Ken Cochrane's Daily Journal

Blog has moved

2010-05-01T09:41:00.001-04:00

I have moved my blog from blogger over to http://KenCochrane.net.

Mercurial 1.5.1 on RHEL5 using python 2.5

2010-04-28T11:34:00.002-04:00

Installing Mercurial 1.5.1 on Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 (RHEL5) using Python 2.5My RHEL5 setup uses python2.5 which I compiled from source, since RHEL5 only comes with python2.4.Because I didn't use the built in python 2.4 version I couldn't do the simple "yum install mercurial". Instead I need to build mercurial from source, which isn't too bad. Just do the following.:as Root:> wget http://

Introducing my new iPhone application Face Flip

2010-01-18T09:59:00.014-05:00

I have finished with my latest iPhone application and I have submitted it to Apple. I submitted it on Sunday 01/17/2010, and hopefully it will be approved by the end of the month. Normally it takes about 10-14 days for apple to approve apps but there have been recent reports that apps have been approved in as little as 2-3 days. I'll keep my fingers crossed and post when I hear back.Face Flip is

New TV Feature Request: Ability to set the channel order

2010-01-11T11:37:00.003-05:00

Recently I decided it was time to upgrade my aging 36" CRT television with a new HDTV. After doing a lot of research I narrowed down my requirements to the following:At least 42"HDTVLow power consumptionAbility to hook up my Mac Mini so that I can watch internet TV (hulu, netflix, etc).LCD Flat panelDigital TV tuneUnder $800.00I looked around for a few months and finally ended up with a Vizio 42"

Django-Notification Creating Notice Types issues

2009-03-09T11:03:00.002-04:00

I was setting up Django-Notification for a project, and I was trying to create notice types like it mentions on their wiki . Their wiki says that you should add the following code to your management.py file in your app.from django.conf import settingsfrom django.db.models import signalsfrom django.utils.translation import ugettext_noop as _if "notification" in settings.INSTALLED_APPS: from

Plesk 8.6 cgi-bin trouble

2009-02-26T09:07:00.004-05:00

I recently worked on a project to quickly create a simple cgi-bin script to capture some data from a form on a mostly static website. The script was simple, take the data from the form, and send it via email. The script was written by a co-worker of mine using python. When we went to deploy the script on the server with Plesk 8.6, it was nothing but a pain in the butt.. I have documented some of

Google's Ajax Libary hosting, the New Web Tracker

2009-02-04T21:05:00.004-05:00

A little while ago, I noticed that Google started hosting the most common JavaScript libraries on their CDN. The project is called AJAX Libraries API , and it allows websites to reference these libaries instead of hosting the files themselves. Using a CDN to host your static files isn't anything new, and it provides some nice side effects.Less bandwidthLess space (every little bit helps)Global

100Boxes.com - Free Online Football Squares Pool Management

2009-02-01T12:52:00.004-05:00

I would like to announce the release of a new project I have been working on. 100Boxes.com FREE online Football Squares Pool . I basically took the classic superbowl squares game, that is usually played with paper and spreadsheets and I put it online. I tried to make it as simple as possible for someone to manage their pool, and for people to buy their squares. I started the project pretty late

Installing mod_python on Mac OS X Leopard (10.5.x)

2009-01-23T09:37:00.006-05:00

Apache2 comes pre installed on Mac OS X Leopard as does Python (2.5). But it doesn't come with mod_python. Here is what you need to do to get it to work.download the latest file from http://www.apache.org/dist/httpd/modpython/ I downloaded (mod_python-3.3.1.tgz)$ tar xvzf mod_python-3.3.1.tgz$ cd mod_python-3.3.1$ ./configure --with-apxs=/usr/sbin/apxsNow we need to patch the make file so that

Django Query using value from another field in same table

2009-01-21T13:19:00.006-05:00

I came across a query that seemed like it should be pretty easy, but it wasn't.Suppose you have the following Model Class.# pseudo code.class Person(models.Model): first_name = models.CharField() last_name = models.CharField()I would like the query to return all Person's who have the same first_name and last_nameMy first guess was to do the following.person_list = Person.objects.filter(

Managing Django settings across multiple environments

2009-01-17T14:43:00.006-05:00

I don't know about you, but when I typically work on a Django application I have at least two environments (Local and Production), and a lot of times I am working on these projects with at least one other person.The way that django currently supports project settings is to have all settings in a settings.py file. This works fine if you are working by yourself in one environment, but once you add

django common commands

2008-05-24T22:09:00.004-04:00

I keep forgetting all of the different django commands so I am creating this cheat sheet for myself.# start a new project>>> django-admin.py startproject $mysite# create a new site inside of a project>>> python manage.py startapp $siteName# start dev server>>> python manage.py runserver# sync the database with recent model changes.>>> python manage.py syncdb

iText HTMLWorker Style guide

2008-03-09T17:40:00.004-04:00

iText provides a way to convert HTML snippets to PDF using the HTMLWorker class. Unfortunately there isn't much documentation on what you can do for styles. In order to figure this out I went through the source code. I'm putting it here so that I won't have to do that again, and so that others will be able to gain something from my pain.This is from iText 2.0.8HTMLWorker supported tags "ol ul li

New version of CampRate.com is now Available

2006-04-23T16:04:00.000-04:00

I just released a new version of CampRate.com and here are some of the new features / changes.I am about 90% finished with the new image uploader, it uses AJAX to make it look cool.. This just needs to be tested some more, and will be released when we finish with the new add/edit campground flow.95% finished with the PayPal upgrade. Just need to do some more testing. When complete, people can

AJAX Struts File Upload Progress Meter

2006-03-21T09:25:00.001-05:00

** This Post is a work in progress, and is still being worked on, it hasn't been edited yet, and may contain errors, use at your own risk **Over the course of the last year or so I have been hearing a lot about AJAX, and how cool it is, and what neat stuff you can do with it. At first I wasn't too impressed, mostly because I have heard it all before. It wasn't until I saw google maps that I

digg - Submit Item

2006-02-24T09:15:00.000-05:00

Check out this cool site, if you write movie reviews or add other movie info you can collect points which you can use to cash in for prizes.read more | digg story

Debian Package management

2005-11-13T13:23:00.000-05:00

Debian Package managementapt-get updateRun this after changing /etc/apt/sources.list or /etc/apt/preferences. (this debianhelp.org page is helpful); run it periodically anyway, to make sure your source list is up-to-date.apt-get install packagename installs a new package: rpm -i package.rpmapt-cache search string Searches for string in the list of known packages: like using rpmfind.dpkg -l

CampRate.com online campground directory with reviews

2005-06-12T15:24:00.000-04:00

Last summer a bunch of friends and I decided we would go camping. I have been camping before, when I was a kid, so I knew what I was getting myself into. First off I had to find out if I had all of the proper equipment. I found my Tent, sleeping bag, propane grill and some big blue tarps. Once I gathered all of my stuff and dusted it off, I needed to check with my friends to see if they had

Getting WinCVS out of flat mode

2005-05-05T12:58:00.000-04:00

If you accidentally browse up to the root directory or some other level that is too large for WinCVS to initially deal with and you have the flat mode browser view toggle button of WinCVS on, WinCVS will freeze indefinitely. If killing it in Task Manager and restarting doesn't fix your problem, you need to hack the registry. Launch regedit (Start -> Run "regedit") and browse to:

Commands I use, but often forget

2005-02-13T20:58:00.000-05:00

Importing (Restoring) Many MySQLDump Text Files: ~ from a user (paraphrased): "If we have 100+ mysqldump *.txt files, how can we easily import them all, in order to restore a database, without typing each file name in by hand? (i.e. from the shell prompt, piped to the mysql monitor: mysql mydb <>). Wouldn't it be better for the script to write all

Connecting to MySQL 4.1 with Old Libraries

2005-02-13T20:49:00.000-05:00

If you need to connect to a MySQL 4.1 Database using an old mysql library, you need to change the password for the user account that you want to connect with, so that it uses an old password. The new version of the database uses a different password algorithm which is much longer then the old version, which causes problems with the old library. To fix this you have to set the user password with

Setting up Postfix (TLS) / Courier-IMAP (SSL) / MySQL / Postfixadmin

2005-02-08T09:37:00.000-05:00

This is an install guide for setting up a secure mail server using Postfix, Courier-IMAP, MySQL, and Postfixadmin on Debian Woody. Before we begin here are a few notes regarding how things are handled: Virtual domains - All domains including the local domain are handled as virtual domains. This allows a central location for all mail. All interactions with the server are authenticated and

Integrating Apache 2.0.x and Tomcat 5.0.x with mod_jk on Mandrake Linux 10

2005-02-08T09:21:00.000-05:00

(Roger Kepler) When it comes to Linux, nothing comes easy for me, but I get it done. Tonight I tried to install the connector between Apache and Tomcat. Ken Cochrane wrote on his blog page basic instructions for that, and he even e-mailed me the required mod_jk.so file. Unfortunately, Mandrake 10 didn't like it and I had to manually build it frmo the source. What a pain, but the instruction

2005-02-07T13:49:00.000-05:00

Check out these sites from some co-workers of mine. There might not be much now, but check back soon. KennyLloyd.com RogerKepler.com Ken Cochrane 02-07-05

2005-02-07T09:15:00.000-05:00

Patriots Win Again! Dynasty anyone? I am not sure if they are a Dynasty but I do know that they Won 3 superbowls in 4 years. Won 32 out of their last 34 games. Won 9 strait playoff games. Has the longest winning streak in NFL history. All 3 superbowl victories were in February. Is the only team in NFL History to win a SuperBowl in February (3-0) The one year they didn't win the

2005-02-07T09:05:00.000-05:00

If SSH with Public/Private Keys isn't working For you, check out this bit of info from my friend Roger. From Roger Kepler 02-06-05: I finally got ssh to work! BUT it wasn't easy and there are some extra steps you may not be aware of (or just didn't apply to you). With the ssh client I was getting the message "key refused" even though everything was setup correctly and in the server the public

2005-02-06T11:14:00.000-05:00

Tomcat 4.1 + Apache 1.3 + mod_jk + Debian 3.0 (Woody) (This is still in progress, Not quite finished yet) This is a little install guide on how to install Tomcat 4.1 with Apache 1.3 using mod_jk on Debian. Install and setup Tomcat 4.1 First off I went to apache.org and downloaded the latest version of Tomcat 4.1's bin distribution, I am using the binary distro instead of the debian package

2005-02-05T14:58:00.000-05:00

CVS with SSH on Windows Written for Tortoise CVS - 1.8.11 PuTTY,PageAnt,PuttyGen,PLink - 0.56WinCVS 1.3.20.3 Beta 20 (build 3) How this works. Find out if you are going to be using Tortoise or WinCVS as your CVS client. Then pick the instructions for that client. Some of the steps are the same for both clients, so instead of typing them twice, I just reference which steps to use in that

2004-11-01T15:58:00.000-05:00

Greatest Reality Show on Earth! As most of you already know, tomorrow on almost every broadcast station we will see the conclusion to the biggest and most popular reality show in the world. It all started out 18 months ago with candidates from around the country fighting for the top spot. Over the course of the last year and half we have been slowly narrowing down the field. Tomorrow everyone

2004-08-25T12:59:00.000-04:00

SPAM Good for the Economy? I just read something today that made me wonder. I was reading an article on how bad was and how much it was costing the U.S. $10 billion a year. I was surprised it was this much, but I could see it. It got me thinking what would happen if SPAM all of a sudden went away. What if someone figured out a sure fire way to stop all SPAM and instantly all of the SPAM was gone

2004-04-28T10:19:00.000-04:00

Signed up for a new GMail account, haven't had much time to play with it yet, but I like it so far. How can you not like 1Gig of storage. We have been bringing Bowie to doggie day care this week, and boy does he like it. He comes home and sleeps, and that is nice.. When he doesn't go to day care he is very hyper when we get home, so now we know he is getting all of the exercise that he needs. He

2004-04-26T08:18:00.000-04:00

spent most of the weekend cutting down trees and hauling them off to the recycling center. There will be photo's posted soon..

2004-04-05T07:32:00.000-04:00

Woke this morning and was surprised that the sun wasn't there like it has been for the last bunch of weeks.. Then I remembered that we switched to Day light savings time this past weekend, and then I looked out the window and I noticed it was snowing.. Snowing in April, that's Maine weather for you..

2004-04-04T19:51:00.000-04:00

This weekend we were dog sitting for my aunt while she was out of town and that was pretty nice. This was sort of a dry run for when we get our new dog Bowie. We visited Bowie today, check out the pictures.. He is getting so big. We were originally going to pick him up on April 15th (tax day) but we are trying to pick him up sooner. We just need to get the rest of the house finished and then we

2004-04-02T07:10:00.000-05:00

This is my first message in my blog. Not sure what to say at the moment. Well I guess I can start by saying why I decided to start a blog. Well I guess I figured since everyone and there brother has one at the moment why not me. I am actually home sick from work right now, and stumbled across blogger.com and I figured I would try it out while waiting for an email. It seems pretty easy so far. I