If anybody has some good guides on how to set this up, it’d be great to hear from you, now I have my install set up to allow the test user to connect remotely, I’m looking for another mini-project to include in this larger one Also…if you notice any DB oddities on here, please forgive me

Now normally, I don’t mind being all long winded about plugin upgrades, because it’s usually just one or 2. Now because I’m picky and awkward, the WP auto-upgrade for plugins doesn’t seem to work on my server. Instead of fixing that, I simply wrote a bash script. The contents of which are:

#!/bin/bash

if [ $# == 2 ]; then
                new=$2
else
                new=$1
fi

if [ -d $1 ]; then
                rm -rf ./$1
fi

wget http://downloads.wordpress.org/plugin/$new.zip
unzip ./*.zip
rm ./*.zip

Not sure if anybody wants to use that – I’m sure it could be improved, but it satisfied 2 of my needs. I now have an easier way to update (and install, I guess) plugins, and a lesser desire to code things. I now have to think of my next blog topic so I can get back on track!

I’ve recently dabbled with some PHP & MySQL on a test server running from my desktop, as I’ve been meaning to learn PHP for a while. I think it’s gone OK, I’ve learnt quite a bit, but it may help that I know some C (setting variables is very similar etc.). What this little PHP learning experience has done (other than taught me some php), is reignite my passion for programming.

I’ve always enjoyed programming, that doesn’t mean I’m fantastic at it, but I really do enjoy it, the only thing I really struggle for is ideas for programs/applications. What my request to you – the community – is, is whether you struggle for ideas as well, if not, then do you have any you’d like to suggest?

Secondly, I’ve set up a local SVN repository (without apache access). This is mainly just for my coding, which I seem to be doing a lot of at the minute, so I figured in my downtime from that, I’d set up SVN.

It was pretty easy, and I have Netbeans (we have to use it at Uni, I’ve grown to like it though, it’s pretty good) set up to commit to the svn repo’s for the various projects etc. Which was also incredibly easy to set up. I’m pleased I did it, whether it will be used remains to be seen. Either way, I think I better get back to coding this interface! So far I’m doing ok (though I’ve not got more than 1 class so far either…)

So I’m thinking that when I’ve got a bit of free time I’m going to try Jaunty in a VM, just because I’ve not actually tried it at all so far, I’m a bit disappointed in myself! From what I’ve heard on IRC and generally from people using it, there’s been the usual breakage of some things, but that’s to be expected. Other than that I’ve actually heard a lot of positive things about it, so I’m looking forward to actually installing it on my system

As for Java, some of you may know that I’m on a Software Engineering course at University. This means I do a fair amount of programming and general sitting-in-front-of-a-computer-looking-busy . One of the modules on my course this year is OO (Object-Oriented) Software Development, for which we’re using Java. Now I’m not a huge fan of Java, but I can appreciate it has many uses, and I don’t mind coding in it. The only issue is that, from the lectures, I don’t actually have a fantastic understanding of OO Methods and such. So I got a book out of my Uni library – Java in Two Semesters – so far, it’s actually really good, and I already have a better understanding of things Now I just have to finish an assignment!

One final comment – I’ll be changing my Planet Ubuntu feed in the coming week to include all posts from my blog, as I’d say that 99% of my posts relate to Ubuntu in some way

Me being me (read: lazy) I didn’t want to have to trawl through all 2041 songs I have in there, just to find the purchased ones.

So I wrote a program, and I’m hosting it on my googlepage

So click here for the page, or here for the program.

The problem is; I use cygwin for my C compiling and ssh-ing into the University servers. SO obviously I wanted mono installed in cygwin.

Luckily I found a way to do it:

1. Download the mono for windows installer
2. Run the installer, and select your cygwin folder for the installation directory (in my case this was C:\cygwin)
3. Install
4. Open cygwin and type "mcs" without quotes, and if it’s installed correctly it should spit back a load of rubbish about no files at you.

Hope this helped anybody who was struggling to do this.

However a friend of mine is starting doing C# (C Sharp), and asked if I’d do it, which I said I would.

So I might start learning that soon, just got to wait to see if we can have a proper lab session on it first. Though I might have a bash over the weekend, I’ll probably download Visual C# Express Edition or something to try it out.