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Archive for the 'Tips & Tricks' Category

How to Reply Tweet without Spamming Every Twitter Follower?

Published April 4, 2009 in Tips & Tricks and Web Applications. 1 Comment

If you’re like me, following a small but very active group of Twitter users, Twitter will soon be blended into part of life. Now, where ever I go, as long as I have a few minutes to sit down or wait for someone, then I will surely fire up my phone browser and nagivate to m.twitter.com. If I don’t read tweets I’m following for 1 day, I think I will easily miss out at least, at least 60 tweets.

At times, you might come into situation when, someone asked you a question on Twitter, and you don’t feel like exposing the responding answer to all your Twitter followers, for personal resaon, privacy concern or simply don’t want to spam every single reply to all followers.

The alternative option available in this case, is to send Direct Message. By sending Direct Message using Twitter, only the intended recipient will be able to read your tweet.

How to Send Twitter Direct Message?

  1. Login to your Twitter account, and go to Home page. You will see a menu link labeled “Direct Messages” on the right sidebar.
  2. In the Direct Messages page, you will be able to select a recipient from the list containing all your followers. Select a recipient, type in your message, press the Send button, and you’re done with it.

In TwitterFox, there’s a panel that shows all direct messages that you have received. You can also send direct message from TwitterFox using this format — d twitterUser yourMessage. Example: d google this is a direct message to google. Note that it doesn’t require the @ character

Best Day to Start Work After Chinese New Year 2009

Published January 10, 2009 in Tips & Tricks. 9 Comments

Are you looking for advice on the best day to start work or commence your business in the year of Earth Ox (己丑) after Chinese New Year 2009?

I’ve received a tip from Joey Yap - the world renown Chinese astrology and feng shui master, with a quote as follows:

“If you look at the Tong Shu, the good days right after Chinese New Year is on the third day (28th Jan), but normally most Chinese will take the 1st week off. So, the most appropriate day to start work would be the fifth day (30th Jan) of Chinese New Year. It is actually a very good day on the horse hour (11am - 1pm) but the best day to start work is the 8th day of Chinese New Year (2nd Feb) at the dragon hour (辰時) on 7am to 9am. This day is actually a remove day but the remove day helps remove the old problems that you have on the year of rat. And in fact this day is good because this is a Dong Gong auspicious day and there are a lot of auspicious stars for the rest of the year.”

You may watch Joey Yap’s “Start Off on a Good Date in 2009″ video clip at http://www.masteryacademy.com/eb/lesson01/

In summary, these are the good dates to commence your work after Chinese New Year:

  • 28th Jan (Success, 成日)
  • 30th Jan (Open, 开日)
  • 2nd Feb (Remove, 除日)

Hehe.. good thing is, I actually plan to apply leave for the first week of CNY, and begin working on 2nd Feb :D To those working in KL, 2nd Feb is a public holiday though.

Flickr Pro Account Gift Code at RM30 - 1/3 of Original Price

Published January 4, 2009 in Internet and Tips & Tricks. 1 Comment

—– Updated on 26th May 2009 —–

WARNING: Don’t Buy Flickr Pro Gift code From Third Party

After 5 months of sweet enjoyment with my Flickr Pro account at discounted rate, I have got the following mail message from Flickr:

Flickr Pro Gift codes cannot be resold or purchased from a third party. It’s been determined that the Flickr Pro Gift Code(s) you used had been purchased from a third party.

We’re very sorry sorry, but the Flickr Pro Gift Code that you redeemed on your account has been revoked.

That’s right, the tips written in this post DOESN’T WORK ANYMORE. So, lesson learned, only buy Flickr Pro from Flickr.

—– Original Post —–

When I realized that my Flickr Pro account is expiring in less than a month, I was Googling, hoping to try my luck to stumble upon any Flickr gift code offering some discounts.

Then, I found this catchy topic at Photokaki, and aparently, someone is selling Flickr Pro 1 year subscription at RM30, and 2 years for RM50!!!

Which also means, I only need to pay 1/3 of the original price (USD24.95)! I was trilled.

Flickr Gift Code

Then, seeing some positive replies of success stories, without second thought I PMed the author to confirm its availability. Then, bought a RM30 DiGi reload code (yes, the payment method is DiGi prepaid reload code) via Maybank2u, and yes, I received an email from Flickr, with a gift code of “LgS00Jke” (not valid anymore)

So, if you are renewing your Flickr account, why not give it a try? Please PM the author to confirm its availability.

Exporting and Importing WordPress Posts is Easy, with WordPress 2.7

Published January 4, 2009 in Tips & Tricks. 0 Comments

I’ve just tried a full cycle of WordPress 2.7 exporting and importing features, and I must say, it’s COOL! As easy as snapping your fingers (snapping fingers is not something everyone can do though :p).

Exporting Posts, Comments, Categories and Etc

In WordPress 2.7, there’s an Export utility under the Tools menu in admin panel. This tool allows us to export posts, pages, comments, custom fields, categories and tags into a format (XML file) called eXtended RSS or WXR.

By selecting an author (or all authors), you’re ready to effortlessly export the above mentioned contents in your WordPress blog.

Even if you’re not migrating your blog, this utility is a very good and convenient backup tool too.

I’ve got an XML file of 1.08MB. Continue reading ‘Exporting and Importing WordPress Posts is Easy, with WordPress 2.7′

Find Out Which Program is Using Internet Connection

Published December 29, 2008 in Software and Tips & Tricks. 2 Comments

At today’s age with Internet connection availability becoming a common lifestyle companion, it’s practically impossible for your computer not having any program unknowingly accessing Internet in the background, as long as your PC is connected to Internet.

Even if you’re not running any web browser, IM client (such as MSN, Yahoo! Messenger) and email checker, chances are there will still be some programs running background scheduled jobs to check for software updates.

So, how do you know which exact program is actually communicating to the Internet?

NetLimiter 2 - Monitor

I’m using NetLimiter 2. It’s available for Windows. The free version of NetLimiter 2 is featuring a simple monitoring tool, which is showing a listing of all programs currently requiring incoming or outgoing network connection.

NetLimiter 2 - Stats for a Program

Besides, you can also generate network traffic statistics of a program, for a particular date.

Download NetLimiter 2

MySQL Table Names could be Case Sensitive in Unix

Published October 22, 2008 in Database and Tips & Tricks. 0 Comments

Something notable about MySQL case sensitivity that my project team has encountered last weekend. On Windows and Mac OS X, all object identifiers (such as names of database, table, column, index and etc) are case insensitive.

So, even if someone doesn’t practice consistency of identifier naming on Windows and Mac OS X, you will not encounter table 'tbl_name' doesn't exist error, as long as spelling is correct.

However, if you have a MySQL table named as PRODUCT_ITEMS, you will encounter table 'product_items' doesn't exist error on most varieties of Unix and Linux, when the following select statement is executed.

select * from product_items;

Such a simple select statement isn’t it? But will fail in Unix and Linux as database names, table names and table aliases are case sensitive by default.

Solution 1: Ensure Identifier Naming Consistency

The most elegant solution, is of course to ensure identifier naming consistency in database and codes. But if you’re working on a mammoth project, this is not the quickest solution though.

Solution 2: Alter lower_case_table_names System Variable

The quickest solution in this case, is to alter the database default behavior, such that table names are always treated as case insensitive.

By default, lower_case_table_names is set to ‘0′ in Unix. So, you can do the following to alter the lower_case_table_names variable.

  1. Ensure that the database name and all existing table names are lowercase.
  2. Open to edit /etc/my.cnf file
  3. Add “lower_case__table_names=1” (without quote) into /etc/my.cnf
  4. Restart MySQL

After restart, the lower_case_table_names variable of your MySQL database should appear as ‘1‘. So, regardless of the case of identifier naming in your codes, all should work like case sensitivity is never an issue at all.

Refer to http://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/5.0/en/identifier-case-sensitivity.html for further information.

Update WordPress and Blogger Blog through Firefox - ScribeFire Blog Editor

Published October 12, 2008 in Internet and Tips & Tricks. 0 Comments

KC posted in his Twitter: bloggers should check out scribefire - http://www.scribefire.com/

Immediately, this tweet caught my attention. So, visited ScribeFire site, and again, I was attracted by this quote from Michael Arrington of TechCrunch.com:

…a lot of bloggers swear by it.

Wow! I think this couldn’t be wrong. So, installed the ScribeFire Blog Editor, and I was immediately amazed! It’s just too good!

In summary, ScribeFire Blog Editor is a Firefox extension which allows bloggers to publish and manage their blog posts. At present, the supported blog engines are: Blogger, Movable Type, Drupal, Textpattern, Roller, MetaWeblog API, Blogger and Tumblr. Wow~~ this coverage is easily satisfying 80% bloggers in the world.

Adding a New Blog Account in ScribeFire

1. Specify your blog URL
Create New Blog Account in ScribeFire - Step 1 - Blog URL

2. The supported blog engine will be automatically detected
Create New Blog Account in ScribeFire - Step 2 - Select Blog System

3. Specify login details
Create New Blog Account in ScribeFire - Step 3 - Login Details

4. Login successfully tested
Create New Blog Account in ScribeFire - Step 4 - Successful Login

5. Blog account successfully added into ScribeFire
Create New Blog Account in ScribeFire - Step 5 - Account Added

Isn’t it easy? Once you’re done with the above steps, just wait for a minute for all your blog entries, pages and categories to be imported from your blog system, so that you can manage them locally in your PC. Thus, it doesn’t require active Internet connection to compose your blog post. Once you’re connected, simply pressed the “Publish” button and you’re done. Continue reading ‘Update WordPress and Blogger Blog through Firefox - ScribeFire Blog Editor’

Adding RAW (CR2, NEF, PEF, SR2, ORF) Files Support into Vista Photo Gallery

Published August 25, 2008 in Shutterbug and Tips & Tricks. 0 Comments

If you are shooting with your DSLR in RAW without JPG, then quick preview of your RAW files (Canon’s CR2, Nikon’s NEF, Pentax PEF, Sony’s SR2, Olympus’s ORF) is quite inconvenient, unless you have installed any third party viewer.

Thanks to modular design, camera manufacturers can create their RAW image codecs for Windows Vista, which will add RAW file support to the built-in Vista Photo Gallery.

After installing the relevant codecs, the support RAW file can be previewed as thumbnail. Besides, you can also double-click your RAW file, and it will be shown in Photo Gallery, just like any other typical image files.

However, the codec doesn’t provide any image editing support.

Click at the following links to get the relevant RAW codec.

By the way, on a side-note, there’s a new slider called “Clarity” in Photoshop Camera RAW, since version 4.1, which increases mid-tone contrast for selective parts of the image, resulting in a “punchier” image. Personally, I find this extra feature to be very useful. If you don’t see the Clarity slider in your Photoshop Camera RAW, it’s time to consider upgrading the version :)

Claim More Free Disk Space with Vista SP1

Published May 6, 2008 in Tips & Tricks. 3 Comments

If you’re running on Windows Vista now, have you installed Vista Service Pack 1 (SP1)?

Manual download and installation of Windows Vista SP1 was released on 18th March, and available from Windows Update beginning from 15th March. If you’ve not manually downloaded this service pack, chances are, by now, you should have been prompted for automatic update of Vista SP1 from Windows Update.

I’ve updated to Vista SP1 on 19th March, a day after the release of manual download hehe. Itchy hand lo… I was kind of frustrated with some performance issues and bugs residing in Windows Vista, and thus very much anticipating for the availability of Vista SP1, hoping to see some notable issues resolved.

7GB Free Space to Begin

For Vista 32bit, SP1 requires minimum 7GB of free space in C drive to execute installation. However, no worry, SP1 is NOT going to eat up your 7GB hard drive space. Continue reading ‘Claim More Free Disk Space with Vista SP1′

How to Transfer Your Songs from iPod to PC

Published May 4, 2008 in Gadgets and Tips & Tricks. 1 Comment

I have a 30GB iPod as mobile “entertainer”, which I use for the following purposes:

  1. Store MP3s
  2. Store some latest pictures so that I can easily show-off my recent trips to friends
  3. Store podcasts

iPodHowever, just like any other iPod owner, I’m facing a kind-of-disappointing iPod “feature”, which only allow songs to be transfered into iPod, and not vice versa (transfer songs from iPod to PC). If given a choice, I don’t really want to keep 2 copies of the GBs of songs, especially in my office laptop; I would rather keep them all in iPod, and transfer any individual song out to PC if needed. But how?? Continue reading ‘How to Transfer Your Songs from iPod to PC’

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