Sunday, October 28, 2007

Drupal Hack:: Show users email addresses

I was looking through all the spam registrants of a drupal site I maintain. Alot of usernames of zhzjshsk are very suspicious, and also emily and kate, and worst of all, sorry russia, but email addresses from .ru are HUGE sources of spam. Doesn't your country have a valid source of revenue? Can't you just up the production of vodka a little? I don't think stoli sales are as high as they could be.

Anyways, I modified my modules/user.module so that when in the administrative mode of view my users I can see certain info at a glance.

username, email address, status, member since, last online, ...

It doesn't have built in showing of email address, so I hacked modules/user.module to give that feature.


function user_admin_account() {
$header = array(
array('data' => t('Username'), 'field' => 'u.name'),
array('data' => t('Email'), 'field' => 'u.mail'),

array('data' => t('Status'), 'field' => 'u.status'),
array('data' => t('Member for'), 'field' => 'u.created', 'sort' => 'desc'),
array('data' => t('Last access'), 'field' => 'u.access'),
t('Operations')
);
$sql = 'SELECT u.uid, u.name, u.mail, u.status, u.created, u.access FROM {users} u WHERE uid != 0';
$sql .= tablesort_sql($header);
$result = pager_query($sql, 50);

$status = array(t('blocked'), t('active'));
while ($account = db_fetch_object($result)) {
$rows[] = array(theme('username', $account),
$account->mail,
$status[$account->status],
format_interval(time() - $account->created),
$account->access ? t('%time ago', array('%time' => format_interval(time() - $account->access))) : t('never'),
l(t('edit'), "user/$account->uid/edit", array()));
}

Ubunut Studio -- An ubuntu linux distro for multimedia gurus

I was pretty much way off on this one. I had thought Ubuntu Studio was going to be a killer sweet multimedia app to compete with the likes of Adobe CS3 and mac iLife. But instead it is an entire customized operating system for multimedia production.



I'm fairly certain that I'm going to be distributing discs of this distro, in addition to gutsy for mac and pc.

Pro's
It is maintained by the Ubuntu Community, especially as far as operating system enhancements are concerned, so this isn't a dead fork in the road; but rather an expansion that grows off the same Ubuntu/Canonical root.

Con
I kinda wanted an application to show up in add/remove programs that would just pull in some great multimedia apps.

Feedback.
I would suggest that ubuntu give you the option to transform your OS as you need it. Stupid suggestion given that it is already an open environment, since you can do that anyways. But perhaps a button that enables you to revert back to the base install of Gutsy, or to transform into Edubuntu, or Kubuntu, or over to Ubuntu Studio.

Anywhere.FM + an FTP server full of music + WebDrive == Awesomeness

I had a minor dilemma this morning. And the day before as well. I had alot of music that I've uploaded to my (ftp) server and I wanted to bring it in to my anywhere.fm profile.

TWO OPTIONS
1) Download all my ftp music back to my hard drive, and then use the anywhere.fm uploader for the music that is back on my hard drive.
2) Emulate the ftp server as a mounted drive (in windows) and tell anywhere.fm to scan that mounted server.
3) option 3 is not very feasible because i would have had to install the last.fm uploader tool on the shared server which runs linux, that I have no authority to install programs on. but it could be a nice project if i were a genius with nothing better to do.

I chose to use WebDrive and emulate a w:\ as ftp.myserver.com and then use the anywhere.fm uploader to scan it for new tracks. There is a lot of file movement, but I'll update this when it works.. or even if it didn't work.

The Future now of music

A good buddy of mine, Paul Betts had a posting that music no longer should be tied to us, ergo Voyager sans bagage. Autotranslated into english english.. we don't need to carry 8,16,30,100 gigs of music on us. We just need to be able to grab what we need when we need it.

{insert modern graphic of an ipod that has been damaged, and a headphone sucking wireless music out of the air}

The NOW of music is that we have an interesting web app called Anywhere.FM . You essentially upload all of your music that you are currently toting around with you, and fragmentally residing on all of your computers and consolidate it beautifully through a more or less fantastic interface. Your music plays through the player, and you would no longer need to touch your mp3 files again.

The FUTURE of music...
We however do not have our uMachine; our uBiquitous, uNiversal Machine. When you go for a drive in your car, we don't (I don't) have an internet connection feeding websites to my radio. So if we could get this wonderful (perhaps existing as an iPhone) internet-fed poly-purpose {not just multimedia} device that we can dock into our car's headunit, we then pass the modern test of making progress with our lives, our music, our overall doing something more.. which is a greater act than just doing some more.

Wednesday, October 10, 2007

Good Culture

...there is no good culture without people trying something new...

otherwise, that is heritage

~*~*~
My thinking is that a people cannot preserve their exact lifestyle without taking away from their culture. A tradition is a custom that continues from generation and regenerates with the coming generation. But a culture that locks its place in stone is inheriting a tradition of frozenness; a trait that alters their original intention of preserving their culture.

Man changes each day. A culture that denies changes moves from its base of nature and shifts away from natures natural process of change.. Perhaps like a stone sliding.. sliding over a cliff slowly and slowly and then falls in when it no longer has any base in reality.

Monday, October 01, 2007

OSU is #4??!!??

I can't believe it, we're good.