Aviva Premiership Rugby Predictions ~ Final Standings

Regular readers of this blog know that I do regression analysis for Aviva Premiership Rugby.  It comes out of my RugbyMetrics analysis tool.  Much like MoneyBall, I mine statistics looking for new ratios and performance indicators.

I came up with a new index that takes into account a teams ability to score point versus its ability to defend.  It is an interesting analysis.  Based on performance thus far, I will go out on a limb, and barring any unforeseen circumstances, the following table shows how the teams should finish at the end of the season based solely on the numbers that they have put up:

Scoring Advantage Index	Team
1.438405797	Harlequins
1.034782609	Leicester
0.945652174	Exeter
0.795986622	Northampton
0.785507246	London
0.724637681	Bath
0.688405797	Gloucester
0.617391304	Saracens
0.585507246	Worcester
0.52173913	London Welsh
0.48447205	London Irish
0.194508009	Sale Sharks

This should be a fairly reliable predictor of how the teams will finish.  The numbers show that the Exeter Chiefs should make a big move from their current 8th position to third if they continue to play the way that they do.

A team with a higher scoring advantage index should beat any team with a lower one.

The scoring advantage index can be used as a coaching tool.  If a particular, play, setup, roster change etc creates a better Scoring Advantage Index, then that is a successful strategy.  The next course of action is to tie individual player performance to Scoring Advantage Index.

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A Whole Bunch of MySQL Stuff

Had a major event today on our server.  MySQL took the server down.  It was the daemon mysqld.  It started to spike the memory, which started the system to page furiously and then we had a kernel dump.  Went to /var/log/messages and grepped for “memory” and saw that UID27 reported out of memory as part of the crash output.  The message was

 [ERROR] /usr/share/mysqld: Out of memory (Needed xxx bytes)

So what to do?  Obviously we didn't have enough RAM allocation.  I use entirely an innodb engine with mysql.  So I had to find where mysql was getting its configs from.

From the server console, I typed in:

mysql --help

and among all of the stuff that was returned, it told me where to look for the config file.  It said:


Default options are read from the following files in the given order:
/etc/my.cnf ~/.my.cnf

So I went to /etc/my.cnf and used the vi editor.  I added

innodb_buffer_pool_size = 1000M

I added it under [mysqld].  We have 4 Gigs of RAM and the allowable value is up to 80% of the RAM.  Previous to this it was 16M.

Then I stopped the database by issuing the following command:

/etc/init.d/mysqld stop

No issues.

To start it, I issued

/etc/init.d/mysqld start

and it failed.  This is what it said:


[root@ap1 etc]# /etc/init.d/mysqld start
Timeout error occurred trying to start MySQL Daemon.
Starting MySQL:                                            [FAILED]

Well, went back to /etc/my.cnf and I noticed that I had forgotten the "i" in the innodb_buffer_pool_size.  I added that, and it started.

I gotta tell you, the application now screams!!  I should have done a RAM allocation earlier.

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Making Effective Online Ads

Everybody sells at one time or another. We sell ourselves to our dates. We sell ourselves to our prospective employers. We sell stuff on the internet. There is a lot of clutter out there, and when we have something to sell, we must get ourselves to stand out above the clutter.

If you have to create an ad, or a webpage or any online presence, then this eBook is for you. It is the Top Secrets of the Admasters. It teaches you how to make the most effective online ads and web pages. It tells how to make ads that people cannot resist clicking on.

The psychology and layout of an online presence is important. This book show you how to use color, subject matter, trusted colors, the 9 elements that your ad must have and other helpful tips to rise above the noise and get noticed on the web.

Buy it here on Amazon Kindle:  http://www.amazon.com/dp/B009XHPIYE

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Major UIX Tip -- It's Black and White

If you ware a regular reader of this blog, you know that I have several blogs, and I am constantly experimenting with them as to optimal design to generate the most hits, the greatest user experience and the best UIX or user interface experience.

I decided to experiment with stickability -- how long visitors to the site would stick around for content other than that what brought them there in the first place.  I took two relatively popular blogs, and had one with a black background and one with a white background.

The white background blog continuously outperformed the black one.  After a month, I switched it.  The one that was previously black and now white, suddenly became popular again with more hits.

No one needs more black and white evidence than this.  I had previously opined that a black background on a mobile device acts like a mirror, and that a white background was better.  That was a subjective feeling before.  It appears that it is also an empirical observation now.

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New Revenue Stream for Photoshop Gurus

Self publishing on Amazon with eBooks is now a big thing.

I was reading an online forum for that topic and the author of the above book idly wondered online as to whether Brits hated her because she wasn't getting sales in the UK.  Her book had a cover of the heroine in a bar scene that was drawn for the cover.

I opined that perhaps the UK reader had cultural anomalies that made them hard to identify with the American bar scene.  The author replied that she was considering changing the cover.

It occurred to me that a photoshop person could make some serious cash by doing covers for authors.  Then I discovered that they were.  There was some guy selling stock photos for $20 with the title and author added with the photoshop text tools.  Others were selling covers for up to $299 per cover.  Photoshop gurus, here is another revenue stream for you.

A real graphics designer with a creative flair could probably make more money doing covers than the authors were making writing the books.

Just as an exercise tonight, I idly wondered how I would re-design the cover of Ms. Alroc's book called "Strangely Sober".  Knowing that sex sells, I photoshopped the above cover just as an exercise.  Ms. Alroc didn't ask for this and is unaware that I am doing this.  I just did it to see how my design effort would turn out.  I will certainly notify her that I have done this, and I will remove it if she requests it.

And if you are a Kindle reader, please buy her book:  http://www.amazon.com/Strangely-Sober-Essa-Alroc/dp/1478341467/ref=la_B008QN3FX2_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1350875121&sr=1-1

Thanks.

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How to split a .war file or a .zip file

I had a problem.  I remotely manage some coders 800 miles away.  I am getting them up to speed with j2ee, jsps, java, pojos and such.  I needed to get a .war file to them to deploy on a test server.

I used Eclipse to make my war, and when I went to send it to them, the size of the file was 34 megabytes.  I am only allowed 25 megabytes with my email program as an attachment.

What makes a war file big, are the jars in the lib directory.  I could have pulled them out and sent them separately, but my programmers are junior programmers and I wanted a no-muss, no fuss solution.  I needed a free file splitter.

So I went to http://www.filesplitter.org/ and downloaded FreeFileSplitter.  I broke my war file into 18 mb chunks, and sent my guys two emails each with a chunk attached.

They downloaded FreeFileSplitter on their end.  It doesn't even have an installer.  It is just a very small binary that sits on the desktop.  They joined the two chunks together and deployed the war.

Thanks very much to FreeFileSplitter.  It works like a charm.  It will split and reassemble any kind of file including zip and media files.

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How To Prevent Hack Attacks and Cyber Attacks From Iran

I just read that American Banks and other companies are under cyber attack sponsored by the government of Iran.

If I were the CIO, CTO or the IT management type responsible for American banks, financial institutions, energy companies, or major (and not-so-major) corporations, I would call in my network administrators and system administrators and have them write firewall rules blocking everything from Iran. If there is an economic embargo, there should be an internet embargo as well.

As a public service, here is a list of IP addresses to write the firewall wall rules preventing any access at all from Iran.

Major IP Address Blocks For Iran

From IP	To IP	Total IPs	Assign Date	Owner
62.60.128.0	62.60.255.255	32768	13/06/2001	Iranian Research Organization for Science & Technology
62.193.0.0	62.193.31.255	8192	17/07/2000	DP IRAN
62.220.96.0	62.220.127.255	8192	25/10/2001	Soroush Audio Visual Company
77.36.128.0	77.36.255.255	32768	12/03/2007	IRIB (Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting)
77.77.64.0	77.77.127.255	16384	21/02/2007	Rayaneh Danesh Golestan
77.104.64.0	77.104.127.255	16384	07/10/2008	Respina Networks & Beyond
77.237.64.0	77.237.95.255	8192	01/02/2007	Respina Networks & Beyond
77.237.160.0	77.237.191.255	8192	06/02/2007	Parsun Network Solutions
77.245.224.0	77.245.239.255	4096	07/05/2007	Research Institute Of Petroleum Industry
78.38.0.0	78.39.255.255	131072	19/03/2007	Information Technology Company (ITC)
78.109.192.0	78.109.207.255	4096	17/07/2007	Afranet
78.110.112.0	78.110.127.255	4096	09/08/2007	TSTonline co.
78.111.0.0	78.111.15.255	4096	27/08/2007	Neda Rayaneh
78.154.32.0	78.154.63.255	8192	17/07/2007	Arya Sepehr Ettelarasan Tehran
78.157.32.0	78.157.63.255	8192	28/08/2007	Fanava Group
78.158.160.0	78.158.191.255	8192	06/09/2007	Arya Sepehr Ettelarasan Tehran
79.127.0.0	79.127.127.255	32768	17/09/2007	AsiaTech Inc.
79.132.192.0	79.132.223.255	8192	02/10/2007	Morva System Company
79.175.128.0	79.175.191.255	16384	12/11/2007	Afranet
80.66.176.0	80.66.191.255	4096	09/06/2004	University of Tehran Informatic Center
80.69.240.0	80.69.255.255	4096	03/04/2009	ir.pasargad
80.71.112.0	80.71.127.255	4096	18/01/2005	Neda Rayaneh
80.75.0.0	80.75.15.255	4096	19/06/2001	Afranet
80.191.0.0	80.191.255.255	65536	23/07/2002	Information Technology Company (ITC)
80.242.0.0	80.242.15.255	4096	27/04/2009	AFROOZ Etela Resan Company Ltd
80.253.128.0	80.253.143.255	4096	13/12/2001	Azadnet Resaneh
80.253.144.0	80.253.159.255	4096	28/05/2002	Azadnet Resaneh
81.12.0.0	81.12.127.255	32768	27/05/2002	Soroush Audio Visual Company
81.28.32.0	81.28.47.255	4096	17/04/2002	IsIran
81.28.48.0	81.28.63.255	4096	22/12/2004	IsIran
81.29.240.0	81.29.255.255	4096	17/06/2009	Pardis Ettela Resaan Sepehr
81.31.160.0	81.31.175.255	4096	03/06/2002	Sharif University Of Technology
81.31.176.0	81.31.191.255	4096	08/12/2003	Sharif University Of Technology
81.90.144.0	81.90.159.255	4096	04/01/2006	Afranet
81.91.128.0	81.91.143.255	4096	18/07/2002	DATAK Internet Engineering, Inc
81.91.144.0	81.91.159.255	4096	26/09/2002	DATAK Internet Engineering, Inc
82.99.192.0	82.99.255.255	16384	12/12/2003	Pars Online
82.115.0.0	82.115.31.255	8192	06/01/2004	Parsun Network Solutions
83.147.192.0	83.147.255.255	16384	14/06/2007	Oracle Investment Group.
84.47.192.0	84.47.255.255	16384	18/10/2004	Parscyberian Consultants
84.241.0.0	84.241.63.255	16384	10/06/2004	Aria Rasana Tadbir
85.9.64.0	85.9.127.255	16384	11/02/2005	Pishgaman Kavir Yazd Cooperative
85.15.0.0	85.15.63.255	16384	19/04/2005	Aria Rasana Tadbir
85.133.128.0	85.133.255.255	32768	06/12/2005	Sepanta Communication Development Co. Ltd
85.185.0.0	85.185.255.255	65536	25/11/2004	Information Technology Company (ITC)
85.198.0.0	85.198.63.255	16384	31/01/2005	TSTonline co.
86.109.32.0	86.109.63.255	8192	05/07/2005	Azadnet Resaneh
87.107.0.0	87.107.255.255	65536	22/08/2005	Soroush Audio Visual Company
87.247.160.0	87.247.191.255	8192	23/11/2005	Neda Rayaneh
87.248.128.0	87.248.159.255	8192	26/08/2008	CallWithMe
89.144.128.0	89.144.191.255	16384	27/01/2006	ANDISHE SABZ KHAZAR CO. P.J.S.
89.165.0.0	89.165.127.255	32768	01/03/2006	Neda Gostar Saba Data Transfer Company Private Joint Stock
89.221.80.0	89.221.95.255	4096	29/09/2006	Fanava Group
89.235.64.0	89.235.127.255	16384	30/05/2006	Azadnet Resaneh
91.98.0.0	91.99.255.255	131072	11/09/2006	Pars Online
91.184.64.0	91.184.95.255	8192	11/10/2006	DATAK Internet Engineering, Inc
91.186.192.0	91.186.223.255	8192	10/11/2006	Oracle Investment Group.
92.50.0.0	92.50.63.255	16384	17/12/2007	Shahrad Net Company Ltd.
92.61.176.0	92.61.191.255	4096	02/01/2008	Arian Rasaneh Pars
92.62.176.0	92.62.191.255	4096	25/01/2008	ir.pasargad
92.242.192.0	92.242.223.255	8192	08/01/2008	Respina Networks & Beyond
93.110.0.0	93.110.255.255	65536	24/04/2008	Laser Company Ltd
94.74.128.0	94.74.191.255	16384	14/07/2008	Farahoosh Dena
94.101.128.0	94.101.143.255	4096	15/08/2008	AFROOZ Etela Resan Company Ltd
94.101.176.0	94.101.191.255	4096	21/08/2008	Jahan Negar Parsian
94.101.240.0	94.101.255.255	4096	26/08/2008	AFROOZ Etela Resan Company Ltd
94.139.160.0	94.139.191.255	8192	26/11/2008	DATAK Internet Engineering, Inc
94.182.0.0	94.183.255.255	131072	17/09/2008	Aria Rasana Tadbir
94.184.0.0	94.184.127.255	32768	11/08/2008	I.P.M
94.184.128.0	94.184.255.255	32768	15/07/2009	I.P.M
94.241.128.0	94.241.191.255	16384	30/09/2008	Oracle Investment Group.
95.38.0.0	95.38.255.255	65536	11/12/2008	Fanava Group
95.80.128.0	95.80.191.255	16384	25/11/2008	Bozorg Net-e Aria
95.81.64.0	95.81.127.255	16384	04/06/2009	Hamara System Tabriz Engineering Company
95.82.0.0	95.82.63.255	16384	08/12/2008	Shahrad Net Company Ltd.
95.82.64.0	95.82.127.255	16384	11/12/2008	kara amin ertebat
95.142.224.0	95.142.239.255	4096	11/08/2009	Armaghan Rahe Talaie
188.34.0.0	188.34.255.255	65536	19/03/2009	Asre Enteghal Dadeha
188.75.64.0	188.75.127.255	16384	24/08/2009	homatelecom
188.118.64.0	188.118.127.255	16384	22/06/2009	University of Tehran Informatic Center
188.121.96.0	188.121.127.255	8192	11/05/2009	Jahan Negar Parsian
188.121.128.0	188.121.159.255	8192	11/05/2009	TSTonline co.
188.126.128.0	188.126.159.255	8192	23/07/2009	Arian Rasaneh Pars
188.136.128.0	188.136.255.255	32768	15/05/2009	Ariana Gostar Spadana
188.158.0.0	188.159.255.255	131072	09/06/2009	Neda Gostar Saba Data Transfer Company Private Joint Stock
194.225.0.0	194.225.255.255	65536	29/12/1995	I.P.M
195.146.32.0	195.146.63.255	8192	22/07/1997	Information Technology Company (ITC)
212.16.64.0	212.16.95.255	8192	29/05/2008	Farhang Azma Company Ltd
212.33.192.0	212.33.223.255	8192	15/07/2008	Fanavaran Ettelaaat Dibagaran Karaj Co. Ltd.
212.50.224.0	212.50.255.255	8192	23/05/2008	Rasaneh Esfahan Net
212.80.0.0	212.80.31.255	8192	27/05/2009	Farhang Azma Company Ltd
212.95.128.0	212.95.159.255	8192	27/04/2009	Parsun Network Solutions
212.120.192.0	212.120.223.255	8192	27/05/2008	Hamara System Tabriz Engineering Company
213.176.0.0	213.176.31.255	8192	08/12/1999	Iranian Research Organization for Science & Technology
213.176.32.0	213.176.63.255	8192	25/07/2000	Iranian Research Organization for Science & Technology
213.176.64.0	213.176.127.255	16384	01/02/2000	Iranian Research Organization for Science & Technology
213.195.0.0	213.195.63.255	16384	21/04/2009	Arya Sepehr Ettelarasan Tehran
213.207.192.0	213.207.255.255	16384	07/11/2002	DATAK Internet Engineering, Inc
213.217.32.0	213.217.63.255	8192	19/02/2001	Pars Online
213.233.160.0	213.233.191.255	8192	04/04/2003	Sharif University Of Technology
217.11.16.0	217.11.31.255	4096	21/11/2002	Afranet
217.24.144.0	217.24.159.255	4096	20/03/2003	Parscyberian Consultants
217.25.48.0	217.25.63.255	4096	24/03/2003	IRNA
217.64.144.0	217.64.159.255	4096	01/04/2009	Aka Networks
217.66.192.0	217.66.207.255	4096	07/11/2000	Neda Rayaneh
217.66.208.0	217.66.223.255	4096	02/02/2001	Neda Rayaneh
217.146.208.0	217.146.223.255	4096	26/04/2004	Neda Rayaneh
217.172.96.0	217.172.127.255	8192	11/02/2004	Parscyberian Consultants
217.174.16.0	217.174.31.255	4096	26/03/2004	National Iranian Oil Company
217.218.0.0	217.219.255.255	131072	03/04/2001	Information Technology Company (ITC)

Source:  http://www.nirsoft.net/countryip/ir.html

Come to think of it, I should do this with China too.  It is ironic that the minute that I deploy a new server, I start getting clever scripted hack attacks from institutions in China, like the meteorological institute.  I think that firewall blocking from unfriendlies, should be the first step in protecting your digital assets.


 

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Buddha of the Binaries ~ Zen of Software Development~ Noble Truth #3

Oh Buddhist of the Binaries, I desire more lessons, what is the third noble truth?

Well my little code monkey with the red ass,  the third noble truth is that bugs in software  can be overcome and apps become killer and happiness can be attained; that true happiness and contentment are possible. lf we give up useless kiddie scripting and learn to code Java classes and jsps each day at a time (not dwelling in the past or the imagined future) then we can become happy and free. We then have more time and energy to help take our company viral. This is Nirvana.

One must learn to write elegant, simple profound code that supplies a desired need among the software addicts of the world.  Your code must become the crack cocaine of the mobile device.

For the other lessons, click HERE (and send money!)

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How To Resize and Rename Photos

I had a problem.  I had to send a kajillion pictures to a person.  They were taken with a high resolution setting on the camera.  All of the photos were too large to be sent by email.

Usually when I have just a few, I open them in GIMP and resize the image.  This was a whole folder full of photos.

I searched the web for a free resizer and PhotoResize400.exe came up.  I gave it the college try.  I downloaded it from here:  http://www.rw-designer.com/picture-resize  and to my surprise, it wasn't zipped or anything.  The binary executable loaded directly onto the desktop.

I then separated out the pics that I wanted into a new folder on the desktop.  Then I closed the folder, grabbed it by selecting it, and drag and dropped it on the PhotoResize400.exe icon.  As quick as you could say "Gee I wonder if this works|, it was done.  I took a peek inside the folder, and sure enough it was done.

It preserved the original pics, and next to it, made a newer smaller version labeled -400.jpg.  (If the original pic was name 100234.jpg, it renamed it to 100234-400.jpg).  So now, it was a pain in the rear to separate them.  I decided to use DOS to do it.

I opened a RUN command shell and changed directory (cd command) to my desktop.  Then I did a directory listing (dir).  All of the photos were name September12-00x.jpg and the smaller ones were named September12-00x-400.jpg.

To separate them out so that the listing would group the smaller ones together, I had to do a DOS rename. It was easy as pie.  I typed in rename September12*-400.jpg  resized*.jpg in the cmd window.

What this did was rename the September12-00x-400.jpg to resized-00x-400.jpg.  The 00x was an incremental number (01, 02,03) so the numbering was preserved, it just took out the September12 prefix, because even the big ones (unresized) started with that prefix and they were a pain to separate.  Now all of the unresized ones started with September12 and all of the small ones started with resized.  When you did a directory listing or explored the folder, they were all neatly grouped into large and small by name.

As a product review, I fully recommend PhotoResize400.exe.  The photos are a little small for my liking, but it let me send a whole pile through the email.

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Anonymous Email? What is the Best?

I was idly wondering about sending an anonymous email, so I plugged the term into good old Google.  The first site that came up was:

www.sendanonymousemail.net


I have a couple of throwaway email accounts (everyone should have a couple of them that cannot be tied to you) and send two from that page.  That was 5 hours ago.  No email has arrived at any of my email boxes from them.  Things that make you go hmmmmm.

Then I ended up at:

send-email.org

Well, within 20 minutes the test email arrived.  So I would say that send-email.org is the best out of the two.

When the email arrived, it said that it was from Free Email Service and the return address was: info@send-email.org

That works for me.

Then I got to thinking ...........  ..............

suppose that I was an intelligence agency, FBI, law enforcement, private investigator, criminal, blackmailer or a news organization.  I would set up one of these things to collect information and see what comes in.

That thought was enough to scare the crap out of me.  Its now back to sending emails from a Linux command line for me.

Update:  It is now 16 hours and the emails from sendanonymousemail.net still have not yet arrived.  This service is definitely not to be relied on.

Update II - I think that sendanonymousemail.net is a scam.  My test emails still haven't arrived a full day and a half later, and they probably never will.

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java.sql.SQLException: After end of result set

I had to google this exception thrown because I had never encountered it before:

java.sql.SQLException: After end of result set


It turns out that I had called ResultSet rs.next() twice.  The second time it was after the end of it.  It was a careless dumb coding error.

Simple yet dumb error.   Hope this helps.

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Thread: java.net.SocketException: Too many open files

Running my tomcat app on a Centos machine.  I looked at the logs and saw this error:

Thread: java.net.SocketException: Too many open files

Bummer.  I opened up a putty ssh to the server and did an su to superuser.  I wanted to see what the hard limit was for open file handles

I typed in at the bash#    ulimit -Hn and the return value was 1024,  Not good.

I issued the command to up the hard limit to 10000.  The command was ulimit -Hn 10000.

The soft limit was 1024 as well.  I upped the soft limit to 5000 with the command:  ulimit -Sn 5000

From what I could gather, this problem started happening when I initiated a log4j logger and we started getting decent traffic.

Hope this helps.

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Java - How to make an arraylist of arraylists

I had to make an arraylist of arraylists.  The reason that I was doing this, was that I had to eliminate duplicates from a resultset.  The easiest way to do this was to put the resultset into an arraylist so that I could operate on it, because you can't iterate or use a resultset twice in Java.

Here are a few examples of the constructors to make an arraylist of arraylists:

   ArrayList<ArrayList<Object>> allData = new ArrayList<ArrayList<Object>>();

 ArrayList<ArrayList<String>> allString = new ArrayList<ArrayList<String>>();

 ArrayList<ArrayList<int>> allInts = new ArrayList<ArrayList<int>>();


Easy once you know how.

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CNN Website Error

(click for larger image)

This has all happened to us at one time or another.  We have deployed a website and have forgotten to validate the tags.  When we visit the website live, we find the above junk printed.  It is actually the tag code that wasn't interpreted but rather rendered as text due to a missing element.

One of the easiest ways to avoid website validation errors is to go to the following URL:

http://validator.w3.org/

and enter the URL.  It will identify any tag errors.

I am just amazed that a large organization like CNN who lives and dies by their online presence would make such newbie mistakes.

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Java String MySQL Error

I just spent an hour banging my head against a wall.  I constructed a mysql query string from variables.  So my string construct would look like this:
String quality = "Very Good";

String queryString = "Select  * from products where consumer_rating=" + quality;

The thing kept bombing.  It said that I had an sql error near where consumer_rating=Very Good.

It all looked kosher.  I had forgotten that a string value needs single quotes.

In other words, I should have declared quality =" 'Very Good' ";

Notice the single quotes after the double quotes.  Necessary for an sql statement for string injection.

Hope this helps someone save some time.

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