EHCP VirtualHost Django Applications Configuration

While deploying a Django application on an Easy Hosting Control Panel environment following the guide about how to configure virtual hosts totally failed because the configuration was not written in the correspondent Apache file.

So, I had to hack the system in order to make it work. It's as simple as edit the

/var/www/new/ehcp/apachehcp.conf

file where all virtual hosts are defined.

./M6

Building smarter software: Proactively deliver insights

Here's an excellent article about data exploration and user needs.
A must read: Building smarter software: Proactively deliver insights.

./M6

Testing websites in Internet Explorer

Here's a great solution for testing website development in the various versions of Internet Explorer: Testing for Internet Explorer.

./M6

PostgreSQL on Kubuntu

As I needed to install PostgreSQL on Kubuntu, I find these three tutorials particularly helpful:

• How To Install and Use PostgreSQL on Ubuntu 12.04
• How to Configure PostgreSQL for the First Time
• Unicode
• PostgreSQL

I recommend reading them all before actually installing it. They overlap in some parts but do complement each other.

./M6

Cocktails for Programmers

I'm totally Python :)

Here are they: Cocktails for Programmers.

./M6

Apps Market Niche

I've crossed with these interesting posts about marketing an app by Trevor McKendrick:

• How to Choose a Profitable Niche
• How to Choose a Profitable Niche, part 2

 ./M6

Self-Assembling Robots

This is Transformers in real life.

 How cool is science can be?
Here's the answer:

./M6

Ariston Quality: It Sucks Big Time!

My Ariston refrigerator has announced is death!
Finally, I got rid of it!

How hard it is provide good quality home appliances in the 21st century?
Well, to Ariston, it's seems an impossible mission.

Since 2001, Ariston convinced me that they are unable to produce good products.
At home, I have:

• a two door fridge
• a washing machine
• a dishwasher
• an oven
• a gas cooker

From all the above, I only bought the two door fridge. It was back in 2001 and it costed me around 650€ back then. Not cheap!

From all the above, since 2001 only the oven has not given a single problem (at least until now):

• two door fridge: broke after approximate 5 years. Ariston was "kind" enough to replace it for a new one for 150€, same model, same crap. It broke last week!
• washing machine: sometimes the washing program gets stuck, which has lead to huge water waste. There were times when it kept pumping water directly down the drain for hours.
• dishwasher: the entire electronic control was replaced. Don't recall the exact value, but I do recall it was not  cheap.
• gas cooker: sometimes the ignition lighter starts working continuously out of the blue, forcing an electrical shutdown to stop it

"Bad luck" one must say.
But actually this has nothing to do with luck, it's entirely a bad quality issue.
I have a friend with exactly the same issues on his fridge, same model as the mine.
Bad luck and coincidence?
No, simply bad quality.

For those that don't believe, check out Ariston appliance user rates and comments on the web.
Many (not to say most) are barely rated as average...

Ariston quality is very bad: it totally sucks!
How hard is it to make good appliances in the 21st century when the worlds sees it as a commodity?

One thing is for shure: Ariston will never see a dime from me again!

./M6

iOS Tutorial

If you're looking for an iOS development starting point, including database coverage, here's some help:

• iPhone Tutorials
• iOS (iPhone, iPad) Tutorial
• Your First iOS App
• Core Data Tutorial for iOS: Getting Startedl
• Core Data Tutorial for iOS

./M6

Stripe, Payments for Developers

While developing in Django, sometimes one needs to access a payment system.

Django is a development framework and it does not have payment plugins like VirtueMart or Magento.

One possible and fast solution is to use Stripe.

It's focused to help developers to overcome the payment solution implementation, it has wrappers for Ruby, PHP, Python and more.

./M6

Learn Yii Framework

After evaluating some PHP frameworks, I've picked Yii because it seems to have the best ratio between cost/benefit. It's quite complete, easy to learn, performs fast and even has some similarities with Django, my favorite web framework.

Here's my Yii learning process:

• Start with Larry Ullman Learning the Yii framework tutorial.
• Read the Larry Ullman Working with layouts in Yii to learn how to change the GUI.
• Read the Configuring controller access rules to default-deny to learn how to control the user access.
• Read the Relational Active Record to learn about the model relations.
• Get Yii Bootstrap and read the documentation to get great widgets. 
• Get Yiiclipse, if you use Eclipse as an IDE.

If you'r new to Yii and are looking for a starting point, this one worked for me.

./M6

Low-Fat Presentations

Presenting may be an art, but presenting without boring the audience is actually easy.
There's a lot of blogs, books and opinions about the subject, but the main idea is the triplet: message, focus and design.

The message is easy: it's what one needs to communicate to the audience.
This main principle is to open your presentation with the conclusion, i.e., show what the audience will see next. Then show how to get to conclusion, or how did one got into that conclusion.

Focus is an exercise that must be performed at each presentation step.
For each step one must ask the question "is there anything that I can remove?" This will maintain the presentation focused on the message, so that no unnecessary "fat" will be included.

Contrary to the common believe, design is not hard to achieve.
Start by using a clean and professional good looking template and keep things simple. Don't stuff loads of text that no one will read nor retain. Pick a good font that is easily read when projected, take into account the fact that size does matter and people on the back of the audience need to see it clearly.
Use graphics, workflows, etc. whenever possible, it usually is more eye appealing and much less boring than it's similar text description. Please use good looking graphics, picking from clipart that's bundled with office suits and alike is usually a bad choice, since it's looks usually very outdated.
Finally, be consistent by using the same lettering, colors, etc..


Here's a set o articles which I recommend:

1. How to Present to Senior Executives
2. Create a Presentation Your Audience Will Care About
3. Do Your Slides Pass the Glance Test
4. Structure Your Presentation Like a Story

./M6

Oracle Print Cursor Result

Here's how to print the result of any cursor in Oracle PL/SQL: Print the result of a cursot in Oracle PL/SQL

./M6

InfoSphere DataStage

While researching information about ETL tools, I've come across with this IBM RedBook about its InfoSphere DataStage product:

You can get IBM InfoSphere DataStage Data Flow and Job Design here.
I also recommend InfoSphere DataStage Parallel Framework Standard Practices.

./M6

For XML Path Equivalent in Oracle For String Aggregation

Here's how to translate the SQL Server XML Path into Oracle string aggregation:
For XML Path Equivalent in Oracle For String Aggregation

./M6

Do you really want to... ?

For the development of an application, I had the need to install some Oracle components for .Net.
After all components have been installed, I got this screen

with a very intriguing question

Well... do you?
(Hint: the answer is in the dialog)

./M6

Malware detection tool

I've just helped a partner to recover a Joomla! 1.5 malware attack.
The Sucuri scanner tool was a great help, check it out: Sucuri SiteCheck

./M6

Designing for the iPad

While researching for the development of an iPad application, I've came across this great article: Designing for iPad: Reality Check.

I recommend if in order to avoid UI and UX mistakes. 

./M6

Free Stock Photos

There's a lot of places where one can find stock images, some are even free.

But VisualHunt, picjumbo and Morguefile are one of the bests. Why? The images are very good quality, the license is very generous and no registration is required.

./M6

Install Keynote Templates

When one gets a Keynote template in a .kth file (the Keynote extension for templates), the correct way to install it is to:

• Open the .kth file with Keynote
• In the File menu, click on Save Theme...
• The file will be stored in /Library/Application Support/iWork/Keynote/Themes.

This also works with .key files (the Keynote extensions for presentation source). 

./M6

Creating a muli-lingual site with Joomla!

While looking for i18n information on Joomla!, I found this great step-by-step tutorial for creating multi-language sites on many Joomla! versions:

Creating a muli-lingual site with Joomla!® 1.7.3

./M6

An Unexpected Ass Kicking

What a great shared experience that Joel Runyon in this post:
An Unexpected Ass Kicking.

A must read for everyone, specially for entrepreneurs.

./M6