Digitivity » Developer

Microsoft Expression Web SuperPreview – BrowserCam for IE 6 and 8

Digitivity — Tue, 02 Nov 2010 12:04:36 +0000

If you design websites, you’ve probably had to view a site in multiple versions of Internet Explorer.

Unfortunately, you can only usually have one version of IE installed on your computer.

Now Micrsoft has come out with a way preview web pages with multiple versions of IE.

SuperPreview lets you view a web page in both IE6 and IE7 or 8, whichever you have installed on your machine.

Get SuperPreview here.

Creating a Database in MySQL with MySQL Query Browser on Ubuntu Linux

Digitivity — Thu, 29 Apr 2010 10:53:28 +0000

A handy tool to manipulate MySQL is the MySQL MySQL Query Browser. It’s from MySQL AB (the company that makes MySQL).

Click through to find out how to create a database using the Query Browser.

Installing MySQL Query Browser on Ubuntu Linux

Depending on how you installed MySQL, MySQL Query Browser may already be installed. If so, it’ll be in the Programming section of the Applications menu:

If not, click here in Firefox to install it, or type the following into a terminal:

sudo apt-get install mysql-query-browser

Make sure you have all the repositories enabled before installing.

Running MySQL Query Browser

Choose “MySQL Query Browser” from the Applications > Programming menu of Ubunutu. Or execute the program “mysql-query-browser” from the terminal.

Once it opens, it’ll ask you to log in. Use the root user and password you specified when installing MySQL:

You can save connection information to avoid having to enter it again. If you want it to save passwords, too, choose that option from Tools: Preferences: General Options: Store connection passwords.

Creating a Database with MySQL Query Browser

Find the “Schemata” window on the right-hand side. “Schema” is a fancy synonym for “database”, and “schemata” is the plural.

Right click anywhere, and choose “Create Schema”.

Enter the name of the new database and hit OK.

The new database is shown in the schemas window:

Setting Permissions on the New Database

Once you’ve created a database, you have to set permissions on it for a given user (other than root) to use it. You can do that textually by executing queries with the MySQL Query Browser. But it’ll probably be easier to set user permissions with MySQL Administrator.

Facebook Announces a Better, Faster PHP: HipHop PHP

Digitivity — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 17:52:31 +0000

PHP is the programming language that runs many web applications, including WordPress. PHP’s slower than many other languages, but it’s fast to develop in.

Now Facebook, which also runs on PHP, has announced a new version of PHP that runs twice as fast.

This also means that if you have a popular WordPress blog, you might only have to have half the server size you use now.

How PHP Works

PHP, in its usual incarnation, is an interpreted language. This means that a program (such as a PHP module in the Apache webserver) reads the PHP instructions in your script and executes them in turn. Every time the PHP script is executed, it has to be turned into machine code, even if the script runs 1000 times per hour. Obviously, this is inefficient, but people put up with it because PHP is considered easier to develop in than other languages.

By comparison, C++ is a language which is usually compiled (changed to machine instructions which run directly on the CPU). This happens only once, and every time the program runs, it runs directly on the processor. Because there’s no intermediate interpretation step, C++ programs run much faster.

Facebook’s HipHop PHP

Facebook announced what they are calling HipHop PHP, which translates PHP into C++. Then you use g++, the GNU C++ compiler, to compile the C++ program.

Here’s how the process works:

HipHop PHP Transformation Process

Facebook says compilation of their PHP code results in savings of 50% in server usage.

They also released HPHPi, which is an optimized PHP interpreter that doesn’t require you re-compile your code.

Download HipHop PHP

Facebook is going to release the code to HPHP under the PHP license on Github for download at this address (but it’s not there yet).

Caveats

In order to optimize PHP to the maximum, they left out some rarely used dynamic functionality, such as the eval() function.

I’ll report more on HipHop PHP as Facebook releases more information.

Resources

Facebook HipHop PHP announcement

HipHop release video

Facebook HipHop developer mailing list

ZDNet article

HipHop for PHP: Who Benefits?

BestTechie article

Feed2Meme article

Facebook’s HipHop Goes Public With a New PHP Runtime

PHPC: A PHP Compiler

Roadsend PHP compiler

An interview with a Facebook employee about PHP

PHP Facebook release

Monty Widenius Is Still Trying to Save MySQL From Itself

Digitivity — Tue, 05 Jan 2010 20:28:54 +0000

I blogged before about the different versions of the MySQL database, which is the most commonly deployed database on the Internet, the one favored by most free and open source software, and the one that WordPress uses.

Monty Widenius, the erstwhile head developer for MySQL, sold his company to venture capitalists, and later the company was sold for a cool one billion dollars (yes, billion with a B) to Sun Microsystems. Now, basically, he’s asking for it back.

He’s campaiging to have to have the European Union deny permission for Oracle’s buyout of Sun. It may partly be his fault that the EU has dragged the review process for the Sun acquisition out for close to year now.

The depths to which he’s sunk really show either desperation or obsession. He’s spamming every one who ever filed a bug report for MySQL with his plea. What I don’t understand is how he has these e-mail addresses. Isn’t Sun supposed to have custody of the MySQL bug database, and it’s e-mail addresses?

What he wants

He has a another post on his blog asking people to “Help Keep the Internet Free.” Meaning that without MySQL, the Internet won’t be free.

First of all, his premise is ridiculous. There are plenty of other free databases, including Firebird and PostgreSQL. PostgreSQL is widely seen as a much better database than MySQL. If MySQL disappeared tomorrow, the Internet’s databases would still be free.

But there’s a catch here: MySQL is already free and open source software under the GPL. Neither Oracle nor Sun can un-GPL MySQL. That means Monty (or whoever) can already take the MySQL code and create their own forked versions of it, improve it, and redistribute it. So what’s the problem?

The problem is that Monty wants to have his cake and eat it too. He wants not only to have the free GPL MySQL code, but he also wants to be able to sell commercial versions of it. To that end, he wants the EU to invalidate the GPL copyright on the MySQL code.

The gall of his request is stunning. He already accepted money in return for giving up control of the code. He has no moral basis to ask for it again.

He claims to be saving MySQL from the evil clutches of Oracle, but he fails to see it’s he himself who is destroying it. By giving the EU a reason to drag out the acquisition process, he’s damaging Sun, which naturally then has less money to spend on MySQL development. My damaging MySQL, he’s also damaging the interests of everyone who uses MySQL, which includes myself since this blog runs on WordPress which runs on MySQL.

Stop it, please.

Resources

Widenius on “selfless” quest to destroy GPL MySQL “in order to save it”

Hypocrisy of Monty – Groklaw

Slashdot Discussion

Why Oracle Won’t Kill MySQL

Color Syntax Highlighting for Code WordPress with the wp-syntax Plugin

Digitivity — Wed, 27 May 2009 04:12:11 +0000

If you ever want to insert code in your WordPress blog, you probably ought to have a syntax highlighting plugin installed. Otherwise, you’ll probably mess up your blog template for the pages that have code on them.

By the way, this applies not only to code, but also anything that you might want to display to the user as-is, without line breaks, maybe even a poem.

Why a Code Syntax Plugin

Anyway, if you enter program code in the normal WordPress visual editor, you’ll lose the indentation:

public static void main(String[] args) throws ClientProtocolException, IOException {

URL url = new URL(“https://ssl.site”);
Socket s = new Socket(“proxy.address”, 8080);

Also, lines will usually wrap, which, depending on the programming language, may or may not change the meaning of the code, but might also hinder the reader’s understanding of it.

As well, since the text will be in a proportional font instead of monospace, which is usually used to line up text columns with code.

Code Syntax Plugins for WordPress

Code Snippet

The top Google result for “wordpress code plugin” is Code Snippet. It’s based on the excellent and flexible GeSHi syntax highlighting engine. Unfortunately, the last time it was updated was 2007, and the total all-time downloads (about 3000) are equal to the weekly downloads for wp-syntax, discussed below.

Google Code Highlighter

The Google Syntax Highlighter for WordPress also highlights code. It uses the Google Syntax Highlighter. Disadvantages of this plugin as I see it include:

JavaScript is required. The code isn’t highlighted as-is, rather it’s highlighted when it reaches the user’s browser. I’m not quite sure how this is to work in FeedBurner and other readers.
Much fewer languages are supported than GeSHi. While the supported languages are the most common ones in use today, it hardly seems worthwhile to limit your blogging to just these specific languages.

Google Syntax Highlighter WordPress Plugin: Sample 1

wp-syntax

wp-syntax is the best overall plugin for displaying code in WordPress:

wp-syntax WordPress Plugin: PHP Sample 1

It’s based on GeSHi, which supports over a hundred programming languages.
All the highlighting happens on the server, and the syntax coloring is embedded in the HTML instead of being in a separate stylesheet file. What that means is that users reading your webfeed in something like FeedBurner will see highlighted code.
The high number of downloads reduce the possibility that you’ll have standardized on a plugin that will be abandoned.
The code display is very sleek, unlike a lot of other highlighting plugins. For example, the Google Highlighter has “view plain”, “copy to clipboard”, “print”, and “?” menu items. This is partly necessitated by the fact that many code plugins have so much cruft that a normal select-and-copy operation doesn’t result in copying usably indented code to the clipboard. I’m put off by the fact that a code display needs a user interface! wp-syntax just works; you select the code, copy, and paste.
You can choose whether to display line numbers or not, adding to the unburdened display.

Using wp-syntax

Just put your code in a

block. You can do that by selecting the “Preformatted” option in the text Format selector. If that’s not visible, you may need to press the “Show/Hide Kitchen Sink” button, which is the rightmost button on the top row in the Visual Editor.

After you’re done adding your all your code blocks, switch to the HTML Editor, and add a lang=”java” (or whatever language you’re using) to the

 blocks.  You can also add a line=”1″ to start line number at whatever number you want. (But beware, this’ll be stripped away after switching back to the Visual Editor.)

<pre lang="java">

That's it for basic usage.

Note: be sure to watch for more posts, which will go into more detail about installing and using the wp-syntax plugin.

Get wp-syntax here.

How to Show a MessageBox in Java Swing

Digitivity — Sat, 23 May 2009 13:11:23 +0000

VisualBasic and a lot of other languages have a handy function to show a message box to the user. In typical Java fashion, Java’s equivalent has a lot more power, but also complex.

To get simple message box functionality, you have to specify a number of options:

JOptionPane.showMessageDialog(parent,
    "Message",
    "Title",
    JOptionPane.INFORMATION_MESSAGE,
    icon);

This shows a dialog with your message plus a look-and-feel defined icon which varies depending on the option selected. For example, a question mark icon is shown for JOptionPane.QUESTION_MESSAGE. The various message types are shown below for the default Swing Metal look-and-feel:

Java Swing MessageBox: PLAIN_MESSAGE

Java Swing MessageBox: INFORMATION_MESSAGE

Java Swing MessageBox: QUESTION_MESSAGE

Java Swing MessageBox: WARNING_MESSAGE

Java Swing MessageBox: ERROR_MESSAGE

Note: the icon can be null if you don’t want or need an icon. You should specify a parent component (such as a JFrame) if you want the dialog to be modal with respect to that component. If you don’t mind that the user can click on something else and ignore your dialog message, leave it null.

If you want to get a response from the user as opposed to simply having him click OK, use the JOptionPane.showConfirmDialog() series of methods.

How Facebook Runs PHP and MySQL

Digitivity — Sun, 12 Apr 2009 12:31:52 +0000

Posted in Developer Web/Software Development

I was surprised to know that Facebook runs on PHP. It also uses C++ and Java in places, but it’s the fact that it uses the little scripting language that could (PHP) is what is interesting. Aditya Agarwal of Facebook describes how the social networking giant does it in a presentation at QCon SF 2008. [...] Related posts:

Will the Real MySQL Please Stand Up?

Digitivity — Fri, 03 Apr 2009 12:24:40 +0000

Of late, there isn’t just one version of MySQL being used anymore.

First, there’s the version of MySQL offered at mysql.com by the former MySQL, AB, which was bought by Sun for one billion dollars.

Then, there’s MariaDB being offered by Monty Widenius, former head at MySQL, AB.

Percona claims to be the high-performance MySQL version.

Then, there’s Drizzle, hosted on Ubuntu’s servers, but also blessed by Sun. It’s oriented toward cloud and net applications.

Ronald Bradford’s blog covers some of the differences.

One thing to keep in mind, though, is if you want a commercial license for MySQL, the only version for you is the version offered by Sun. The other variants are offered under the GNU GPL, which also commits you to use that license for your applications if you distribute them with the database.

Discussion at Slashdot.

Firefox 3.1 Beta Has New, Faster TraceMonkey Javascript Engine

Digitivity — Thu, 05 Mar 2009 11:49:35 +0000

InfoPackets reports that the Firefox 3.1 beta is getting faster at JavaScript and CSS rendering. It’s going to need it for upcoming competition from Google Chrome and Microsoft IE.

But the original article‘s test numbers aren’t quite promising. While Firefox 3.1 may be faster than previous Firefox versions, it’s still slower than the current Safari beta.

HowToCreate.co.uk CSS rendering benchmark: Firefox 3.1 beta loads in 456 ms and renders in 38 ms. Safari 4 beta loads in an amazing 54 ms and renders in 7 ms.
Sean Patrick Kane’s JavaScript test: 344 ms for Firefox and 174 for Safari.
Acid3 standards compliance test: 93 for Firefox and 100 for Safari.

Sorry to say, but this is really pathetic performance. Here’s hoping the Firefox devs can bring their game up by release time.

Technology Firms Against Union Organizing Bill

Digitivity — Wed, 17 Dec 2008 12:18:00 +0000

The Hill is reporting that tech firms are beginning to wake up to what they see as a threat in the form of an upcoming pro-union bill.

The bill is a so-called “card-check” bill , which means that instead of employees voting in an election for whether they want to be in a union or not, they can sign “yes” to a union representative when they come to their door.

The story is being discussed on Slashdot here:

Slashdot | Tech Firms Oppose Union Organizing

I have to say I don’t really like the general theory of “card-checking.” For one thing, it means that there’s no secret ballot. Also, I think most people think of signing something when someone comes to your door as more akin to signing a petition than actually voting.

So I don’t necessarily support this bill.

On the other hand, it’s hard to figure out why software professionals, of all professionals, have no professional association that actually does something in their interest. For some reason, most programmers seem to associate unions with blue-collar factory workers and violent strikes and therefore don’t want to be part a union. What they forget is that a union doesn’t have to be like that.

For example, doctors have the American Medical Association (AMA). If it seems that that the AMA doesn’t engage in the kinds of “dirty” political activities that (blue-collar) unions do, it’s because they’ve already done all the lobbying they need to do. Doctors are licensed by the state in all 50 states. Who can become a new doctor is regulated by existing doctors. Same for lawyers and the American Bar Association (ABA). Try practicing law without a license.

Note: organizations like the ACM don’t really count, because they promote computer science, not software developers.

Not only would having an active professional association promote the financial interests of software engineers, it would elevate the the profession to a respected level among the other professions. The problem is that we programmers are just too in love with machines to notice what our own interest is.