:  nop   IL_0008:  ldarg.0   IL_0009:  ldc.i4.5   IL_000a:  stfld      int32 Test2.Test::a   IL_000f:  ldarg.0   IL_0010:  ldsfld     string [mscorlib]System.String::Empty   IL_0015:  newobj     instance void [mscorlib]System.IO.StreamReader::.ctor(string)   IL_001a:  stfld      class [mscorlib]System.IO.StreamReader Test2.Test::reader   IL_001f:  nop   IL_0020:  ret } // end of method Test::.ctor   There are 3 nop commands. (Which as I know stands for no operation). What is the need of those commands. I mean what would be the difference if there was no command at all instead of nop
I'm going through MSIL and noticing there are a lot of  instructions in the MSIL.  The MSDN article says they take no action and are used to fill space if the opcode is patched. They're used a lot more in debug builds than release builds.  I know that these kinds of statements are used in assembly languages to align later instructions, but why are MSIL nops needed in MSIL?  (Editor's note: the accepted answer is about machine-code NOPs, not MSIL/CIL NOPs which the question originally asked about.)
How can I replace a string in a file(s)? Find the limit of $\log\Big(\frac{(n^2+n)!}{n^2!n^{2n}}\Big)$ I have to prove that      $$\Big[\log\Big(1+\frac 1{n^2}\Big)+ \log\Big(1+\frac 2{n^2}\Big)+...+ \log\Big(1+\frac n{n^2}\Big)\Big] \to \frac 12$$   I know that $$\log\Big(1+\frac 1{n^2}\Big)+ \log\Big(1+\frac 2{n^2}\Big)+...+ \log\Big(1+\frac n{n^2}\Big)= \\ =\log\Big(\frac {n^2+1}{n^2}\Big)+ \log\Big(\frac {n^2+2}{n^2}\Big)+...+ \log\Big(\frac {n^2+n}{n^2}\Big)=\\ =\log\Big(n^2+1\Big)+ \log\Big(n^2+2\Big)+...+ \log\Big(n^2+n\Big)-2n\log n$$  Doing some manipulation we get:           $$\lim_{n \to +\infty}\log\Big(\frac{(n^2+n)!}{n^2!n^{2n}}\Big)=\frac 12$$      How can I prove this limit? Finding the missing digits of $23!$ It is given $23!=2585201xy38884976640000$. Now it is required to find the value of $x$ and $y$. I know I could find it by using divisibility rules and solving simultaneous equations. Is there any other way to solve it (without computing it by a calculator)? This question is just out of curiosity. Form inside a table What determines who gets or becomes an MVP? This hasn't been asked yet, but what determines how or who gets an MVP award in CS:GO? After a match, there's always a little blurb that first states who got MVP first, and then a random fact (Player X got Y knife kills, Player X lasted Y rounds without dying, etc.).  Do these two factors both "factor" into getting an MVP award? Is it a set percentage of enemies you kill? Is there a priority list (ie, planting bomb, defusing, etc.)? Error in .bib entry, "Too many commas" The code for reference is this  @article{matcontcl,  title= {MATCONT and CL MATCONT},  author = {A. Dhooge, W. Govaerts, Yu.A. Kuznetsov, W. Mestrom, A.M. Riet and  B.Sautois},  year = {2006},  journal = {Continuation toolboxes in matlab}, }   This is the error that follows  This is BibTeX, Version 0.99d (TeX Live 2015/W32TeX) The top-level auxiliary file: PropuestaInvestigacion.aux The style file: abbrv.bst Database file #1: biblio.bib Too many commas in name 1 of "A. Dhooge, W. Govaerts, Yu.A. Kuznetsov, W. Mestrom, A.M. Riet and B.Sautois" for entry matcontcl while executing---line 1049 of file abbrv.bst Too many commas in name 1 of "A. Dhooge, W. Govaerts, Yu.A. Kuznetsov, W. Mestrom, A.M. Riet and B.Sautois" for entry matcontcl while executing---line 1049 of file abbrv.bst Too many commas in name 1 of "A. Dhooge, W. Govaerts, Yu.A. Kuznetsov, W. Mestrom, A.M. Riet and B.Sautois" for entry matcontcl while executing---line 1090 of file abbrv.bst Too many commas in name 1 of "A. Dhooge, W. Govaerts, Yu.A. Kuznetsov, W. Mestrom, A.M. Riet and B.Sautois" for entry matcontcl while executing---line 1090 of file abbrv.bst (There were 4 error messages)   How could I fix it? How can I make an object follow a path exactly Storage order vs Result order This is a spin-off question from .   says this on the subject of storage order (clustered index) and the output order     A lot of people believe that a clustered index guarantees a sort order on output. But that's not what it does; it guarantees a storage order on disk.   See, for example, .   I've read the blog post by Hugo Kornelis and understands that an index doesn't guarantee that the sql server reads the records in a specific order. Yet I have a hard time accepting that I can't assume this for my scenario?  CREATE TABLE [dbo].[SensorValues](   [DeviceId] [int] NOT NULL,   [SensorId] [int] NOT NULL,   [SensorValue] [int] NOT NULL,   [Date] [int] NOT NULL, CONSTRAINT [PK_SensorValues] PRIMARY KEY CLUSTERED  (   [DeviceId] ASC,   [SensorId] ASC,   [Date] DESC ) WITH (     FILLFACTOR=75,     DATA_COMPRESSION = PAGE,     PAD_INDEX = OFF,     STATISTICS_NORECOMPUTE = OFF,     SORT_IN_TEMPDB = OFF,     IGNORE_DUP_KEY = OFF,     ONLINE = OFF,     ALLOW_ROW_LOCKS = ON,     ALLOW_PAGE_LOCKS = ON)   ON [MyPartitioningScheme]([Date])   My original query was this:  SELECT TOP 1 SensorValue   FROM SensorValues   WHERE SensorId = 53     AND DeviceId = 3819     AND Date &lt; 1339225010   ORDER BY Date DESC   But I suggest that I could as well use this one (read below for my explanation):  SELECT TOP 1 SensorValue   FROM SensorValues   WHERE SensorId = 53     AND DeviceId = 3819     AND Date &lt; 1339225010   As you can see, my table rows are small (16bytes) and I've got only one index, a clustered. In my scenario, the table consists of 100.000.000 records at this moment (and this will most likely increase tenfold).  When the database server queries this table it has two ways of finding my rows, either it seeks the primary key and thereby reading and returning my values in desc. order of Date, or it has to do a full table scan. My conclusion is that a full table scan on all those records will be way too slow and the database server will therefore always seek the table via its primary key and thereby returning the values sorted by Date DESC Find the value of $x,y$ for the equation $12x+5y=7$ using number theory . I tried the solution using other ways like:  $12x+5y=7$  $12x=7-5y$  $x=7-5y/12$  putting the value of $x$  $12(7-5y/12)+5y=7$  both $12$ will cancel out  $7-5y+5y=7$ here comes the problem please help me ? Confirming that my own question is a duplicate by voting to close should have immediate effect Someone voted to close my question as a duplicate. I agreed, so I cast my close vote (I have enough reputation to vote to close).  . So I expected this to happen.  But it didn't. This confused me — is this not a question I asked after all? No, it is. Maybe I need to reload the page? Nope, the question still isn't closed. Is the asker confirmation feature broken? Well, there's the “This question may already have an answer here” banner at the top. What if I click “That solved my problem!”? Ah, that does close the question.  It turns out that only clicking “That solved my problem!” instantly closes the question. Casting a close vote has a different effect, it's just an ordinary close vote.  Please make casting a close vote equivalent to clicking “That solved my problem!”. Ubuntu system is broken after accidentally uninstalling many packages I accidentally removed all the packages starting with the name jpeg with:  sudo apt-get remove jpeg*   This screwed up a lot of things, removed Unity, Firefox, Flash player etc.  I somehow managed to recover the desktop and unity but then a lot of things are still buggy. For example .rpm files and .tag.gz just won't open up at all.  What I want is a way to fix everything that's amiss. Something that is the equivalent of a 'repair installation' with a windows disc.  Any tips, anyone? How can I mass rename files? I've got a bunch of files named with a the pattern 99 - DescriptiveName.txt and I'd like to remove the number from the front so I just have DescriptiveName.txt.  How can I do this? Can I do it from the command line or is there a utility that can do this? Low rep users should be able to fix broken links At present a low rep user (under 2k) can only make an edit suggestion of more than 6 chars, however when someone has taken the time to find to correct link it is a real shame the correction can help other users!  So I think link fixing should be special cased somehow.  (Also the checkering of a changed link need to be better than other edits, so a page that showed what both the old a new links point to (in frames) could help with the approving processes.) Too much memory getting used I have been feeling this way for a while, looking at task manager mentally ballparking how much physical memory should be in use, and noticing a large disparity. I finally got around to measuring it. Taking the results of tasklist and adding, gave about 3.87 GB. Task manager told me I was using 4.6 GB of memory. This seems like a large disparity. Where did it go?  EDIT: So its clear, it is not going to prefetch. It has also been suggested that its part of the OS, but not part of any of the system processes. If this is true, please find a way to get the OS to tell me how much memory is getting used. Since I want to find out where the memory went, asking me to look at the difference does nothing for me.  EDIT 2: It is not the following:   The kernel The cache Hardware reserved memory   Picture of resources taken up. Not quite sure what it will do but... Let $m\in \mathbb{N}$ and $c_1,c_2,\ldots,c_m \in \mathbb{R}_+$. Show that $$\lim_{n\rightarrow \infty} \sqrt[n]{c_1^n+c_2^n+\ldots+c_m^n} = \max\{c_1,c_2,\ldots,c_m\}$$  My attempt: Since $$\lim_{n\rightarrow \infty} \sqrt[n]{c_1^n+c_2^n+\ldots+c_m^n} \leq \lim_{n\rightarrow \infty}\sqrt[n]{\max\{c_1,c_2,\ldots,c_m\}} = \lim_{n\rightarrow \infty} \sqrt[n]{n}\sqrt[n]{\max\{c_1,c_2,\ldots,c_m\}}=\lim_{n \rightarrow \infty} \max\{\sqrt[n]{c_1^n},\sqrt[n]{c_2^n},\ldots,\sqrt[n]{c_m^n}\}=\lim_{n \rightarrow \infty}\max\{c_1,c_2,\ldots,c_m\}=\max\{c_1,c_2,\ldots,c_m\}$$  it follows that $\lim_{n\rightarrow \infty} \sqrt[n]{c_1^n+c_2^n+\ldots+c_m^n}$ is bounded, but I don't think it's monotonically decreasing, at least I can't prove this. Can anybody tell me whether the approach I have chosen is a good one, whether what I have done is correct and how to finish the proof? Material Opacity in viewport? I'd like to do motion graphics type work in blender and it would be really helpful if I could see the results of keyframing material opacity to cut items in and out of view.  Blender internal is sufficient, using shadeless materials.  I could have swore there used to be something in view options.  Any ideas? What are the units of entropy of a normal distribution? I have a random process that follows a normal distribution. It's parameters are mean = 35 units, std.dev. = 8 units. I've seen from the  for the normal distribution that there is a formula to calculate the entropy. So plugging in the figures as:- $$     .5\log\left(2\pi e^1 8\cdot 8\right) $$ I get a value of 1.52, which I take to be  per sample.  My question is what are these units?  What thing do I have 1.52 of?    is (typically) measured in units of bits, after Claude Shannon's definition.  So can I take it that each sample generates 1.52 bits of entropy?  Clearly recording those samples generates information and therefore occupies a real and discrete amount of storage space. Ergo entropy cannot be unit less. How to cross-reference an inequality with \cref? I have inequalities being cross-referenced by \cref as equations.  1-) How can I change that? (and still have inequalities with the same numbering as equations)  2-) How can I change that and have inequalities with their own numbering?  \documentclass[12pt]{article} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{cleveref} \usepackage[letterpaper]{geometry} \begin{document}  \begin{flalign} &amp;f(x) \geq g(x)&amp; \label{i:positivity} \end{flalign}  Admitting that \cref{i:positivity} has a solution, ...    \end{document} Converting GeoPDF to vector format like CAD or shapefile? I want to convert a GeoPDF that has vectors entity in it to a vector format and preserve the real coordinates of these vectors. The GeoPDF has been exported from ArcMap and has layers in it.  I have try GDAL, but it rasterize the PDF before exporting it. Which is not good for me. Also I don't want a solution that would convert this image back to vectors, too complicated for the data I have.  Is someone aware of any tool that can do that? The resulting format can be a CAD file or a shapefile or anything that is a vector format. What is this Windows 8 icon for as rectangle icon in the title bar? Every Window in Windows 8 got this icon if it gots the focus. When clicking on it, nothing seems to happen.   How does this icon work?