http://www.markinns.com/index.php/articles/index/ en mark@markinns.com Copyright 2010 2010-08-27T09:15:55+00:00 http://www.markinns.com/articles/random_banner_script_using_php http://www.markinns.com/articles/random_banner_script_using_php#When:09:15:55Z I wanted to start alternating the banner advertisements on this site so started looking around for the simplest way to randomly display a different banner in my case a few lines of code that included the link, image and some text. I found a number of scripts that all seemed a bit clunky. I started thinking there must be a better simpler way.All the solutions I found used the php function rand. We end up having to generate a random number from a range e.g. rand (0,100); will give us a random number between 1 and 100. There are a few problems here, firstly the range needs to be set to reflect the number of banners we have in our array so therefore we end up having to count the items in the array or use a fixed number. The problem with rand is it deals with integers not blocks of code. I started looking for an alternative and stumbled upon shuffle. Shuffle as you would expect takes our array and reorders it at random as you do with a deck of cards. If you shuffle a deck of cards hen take the top card you end up with a random card from the pack each time. The other good thing about shuffle is it shuffles the whole array without us having to specify the number of entries. Code, PHP, Tutorials, 2010-08-27T09:15:55+00:00 http://www.markinns.com/articles/free_joomla_blockquote_module http://www.markinns.com/articles/free_joomla_blockquote_module#When:13:04:09Z Download the latest version of the blockquote module. Blockquote is a simple extension that allows you to add your own custom quote to any module position in your Joomla install and have it displayed in the front end.Download Module ZIP File (17,735 bytes) This simple module contains a text area for your quote and outputs your quote in any assigned module position within <BLOCKQUOTE> tags. Optional parameters include attributing the quote to the author/speaker output within <CITE> tags and adding a URL to the original quote if it was taken form an online source using the cite attribute. There are also options to position the module on your page position more accurately and you can opt for the module suffix feature to style with CSS. All releases have alliterative code names, following the same format as Ubuntu releases, using an adjective and an animal. The first release is Angry Antelope. Names follow in alphabetical order to make it easier to tell the latest release. Joomla, 2010-07-30T13:04:09+00:00 http://www.markinns.com/articles/move_related_products_to_centre_column_in_magento http://www.markinns.com/articles/move_related_products_to_centre_column_in_magento#When:12:49:59Z The default theme for Magento has the related products block on the left hand side which is not necessarily the best place for it. A more logical place to put related products is under the product description in the center column. It is simple to move the related products block but you need to know where to look.This article assumes you are using the modern template as a starting point and the line numbers relate to Magento version 1.4.0.1. If this is not the case for you the path to the file and the line numbers may be different but the process should still be the same. Magento, Tutorials, 2010-07-09T12:49:59+00:00 http://www.markinns.com/articles/password_protecting_your_site_with_htaccess http://www.markinns.com/articles/password_protecting_your_site_with_htaccess#When:15:23:08Z It is sometimes handy to be able to password protect your pages or an entire site. Maybe you're building a new site, but you only want yourself and client to be able to view the work-in-progress. Apache allows you to fairly easily add password protect an entire site, folder or individual file. This is the login box a Safari user will see when trying to access a site protected with a username and password. To add password protection to your site we need two things: 1. A text file on your server that will store your username and password. 2. A special file called .htaccess in the folder you want to protect. Each time I have needed to password protect a site in the past I have ended up searching around for bits of code and password encryptors on various websites. This tutorial brings all the information you will need to one single page. Apache, Code, Tutorials, 2010-07-02T15:23:08+00:00 http://www.markinns.com/articles/simple_share_on_twitter_social_link http://www.markinns.com/articles/simple_share_on_twitter_social_link#When:14:09:24Z At the moment it seems to be fashionable to add social networking links to your website. Recently a client wanted a quick and simple link to share a post on Twitter. The Twitter API is comprehensive but can be daunting for those with less advanced coding skills.We can skip the complexities for the API and use a simple string in a URL to create our link. The code is straight forward enough: <a href="http://twitter.com/home?status=Currently reading http://www.domain.com/post-url" title="Click to share this post on Twitter">Share on Twitter</a> Code, ExpressionEngine, Textpattern, 2010-06-25T14:09:24+00:00 http://www.markinns.com/articles/fixing_a_broken_contact_form_on_a_joomla_site http://www.markinns.com/articles/fixing_a_broken_contact_form_on_a_joomla_site#When:10:25:25Z If you are having the same problem as I have had with the Joomla contact form not delivering the mail to your email address maybe this solution can help. This problem only occurs under certain circumstances. You Joomla site is hosted on one webserver, your mail is on another and your DNS records on another. This circumstance is more common than you would expect, say you register your domain with 123-reg and enter your MX records here, your site is hosted elsewhere and you are using Google Apps (gmail for domains) for your email.To trouble shoot the issue first make sure your server is actually able to send mail. Set your email address to another address you have access to e.g. hotmail, yahoo, gmail in Joomla. If the form contents is received by this address we know it is not a problem with the servers ability to send mail but the address itself. Joomla, PHP, 2010-06-18T10:25:25+00:00 http://www.markinns.com/articles/homepage_conditional_statements_for_joomla_templates http://www.markinns.com/articles/homepage_conditional_statements_for_joomla_templates#When:14:33:26Z Jommla 1.5 the popular content management system (CMS) is built using PHP allowing you to use conditional statements within your templates to further control site. A common requirement is to determine if we are on the homepage. There are a few ways of doing this as outlined in this article using different conditions.We can test to see if view is set to frontpage e.g. using the frontpage component. The front page component is used on the home page by default in Joomla. Code, Joomla, 2010-06-11T14:33:26+00:00 http://www.markinns.com/articles/redirecting_visitors_to_a_holding_page_while_you_develop_a_new_site_apache http://www.markinns.com/articles/redirecting_visitors_to_a_holding_page_while_you_develop_a_new_site_apache#When:12:19:27Z When you are uploading and testing a new site on the same domain as an existing site you need to keep the public from seeing a part finished site while you are uploading the files and sorting out any problems.The best way to do this for those of us using Apache, is to create a holding page and redirect traffic from IP addresses other than your own while you are uploading and debugging. This can be done using a .htaccess file. Apache, Code, 2010-05-21T12:19:27+00:00 http://www.markinns.com/articles/export_excel_csvs_with_double_quotes http://www.markinns.com/articles/export_excel_csvs_with_double_quotes#When:08:25:39Z Excel allows you to save spreadsheets using CSV file format. This particularly helpful as you or your client may have data, say a product catalogue, that can be imported into another application. Continuing the example you may want to import this data into a shopping cart system like Magento. This all sounds good so far but Microsoft in their wisdom don't allow you to alter preferences for the CSV file format. Excel does it's own thing and if that does not match your way or the software you want to import the data into then things get a little more complicated.An Example I have an Excel spreadsheet from a client with 1000’s of products that have columns for Name, Description, Short Description, Category, SKU, Weight, Status, Visibility, Price & Tax Class. I want to import this into my shopping cart so I don’t have to go through and re-key each item manually. If I save the file as a CSV file using Save As the file is saved something like this: Excel, Magento, 2010-04-09T08:25:39+00:00 http://www.markinns.com/articles/granting_database_privileges_in_mysql_via_ssh http://www.markinns.com/articles/granting_database_privileges_in_mysql_via_ssh#When:10:16:24Z This week I experienced some problems installing Magento the Open Source shopping cart system onto a dedicated server hosted by Wedfusion. The installation seemed to go well until just after the database was populated by the installer script. All the tables were created as expected but Magento produced a rather unhelpful general error. After some investigation it turned out that the issue was occurring because by default a database created in the server control panel do not assign the CREATE TEMPORARY TABLES privilege to the database user. To fix the issue all I needed to do was add the privilege to the user and the installer then works flawlessly. Below are some simple instruction on granting privileges in MySQL via SSH.Step 1: Connecting to your server via SSH. See my previous article regarding login on to a remote server using SSH in OS X Terminal application here. Misc, Tutorials, 2010-03-26T10:16:24+00:00