Author Archives: stonysleep

Sandvox from Karelia Software

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While everyone eagerly awaits what his Steveness (aka Steve Jobs) is going to announce at the keynote tomorrow, rumours have been circulating about one of the items
This item has encroached on the territory of another developer Karelia Software and their new product, Sandvox:

Sandvox

The app requires OS X 10.4 Tiger, and is a Web Site Creation app which makes it very easy to make good looking well coded sites

…Sandvox makes Web site creation elegant, intuitive and fun. It’s the Macintosh way — the way it should be: drag and drop content, watch your site take shape as you create it, and publish. Sandvox makes it easy to keep in touch via the Web with friends, family and customers. …

Now, here’s the part I’m trying to get to – please click the download link and download a copy – because the more people that download from this link, the more I get to save when it comes out on full release, as this is still a beta version. And from that you too can save money by recommending the software to others

This is all so that when Apple release their program tomorrow, lots mac users can then have tried Sandvox aswell. We will have to wait and see which will be preferred, but we have to give the little guys a fair shot

Mods to Blog

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Just a post to talk about the add ons that i’ve done to the blog today
If you look in the comments you will notice that it now notifies the country of the poster, plus what browser & OS they were using when they made the post
It utilises two plugins to WordPress which are linked to below. I also want to add some details as it is not very well documented
The easier of the two is the one that produces the OS and browser and is fully documented in the below link:
Priyadi’s Place WordPress Browser Detection Plugin
I will not add anything to this as it is very comprehensive and links to where to download the plugin, what to add to your files and contains links to download the images
The plugin to add the country is not as well documented, so I will detail it below

1. Go to the IP to Nation WordPress Plugin Site
2. On the site download the plugin from this link
3. Rename the file to have a .php suffix as opposed to the .txt suffix that it will download as, and upload it to the plugins folder on your WordPress site
4. Download the Flags from this site – note that although the link is to a zip file you need to click the link on the site as it is not a direct link to the zip file.
5. Unzip the file and upload the folder to the root level of your blog
6. Enable the plugin in WordPress

Now for the tricky part (I have deliberately separated this bit from the rest of the guide in order to ensure that you understand what is going on)

I am providing a guide for PHPMyAdmin, because that is the easiest way to go about installing anything MySQL as not only do I not have the SQL knowledge to run through how to do it manually, but also PHPMyAdmin is so much easier. Download it & install from PHPMyAdmin if your webhost does not already have it installed – most good ones do, but some don’t.
Right, now you have the tools and are ready to do the tricky part
1. Download the SQL Dump file from ip2nation.com and decompress it if necessary
2. Log into your webserver’s PHPMyAdmin Control Panel – all of them are different, so I won’t attempt to explain how to do this. If you get confused, now would be a good time to stop the mod
3. Use PHPMyAdmin to BACKUP your MySQL data – if it goes wrong, this will form the backup for your blog which you can restore from – you do this by clicking the export button – ensure all the tables are checked and choose to save to file, then click go – a file we be downloaded to your downloads folder – check that this is ok!
From now on I assume no responsibility for corruption to your data, but if you follow the instructions, and have a backup nothing should go wrong – this is just a provisor – you have been warned
4. Choose your database from the pull down menu and you will see the tables in the right hand frame
5. You will see in the toolbar the button SQL – click it
It will look like:
phpmyadmin
though since I have already imported the tables required they are already there on the left hand side – when you see this screen they will not be there
(you should probably also ignore the address bar and all the other tabs i’ve got open – i’m far too lazy to edit the screenshot so that it doesn’t show my site’s IP address or any of the other junk on there)
6. Click the “Choose File” button
7. Find your SQL dump file you downloaded earlier and select it however your OS would open a file
8. Click the “Go” button
You should now have completed everything involved with PHPMyAdmin and have two new tables added to your MySQL database called:
ip2nation
ip2nationCountries

You now need to add the PHP coding to your comments.php following the examples shown in the IP to Nation WordPress Plugin Site
This isn’t very clear, but with a bit of PHP knowhow, you should be able to figure it out. Don’t worry if you get a parse error or two while trying to add it – remember work on a BACKUP and you can always restore it back to as it was.
If it’s anything like my experience, adding the browser sniff plugin will be much easier as it makes more sense. Don’t forget to add the < ?php and ?> tags when typing the commands into the comments.php file and with a bit of luck it should go well

I’m willing to help you through it if it goes pearshaped, and also remember depending on your theme, you may have to add the information in different places compared to mine – the joys of WordPress themes

Again, I add the proviser that I am not responsible if you ruin your Blog’s data, as my guide is just intended to make the instructions more user friendly. Do read the site for the plugins to get the full information before going ahead with this modification to your WordPress Blog

Happy Modding!!

Apple Store & New Keyboard

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I finally got round to going into my local Apple Store in London’s Regent Street
Expecting it to be amazing I came out with mixed emotions
Of course I couldn’t walk out of there without buying something, so I bought a new keyboard to replace my existing replacement one. I broke the original USB one a couple of years ago after trashing it at uni – spilt too much beer on it and it got thrown around the room a little bit too much! Replaced it temporarily with my old ADB Apple Extended Keyboard II – arguably Apple’s best keyboard… except that it’s not USB, so I had to connect it with an ADB to USB adaptor

But back to the store… my initial impressions were: this is not a shop, it’s a showroom!
I felt like I needed to be wearing an iPod and talking about the latest airport extreme accessory to use it to listen to my music from two rooms away!
But my mac isn’t like that! I don’t own an iPod, and don’t have any intentions of owning one in the short term – am more likely to buy one of the competitor’s options
I also felt that this wasn’t a computer shop because there were assistants everywhere except whenever you wanted them – I had to fight to talk to someone to ask advice about upgrade options and then where I could find a keyboard that wasn’t a bluetooth one. Eventually one assistant offered to look to see if they had any in stock, and it was pretty good value @ £19 including VAT
On my way out I asked someone if they were going to be showing the Macworld keynote next week, to which the response was as if to say “what’s a keynote” based on the expression. This was followed by a more official “We don’t show Keynotes” – that was the icing on the cake – why not!?!

Back home, the keyboard seems good, though it crashed my mac a couple of times – teething troubles i guess with all my hardware, and i don’t like the left ctrl button or the slopes, but at least i can drop into open firmware, single user mode, the boot manager and zap the pram again. It’s also good to be able to type the “~” key again which seemed to disappear when I upgraded to 10.4 – dunno why, but now I’ve got it back! Oh, and the eject and opt-eject keys now open the correct DVD drives – on the old keyboard, they both opened the slave on the IDE bus.
The arrow keys seem a bit weird, I do miss the power key which is now the eject button, as now I have to use ctrl-eject to bring up the shutdown/sleep/logout dialogue box. Haven’t even tried the volume keys – they look a bit weird. Also, as many have commented, it’s a shame the F-keys don’t have spaces every 4 keys like the old keyboards. And again, the downward slope on the bottom row (command, ctrl, spacebar, etc) is very weird, and upward slope on the F-keys will take a bit of getting used to
I liked the nice touches in the packaging – the USB extension lead, and the covers for the plugs on the leads which I will be keeping for my other USB cables – very well done and that they give you a nice bag that you can carry on your shoulder

Also on my way out I picked up the event schedule which looks really good if I had the time to practically live in the apple store covering a different topic every hour. You can follow what’s going on using Apple’s Event Widget (requires dashboard ie OSX 10.4 Tiger or equivalent)
I’m waiting to find out when the really local Apple Store in Brent Cross, London will be opening – have walked past it several times, and would be really convenient. Having said that, I can’t not add how disappointed I was by the range of products and how overpriced everything felt. Nothing felt like it was a bargain (except for the keyboard! and that wasn’t even on the shelves). USB card readers for £30, DVD-Rs for £4 each, Firewire drives £70 for 40GB – none of it felt like something I wanted to buy, and more like something I might write down and go online to find somewhere cheaper.

Would I go back to the Regent Street shop again? Not unless I was in the area and had some time to kill – like I say, it felt more like a showroom than a shop
Accessories were stacked underneath showroom iPods, Scanners, and iMacs. Even Powermac G5s seemed to be pushed into the background to show off the consumer products
It’s a shame, but perhaps I had too high an expectation of it

New Year’s Eve

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Happy New Year Everyone!
2006 here we come – hope everyone had a good celebration & all
I quite enjoyed it this year – it had everything that was required – went to a house party with my former uni mates, plus some of their friends
Until midnight it was going surprisingly well with no damage to the house whatsoever – which is pretty impressive for a combined new years and house warming party
It didn’t go badly wrong but it certainly was a bit of a change when the cheapo “Champagne” or more accurately Asti was being drunk shortly followed by the Fireworks….

Ok, I will set the scene, the house is my ex flatmate from uni’s and letting off the fireworks are his two mates from school and himself.
Starts off fairly well, though the fireworks are obviously the extra value cheapo set, but they make a few bangs along with some pretty fountains
But when one of his mates set off a rocket directly from his hand which went flying into the garden of the house two doors down you could tell that something mad was a brewing
He then proceeded to light fireworks while about 3 feet away from one that was going off and lit one and threw it into a corner of the garden
I think about that point most of the group went into the kitchen to watch from the safety of indoors
But, then one of the fireworks had blown a hole in the pots they were using to set them off and the nutter set one off which was pointing in the direction of everyone else and was not well secured. And you guessed it… it was in the pot which had the hole in it!
Firework goes whirling round to shout of it’s coming this way
Those that hadn’t gone inside (like myself) now ran for the kitchen door, which only made it worse as the end of the firework flew out, bounced off the patio, through the kitchen door. All the while it was chucking black smoke and sparks bounced off peoples’ legs (including mine) as we ran further into the kitchen!
Eventually it went out, fortunately causing no injuries and we can only be thankful that the kitchen had a stone floor rather than anything expensive or flammable as it was now covered with firework debris on the floor and up the walls.

I dont think anyone could quite believe what had happened, and on reflection how lucky we all were. A bit of soap and water and the floor and walls were good as new and the last two fireworks were set off by the other two to a muted applause.

After that everyone needed a few more stiff drinks and 2006 had arrived!

The rest of the party went well, apart from the cream carpet getting covered by several red wine stains which just had to happen. Amazingly no breakages, which was very impressive considering the amount of alcohol that was consumed. It all ended at about 3:30 in the morning and we all laughed about it in the morning.

On an unrelated note, i got an interview letter for one of the jobs i applied for, and with a bit of luck i feel confident that i can get the job
I think i’ll be celebrating some more tonight *raises glass* cheers

I’m Back!

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I’ve been on holiday in Italy for christmas, and back today so that I can spend new year at home
Since i haven’t been updating my blog you’re in for a bit of a special as is always the case after i get back from a holiday

I’ll start with Desert Island Discs which is a radio show in the UK. We got talking about a variation on the theme where you get to choose 4 tracks, 3 films, 3 books and a luxury.
We came to the conclusion that this is very difficult for younger people as I said I would probably choose 4 different tracks for every day of the week. Fairly sensibly, it was suggested that perhaps the best books would be ones along the lines of “How to survive on a desert island in 200 easy steps”, and I added one though i couldn’t remember the name at the time, but it’s The Worst-Case Scenario Survival Handbook. It includes things like how to get out of quicksand, and wrestle an alligator with just a stout pole
Suggestions for the music and films varied from ones that you enjoy the most already to ones that you’ve never had the time to watch/listen to and would get the most out of.
But the general consensus was that the most interesting choices were those that had a good reasoning and reminded the person of something in the past.
Being under 30, I don’t think I’m old enough to have had that many moments to reflect on

Onward we go – I was thinking about animals that have become extinct and how often they are ones that don’t appear to be missed that much by the layman. But i thought i’d turn it around into what animals would you be more than happy to have extinct which really would make a difference to the layman. My first suggestion was the Mosquito – they’re ugly, a pest, suck blood and some species carry malaria and dengue fever, yellow fever, west nile virus (amongst others). I am not an ecologist, but as far as i’m concerned the mosquito is better to me dead than alive – the World Health Organisation did declare war on the mosquito and largely failed when trying to rid the world of Malaria. I can’t think of any other suggestions i came up with, but would be interesting to hear a few more.

Last but not least, in the in-flight magazine coming back I saw an advert for a piece of software called OnSpeed. It makes some pretty amazing claims for a piece of software and is charged at £24.99 or €39.99 in Euros per year.
It must be more than just an internet optimiser since you have to renew the subscription annually, whereas an optimiser would do the changes and that would be it. It’s won lots of awards, and has mac support (except for email optimisation). It doesnt seem to make a lot of sense though, and it’d be interesting to see if it actually works.

Till next time…

Frankenstein Mac

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My Powermac G4 Case Mod from 2003
I was talking to MacHeadCase yesterday about future computers, and we were comparing what each of us had. It was then that I realised that I’d never talked about my Mac on this website and/or blog. So I got my digital camera out, a Sony T-1 and built a little page about my Mac and what i did to the case.
It’s a bit of a mishmash of a computer now – many of the components have been upgraded, and being the first tower case computer i’ve owned, am reluctant to give it up, and want to upgrade it as much as possible.
It’s quite old though now – bought it in August 2000 as a 1st generation Powermac G4, with a 450MHz processor, Zip Drive, DVD ROM, 20Gb Hard Drive and 128mb RAM.
It now has a 2nd hard drive: 120Gb Maxtor, a DVD±RW in addition to the DVD ROM, 640Mb RAM, and no Zip Drive. I’ve added an extra 4 USB ports, and a wireless network card. The original ATI rage Pro graphics card was replaced 4 years ago for a NVidia GeForce 2MX, but that is now due for replacement – i think a Radeon of some description will be the best.
At some point i will want to replace this mac, possibly with a Powermac G5, but they are expensive, and don’t have dual optical drives which drives me nuts. Perhaps I’ll go for a cheaper 2002 edition of the Power Mac G4 Desktops or as I’ve threatened for many years buy a Windows Computer because it’s cheaper and easier to upgrade.

French Car and the Bulimic Wizards

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The other day (namely monday) i finally put up the 3rd French Car and the Bulimic Wizards album onto my site
It’s kinda been a bit unofficial that i’m hosting it, though if you do a Google Search for the band it comes up top of the list
I haven’t really listened to the most recent offering much, but the first two albums are worth having a listen to if you get a chance
If I havent mentioned anything about it to you before, it was a side project set up by some of the original members of the band Stony Sleep, and included some of their friends in various guises. It started back in 1996, went on hold for a while and got reborn a year or so ago.

On another google note, it’s good to see my blog is getting indexed already, and it appears the RSS feed got set up automatically. Will have to stick the an RSS button in the sidebar or something.

My Last Week

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It had to come one day – last week was my last week working in the NHS job i’ve been doing for over 18 months
I had planned to have a new job sorted – but things had been tougher than planned and having the time for work, socialising and applying for new jobs hasn’t been easy and realistically never happened
What i’m going to do is look to take an extended christmas/new year holiday and put my feet up for a few days. Even after a day and a half i feel better – i think knowing that i don’t have to worry about anything at weekends has been a weight off my shoulders
Have spent most of today getting application forms out, and yesterday arranged to go to my old agency in the new year.
I’m not worried yet, and there should be some good jobs out there for me. And while i’m waiting on interviews i can also spend a bit more time on my blog, website, wiki, php, mysql and all the stuff i never get the time for

Wasted at Xmas

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I should be heading off to the Mean Fiddler’s Wasted at Xmas punk festival sometime this afternoon. The first bands will be on in about an hour but they’re not worth seeing.

Wasted At Xmas:
The Dickies + The Rezillos + The Saints (2) + The Angelic Upstarts + UK Subs + TV Smith + The Pork Dukes + 999 + The Straps + Menace + Arthur Kitchener (acoustic) + The Grit
With comedy, can can dancers, merch and CD stalls, DJ’s e.t.c. Tickets from tickets@wastedfestivals.com. See www.wastedfestivals.com for more information.

Blog Design

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After a couple of weeks of messing around, i think i’m nearly happy with the look of the blog
The benevolence theme is looking good, and the plugins are working – at last
I struggled with gravatars, but after messing with the CSS and PHP stuff i simply could not get Skippy’s plugin to work
So, after a lot of messing around, posting on both the theme designer’s site and the wordpress support forum, I got no replies
My good friend Stretch suggested i try the official Gravatar plugin from gravatar.com again, as he also had problems with Skippy’s plugin on his blog

After a few parse errors, i finally got it to work. The CSS still needs sorting, but it’s actually displaying the gravatars
The blog finally looks like it’s usable, so there should be more to come

Edit Apologies for the main page completely breaking – that was due to a bit of html lazyness on this post – it has now been fixed