Quote: Your Time is Limited

“Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma - which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of other's opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.”

-Steve Jobs at Stanford Commencement

Windows Microphone doesn't work

Recently I've been having issues with my computer microphone both in linux and windows. I solved the linux problem now here is the windows.

Note: I recently installed a new operating system

One of the reason why your microphone isn't working is because "Realtek High Definition Audio" drive isn't installed.

What we need to do is install Realtek High Definition Audio. Click here to install (Vista and Windows 7)

When dowloaded extract it with winrar.

Then open the extracted folder and click "Setup" icon.

Once your computer reboots the microphone will start working.

Make sure all other setting are configured like the volume and the microphone is plugged in.

Any questions leave it in the comments

Put yourself First

Create for yourself first then share it with the world. At least someone will use it.

Examples:
Andrew Kramer from videocopilot.net
Drew Houston from dropbox.com
37signals Basecamphq.com

Feel free to add more in the comments...

YouTube Success

Internet is one of the best things that happened to mankind. To have the ability to build a business from scratch is liberating. Your internet success isn't determined by your weight, height, race, nationally, looks, gender, family background or your boss but by you.

Freddiew has been able to create a successful business by making youtube videos. He also shares his knowledge. Read his post on how to become a successfull youtuber.

As a side note, I think too many people get hung up on ideas. From my experience, ideas are worthless. Execution is more important than anything else -FreddieW

Programming and Writing have in common

Have you ever heard someone say? "You build it before, build it again".

Its like telling a writer to rewrite a book word for word. You will be able to write the story again but not word for word. Its impossible! Creating applications is the same when coding you're in the present and the creativity is flowing but once you leave that state you may have to start all over (research) to recreate the application. It's important to document all your discoveries.

Don't try to learn every function in the language but be an expert at the basics and add as time goes.

Windows Activation Expired

If your running windows and all of sudden your computer says that your activation has expired and you own the operating system on your computer because you bought it from the store. The way you can easily access your files in to run your computer in Safe Mode and it will bypass the warning.

Brand New Computer for $50

I owned many computers and all of them had the same fate. After 2 years it became very slow to the point where I needed to delete all the memory and reset to factory settings. The computer did run faster but it would get slow again in half of the time when I first bought it. Eventually I was forced to buy a new computer because resetting wasn't resolving the problem.

Here is what I discovered. Older technology is not the main reason why your PC slows down its the internal hard drive. Consider your hard drive like your breaks in your car. The more you use it the worse it gets.

You want a brand new computer? Change the internal hard drive (you will need to install an operating system). You can buy new one 500gb for $49. Click here to see the one I bought.

Internet Explore extinction

Two years ago the only browser I had installed on my computer was internet explore. I always used IE and never understood why people had something against it until I started using Chrome. Everyday that goes by I hate IE more.

From a developer prospective you need to always make exceptions for that piece of crap software and as an user for its extremely slow and unfriendly interface.

It seems that Microsoft doesn't care. They don't change or improve their software.

Microsoft you think you can get away with this crap huh? Its Internet Explore extinction. I won't create or allow anyone with an IE browser to access my website. I'm not getting that many users from IE anyways. Below is how I'm going to do it.

<!--[if IE]>
 <script>location = 'http://chrome.google.com'; </script>
<![endif]-->

I'm going to put this code inside the <head> tags of my site and its going to redirect the user to download chrome.

Sort an Array of Arrays in PHP

Want to know how to sort the code below by [name]?

Click me to navigate to the tutorial.

Array
(
  [0] => Array
      (
          [id] => 1
          [name] => Rob
      )
  [1] => Array
      (
          [id] => 4
          [name] => Ultimate
      )
  [2] => Array
      (
          [id] => 8
          [name] => Dog
      )

eg:

//for array
function views($a,$b){
    return strnatcmp($a['name'], $b['name']);//to reverse the sort swap the variables(letters)
}
//for stdClass object array
function viewsObj($a,$b){
    return strnatcmp($a->name, $b->name);
}
usort($result,'views');
echo '
';
print_r($result);
echo '
';

Adding Syntax Highlighting to Blogger

Do you want to show code on your blog like I'm doing below? Click Me to see instructions.

<?php 
echo "hello world";
$ball = "ball";
?>

Coolest Website Design

There's always a trade off. A cool ass website and slow or boring website and fast. The one to use will be determine by your needs. Tijuana Flats is by far the coolest website design I've seen.

I have no Time. Shut up!

Today I was sitting at my desk contemplating all the things I don't do because I don't have time. Then I stopped and remember that I'm a programmer. And then I told myself real loud, in my head of course because there were people around me. "Shut up and build it".

Having limited time is a gift because it forces you to create things that are efficient, automatic and non-time consuming.

Security Tip: Inserting index.html in every folder

Building a website is simpler than most people imagine. Its a bunch of folders with files. Now to increase your website security is to include a index.html in every folder that is accessible to the visitor. Here's why.

index.html is a default document that is automatically loaded when someone visits the webpage. If its not loaded the visitor has access to view ALL your files in your directory. Some files are not meant to be seen by the visitor because it can give information that may comprise your security.

Lets use www.example.com/folder/photo.html as an example. If photo.html part of the url is deleted (www.example.com/folder ) the visitor now has access to see all your files in that directory/folder. To avoid this vulnerability put an index.html in every folder inside your website.

CodeIgniter is a PHP framework which follows this concept.

Check out the site example below

http://macrabbit.com/espresso/features/edit/

Now delete /edit/ to see what page it leads you to

http://macrabbit.com/espresso/features/

PS. You can also configuring your .htaccess file to show 404 or 403 pages.

Making your server accessible to the internet (outside your own network).

If you want to see a prettier version of this post with pictures and color coding (part of this post won't make sense if you don't see the pictures) click on the link below to view the pdf format
setting up your server.pdf

There are two types of IP address. I like to call it the internet ip address and the server ip address. The way it works is that the internet ip address points to the server ip address. The INTERNET cannot access your server directly but can access your internet ip address.

Figure:
This works
INTERNET(The world)->your internet ip address ->your server ip address

This doesn’t work
INTERNET(The world)->your server ip address

To find your internet ip address go to http://myipaddress.com

Your server ip address is what you created with Ubuntu or any server.

To point your internet ip address to your server ip address you need to access your router. You do this by typing 192.168.1.1 in browser (for Linksys, it may be different if you have a different router). What we will be doing is Port Forwarding.

In Applications & Gaming-> Port Range Foward

Applications-> can be anything you want
Start and End-> needs to be 80
Protocol->needs to be Both (TCP & UDP)
IP Address -> need to be your server IP

Save and exit

That’s it . Type your internet ip address in the browser. It will now direct you to your server.

Connect using domain name
I purchased my domain from godaddy
All were doing is connecting a domain name to the internet ip address

Log into godaddy.com account
Select the domain name you want to use
And access you Domain Manager
Click Launch where it says DNS Manager



Put your internet ip address (not the server) under Points To (next to Host) where its highlighted in blue


Then save

Now when you type your domain name it will take you to your site

Figure:
INTERNET(The world)->Domain Name->your internet ip address->your server ip address


You did it!!!
Thumbs up Everybody for Rock and Roll

How to set up Static IP address for Server

Its good practice to give your server a static IP address because
1. You don't always need to reconfigure your router
2. It's easy to do

Click on the link below for a full explanation

http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/ubuntu/change-ubuntu-server-from-dhcp-to-a-static-ip-address/

PS. It's not true that you need a static IP address for the world to access you website from you server. You can also use a dynamic (DHCP), which is the default when you set up your Ubuntu server.

For more infomation on Making your server accessible to the internet