Jun/090
Gmail iPhone app, no address bar chrome
I love the mobile gmail. Even more than I love the iPhone’s mail app, configured to work with my gmail account.
That’s why I always use mobile safari to access gmail. The only problem is I always got the address bar and bookmarks bar at the top of bottom of mobile safari (these UI controls are called ‘chrome’), ruining the whole mobile gmail experience.
That’s when I noticed that mobile Google Talk, which I had added to my home screen, didn’t ever display the mobile safari chrome. The same wasn’t true for the Gmail site on my home screen – so I decided to fix it.
If you head to http://carbis.fu8.com/iPhone/gmail on your iPhone, then quickly hit the + button and add it to your homescreen before it redirects, then you too can have Chromeless Gmail on your iPhone.
Don’t be phased by the lack of icon. After you open the home screen icon for the first time, your iPhone will give it the right icon.
I hope this works for everyone, let me know if you have any trouble, or even if you don’t!
Jun/092
Post a tweet from an anchor link!
Wow! You’ve heard of mailto: links that automatically launch your mail client, and iTunes links that open the iTunes music store, but did you know that you could make a link that posts a tweet on twitter!
I discovered it when learning about Fussy Follow Friday on Matt Stratton’s blog.
First, an example: Click here to tweet!
And now, here’s some html how-to goodness:
<a href=”http://twitter.com/home?status=type twitter status here“>Click me!</a>
Of course, if you’re not signed into twitter, it will ask you to sign in first… but if you are signed in, it will post automatically.
Jun/090
Media PC (completed)
Okay, I’ve just about finished my media PC, just waiting on a few last parts from Umart. Here’s how things went in the end:
- Gigabyte GA-8VD667K Motherboard: already owned
- Pentium 4 3.0Ghz: $49
- Socket 478 Cooling Fan & Heatsink: $11.77
- 512MB DDR RAM: (already owned)
- 750GB SATA 7200RPM 32MB HDD: (already owned)
- SATA / IDE cross converter: $6.41
- PSU: Included in case
- Sony 20x DVDRW IDE: $36.50
- Asus 802.11b/g Wireless PCI Card: $32
- CoolerMaster RC283 Media Case: $116
- Logitech X-530 5.1 Speakers System: $90
- BenQ G2400WD 24? Lcd Monitor: $350
- EVGA PCI GF6200LE 256M Low Profile: $86
All up it came to a total of: $777.68, a little over budget, but not too bad when you consider the size of the screen and quality of the speakers.
Without the screen or speakers, the whole thing only cost 337.68, which is a hell of a lot cheaper than a mac mini. I hope you’re reading this, darling wife. 
May/091
Media PC
I’m procrastinating from uni, so here’s the specs of the new media PC which I’m making for T & myself.
- Gigabyte GA-8VD667K Motherboard (already owned) link
- Pentium 4 3.0Ghz (approx. $50) link
- Socket 478 Cooling Fan & Heatsink (approx. $13) link
- 512MB DDR RAM (already owned)
- 750GB SATA 7200RPM 32MB HDD (already owned) link
- SATA / IDE cross converter (approx. $7) link
- PSU (already owned)
- Sony 20x DVDRW IDE ($36.50) link
- Asus 802.11b/g Wireless PCI Card ($32) link
- CoolerMaster RC283 Media Case ($116) link
- Creative Inspire M5300 5.1 Speakers ($68) link
- BenQ G2400WD 24″ Lcd Monitor with D-sub, Dvi-D & HDMI ($300) link
Some parts are a bit of a hack together, I know, but I think it will do the job. Comes to a grand total of $622.50, including 5.1 surround sound and a 24″ monitor as a screen.
I’m thinking I will run Plex on it. Motherboard hasn’t been test on OSx86 (quite old) but I’ll give it a shot, otherwise Ubuntu.
Apr/093
Custom iTunes Genre Art and Language Names
Today I decided to make a custom genre icon for all of my Hebrew music. Here’s a good tutorial on how to do it: Custom iTunes 8 Genre Art.
Of course, all my Hebrew music has the genre ‘Hebrew’. Unfortunately, no matter what I did, I couldn’t get the custom genre art to work! It would work if I used the genre ‘Israel’ or ‘Jewish’, but never ‘Hebrew’.
Then I cottoned on to something. I tried the genre ‘Italian’, and that didn’t work either. Nor did ‘French’.
In short, iTunes 8 custom genre art does not work with language name genres.
Hope that helps someone. Here’s what I ended up with.
iTunes 8 Custom Genre Art
Apr/091
How to reset your Leopard Password without the DVD
Forgotten your password? No problem, here’s a way of resetting it. The bonus of doing it this way is that it doesn’t create a root user password, so it can be repeated as long as you haven’t got one.
- Start up in single-user mode by holding command-s while turning on the computer (this gives you root access)
- Type: “fsck -fy” (without quotes – ALWAYS without quotes)
- Type: “mount -uw /”
- Type: “launchctl load /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.DirectoryServices.plist”
- Type: “dscl . -passwd /Users/theUsernameWhosPasswordYouWantToChange newPassword”
- Type: “exit”
- Restart your computer
That should work. If you have any problems, let me know in the comments. If you don’t, let me know in the comments.
Apr/095
God’s Design for our lives, as a PHP Script
UPDATED: Thanks to AKX for a few corrections (he’s the PHP wiz, not me)
Here’s the gospel for programmers.
Sorry about the spacing… wordpress doesn’t like tabs. Please feel free to point out any syntax errors.
var $sin = 0;
var $pricePaid = true;
var $heaven = true;
var $alive = true;
var $deathAge = 120;// please set this variable as a boolean
var $acceptChrist =function eatForbiddenFruit ($temptation, $resistance) {
if ($temptation == true && $resistance = false) {
$sin = 1;
$pricePaid = false;
}
}function jesus($sinOfChrist) {
death($sinOfChrist,true);
}function death($amountOfSinFromLife, $programmer) {
if ($amountOfSinFromLife == 0 && $programmer == true) {
$pricePaid = true;
}
else {if ($acceptChrist && $pricePaid) {
$amountOfSinFromLife = $sinOfChrist;
}if (amountOfSinFromLife == 0) {
$heaven = true;
}
else {
$heaven = false;
}
}}
eatForbiddenFruit(true,false);
jesus(0);
while ($alive) {
$sin ++;
if (rand(0,$deathAge) == $deathAge) {
$alive = false;
break;
}$deathAge –;
}death($sin,false);
I’m thinking about expanding on this, to include all the major events of the bible. What do you think?
Apr/092
A nice little touch…
I just redesigned my home page, and wanted to mention this nice little touch I included.
Rather than update my age in the about section every time I have a birthday, I decided to do this instead:
<?php
function birthday ($birthday){
list($year,$month,$day) = explode(”-”,$birthday);
$year_diff = date(”Y”) – $year;
$month_diff = date(”m”) – $month;
$day_diff = date(”d”) – $day;
if ($day_diff < 0 || $month_diff < 0)
$year_diff–;
return $year_diff;
}
?>
<p>I am a <?php echo birthday(”1987-03-06″); ?> year old web developer, based on the Sunshine Coast, Queensland.</p>
Tricky… You like?
Mar/094
I need your help! If you were a butler… (or a computer)
I’m writing a program that uses bluetooth tell when you leave and enter the house. It includes an alarm to wake you up, and the ability to check the weather, the time, emails, and other things like that.
Here’s a list of things it is going to say so far – I want you to add to it! What would a butler say?
Good morning.
Good afternoon.
Good evening.
The time is x:xx AM/PM.
Today is January x, 2009.
Right now it’s x degrees and fine outside.
It’s expected to reach a top of x degrees, and a low of x degrees today.
You have x items on your to-do list for today.
I’ll wake you again in x minutes.
Welcome home!
I hope you had a wonderful evening.
You have x unread emails.
While you were out, you had x visitors.
Rain is forecast for the next x days, why not consider doing a load of washing today?
It looks like it will be beautiful weather tonight. Perhaps dinner outside would be nice?
What a beautiful day it is today!
I love thunderstorms. But if it starts to get too close, you might want to consider turning me off!
Aah… Friday. Finally!
I hope you had a restful weekend.
Thanks.
Jan/090
Cricket Scores 2
New updated (way better) version…
I completely rewrote version 1, the new version gets the latest cricket scores, with the option to refresh automatically. It includes a full scorecard for each innings, partnership information and even ball by ball commentry.
It’s not without it’s bugs, but it does the job, complete with growl support.
At the moment it’s mac only, and only tested on 10.5, but I’m sure it would work fine on other versions of Mac OS X. I can also release a windows version pretty easily, if anyone wanted.
You can download it here: http://upload.lukecarbis.com/uploaded/Cricket%20Scores%202.zip