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215 - links for 2006-04-15


214 - The Power of Regular Expressions & Google (RE: PHP Searches)

So I know that the complaint I have is actually a very valid search for some. For example, Leo Laporte in KFI Tech Guy Episode 231 from mid March said how he searched for sounds with a search like “door squeak wav”. “door squeak .wav” provides the same results due to regular expressions. The answer for eliminating strings with regular expression special characters (. * etc) lies in regular expression syntax itself.

In this case, surround the . in .php in brackets thusly: “-[.]php”. The syntax page explains why this works:

Matches a single character that is contained within the brackets. For example, [abc] matches “a”, “b”, or “c”.

So if you want to search for something containing say a “.”, then use the syntax above and you’ll be set. See the search below for an example.

Results 1 – 100 of about 1,860,000,000 for php -[.]php ( php -[.]php – Google Search )

EDIT: OK, so this advice is still sound, but I could have just used the filetype: property that Google allows “php -filetype:php”.  Duh.


213 - links for 2006-04-14


212 - You Say Feature; I Say Bug -> .php != PHP in Search

I have reached my breaking point on this “feature” of search engines.  I do a lot of work with PHP and thus do a lot of searches for PHP related materials.  Most search engines allow keywords in URLs to be searched as well.  I won’t argue that, it’s a great idea (or bad  if you consider all the SEO “experts” naming files things like  best-seattle-bar-and-grill-menu.html).

What really tweaks me is that file extensions are included.  A search for anything PHP related inevitably results in millions of false positive *.php results.  This does not make for good search results.

Take this Google Search for php -”.php” as an example.  Do you know what the results are?

Your search – php -”.php” – did not match any documents.

Useless! I want results that have PHP, but not .php.  Damned regular expressions kicking me in the ass here.


211 - eHomeUpgrade Reveals Leopard (Mac OS 10.5) Features

EDIT: Since I saw this news article last night, it appears the editors have fessed up to their sorry lack of follow up fact checking:

UPDATE / Editor’s note: Whoops! It looks like we got duped. It seems that this list of 20 originally was posted at MacNN as part of an April Fool’s joke. Sorry about the mix up. Nonetheless, the supposed upcoming features make for good conversation (as seen on digg).

eHomeUpgrade has a list of supposed features for Leopard (OS 10.5) Given the intro below, it seems fairly correct:

Rumors are floating around about significant Apple OS X updates that could possibly blow the doors off of Windows Vista in the near future. Of particular interest are numbers 2, 6, 11, and 17 in the following list provided by a confidential source working with Apple. Caution: You may want to monitor your heart-rate while reading.

Disclosure Agreement (NDA) with Apple precludes me from revealing proprietary detail, but because most, if not all, of this is posted elsewhere and is commonly available, I have no problems with confirming the following. Still, please don’t quote me.

Good golly miss Molly. This list is HOT! I’m particularly digging 6, 7, 8 11, 18, 19, and as an employee at a home networking company number 17:

17. Airport (Extreme only) will notify you via the airport icon flashing in the menu bar if your signal is being hijacked or used by anyone other than you authorized.

eHomeUpgrade | Future Apple OS X Rumors Look Promising



210 - Google Calendar Launched

 I’m torn on this one.  There are core features that don’t work as well they should in favor of flashy Web 2.0 interfaces that are at the least very well implemented.  I’m thinking especially the day and time selection on event create – very nice.  I’ll give the public search another shot (see below) on a PC instead of Flock on a MAC and roll through some more of the site and give a more full report.

The interface is clean and very snappy.  I couldn’t stand to do a full run through, because the public search page kept jumping to the top of the page as I was scrolling down.  This makes this section (the one that I would use first to populate my calendar for me) useless.  It is a Beta, but my thoughts on this alone is to just sit back and wait.

The pros I was able to see before I gave up on the above:
1) share calendars with friends by email address
2) LOTS of public calendar – gym exercise schedules, pool schedules, sports team schedules
3) iCal published calendars can be imported and then made Google searchable (supposedly – the calendar I added this way does not show, but this may be a result of the fact that it is all "all day" events.) EDIT: as I was writing this, I got a script popup that told me the calendar failed to import.  No reason why though…
4) phone notifications for appts.  SWEET!!!!

Cons/bugs/missing nicetys:
1) the scrolling issue in public calendar search mode
2) quick add requires a fully qualified date (4-20-06) to create anything past tomorrow.  Not bad, but makes the feature less useful than it could be.  This should be a nice add when it fully works.
3) No clock – how do I know how the current time relates to my appts w/o it?  Even forum software has this feature.
4) No help resolving failed iCal imports

Google Calendar

 

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209 - links for 2006-04-13


208 - links for 2006-04-12


207 - A Programmer With a 6 Pack???

When I saw this post’s headline in Reddit, I could have sworn I’d be shutlled to Chris’ site.  With his recent exercise regiemen and his obscure methods of earning side money, I thought I could bank on this being his idea…

Six Pack by Summer is an experiment in willpower and game theory.  I, Erik Kastner, will have until July 4th, 2006 to show the world a 4-pack, then a little more time for a 6-pack, or I lose $1,000, plus whatever this site brings in through ads, donations and affiliate links. 20 people will have an opportunity to either encourage or discourage me. If I’m able to achieve my goals, I’ll keep my money, and splits the profits from the site with the group. If I fail You get it all!

Six pack by summer – Can I get a six pack by the end of summer?

 

 

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206 - Joel on the DAL

Yet again, Joel Spolsky has a great piece of writing.  In this case, he describes the develoment abstraction layer.  It’s about how great companies are built around great development managers that allow developers to be, well, developers.  They don’t need to worry about all that businessy cruft that we find drudgerous and burdensome.  Here’s a great quote from the essay:

A programmer is most productive with a quiet private office, a great computer, unlimited beverages, an ambient temperature between 68 and 72 degrees (F), no glare on the screen, a chair that’s so comfortable you don’t feel it, an administrator that brings them their mail and orders manuals and books, a system administrator who makes the Internet as available as oxygen, a tester to find the bugs they just can’t see, a graphic designer to make their screens beautiful, a team of marketing people to make the masses want their products, a team of sales people to make sure the masses can get these products, some patient tech support saints who help customers get the product working and help the programmers understand what problems are generating the tech support calls, and about a dozen other support and administrative functions…

The Development Abstraction Layer – Joel on Software

 

 

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