Inspired by an email I recently received, I have created a seventh Spidermonky article. This article covers how to execute a Javascript function from your C application and get the return value for use in your application. To demonstrate how to do this I create a simple application for encrypting data which relys on Javascript functions to perform the actual encryption. Enjoy the new article, and as always, leave your comments :)
We got some Sun Solaris Sunfire T1000's at the office, and I have more or less been tasked with managing these boxes. I have never worked with Sun hardware, or software before, but because it's Linux like and I am the most experienced with Linux I have been assigned the task. That doesn't bother me, I've been having some fun with it and learning a lot. The first challange I had right away was how to reset the root password and the ALOM password because they had been lost between the time the boxes were originally setup and when I took over to finish preparing them. Figuring out how to get the passwords reset was about a week long venture. I've taken the time to document what I did in an article, Resetting root password in Solaris. Hopefully this will help out anyone who may be in a similar situation as me and keep them from spending a week figuring out what they need to do.
I finally got around to producing another spider-monkey tutorial. This time I dive into creating a socket object that will allow my javascript files to connect to a website and download a file. I cover things like creating properties on a class and then using JS to create a class using the socket class which deals specifically with HTTP. I also cover how to pull properties from an object passed to a function as a parameter, as that is the technique I used for the connect function. So, check out Coding with Spidermonkey Part VI - Sockets soon!
Recently at work we have been messing with Exchange 2007 and setting up resource calendars for our conference rooms. We got the resource mailboxes fine, no problem there. Where we did have a "problem" though was with the free busy data because it was not being generated fast enough. After much searching I finally found my way to a blog entry which explained how to lower the polling rate and get the information updated faster. Basically you just need to add a registry entry to HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\MSExchangeFBPublish\Parameters\<VS name> where <VS Name> is the name of your exchange server. Add a new DWORD value in that key named PollingInterval and make the value the time in seconds you want the free busy data updated. There is a minimum of 30 seconds. Any value less than that causes it to use the default of 5 minutes.
Once the change is complete you need to restart the MSExchangeSA (System Attendant) service for the change to take effect. You can accomplish that by running the following power shell command: Restart-Service MSExchangeSA. Now the free busy data for conference rooms is published according to your schedule.
I've added the ability to post comments on many pages on this site. I wrote this so people can easily comment on any of the
articles I have written, or will write in the future. I haven't tested each page I put the code into, but I belieive they should
all work fine. So if you have some comments on one of the articles, please do write them down for me 
Had some interesting problems crop up at the office the other day, though I would write up a little bit about what was going on, what the solution ended up being, and a little about how I found that solution just so anyone else out there running across the same problem has yet another resouce to find through google. So without further delay, check out the ODBC, PHP5, and MS-SQL mess.
Separatly from the work issue, I also had another personal issue the other night. I recently put together a new computer designed specifically for games. I chose to run Windows Vista on the computer, because I wanted the pretty, and I also like to run software that is new, near bleeding edge, if not the bleeding edge. My problem had to do with enabling the Administrator user account, so that I could use it as a target of the runas command. After I enabled the account, it was showing up on my welcome screen. After a little research and playing I found how to do this. Since I didn't find any answer quick on google, I though I would write up a little article about hiding a user account from the welcome screen in Vista. Check it out if you are curious or want to know how to do that.
I re-wrote the code for my guestbook about a week and a half ago, and while I was doing that implemeneted a new anti-spam measure. This method of controling spam has been working well for me since then, and because of that I have decided to write up a short article about what I did to fight my guestbook spam. I hope this article will be of some benifit to people out there and help them to learn new ways to fight the spam.
I wrote another article on Spidermonkey. In this article I built four custom objects: Directory, File, FileStream, and DirectoryStream. With the engine in this article it is possible to do basical file I/O operations, as demonstrated with my test javascript files. I did not extensivly cover the code in this article, instead I just went over some of the highlights of where I had problems. I figure most people reading this tutorial will be familar enough with C to understand the C operations, and all I needed to cover was the code regarding interacting with Spidermonkey. So, please have a look over my fifth article, Coding with Spidermonkey Part V - File and Directory management.
I finally got enough interest and time to continue my experimentations with Spidermonkey. You may read my fourth part in my serise of articles now. This article covers a few bug fixes to the old code, and new ideas I gathered about the engine and how to use it. I show how to throw Exceptions from within your function incase you encounter a problem, and finally I cover the steps involved in creating a basic File object which allows one to create files, check if a file exists, and touch a file to update it's access time. My next article will probably involve either extending the file object to include some I/O or creating a separate Stream object to handle the I/O. I have not decided yet which direction I wish to go. For now, enjoy the fourth article, Coding with Spidermonkey Part IV - Files and Exceptions.
I've been getting hits to my site from people searching for the tribute to the nice girls. I have the tribute to the nice guys and was curious to see what the girls version was so I looked it up. I found it, and decided I would host it aswell, to be fair I guess. So, here it is, the Ode to the Nice Girls.
Ode to the Nice Girls
This is my tribute to the nice girls. To the nice girls who are overlooked, who become friends and nothing more, who spend hours fixating upon their looks and their personalities and their actions because it must be they that are doing something wrong. This is for the girls who don't give it up on the first date, who don't want to play mind games, who provide a comforting hug and a supportive audience for a story they've heard a thousand times. This is for the girls who understand that they aren't perfect and that the guys they're interested in aren't either, for the girls who flirt and laugh and worry and obsess over the slightest glance, whisper, touch, because somehow they are able to keep alive that hope that maybe... maybe this time he'll have understood. This is an homage to the girls who laugh loud and often, who are comfortable in skirts and sweats and combat boots, who care more than they should for guys who don't deserve their attention. This is for those girls who have been in the trenches, who have watched other girls time and time again fake up and make up and fuck up the guys in their lives without saying a word. This is for the girls who have been there from the beginning and have heard the trite words of advice, from "there are plenty of fish in the sea," to "time heals all wounds." This is to honor those girls who know that guys are just as scared as they are, who know that they deserve better, who are seeking to find it.
I've finished the third Coding with Spidermonkey article. I started this article on the 4th but am just now (the 8th) finishing it. Didn't work on it the days in between. This article covers how to make a Console object that your script can then use to read/write information from the Console on stdin/stdout/stderr. With this it's finally possible to do something with JS as now there's a basic form of input/output. There are still many features that could be added, but at least now the language is useable.
The second part of Coding for Spidermonkey is out now. Read it up and hopefully learn something. It covers how to execute a file with Spidermonkey. It's not much compared to the orginal, but it's about the same length because there is more code examples and more code explinations included. I also got my photo gallery working again, but it's still plain as I havn't be able to style it yet. There are also a few things missing, but it does show the photos again at least. I also moved the Tribute to the nice guys rant to it's own page. I'll keep an excerpt on the main page for ya'll though. Just the first paragraph.
I've been working with spider monkey lately (and also GTK+ again, but that's minor). I decided I will document my experiences with spidermonkey as I go. I feel that it may be useful to others in the future, and also useful to myself. I find I often lose time and/or interest on my personal projects for months at a time and when I do get back to it, I often end up needing to re-learn a lot of infrormation I learned previously before I can continue. This documentation will let me just read about my past experiences and hopefully make the relearning process a lot easier and take a lot less time. I will be documenting my experiences in the form of an article or tutorial about how to interact with spidermonkey. This way it can provide the most good to everybody. You can check out my first article, Coding with spidermonkey if you wish. Eventually I will try and get a feeback system going for these articles, but for now if you want to get in touch with me, simply email me using the address listed on the article.
So, I'm working on my site right now. I had a bad experience with wordpress and as a result I decided to just make my "blog" posts actual pages. They were going to be pretty big and somewhat complex anyway, so this will probably work better in the long run. I decided that I should re-structure my site and re-code certain things (mostly the template system, dropping smarty) while I was at it. I'm splitting my CSS up into multiple files rather than one huge behemoth. I'm going to be doing the same for my javascript files, though they are already split up fairly well (but could be better).
So, as these changes are taking place you will notice that some of my pages no longer work. Just be patient and come back in a day or two. I don't think it will take me too long to implement all these changes.
I find it funny that I type the above as if I actually had people who visited my site somewhat regularly. Ha. Ha.
Here's a little experiment I'm trying. I created an Anonymous FTP Server that is writable, but not readable. Meaning people can upload all they want, but nobody will be able to download anything. What good is this kind of service you ask? Well, it's not worth anything, other than to test my theory.
Now, last time I had an open FTP server, there were bots that would tag it then start uploading pirated stuff (software, music, movies, etc) and use it as a distribution center for their "customers." There are bots doing this type of thing to all sorts of unprotected ftp servers out there already, so my server likely won't affect the pool much, but basically what I want to see is how much stuff I manage to accumulate as bots discover this seeming paradise, without realizing that once they upload their info, it can't be changed, updated, or re-downloaded. So basically anything they upload mearly becomes traped on my server. Ocassionally I'll delete out the entries so I don't run out of diskspace, but it will be intersting to see what kind of stuff the bots are willing to put on my server.
Here's a good little tribute that was posted on devshed forums. I dunno the orginal author, but I'll put it as a quote by the poster.
Tribute To The 'Nice Guys!
This is a tribute to the nice guys. The nice guys that finish last, that never become more than friends, that endure hours of whining and bitching about what assholes guys are, while disproving the very point. This is dedicated to those guys who always provide a shoulder to lean on but restrain themselves to tentative hugs, those guys who hold open doors and give reassuring pats on the back and sit patiently outside the changing room at department stores. This is in honor of the guys that obligingly reiterate how cute/beautiful/smart/funny/sexy their female friends are at the appropriate moment, because they know most girls need that litany of support. This is in honor of the guys with open minds, with laid-back attitudes, with honest concern. This is in honor of the guys who respect a girl.s every facet, from her privacy to her theology to her clothing style.
-- illEATurHARTout
http://forums.devshed.com/dev-shed-lounge-26/tribute-to-the-nice-guys-271169.html
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