WebberLog

It has been over 2 years since I posted my previous Top 10 Tools list. O how time seems to race ahead. It’s time to take another look and see how we’re doing today.

Chrome
My browser of choice still is Google Chrome. Since last time, the best thing that was added to Chrome are Extensions. FireFox users were familiar with those, Chrome users had to wait quite a bit. Right now, I’m using extensions for ad-blocking, twitter integration and Buzz integration. That last one deserves a post of its own.

Komodo Edit
No change here. It’s still a bit too bulky for my liking, but it is loaded with the greatest features. Komodo Edit is still my PHP editor of choice.

FileZilla
FTP client with an edge. I used to be a LeechFTP adept, but since they stopped updating that in the late 16th century I decided to look for something else which matches it in speed and quality. This is it.
Still my number 1 FTP client. No doubt about it, nothing else compares.

TweakUI
Last install has been on Windows XP. Since then, using Vista and currently Windows 7, no more need for tweaking. Well, nothing that needs extra tools, anyway.

TaskSwitchXP
For XP machines I still download this little gem. Again, using Windows 7 now, the need for it to be on my production laptop is gone.

Winamp
Even though Windows Media Player isn’t all bad (just mostly), I still revert to good’ol Winamp for playing MP3 files. Since I’m a Last.FM subscriber, I do use that a lot too.

GIMP for Windows
Finally an item that has gone from my machine. Having used GIMP for many years, I recently switched to Photoshop. Comparing them is akward, since Photoshop costs a lot and GIMP is free, so I’m gonna go with saying it was worth it for me. For simple editing tasks I do tend to revert to Paint.NET. Free, simple, fast.

7-Zip
Archive manager that handles .zip, .7z, .rar, .tar, etc.
Still no change here either. With it’s superior compression and handle-most-input-format-mentality, there’s no need to change. (And yes, this one does compress better than RAR. Sorry RAR lovers)

Tweetdeck
Tweetdeck is a new addition to my toolbox. It is, to me, the best Twitter client by far. It’s fast and flexible and doesn’t bug me when it’s minimized. Feel free to
follow me if you’re a Twitter user.

Eclipse
The last one on my list is another development tool. This one is very well suited for developing Java programs and that’s exactly what I’m doing. To be more precise, I develop Android apps. Find them in the Android market by looking for me.

Yet another Android app has hit the market. This time, it’s a free (as in beer) music player containing not one, not two, but THREE great albums. Two of the albums are by The Gasoline Brothers, the third one is a compilation of christmas covers by alternative dutch bands.

Check it out at: market://search/?q=pname:nl.deskweb.tgbp.

Het overkomt me regelmatig; ik zit lekker op de bank (mijn favoriete plek om lekker te zitten) en in de verte hoor ik een brandweer wagen met veel kabaal naar een onheilsplek racen. Doorgaans surf ik dan even naar www.alarmeringen.nl om te zien wat er aan de hand is.

Tegenwoordig hoeft dat niet meer. Ik heb een simpel appje gemaakt voor mijn Android telefoon om precies dat voor mij te doen. Het heet Alarmering Droid en is terug te vinden via de Android Market.

Voor die gelukkigen met een Android telefoon: Have fun!

I’ve release a new version for ODD, my Oracle Database Dashboard. Go get yourself a copy. Upgrading is as easy a copying the new version into your existing ODD directory.

ODD has been downloaded almost 1500 times as I type this. If you rush, we can still make it to 2000 before the year is out

I’ve been reading a lot about people having problems getting this to run, so here’s a small HOWTO on installing. Starting point is a fresh Vista Ultimate installation, but this should work on other variants aswell.

Pre requisites:

• Apache install for Windows. I used: Apache 2.2.4
• PHP, full zip files. I used: PHP 5.2.2
• MySQL, full version without installer. I used: 5.0.41
• Turn of Windows UAC (feel free to turn it back on after installation, if you’re a big fan)

Steps:
Windows UAC
If you have this turned on, you will have problems creating services and Windows will bug you with install messages all the way. If you’re fond of those, feel free to turn it back on when we’re done.
Open up the Control Panel and go to User Accounts and Family Safety. Click on User Accounts. Select Turn User Account Control on or off. Deselect the option and click Ok. Restart Windows to complete the change.

Apache Install

• Run through the “normal” install of Apache. Alter stuff like domain name, servername and webmaster e-mail. The rest will do just fine.
• Remove the Apache Monitor from the Startup program group. Somehow, it doesn’t work properly and it’s functionality isn’t too impressive anyway.

PHP Install

• Create a directory for PHP. I will use C:\PHP, if you use anything else, make sure to change that in the installation scripts.
• Extract the contents of your PHP zip into your PHP directory
• Copy the file PHP.ini-dist to PHP.ini. This will be your PHP settings file, aimed at developing sites, not running them. (Then, who would be running sites from a Vista machine anyway?)
• Modify the PHP.INI file:
  • Find the setting for extension_dir and change it so the line reads: extension_dir = “C:/PHP/ext”
  • Find the line with the MySQL extension and uncomment it so it reads: extension=php_mysql.dll
• Add your PHP directory to the path. You can do this by right-clicking Computer in the Vista startmenu, select Properties. In the window you see now, select the Task: Advanced system settings. From the new window select Environment variables and find the PATH setting in the section with System variables. Double click it and add “;C:\PHP” to the end of the value. (Without the quotes of course).
• Locate your Apache configuration file. This will be in C:\Program files\Apache Software Foundation\Apache2.2\conf and it will be named httpd.conf. Edit it with your editor of choice.   
  
• Find the section which defines the DirectoryIndex. It will now only have index.html. You will most likely want to add index.php to this. The line will then read: DirectoryIndex index.html index.php
• Go to the bottom of the file and add the following lines:
      # PHP5 installation:
      LoadModule php5_module “c:/php/php5apache2_2.dll”
      AddType application/x-httpd-php .php
      # configure the path to php.ini
      PHPIniDir “C:/php”

MySQL Install

• Create a directory for MySQL. If you’re not going for the default of C:\MySQL, you will have to change the ini files and I’ve noticed some weird problems in there. So I suggest to stick to the yellow brick road on this one.
• Extract the contents of the zip file.
• Copy my-small.ini to my.ini. If you want to allocate more memory to MySQL, you can choose one of the other templates, but this one usually suffices for development machines.
• Using a command prompt, navigate to C:\MySQL\bin and type:
    mysqld –install
    net start mysql
    This will register the MySQL service and start it.
• Add your MySQL/bin directory to the path. You can do this by right-clicking Computer in the Vista startmenu, select Properties. In the window you see now, select the Task: Advanced system settings. From the new window select Environment variables and find the PATH setting in the section with System variables. Double click it and add “;C:\MySQL\bin” to the end of the values

That’s it! You should have a working install now. Of course there’s a zillion things you can change in your install. Personally, I always work with a bunch of virtual domains on my server, which makes it easier to develop more than one site at the same time. And due to size constraints, I park my MySQL data on another drive. All this and more can be changed in the settings.

On his blog, Steven Talcott Smith writes about when Non-programmers write Software. He cites some stories of people creating software to help them do their jobs, some because it seems cheaper to do so, others because there’s just no software around that gives them the functionality they need.

I think all of us programmers have seen this before; in my own circle of friends I know of atleast one non-programmer who’s writing his own document-filing-system. The reason for doing it himself; he has simple needs and no available system can supply him with what he needs for a descent amount of money.

Now I wonder, shouldn’t us “real” programmers fill these kind of gaps by building cheaper, more accessible software?

As the author of Using the Internet to Pick up Babes and/or Hunks, I’ve spent quite a bit of time trying to figure out how to get more dates using my Oracle knowledge. I was doing pretty well with the line “I am an SAP consultant making $7000/day” but women in bars refused to go out with me when I couldn’t answer the following question: “Why doesn’t Oracle support ANSI SQL datetime datatypes?”

– Philip Greenspun