Skip to content
July 26, 2011 / Gary

Changing Magnet URIs in Google Chrome

At one point, I clicked a link on the Skype website which started with “skype://…”. This is a magnet URL which will cause the appropriate application on your system to launch & handle the request.

Well, Chrome asked me what to do. Should I allow Skype to be launched & run off to do as the website instructed (a possible security risk)? Or should I “Do Nothing”? I accidentally clicked “Do Nothing”.

Now… what that did was seemingly permanently disable my ability to use the Skype-specific magnet URI.

To re-enable this function, I found that inside:
/Users/[username]/Library/Application Support/Google/Chrome/
… is a file named “Local State”.

Inside there, I found a key “protocol_handler” with a hash table, and inside that was:
“excluded_schemes”: {…, “skype”: true, … }

I changed that to “false”, shut down & relaunched Chrome.

Boom. Works.

May 6, 2011 / Gary

Namazu Tips

This is a place to store tips on using/configuring the namazu file system search engine (on Linux).

To get namazu to index hidden files:
1. Copy the sample config file somewhere.
2. Uncomment & change the line:
$DENY_FILE = “.*\\.(gif|png|jpg|jpeg)|.*\\.tar\\.gz|core|.*\\.bak|.*~|\\..*|\x23.*”;
… to:
$DENY_FILE = “.*\\.(gif|png|jpg|jpeg)|.*\\.tar\\.gz|core|.*\\.bak|.*~|\x23.*”;
… i.e., remove the |\\..* part.
3. When you run mknmz, make sure to tell it to use your new config file. I.e., ... -f /path/to/namazu.conf

ALSO…
remember to include that semicolon after your $DENY_FILE or $ALLOW_FILE pattern declarations. Without it, shit won’t work properly.

ALSO…
when programatically calling mknmz to create the index or namazu to perform a search, be sure to use /full/path/from/root as well as enclosing your query in “quotes”.

April 21, 2011 / Gary

Data Matrix Library

Celebrate!

libdmtx is a library for generating Data Matrix images.

Steps require to install the libdmtx package and python wrapper on CentOS 5.2

yum install ImageMagick
yum install ImageMagick-devel
yum install python-imaging

Untar source, enter libdmtx-x.x.x directory.
./configure
make
(as root) make install

cd wrapper/python/
python setup.py install
/sbin/ldconfig /usr/local/lib
python test.py

Celebrate!

March 29, 2011 / Gary

Blinky Lights

How to make the CentOS/RH system blink the light on its corresponding ethernet interface (when you have more than one).

/sbin/ethtool -p eth1

You’re welcome.

January 26, 2011 / Gary

OS X Spotlight via Command Line

This is what you’re looking for.

January 14, 2011 / Gary

Dumbest Software Interaction Yet

So I’m hardcore kicking out some awesome mockups in Adobe Illustrator, when I notice that my modifier keys aren’t working properly. When I click-drag something, holding down the option key should make a copy. It’s not. If I click-drag and hold down the shift key, it should constrain the angle of the drag. It’s not.

What sorcery is this?

The pat answer on the Adobe forums is that some other process or program is running which maintains a connection to the Internet, which in turn causes the Operating System to disable these modifier keys under the banner of security. Now that sounds like a bunch of bullshit to me.

But when I shut down Firefox & bounced Illustrator, everything returned to normal.

WTF?

January 6, 2011 / Gary

OS X 10.6 Terminal Crash on Launch

Boss at work reports Terminal.app is crashing upon launch. He can’t use the email batch exporter I wrote; this is chapping his ass.

I launch it from his Dock… crash log reports BAD_ACCESS_something-or-other. No help there.
I try trashing his terminal preferences; no dice.
I downloaded iTerm2, as suggested by Adam, and bring that up on his Mac. It works.

So without thinking, I type: open /Applications/Terminal.app [Enter] into iTerm2, and it crashes as it has been.

Wait a minute.

open /Applications/Utilities/Terminal.app [Enter] … Success.

Somehow, Terminal.app got copied into /Applications (mistakenly), and that’s what his Dock shortcut was calling. Kill that copy, kill the shortcut, drag to Dock from /Applications/Utilities, and all is well.

I have no idea why having the app exist in a different place would cause this behavior… some mysterious callback shit, no doubt.

November 24, 2010 / Gary

Webware for Python + Apache 2 on CentOS… Inside a VM

This post is a codicil to these instructions when attempting to replicate the described setup in a VM, specifically in VMware Fusion on OS X.

Following standard operating procedure results in:
Error: Can not listen for Adapter on (‘localhost’, 8086)

Make sure to disable or otherwise adjust SELinux and firewall settings to allow connections on port 80 and 8086.

Inside the WebKit-related <Location > directive of the Apache configuration file, use “127.0.0.1″ instead of “localhost”.

Inside your WebKit working directory, find the Configs directory, and edit AppServer.config. Change the line:
Host = “localhost”
… to…
Host = “”
… for listening on all interfaces, as the file describes.

Bounce both servers; experience victory.

November 22, 2010 / Gary

AFP Weirdness Appears to be Perms Mystery

Problem: User connects his Mac (running Snow Leopard 10.6.x) to Apple Xserve (running OS X Server 10.6.x) over AFP, authenticates successfully, yet cannot view contents of a particular folder.

Investigation: SSH into Xserve, verify permissions of folder, its contents and its parents, ownerships, group memberships, etc. Everything appears to be in order. What could be the problem?

Solution: Remove trailing space in folder name. Instead of “Software_DD-MM-YYYY”, creator of folder has named it “Software_DD-MM-YYYY ” with a space character at the end. Removal of space at the end = contents viewable.

Stupid computers.

November 2, 2010 / Gary

Overheard in iChat: Part 9 (District 10)

Gregg: Yeah I’m pretty sure thanks to gerrymandering there’s no chance the R will lose.

Me: The R will win.

Gregg: Yeah, 100%. It’s a certainty.

Me: The ONLY thing that would guarantee a more landslide win for R in my town was if the D candidate was a proven illegal who killed a nun in a DUI accident and got caught fingerbanging her corpse by a crowd of third graders on their way to sunday school.

Gregg: I CAN MAKE THAT HAPPEN.

Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.