I pushed out a quick update to ER Tweet Me yesterday (now version 1.1.1). Now URLs are automatically linked up if they are not already a link. If the twitter feed you're pulling in somehow already turns URLs into live links then it should not have any negative effect. So, go download and enjoy the new update. Remember, it's compatible with both EE 1.6.x and EE 2.x (since the 1.1.0 release).
Today I asked a simple question on twitter and got more responses than I expected. Some of the answers also caught me off guard so I thought I'd extend the question to the blog so we had more room to chat and discuss. The question was regarding how many people/firms add their credits to the footer of the websites they build. At Ideal Design Firm we've been doing that since I can remember but lately I've questioned the purpose it serves. I can't recall a single instance where a client has asked us to remove our name or logo but I also can't recall an instance where we've received business from it. I'd discuss my suspicions as to why those have been our results but that's another topic.
This post is for my fellow EE'ers. I will not be using full names or many links and will not be educating you on what happened as this is intended for people who are already aware of the scenario. If you'd like to read about it I suggest reading EE Insider's post "The Matrices" or Travis Smith's post "The FieldFrame Controversy Explained". They are both 3rd party views on the event and recommended readings with good insight. This purpose of this post is not to explain what happened, but rather to expand on and clarify some of my personal thoughts.
As noted on my obligatory "about" page I started my development with HTML 3.2 while in middle school. The vast majority of my development experience has been with the web but while I was in high school I didn't have the opportunity to carry around a laptop from which I could work. Somewhere along the way I started using Texas Instruments (TI) graphing calculators. One of the fun things about these calculators was that you could easily write your own programs in BASIC directly from the device and run them. This is a great time passer...during class (I wonder if mom and/or dad read this blog). Today I found an archive download online for a TI-89 application I wrote and I wanted to share the "readme" file with everyone. It's funny.
I've recently given some thought to a piece of EE that I have never had a great need for. Control Panel logging. Out of the box, ExpressionEngine logs certain actions that are performed in the CP saving the Site ID, Member, IP Address of that member, date/time and the action performed. This can be very useful when trying to figure out when something happened and who may have done it. It can also help see how many people might be logging in under the same account from various locations (IPs). This is all great but quite limited considering the number of actions for which this occurs.
Today I published an article that walked through utilizing the Control Panel Log in ExpressionEngine and recording with certain actions were performed in your add-ons. To display how this might be used I have updated my Redirect Helper Lite module with such a feature. Now when any redirects are added, modified or deleted the action is recorded to the Control Panel Log along with the standard info of the data/time, Member info, and site ID. If you're a code diver you can check out the mcp.redirect_helper_lite.php file for the changes near the top of the file.
I've had this update sitting in my repository for a little while and haven't had the time to polish a couple of things up to release it. Finally I had some breathing room after some client work so I'm now releasing version 1.1.0 of Redirect Helper Lite. This introduces an extension to the add-on which greatly enhances the processing time of the actual redirection. In earlier versions ExpressionEngined to being parsing the template before it even performed a redirection. That's a lot of overhead for something that should occur immediately. For this update I've utilized the sessions_start hook and now the redirection occurs as early as possible saving you that tiny bit of processing time.
First let me thank everyone who participated in the discussion about add-on pricing. There were many great thoughts shared and it helped me make my decision on add-on pricing. What I have decided is to stick closely to what EllisLab already does with ExpressionEngine. The exception will be MSM sites. Essentially I will sell one license per installation of ExpressionEngine. So if you run a single domain or 100 domains off of a single EE install you will only require a single license from me. I will stick closely to the volume discount rates that EllisLab has setup which is outlined on this page.
Tonight I felt like renting the new Star Trek movie in iTunes. I'd heard really good things about it and had wanted to rent it for some time. My wonderful wife bought me an iTunes gift card for Christmas so I wanted to start putting it to good use. The nearly 4GB download finally finished (HD rental) and I was ready to start the movie. After clicking play I received a dialog box with error code 5103. I ran Software Update to make sure I had the latest version of iTunes hoping that it would be a simple fix. That didn't do it. After some digging I got it going and now I'm sitting here enjoying this action-packed opening sequence. Here's what I found:
For some reason I feel like sharing some things I intend to do in 2010. I've never really been one for resolutions but I do set "goals" to some degree of the word. Typically I just aim to achieve something but not particularly by a certain date. For 2010 I will keep that pattern and not really set dates for my personal goals. That said, here are some things I'm working on.