computer

I'm getting started with designing a new Drupal theme using Zen. However, a first step needs to be to set up a development environment on my Mac, so I can use local tools and not keep messing with a production (glorified hobby) server.

We all know the importance of good passwords, and how dangerous it is to reuse passwords between websites. One breach and your whole weblife is open, right? So the alternative is random passwords for each website. That's great - strong, secure - but what if you need to get log in and you don't have 1Password or Keepass (etc) available?

In the morning, my Macbook is usually asleep - and plugged into the hub that connects it to the Time Machine disk. I usually just grab it and go - leading to the dreaded 'disconnect' message when I wake it up at work.

Now, I have a solution - to eject the disk when my Mac goes to sleep. You'll need SleepWatcher, a cool little program from Bernhard Baehr. It is compatible with Leopard, but appears to run fine on my Snow Leopard system. Install SleepWatcher and the startup item.

I've started the Java course created by Sang Shin at http://www.javapassion.com/javaintro/. I'm very impressed - the pacing is pretty good, there are exercises and homework, a forum for questions and comments, and it's free! What a great resource to learn from.

Java has come a long way since I took a class back in 1996.

computers

So, my faithful Macbook Pro died a sudden death a few weeks ago. I had AppleCare, but of course it was voided due to a spill two years ago. Did the spill cause the death? I doubt it - the machine has run great for two years after the spill. But, I can't deny that there was a spill so... no AppleCare.

Wow, first time I've run into a memory chip that died in the machine. And of course the POST said it was fine, despite the fact that Memcheck86 showed it dead in a couple seconds. So, that's the backup server back up.

Still had trouble getting the RAID1 working again... constant "device in use" warnings when I tried to assemble.

Thanks to some suggestions on the Drupal website, I've improved the modifications to a) have Subscriptions honor the $node->moderate bit, and b) have Modr8 send out Subscriptions when a node is approved.

This still requires a patch to modr8 so that subscriptions gets called when the approval form is submitted, but uses a module for the rest. Also it pulls the real $node values from the database, rather than creating a skeleton from the form info.

I've worked on a version of the previous patch to put a checkbox on the registration form to allow users to opt-in during registration. This implementation uses a module instead of a patch, and so should not require reapplication after updates.

As before, it is still in a very rough testing state. You should be very careful with it, although it does work on my small site.

I've made a lot of progress in getting modr8 and subscriptions to work together.

Task 1, easily accomplished, was to have subscriptions not send out notifications if the moderation bit was set.

Although I've successfully gotten Subscriptions to skip posts that have are in the Modr8 queue, I have not worked out the perfect way to send approvals when they have been approved. For the time being, the best way seems to be to make a small change to trigger an update, ie changing the sitemap priority.