code_fu

A friend of mine pointed this site out to me the other day, and I think it’s a great concept.

ripple.org is a website that allows users to support several non-profits and charities by clicking to view an ad or conducting a search.

In this walkthrough, I go through the available options and an example using attachment_fu to handle file uploads and image thumbnailing, and responds_to_parent to implement the iframe remoting pattern to work around javascript’s security restrictions on file system access.

You can also download the complete example.

Here I am writing from my cousin's apartment in the West Village, N.Y. Longest flight ever. Short version: cancelled flight, delays at every point of the trip, and lost luggage. Welcome to the America :D

On my trip to Oz over the festive season I tried out Bluefire Grill at the Docklands in Melbourne. It's a churrascaria style restaurant, offering seafood, calamari, chicken, lamb, beef & pork served on skewers and carved at the table for AU$50. It's fine in itself, but doesn't hold a candle to Barbacoa in Omotesando, Tokyo (Map).

Everyone seems to be a wine buff these days ...

When each year ends, it begins a time of reflection; on past accomplishments and positive life changing events, as well as failures and loss. Hopefully for most of us it was more of the former, and less of the latter.

And just when I was wondering what some kind person could get me, at a special media event Apple released a new version of the iPod. The iPod Nano. It's a replacement for the iPod mini and has a color screen and is apparently as thin as a pencil according to Apple's marketing materials ;). It comes in 2GB and 4GB versions.

I used to hate coding JavaScript. Not because of the language (well maybe a bit) but the many countless hours littering code with alert() messages to see where things were going wrong. Sure, Mozilla has Venkman, but what happens when the error occurs in Safari, Opera or Internet Explorer? I really don't want to go through Message Box hell again now that I'm getting my feet wet with AJAX. Enter fvloggger by David F. Miller.

As usual with my last few trips I brought the rain with me to Fukuoka, the main city of Kyushu island. It was my first time there but we didn't really have a lot of time to do the tourist thing, since we were there to meet Uzuki's relatives and visit her family's cemetery on Sunday.

http://www.news.com.au/story/0,10117,15739502-13762,00.html

Now that scientists in the U.S. have managed to revive dogs that have been clinically dead for three hours it won't be long until tests start on humans.

Usually I don't drink beer when I go out since I'm more partial to a drop of red wine; however, one of my favorite places to go out for a meal and drinks is Les Hydropathes in Shibuya (usually as a regular meet up joint with my good friend Mikihiro).

After seeing an overhanging brace that looks at you funny in someone else's code, do you:

• Spend several hours methodically reformatting (and rewriting) their code using vi/emacs/NOTEPAD.EXE only to have it changed back on your next check-out.
• Start a "reformat code" war using your favorite IDE with the other developer, impressing your peers with the amount of commits the both of you do everyday.
• Say fugeddaboutit (one of the guys will change it anyway) and leave work early for a beer at the local.

Ever since I joined the Apple seed developer program earlier in the year, I've been going through a constant cycle of reinstalls trying out new developer seeds of Mac OS X Tiger. At one point, being an inquisitive - and some say masochistic - fellow, I decided to try out a HFS+ Case-Sensitive file system instead of plain HFS+. Case sensitivity is useful when interacting with different UNIX operating systems or when compiling and using some UNIX applications ported to the Mac.

I got a postcard from Tokyo Immigration telling me to go to there within a week to receive my Working Visa extension. I ended up popping down there this morning to be safe since my current one ends this Saturday! It definitely took less time than the last visit.

I've been downloading and trying out several dashboard widgets for Mac OS X Tiger and one of the most useful has been Hula girl.