Windows PATH

 No Responses »
Jul 312006
 

Since I hate it when I can’t get things done when everybody else seems to get it done, I’m still fiddling with the new versions of Apache, PHP and MySQL. On my laptop I decided to give Apache 2.0.59 (the latest 2.0.x) a try, to see if I could make the PHP-module work on that version. To my surpise, this version also gave me the error “No MySQL support”. Starting PHP from the commandline (PHP.EXE or PHP-CGI.EXE) with the -m option still revealed that the MySQL (or MySQLi) extension was loaded properly.

When running PHPINFO.PHP from the newly installed server I noticed one small thing. The PHP directory was not included in the path. Did I in all horror remove it again from the PATH? A quickly opened command-prompt learned I did not: it was still on the path. So….how come the stupid webserver can’t find it. Should it be that I need to restart Windows. Noooooo. Of course not. But since it’s only my laptop, why not give it a try.

I guess you can see where this story is heading. After a restart, PHPINFO.PHP showed the correct PATH and magically also MySQL information. And yes, PHP works as a module.

Geez….how stupid is that? Restart Windows because some process that starts services does not recognize the new path yet. Even more stupid: Windows does not warn you about that. There are a lot of warnings in Windows to which I say: get lost and never come back. But here one would be in place.

Back to the original testbed. I’ll let you know.

 Posted by at 00:03

Server software outdated

 No Responses »
Jul 272006
 

When I look at the server-installations of most of our clients, I always ask myself: why on earth do they use the old version of this-or-that software package. Why don’t they just upgrade to the latest and greatest?
When reflecting this question onto myself: why don’t you just upgrade to the latest and greatest? Why is the Gallery2 software still not up and running?

On my laptop, I installed a fresh Apache 2.2, a fresh MySQL 5, a fresh PHP 5.1 (and 5.2 snapshot). On my laptop, Gallery2 runs superb, with the only exception that PHP can not be run as an Apache module but only in CGI-mode. This is because the DLL’s to run as an module for Apache 2.2 are not production ready yet. Only for Apache 2.0. When using the DLL’s from the 5.2 snapshot, it keeps complaining about not finding MySQL support. But it’s there in CGI-mode (with the same PHP.INI).
Anyways. You can see where this post is going. To be able to upgrade my server to the latest and greatest, I need to check whether WordPress (this blog) still runs, if the other stuff will keep running (phpMyAdmin, CopperMine, my Wiki, etc).

So there I have my answer. I’m only an individual with relatively little software that needs to be upgraded in a cascade of upgrade. Our clients have numerous applications on several servers, with different software suppliers, different support levels and don’t forget: their upgrades cost a lot of money. Mine only cost spare time.

I’m confident however that my software upgrade will be possible, since the key-applications are already functioning in the test-environment. When the time comes to upgrade the server, I will post a message here.

 Posted by at 20:59

AutoHotkey

 No Responses »
Jul 212006
 

At the client I’m currently working for we are converting an old client-server Forms application to the latest Webforms (10g). This is because Oracle (read the SoD) is deprecating client-server Forms in 2008.
To get the “we have no support” out of the critical path of the project, it was decided to automatically convert the application to 10g, thereby not losing anything that’s in the application now (but not winning anything either).
One thing that we could not provide, was the macro facility that their terminal emulator (the forms run on AIX) gave them. So I started looking for a macro-tool. Lot’s of them out there, actually. But not many of them have a macro-recorder. Only a scripting language. Hey, if that’s what I was looking for, I would just use WSH or Python, or any other well-known scripting language. No, I was looking for something with a recorder.

It turns out that AutoHotkey, a freeware tool, was my product of recommendation. It doesn’t look that smart or fancy, but it has a lot of features, it has good documentation, it has a recorder, it can emulate a mouse(wheel), custom dialogs, compile to exe, it recognizes graphical content (for use with remote desktop software that only sends screens) and I could continue the list for quite some time.

So if you happen to be looking for automation software, and don’t have a ton of money to spend, try AutoHotkey. If you look past the ugly GUI, you can see it’s a real gem. And apart from being freeware, it’s Open Source (C++) as well.

The sample below makes your mousewheel, combined with the Windows-key, a volume-control. How cool is that?

; Win+MouseWheel forward: Turn up the volume
#WheelUp::SoundSet, +1
; Win+MouseWheel backward: Hush!
#WheelDown::SoundSet, -1
 Posted by at 00:17

Back to Gallery 1

 No Responses »
Jul 192006
 

Sorry folks, Gallery is back to version 1.5x again. Version 2 just randomly hangs and a reset of MySQL *and* Apache is the only solution. Unacceptable.

 Posted by at 00:21

Gallery2 quircks

 No Responses »
Jul 182006
 

I installed Gallery2 yesterday, but it had some quircks. First of course the save_path I mentioned yesterday, but at some point the whole Gallery software seems to hang. Mostly when viewing thumbnails and/or clicking on them to view the bigger image. You can read numerous entries about that in the support forums of Gallery2. Since Gallery2 by default enables several graphics-tools to create thumbnails, I found that I only had one of them. So I disabled GD, and while I was there, I upgraded ImageMagick to 6.2.8 (I still had 6.2.3). Restart webserver. Done.

 Posted by at 23:03

session.save_path

 No Responses »
Jul 182006
 

While trying to install Gallery2, the first step already crashed on me with an error. Something about not being able to write the session-files. But when I check the directory they’re supposed to be written to, the files were there, complete with their correct contents (as far as I could see). So…what is wrong. After some Googling and after reading the support-forums I found out that on Windows the “session.save_path” should be an absolute path, not just “/tmp”. So I modified it to “C:tmp”, et voila, it works!
I can now normally logout off my old Gallery (1.x): before the change it would always barf some PHP-error at me.

All this to show some of my Van Morrison pictures I took at the North Sea Jazz festival last Saturday. My father bought the tickets the first day they were selling them, and it resulted in us sitting in the almost middle seats of row 2! A couple of chairs to the right (that were occupied by other people of course) and we would have looked him straight in the face. I’ll update the post later with the link to the album.

Update: main gallery is here, and Van can be found here.

 Posted by at 00:25

Virtual PC also free!?

 No Responses »
Jul 142006
 

Probably in response to VMware’s Server, Microsoft announced Virtual PC to be free from now on. But….you still can only use it to virtualize Windows, not for Linux or Solaris, like VMware can.

 Posted by at 01:39

RC5-72

 1 Response »
Jul 132006
 

I’m a participant in the RC5-72 attempt of Distributed.NET. For almost 4 years now. With about 72000 participants we came to a staggering 0.336% of the keyspace. Yup. That means with the current keyrate (speed of PC’s) we still have about 1100 years to go before we exausted the keyspace. If PCs become about 50 times faster than they are now (unlikely, but let’s assume they will), PC’s will still be crunching numbers for the next 21.8 years.

The point of the game/contest is to prove RC5 (we cracked the smaller ones) can be cracked with a brute force attack (just trying every key). I guess it’s safe to assume that RC5-72 or anything with an even higher number of key-bits can not be broken with brute force without some radical changes in hardware or software-algorithms.

So….I’m stopping my number crunchers: 2 laptops and 2 PC’s will have a cool CPU again. You can find the stats of my team here.

Moo!

 Posted by at 00:58
 Older Entries