Most people don’t take action. We spend our days going about our daily business, whilst dreaming and fantasizing about where we would like to be or what we would like to have, but never actually start taking the steps to get to that place. Sure, we intend to; “I’ll start it tomorrow”, “When I’ve finished the garden I’ll do it”, “Once I’ve paid off my debts I’ll start my business”. But as good as our intentions are, unless we make concrete steps towards our goals NOW, they’re never going to become a reality. Ever.

The funny thing is, it’s so easy to take action. It only has to be small actions, done consistently. 30 minutes per week is infinitely better than 10 hours… some day. The most common excuse for not taking action towards reaching a goal is “I’m too busy”. Yet many people spend at least 30 minutes each evening watching TV or browsing Facebook. If you can turn that time towards applying yourself and making your business or project happen, in 1, 2, 5 years time you will have put many hours into building something awesome, rather than what you have the previous few years, which is zero.

So, the time is now. Tonight, you will TAKE ACTION. Every night, or even every week, you will add 30+ minutes to your calendar, and get off your arse and start taking your first baby steps towards your goal. Before you know it, all these baby steps will add up to a mountain of progress. Plan out the first month’s goals first, then you have something to aim for. When you make it to that goal, give yourself a pat on the back for being an action taker! Then proceed to knock ‘em down one month at a time.

1. It’s free
It’s completely free to try for as long as you like. You get a nag popup about once per day, but you can keep trying after that as long as you like. To buy, it’s just $59 per person. You can install it on as many machines as you like.

2. It’s fast
There’s no hanging around with Sublime. It’s fast no navigate between projects and files, fast to search and fast to install addons.

3. It’s light on RAM
I’ve been flicking through projects all morning, I’ve probably edited 50 files so far today and Sublime is using just 70MB of RAM. Netbeans/Eclipse often used to chew up over 500MB.

4. It’s mega extensible
There’s a decent amount of plugins available. I followed a video guide online to install the top addons when I did my initial setup and I found something to do everything I need.

5. It’s easily configurable
Sublime uses two configuration files: Default and User. The Default files holds the current configuration settings in JSON format. To override something, you just copy that setting into the User file, which overrides. The same technique is used for hotkeys, via the ‘key bindings’ configuration files.

6. It’s efficient to navigate
Everything in Sublime can be done from the keyboard, via hotkeys. You can jump between projects, search files, jump to line by number, move screens around, anything. There’s obviously a bit of a learning curve, but within a week you’ll be flipping around like a friggin’ ubergeek using just the tips of your pale fingers.

7. It has plenty of dark themes
I prefer dark themes for coding, they’re much easier on the eye than white once you get used to them. Sublime has loads to choose from.

8. It’s code completion just works
After my frustrations with Netbeans’s's weird code completion shoving triple speech marks around everything, Sublime offers smooth, intuitive code completion.

So if you find your current code editor/IDE to be resource-hungry, bloated or lacking decent features, you simply have to give Sublime a shot. I’ve been using it for about a month now and I’m mega happy with it.

I took the internet enabled fishtank down to the Manchester mini maker faire at MOSI to show it off and boy, what a busy weekend!
It was amazing to capture so many peoples imagination and even inspire a number of adults and children alike to get into making stuff.

Repeating the same demonstration a few hundred times was really draining, but it was worth it. Even though I had watched the bubbles turn up and down and the lights come on and off a thousand times before, every person who walked up to check it out was experiencing what I had made with fresh eyes and a sense of curiosity which is what it’s all about.

I will be sharing a write-up of the fishtank later this week, with some photos taken along the way and also a rough parts list and source code, so you will have all you need to get building your own fishtank of the future.

If you were at the Maker Faire or you’re interested in what I do, I’d love you to get in touch on Twitter, Linked in or even just using my contact form. I’m happy to talk about anything related to hardware, software or anything else!

Photo courtesy of dllhulk

As customers of these ISP’s will know, access to www.thepiratebay.se has been blocked. Fortunately however, working around these blocks is pretty trivial. Here’s how to do it…

Method 1
Simply use the alternative domain name: www.thepiratebay.ee.

Method 2
1. Open up your HOSTS file in Notepad. This can be found in c:\windows\system32\drivers\etc
2. Paste in “194.71.107.81 www.thepiratebay.se” without the quotes and save. Restart your web browser and access to the pirate bay should be restored!

Method 3
1. Subscribe for access to a proxy server from a site such as yourprivateproxy.com.
2. Once registered, you will be given an IP address, port and username/password for your proxy.
3. Enter your proxie’s details into the ‘Prexy Server’ page of your web browser’s settings.
4. Enjoy censorship free internet browsing!

Both of these methods still work at the time of writing on a Sky connection. I’d love to hear whether they work or not on other ISP’s.

The best method of combatting internet censorship in the long run is to file a complaint with your ISP stating clearly that you are against internet censorship of any kind and that you will be moving to a provider that does not censor their customers web activities. Make sure you follow through and move to a company that cares about it’s customers rightsand freedom.

I had created a category, with about 10 child categories. Now I just wanted to duplicate that category 5 times, rather than creating another 4 from scratch, each with 10 children (4×10=40 categories!). Rather than spend the next couple of hours adding categories, I knocked together this quick PHP script. Simply pass in the ID of the category you’d like to duplicate, and it will create a copy of the category, along with all of it’s child categories, as deep as they go!

Ideally, this would be a proper Magento module, but I’m just starting out with Magento. Give me 6 months, eh?!

To use the script, simply copy it into a file such as copycat.php in your Magento root directory and call it like so:

http://www.example.com/copycat.php?id=[CATEGORY ID TO COPY]

<?php
 
 
if(!is_numeric($_GET['id']))die('Please specify a category ID');
 
$catId = $_GET['id'];
 
$xml = simplexml_load_file('app/etc/local.xml');
$host = $xml->global->resources->default_setup->connection->host;
$username = $xml->global->resources->default_setup->connection->username;
$password = $xml->global->resources->default_setup->connection->password;
$dbname = $xml->global->resources->default_setup->connection->dbname; 
$res = mysql_pconnect($host, $username, $password);   
mysql_select_db($dbname);
 
 
 
 
$catsDone = 0;
duplicate_entity($catId);
echo $catsDone . ' Categories duplicated.';
 
function duplicate_entity($id, $parent_id = null){
	global $catsDone;
 
 
	// Grab category to copy
	$sql = "SELECT * FROM catalog_category_entity WHERE entity_id = " . $id;
	$query_entity = mysql_query($sql);
 
	$entity = mysql_fetch_object($query_entity);
 
 
	if(!$parent_id)$parent_id = $entity->parent_id;
 
 
 
 
	mysql_query("INSERT INTO catalog_category_entity (entity_type_id, attribute_set_id, parent_id, created_at, updated_at, path, position, level, children_count)
						VALUES ({$entity->entity_type_id}, {$entity->attribute_set_id}, {$parent_id}, NOW(), NOW(), '', {$entity->position}, {$entity->level}, {$entity->children_count})");
	$newEntityId = mysql_insert_id();
 
	$query = mysql_query("SELECT path FROM catalog_category_entity WHERE entity_id = " . $parent_id);
	$parent = mysql_fetch_object($query);
	$path = $parent->path . '/' . $newEntityId;
 
	mysql_query("UPDATE catalog_category_entity SET path='". $path."' WHERE entity_id=". $newEntityId);
 
 
	foreach(array('datetime', 'decimal', 'int', 'text', 'varchar') as $dataType){
		$sql = "SELECT * FROM catalog_category_entity_".$dataType."
				WHERE entity_id=" . $entity->entity_id;
				//die($sql);
		$query = mysql_query($sql);
		while ($value = mysql_fetch_object($query)){
			mysql_query("INSERT INTO catalog_category_entity_".$dataType." (entity_type_id, attribute_id, store_id, entity_id, value)
							VALUES ({$value->entity_type_id}, {$value->attribute_id}, {$value->store_id}, {$newEntityId}, '{$value->value}')");
		}
	}
 
 
	$sql = "SELECT entity_id FROM catalog_category_entity WHERE parent_id = " . $id;
	$query = mysql_query($sql);
 
	while ($entity = mysql_fetch_object($query)){
		duplicate_entity($entity->entity_id, $newEntityId);
	}
	$catsDone++;
}
 
 
 
 
?>

I had created a category, with about 10 child categories. Now I just wanted to duplicate that category 5 times, rather than creating another 4 from scratch, each with 10 children (4×10=40 categories!). Rather than spend the next couple of hours adding categories, I knocked together this quick PHP script. Simply pass in the ID of the category you’d like to duplicate, and it will create a copy of the category, along with all of it’s child categories, as deep as they go!

Ideally, this would be a proper Magento module, but I’m just starting out with Magento. Give me 6 months, eh?!

To use the script, simply copy it into a file such as copycat.php in your Magento root directory and call it like so:

http://www.example.com/copycat.php?id=[CATEGORY ID TO COPY]

<?php
 
 
if(!is_numeric($_GET['id']))die('Please specify a category ID');
 
$catId = $_GET['id'];
 
$xml = simplexml_load_file('app/etc/local.xml');
$host = $xml->global->resources->default_setup->connection->host;
$username = $xml->global->resources->default_setup->connection->username;
$password = $xml->global->resources->default_setup->connection->password;
$dbname = $xml->global->resources->default_setup->connection->dbname; 
$res = mysql_pconnect($host, $username, $password);   
mysql_select_db($dbname);
 
 
 
 
$catsDone = 0;
duplicate_entity($catId);
echo $catsDone . ' Categories duplicated.';
 
function duplicate_entity($id, $parent_id = null){
	global $catsDone;
 
 
	// Grab category to copy
	$sql = "SELECT * FROM catalog_category_entity WHERE entity_id = " . $id;
	$query_entity = mysql_query($sql);
 
	$entity = mysql_fetch_object($query_entity);
 
 
	if(!$parent_id)$parent_id = $entity->parent_id;
 
 
 
 
	mysql_query("INSERT INTO catalog_category_entity (entity_type_id, attribute_set_id, parent_id, created_at, updated_at, path, position, level, children_count)
						VALUES ({$entity->entity_type_id}, {$entity->attribute_set_id}, {$parent_id}, NOW(), NOW(), '', {$entity->position}, {$entity->level}, {$entity->children_count})");
	$newEntityId = mysql_insert_id();
 
	$query = mysql_query("SELECT path FROM catalog_category_entity WHERE entity_id = " . $parent_id);
	$parent = mysql_fetch_object($query);
	$path = $parent->path . '/' . $newEntityId;
 
	mysql_query("UPDATE catalog_category_entity SET path='". $path."' WHERE entity_id=". $newEntityId);
 
 
	foreach(array('datetime', 'decimal', 'int', 'text', 'varchar') as $dataType){
		$sql = "SELECT * FROM catalog_category_entity_".$dataType."
				WHERE entity_id=" . $entity->entity_id;
				//die($sql);
		$query = mysql_query($sql);
		while ($value = mysql_fetch_object($query)){
			mysql_query("INSERT INTO catalog_category_entity_".$dataType." (entity_type_id, attribute_id, store_id, entity_id, value)
							VALUES ({$value->entity_type_id}, {$value->attribute_id}, {$value->store_id}, {$newEntityId}, '{$value->value}')");
		}
	}
 
 
	$sql = "SELECT entity_id FROM catalog_category_entity WHERE parent_id = " . $id;
	$query = mysql_query($sql);
 
	while ($entity = mysql_fetch_object($query)){
		duplicate_entity($entity->entity_id, $newEntityId);
	}
	$catsDone++;
}
 
 
 
 
?>

If you forget your admin password when developing an app and haven’t coded a ‘reset your password’ part yet (I always code these boring bits last!) you have 2 choices. You can create a new MD5 hash and replace the one in the database, or you can ‘crack’ the hash to find out your password. But how?

Enter Cloud Cracker, the free online MD5 hasher/cracker. This nifty little tool will take any password and give you it’s MD5 hash. It will also attempt to ‘crack’ an entered hash and show you the plaintext password.

Click Here to check out Cloud Cracker now. and feel free to hit the ‘Digg’ button if you like it.

If you’ve had an auto-suggest bubble pop up as you’re searching, or if you’ve seen form sub-sections magically appear as you choose options, then you have already used AJAX. Slow, static web pages have given way to speedy, animated interfaces with more nifty features.

Some examples of what you can achieve with AJAX include:

• Auto-suggest popups
• Form elements appearing/hiding as you complete the form
• Slider controls
• Draggable/droppable content

The term AJAX stands for ‘Asynchronous Javascript And XML’. Technically, AJAX is when javascript sends requests back to the server, receives a response in XML and acts upon it. These days though, AJAX is used more of a blanket term of for anything interactive which uses javascript.

If you have been developing PHP and looking to take your applications to the next level of interactivity, then check out some of the nifty AJAX Javascript frameworks out there that do all the hard work for you:

• jQuery
• Mootools
• Prototype

I think we’re all agreed on the fact that relevant, contextual links from related so-called ‘authority’ sites are good stuff. Generous use of your keywords through your title tag, header tags and page content are also top of the list in our SEO agendas.

Well, what then? What else can we do to be Google’s best friend? Some recent theories have been thrown about such as:

• Get contact us, terms and about us pages
• Add a quick blog to your site and other ‘bulking’ things
• Put your keywords into image ALT tags

But I’ve never heard anyone state the importance of making your sites (X)HTML compliant. I am confident that the big ‘G’ sees this as a big deal, but Nobody seems to have noticed. Just look how clear Google makes this point in their webmaster guidelines:

Check for broken links and correct HTML

Easy to overlook, but even easier to adhere to. Simply let the W3C’s free online validator take a look at your page and tell you how to fix it. Job done!

And in case you’re wondering, of course I have

First, you need to receive an email each time you make a sale. If your affiliate network will do this, then the first bit is already done. If not, copy the script below into a php file called something like  ‘xml-to-email.php’ and upload it to your web server. Full instructions are in comments at the top of the file. You will most likely have to change the regex variable to work with your affiliate network’s own feed format.

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81

<?php
 
/* #########################################################
 
Email When You Make a Sale
Developed by Hayden Kibble July 2009
Hayden@HaydenKibble.com
www.HaydenKibble.com
 
Install instructions:
1. Put your affiliate network login and your email details into the variables below
2. You will probably have to edit '$regex_saletime' to match the sale time/date for your paticular aff networks xml feed
2. Upload this file to your web server.
3. Create a file called 'sales.txt' in the same directory as this script and make sure it has read/write permissions
4. Visit the page and it should show a blank page. An email will probably be sent as it picks up all your recent sales
5. Set a cron job up on your web server to run this script every 10 mins or so
6. If you have problems with any of the above, Google is your friend!
 
######################################################### */
 
$base_url = "https://www.affilliate-network.com/myfeed.xml";
$feed_user = "USERNAME-HERE";
$feed_pass = "PASSWORD-HERE";
$regex_saletime = "/<date>(.*)<\/date>/U";
 
$email_from = "from@address.com";
$email_to = "to@address.com";
$email_subject = "You Made a Sale!";
 
// ##### Do Not Edit Below This Line! #####
 
$ch = curl_init();
 
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_URL, $base_url);
 
// Set your login and password for authentication
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_USERPWD, $feed_user . ':' . $feed_pass);
 
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_HTTPAUTH, CURLAUTH_ANY);
 
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_SSL_VERIFYPEER, false);
 
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER, 1);
 
// get the data and close the session
$data = curl_exec($ch) or die("Error Getting Feed.");
curl_close($ch);
 
$dates = array();
 
preg_match_all($regex_saletime,$data,$dates);
 
// Read previous sales times from database
$fileData = array();
$myFile = "sales.txt";
$fh = fopen($myFile, 'r');
$fileData = fread($fh, filesize($myFile));
fclose($fh);
 
// Split the file into lines
$fileLines = explode("\n",$fileData);
 
$newsale = false;
 
$fh = fopen($myFile, 'a') or die("can't open file");
 
// See if this sale has already been logged. If not, log it and set 'new sale' variable
foreach($dates[1] as $date){
if (!in_array($date,$fileLines)){
$newsale = true;
$sale_time = $date;
fwrite($fh, $date . "\n");
}
}
fclose($fh);
 
if ($newsale){
mail($email_to,$email_subject,"You have made a sale.\nSale Time: ".$sale_time,"From: " . $email_from);
}
 
?>

To test, empty the  sales.txt file you created and run (access) the script. It will see your recent sales have not been logged and fire off the email. Make sure the email does not go to your junk folder.

If you want your computer to play a ‘kerching’ upon making a sale, you can simply set up a rule in Microsoft Outlook to play the sound upon receiving an email with ‘Payment Received’ in the subject. You get the idea.

For those of you who want the full-on portable cash register, continue on to create a gmail account with a difficult to guess name just for these emails. If you share this address anywhere it will get spammed. We do not want this as you will start hearing an awful lot of incorrect kerching’s!

You now need to set your phone up to use your gmail account. Make it check for new emails every 10 mins or so (depending on how often you set your cron job to run the script) and set this kerching wav as your notification sound.

You are now set! When the php script runs intermittently on the cron job, it parses the feed for new sales. When it finds a new sale it sends an email to your phone, which plays a ‘kerching’ sound on receipt!