Archives for March, 2011
Whird redirections
Mar 29, 2011 (about 1 year ago)
Tonight, I pushed up some changes to Whird to allow for adding redirection directives to individual pages and posts. This means it should now be possible to do things like:
- http://corenominal.org/get-firefox — external redirect to mozilla.com
- http://corenominal.org/woof-woof — internal redirect to Daisy’s page
The new feature works in combination with the $view_data_extras array and basically checks if a “redirect” key has been set, before performing some basic validation on the value and redirecting (unless the visitor is logged in as the site administrator, in which case a couple of options will be presented; follow redirection directive, or, edit the record.)
I do not think this new feature is at all groundbreaking, but it is quite useful — especially for those times when you need to do some reorganising of content. Also, I figure it beats having to play around with .htaccess directives, which can be a bit of a PITA.
GNOME 3 — This is the end, maybe
Mar 26, 2011 (about 1 year ago)
“Gnome 3 - This is the end, it seems” is an interesting review of the new GNOME 3. Having recently tried the latest Fedora 15 alpha myself, which features GNOME 3, I found reviewer’s mini summary quite apt, if not a little harsh:
Totally counterintuitive, inefficient, not really productive, the lack of panels and right-click functionality is a sore, annoying loss. Power users will find the polished, rounded looks nothing more than a costly distraction to their work.
I actually quite liked the look ‘n’ feel of Fedora’s GNOME 3 implementation, it was very polished and professional in appearance; however, after using it for an hour or so, I knew it was not for me. This realisation was not much of a revelation as I have not used GNOME 2 in a long time, so I kind of already knew that I would probably not find GNOME 3 suitable for my needs.
Anyhow, what I found really interesting about the review, was that there was no mention of Xfce. The reviewer briefly mentions KDE as a potential replacement, but does not mention Xfce, which to me seems like a much more obvious alternative. In fact, with the latest panel and Thunar features available in version 4.8, I can foresee Xfce attracting many GNOME refugees.
In related news, I mentioned that I have been trying the latest Fedora 15 alpha releases. I have only been doing this out of curiosity and with no intention of actually switching from Debian, but I have to say, the Fedora Project is currently doing some amazing work. I was super impressed with their Xfce spin, which was one of the best Xfce implementations I have seen in a long time.
Not idiots
Mar 25, 2011 (about 1 year ago)
Previously on corenominal.org:
Note, it has occurred to me that I could simply add an additional field to the ‘whird_content’ table for storing an array’s key-value pairs, which would then mean a user could have an unlimited number of extra fields to play with; however, I am holding off from doing this as I cannot think of a way of implementing it nicely without using some client-side scripting, which I have so far managed to avoid. If anyone finds my thinking cap, please let me know.
By “nicely”, I think I meant idiot proof, which was wrong. I know it is a huge generalisation, but, I do not think people/users are idiots. As a user myself, it kind of frustrates me when developers work to the lowest common denominator, aka the idiot, and I do not want to fall into the same trap whilst working with Whird.
So, I have gone ahead and implemented the new Whird feature. I decided to simply use a standard text area for creating custom key-value pairs for posts and pages — one per line, using a double-pipe as the delimiter. I have also started putting together some documentation for Whird, although I am struggling somewhat with how to index/categorise it. The document for the new feature is entitled, “Whird docs: view_data_extras” — catchy!
I have started using the feature myself, to conditionally include submenus for project pages. It seems to be working well and I am quite pleased with it — I think it makes Whird much more useful and opens up all sorts of possibilities.
In semi-related news, not so long ago, Becky and I attended parents’ evening at Emma’s school. We were chatting with Emma’s ICT teacher, who said, “Emma is a capable child, but she needs to fully read the class handouts before raising her hand”, which I translated as, “Emma is not an idiot, she just needs to RTFM!”
**chuckles**
Free software, a form of escapism?
Mar 23, 2011 (about 1 year ago)
These are the decisions I struggle with:
- Debian || Ubuntu || Fedora || openSUSE
- 32-bit || 64-bit
- Openbox || Xfce
- Firefox || Chromium
- Et cetera…
In a world full of madness, I count myself lucky because I only have such trivial matters to worry about; I also count myself lucky because I have huge amounts of excellent free software to choose from.
The year is 2011, the world has turned bonkers-mad, yet I seem more concerned about which WWW browser to use. :/
I wonder, how many other people use their interest in free software as a form of escapism?
Ucubed, running & helicopters
Mar 17, 2011 (about 1 year ago)
I will not be attending Ucubed, but I wish I was. If you are at all interested in Debian or Ubuntu and their derivative projects, such as CrunchBang, then Ucubed is the unconference for you!
The unconference is being held on the 2nd of April 2011 at Madlab in Manchester, which looks like a fantastic venue. Tickets are free [yes, you read that correctly], but there are limited numbers.
Anyhow, here is a list of what I will be missing out on:
- Dan Lynch’s Keynote
- Les Pounder’s “Aubergine is not the only colour” - A look at other Debian based distributions
- Anna Morris’ Okay Computer – A workshop in Free Software Philosophy and Ubuntu
- Charlie Owen’s Whistlestop Tour of Ubuntu
- Plus various other workshops, talks and discussions
Sad face.
I will not be attending Ucubed because I will supporting Becky as she attempts to run 10 kilometres around the city of Lincoln — rather her than me. Becky has been training really hard for the event and I am super proud of her. She is running to raise funds for our local Air Ambulance service, which is cool, because she is doing it for charity, and because helicopters rule!
Happy face.
Images for Whird
Mar 15, 2011 (about 1 year ago)
Last night, I pushed up some small changes to Whird. Basically, I have altered the main database table ‘whird_content’ to include an additional field. The new field is just a standard varchar, but it is named ‘_image’, with the idea being that any post or page could have the URL of an image associated to it.
I was hesitant to make this change as I do not like to play around with Whird’s database structure too much, but in the end I decided that it would make a good addition; not only could it be used to display images within a site, but it can also be used within a site’s metadata, e.g. Open Graph tags.
I think this is the first change I have made to Whird’s database structure since finding out that I am not the only person using it. I am fairly confident that I have accommodated any existing Whird installations and hopefully there should not be any breakages.
For new installations, the ‘_image’ field will not appear within Whird’s main edit form, unless the ‘hide_edit_form_image’ key-value pair is deleted from the $whird_conf_extras array. In reverse, existing users can hide the field by creating the same key-value pair.
Note, it has occurred to me that I could simply add an additional field to the ‘whird_content’ table for storing an array’s key-value pairs, which would then mean a user could have an unlimited number of extra fields to play with; however, I am holding off from doing this as I cannot think of a way of implementing it nicely without using some client-side scripting, which I have so far managed to avoid. If anyone finds my thinking cap, please let me know.
In completely unrelated news, I went paintballing with some good friends at the weekend. I had a blast and it was really fantastic to see my old school friends again, before attempting to shoot them. I had not seen some of them for 5 or more years, but I felt completely at home in their company — I guess that is the measure of good friendship, even if they do shoot you in the neck, twice! :)
I work inside a giant robot!
Mar 8, 2011 (about 1 year ago)
Last night, I was feeling really, really, bored at work. Seriously, I must have the most boring job on the planet, so, in an effort to relieve my boredom, I decided to take the company’s interstellar shuttle for a quick jolly. Strictly speaking, I am forbidden from flying the old jalopy, but hey-ho.
So, there I was, passing overhead the office when I looked down and noticed something truly amazing:
The building I work in is shaped like a giant robot, I mean, I work inside a giant robot!
Superb!
In unrelated and slightly less exciting news, I have now added Facebook’s Open Graph tags to my site. I am undecided if this is a good thing or not, but as part of an ongoing personal project to be more sociable, I think it is important not to ignore Facebook — which I have tried to do for years.
I know many people involved in the free/libre world consider Facebook to be the tool of the devil, and to some extent, I do to, but I also know that to many people, Facebook is the Internet, and I see no reason to spare them from the same drivel I subject everyone else to.
Now, “like” this page and you will be forever blessed with good luck and fortune, or do not like this page and be forever haunted by 200 dead monkeys! :P
Freetard faeries & pragmatic pixies
Mar 7, 2011 (about 1 year ago)
About 2 weeks ago, I happily destroyed the virtual bridge between my Identi.ca and Twitter accounts. I have now rebuilt it, and I have built an additional bridge from Twitter to Facebook.
What can I say, sometimes I tend to flip-flop with my decisions — probably more so when it involves the ongoing battle in my head between the little freetard faeries and pragmatic pixies.
I think it might help if I try and define my personal stance about such matters in a single sentence. So, whenever somebody asks, or whenever I get carried away, I should refer back to this post and repeat:
I have a preference for free/libre software and services, I use and advocate them whenever possible, but I am also a pragmatist.
In semi-related flip-flop news, I have also switched my site’s feed from Atom to RSS format. This is not in anyway related to faeries or pixies and I apologise in advance if I have flooded any aggregators or planets. :/
Zombie FAIL
Mar 5, 2011 (about 1 year ago)
So, there I was, minding my own business, when this cheeky little zombie sneaked up from behind and attached itself to my arm. Luckily, this cute little member of the undead had no front teeth, so I escaped with a slight gumming.
In not totally unrelated news, I have been playing around with MOC, using it to submit tracks to Libre.fm. Now, as a long time user of Last.fm, I love the fact that people are attempting to build a free/libre alternative, but I have to say, Libre.fm does currently remind me of my recent experience with the above toothless zombie.
I want to be careful of not being too critical of Libre.fm, after all it is still alpha software, but it seems to have been an age since the service was first announced and I was hoping it might possess some teeth by now. Unfortunately, it does not and I find it to be lacking any features which might make it useful.
Having said that, it is possible to bridge your submitted tracks from Libre.fm to Last.fm, so I guess I am not losing out by playing around with it. Also, I have been looking at the project in some depth and it is good to see the development roadmap is full of exciting plans — I am sure the team will improve the service soon.
I have also cloned the git repository and taken a quick look at the GNU FM code. I am not sure there is much I can contribute myself, but I may have a play at setting up a GNUkebox instance for testing.
One feature I would really like to see would be a ‘similar artists’ recommendation system, such as seen on Last.fm. Personally, I think this is one of Last.fm’s strongest features and I find it to be a fantastic tool for finding new music. In fact, just last night, I used it to find The Slew, who seem to produce a sublime mix of rock and turntablism. Which reminds me, I have some new music to relax with.
The claw is not my master!
Mar 1, 2011 (about 1 year ago)
My adventure into the world of colour has come to an end. I enjoyed playing around with the previous brightly coloured theme, but after a day or two of using it, the novelty wore off and it really began bugging me.
I honestly do not think my brain is capable of processing too much colour, it gets confused and I lose focus. I should have known better. While I still believe the theme was fun, it did kind of remind me of a sneaky profit-maximising tactic used by some supermarkets in the UK — basically the supermarkets bombard their customers with brightly coloured goods at the store entrance. It is a shock’n’awe tactic, designed to distract and confuse the customer, in the hope that the customer forgets that they only entered the store to buy a pint of milk, and instead ends up purchasing half the shop.
Obviously, this is not something I would like to put any potential visitors through, so I have reverted my site design to something much less dramatic.
Note to self: The next time I think it might be a good idea to introduce some colour into my life, go and buy a new T-shirt or try to take a bit less of an all-or-nothing approach.