SuperPackages for JDK7

Here is a write up of the new Superpackage feature in JDK 7.

JQuery Cheat Sheets

Being a big fan of cheat sheets, I have started my own JQuery sheet but haven't got far with it. Its still very early days.

If you are looking for a traditional super terse cheat sheet, check out this one on techdreams.org.

Alt Tab and Application Selection

Playing around with my Mac yesterday, I figured out that when you do an Alt Tab key combo, you can actually select the application you want with the arrow keys. So instead of using Alt Tab or Alt Shift Tab, just use Alt Tab then move to the app icon you want with the arrow keys. Very useful when you are swapping between more than 2 applications.

Using Apache mod rewrite to make REST URL

I ran across this article on webreference.com, describing how to make REST URL out of a typical HTTP get URL. Looks interesting.

How Matt Works

Matt Mullenweg, of Wordpress fame, was featured in an Inc Magazine column The Way I Work. He felt the article left a few things out so he rewrote it on his blog.

Lots of good stuff here. Comments on everything from his workspace, to how he spends a typical day. One point he makes that I really is agree with, is the importance of meeting over lunch. In my experience, this is one of the best team building experiences you can share with your coworkers. Not done often enough anymore.

Mac OS X Doc Interface Using JQuery

The folks over at the nettuts site have made this post on how to create a Mac OS X like dock interface using JQuery. Check out the demo, its pretty cool looking.

North Denver Free Wifi: Forza Coffee Company

I'm starting a little recurring theme on the best free wifi spots in North Denver. The main reason for doing this is the wifi hot spot web sites on the net appear not to have been updated for a LONG time. Since I don't really want to create my own free wifi hot spot web site (at least not yet!), I thought I would just stick to the area I know.

So I'm talking about the North Denver Metro area, mainly Broomfield, Westminster, Thorton, and Northglenn. I may also include Boulder, Layfayette and Louisville, but I plan on focusing on the other burbs first.

Our first entry in the series is the Forza Coffee Company in Westminster. This coffee shop is located at the top of the hill at 104th and Federal. Awesome view. A nice place, good music. Start your browser and just accept the usage agreement to start surfing. No password required to use their wifi. Yay! Free refills you buy a mug of coffee.

Store hours are 6:30am to 8pm weeknights. They stay open to 9:30 on Friday and Saturday night.

Here is the address and map:

Forza Coffee Company

3013 W 104th Ave Suite 700

Westminster CO 80031

303 465-0605

Get the File Name of the Current PHP Script

Needed to get the name of the current script in PHP. I found this snippet on exactly how to do that. So I must give credit where credit is due. :)

Workaround for Textile 2.0 PHP 5.2.x Bug

At work we use the Confluence wiki quite a bit. The wiki markup is based on the textile markup language. Well to save myself some time, I decided I would download the textile php class and work on my document locally. So I downloaded the 2.0.0 zip of the PHP file, installed it on my web server, and linked the document I'm working on. My PHP script worked, but the list output was all messed up. Every list generated by textile would look like this:

<ul>
    <li>Item One</li>
    <li>Item Two</li>
</ul>
<ul>
    <li>Item Three</li>
</ul>

Very annoying. Anyway after much searching, I have come to the conclusion that this is caused by a bug in PHP 5.2.4 or later. (Although there seemed to be much debate about which version of 5.2 it started with.) I'm running OS X 10.5 and have PHP 5.2.8 and I definitely have the bug. The main solution involves a patch, which I don't really want to attempt. However, after further digging, I found this workaround (Thank you David Green where ever you are.).

Find the fList function in the classTextile.php file. Replace these two lines of code:

foreach($text as $line) {
  $nextline = next($text);

with these two lines of code

foreach($text as $nr => $line) {
  $nextline = isset($text[$nr+1]) ? $text[$nr+1] : false;

Fixed me right up. And hopefully, this note will help other Mac OS X folks out there.

Simple Comment System with JQuery and PHP

I ran across this example of a simple comment system on the 9lessons blog. A very good example of what can be done with JQuery in a few lines of code.

JQuery Tools

Ran across the JQuery Tools release thanks to Ajaxian. JQuery Tools is a series of UI elements included in a 5k library. UI elements include tabs, tooltips, and more. It looks pretty cool. I think tabs are best done with CSS and HTML but that is merely a matter of preference.

A $279 Mini Me from HP

Check out this article on Engadget on the HP Mini 110 Mi. This is an Ubuntu Linux based netbook with a 10" screen, 90% full size keyboard, and 8 Gig solid state drive, 1 Gig of RAM and an Atom N270 processor. All for $279 dollars. This is freaking amazing. The prices and features on these things keeping getting lower and cooler. For more information check out the following links:

• Full Engadget Review


• Video Review

Google Search Tip

I have been meaning to share this tip for some time. There are a number of tips included in this book:

One of the more useful tips is the use of the site: parameter in a Google search. What the parameter allows you to do is perform Google searches of a specific site. For example, if I wanted to search this web site for information on CSS I could write:

site:http://blueskyworkshop.com css

You can also limit the search using site directories and paths. I tried this same trick on Yahoo search the other day, and it seems to work there as well. Very useful stuff.

The Reader gadget

Google Reader has finally come to Google Desktop, as announced on the Google Reader blog. This gadget is a convenient way to check your subscriptions and fits right in with the Gmail, Calendar, and Docs gadgets. Please give it a try and tell us what you think. And a big thanks to Arindam Sharma, who created this gadget during his internship at Google Bangalore.



James Yum, Developer Programs Engineer

Apple WWDC Live Blog

If you can't wait to find out the latest from the Apple World Wide Developer conference, you can get a live blog play by play of the key note from appleinsider.com. Rumors have been that a new iPhone will be announced.

JDK 7 Certification Public Review

If you don't know already, my day job is as a writer and developer for Sun Microsystems' learning/education group. Currently we are planning the development of the courses and certifications for JDK 7.

Right now, we are just finishing up the Job Task Analysis (JTA) for JDK 7. What is a JTA you ask? It is basically a list of topics that will be covered in our certifications and courses. This topic list is published with every certification to give developers an idea of what is covered on an exam and what areas they need to study.

For the JDK7 course and certification development effort we wanted to have a round of public review. Therefore, a preliminary JTA for the Sun Java Certified Programmer exam and the Sun Certified Java Developer exam is available for comment at:

http://wikis.sun.com/display/JTASurvey

Note: If you don't have an account, you can create one on the site.

So if you have ever wanted to have input into what is on the Sun Java exams, now is your chance. Please provide us with comments on any objectives you would like to see added or removed from the list of objectives. In addition, on the main wiki page, you will see a link to a weighting survey. Please take a moment to complete the survey and give us your feedback on what objectives you think are the most important to cover in a course or exam.

The site will be up for a week or two, so act now before this deal is gone. :)

Any feedback would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance.

Google Elements

During its conference, Google announced its Web Elements services. Bascially, these are really easy to use versions of the Ajax APIs that allow you add functionality to your blog or web site. Click on the service you want, customize it a bit, then add it to your site with the supplied code.

From my quick look at this, only the Map and the News tools look real useful. But overall, this does look very promising for the future./p>