Computer Programming Tutorials and Articles
Mapping
- Driving Directions Link
Creating a driving directions link for your customers - Plotting items onto UK Google Maps
Using the Google Maps API to plot items on to the UK Google Maps
Apache
- Apache Redirect Directive
Using Apache's Redirect command after moving, renaming or re-moving a web page. - Apache SetEnvIfNoCase
Using Apache's SetEnvIfNoCase command to ban site rippers and email collection robots. - Disabling a site for essential maintenance
Using an Apache mod_rewrite command. - Using .htaccess files
Creating a customised 404 error page and password protecting a members only directory on your web server.
PHP
- Creating a HTML selection list of file names matching a criteria
Using the readdir function to build a list of filenames matching a supplied criteria - How to automatically capture images of a series of web sites and create thumbnails of the resulting image files.
Using the windows command line tool IECapt to capture Internet Explorer's rendering of a web page to a JPEG file; and then using a PHP script to resize the image to a thumbnail. - PHP GD2 function ImageCopyMerge - setting the opacity of an image
Reducing the opacity of an image using PHP graphics functions GD2 ImageCopyMerge - Using fsockopen with HTTP POST requests over an SSL connection
Shows you how to check that OpenSSL is installed on your PHP installation, with sample code showing HTTP POST requests using fsockopen.
Perl
- CPAN - Installing Perl Modules
Example of how to install Perl CPAN modules, even without root access. - Mass Deleting Email Script
Deleting all emails from a POP3 account using Perl - Paging MySQL database results, printing 10 records per page
How to list database results 10 records per page using Perl. - Parsing XML files with Perl
Parsing XML files with Perl and the XML::parser Module. - Random Password Generator
A sample Perl subroutine to create random passwords of any length. - Splitting Large MP3 podcasts, so that they will fit on an 80 minute CD using Perl
How to use the mp3cut Perl script with Cue Sheets to cut MP3 files into 80 minute segments.
MySQL
- Don't delete database records, unless you really need to
It can be time consuming having to restore a small set of records from a full database backup, because a user deleted records they wanted to keep - code your application so that it does not delete records, only marks them as deleted. - How to backup your MySQL tables and data every night using a bash script and cron
This tutorial will show you how to write a simple bash shell script which will extract your database schema, compress the data and email you the backup - Off Site MySQL Database Backup Service
Details of my off-site MySQL database backup service, if you need a reliable a backup solution for your on-line database, check this out.
Visual Basic 6
- Determine the version number of your MDAC installation
Example visual basic 6 code showing you how to programmatically determine the version number of your MDAC installation, allowing you to take appropriate action if the required version is not installed. - Determine Windows's Regional Settings for Short Date Format, and Prevent Corrupting Your Database
How to use the Windows GetLocaleInfo API Function to determine the Regional Settings for the short date format, and ensure that they are set to English (United Kingdom) - Load a file into the application that's associated with the files extension
Visual Basic 6 code showing how to use the ShellExecute and GetDesktopWindow API functions to open a file with it's associated application. - on error goto statements in Visual Basic 6
Better handling of the on error goto statement. - Screen Capture and Thumbnail Creation using Visual Basic & Freeimage
How to use the windows API to simulate a print screen button event, capturing the screen contents to the clipboard, and then using Freeimage to create a thumbnail of the clipboard image. - Splitting Multipage TIFF Files into Single Pages using Visual Basic & Freeimage
Using the Freeimage OpenMultiBitmap commands to read multipage TIFF files, and split them into single pages. - Using SHBrowseForFolder in VB6
A directory browser / selection tool from the Windows API. - Visual Basic 6 code for connecting to a MySQL database
Using the MySQL ODBC driver & Microsoft Remote Data Object to connect a visual basic application to a MySQL database.
JavaScript
- Unobtrusive Number Field Validation Using JavaScript
How To create onblur field validation using unobtrusive JavaScript techniques.
Backups
- Backing up data on a Windows machine using TAR and GZIP
Tar and Gzip are command line utilities usually associated with Unix systems, so why use them to backup your Windows machine. - Offsite Backups For Small Businesses Using S3, OpenSSL and Jungle Disk
How to encrypt your backups before sending them to Amazon S3, and the easiest method of transferring your files to and from your S3 account.
TAR
- Splitting Large Files to Span Multiple Disks using TAR
How to split large files into smaller chunks so that they will fit onto storage media.
General
- Creating Video Demonstrations of your Software Products
Need to create video demonstrations of your software products or services? - This short article covers things I have learned while creating my first video demo, including what software I used and why outsourcing your voice over is a good idea. - Extending EditPlus
How to extend EditPlus to make it a better PHP IDE (Integrated Development Environment) - Host large video files on Amazon S3, and serve them via a sub domain of your web site
How to host large video files on Amazon S3 and serve them from a sub domain of your web site. How to configure the bucket name, and set-up the CNAME DNS mapping. - Hosts File
Testing new web servers before changing DNS settings. - Using YSlow
Using YSlow to increase the front end performance of your web site
