A web-focused Git workflow

Using Git specifically for web development.

How to install Git on a shared host

Installing Git on your shared hosting plan so that you can use it for web-focused development.

Git Is Simpler Than You Think

An overview of the structure of a Git repo.

Pro Git

A fairly thorough guide to getting up and running with Git, based on the book Pro Git.

Winer’s explanation is purely speculative, and some might call it a conspiracy theory. But it points to a big issue for free speech in the cloud: what happens if one, smaller customer criticizes a bigger customer? In the Web 1.0 era, if you got kicked off a Web host you just found another. Today, the number of providers like AWS are small. As AWS’s promotion material points out, cloud computing gives smaller outfits the ability to take advantage of high-performance computing.

So are Amazon and Apple jeopardizing small(er)-fry companies to keep their lucrative Federal contracts? What does such action mean for customers of all sizes? That’s what Klint Finley asks in Read/Write Web’s Amazon Web Services, WikiLeaks and the Elephant in the Room.

The guide is simply a review of privacy policies, to the extent we’ve been able to find them, plus additional information we received directly from Adobe and the Internet Archive. We haven’t been able to do independent testing to verify how these e-book providers work in practice. Also, in discussing whether individuals are linked to their reading we have only addressed direct ways … as opposed to indirect ways ….

From the introduction to 2010: E-Book Buyer’s Guide to E-Book Privacy from the Electronic Frontier Foundation.

One of the best outcomes from November’s Wave Protocol Summit was a proposal for Wave to enter the Apache Software Foundation’s incubator program. Apache has a fantastic reputation for fostering healthy open source communities that create great software. Last week, that proposal was accepted, and we’re spinning up the project infrastructure so that the community can continue to grow in the Apache way.

That’s news straight from the Google Wave Developer Blog.

[Via Mashable]

We have many Google (and Google Apps) users using Zoho applications and integration between Google and Zoho Apps is increasingly becoming one of the most requested features. We previously integrated Zoho and Google at Sign-on level (both Google & Google Apps) and now, we are extending this integration to the application level.

Zoho is my preferred online application suite. Nice to know that it now plays nice with Google’s offerings.

Git, of course, is the new hotness in version and source control with both command-line and GUI interfaces such as Gitnub, GitX, and SmartGit available.

I use SVN, hosted by Springloops with Versions at the day job, but we’re considering a switch to Git and GitHub.

UPDATE: Turns out, I wasn’t wrong. I was just clairvoyant . WorldMate is working on an Android version of its application.

Hrm. It appears I was wrong about a WorldMate application for Android. I managed to find an unused download page (by typing “android site:www.worldmate.com” in Google) that listed Android as an option. I assumed — and y’all know how the rest of that goes — that meant there was a WorldMate for Android available now. The HTC device (running S60) pictured on the homepage added to my confusion. Nope. No, WorldMate Android app. My bad on that. The post has been updated below.

Yes, I stole the title from Chris Elliott‘s post on iPhone applications for travelers.

I’m (currently) an Android girl, so I wondered whether it was possible to find similar applications for my G1. I couldn’t find perfect matches for Elliot’s list, but here’s what I came up with.

Where

• What: Where is a series of GPS widgets that you can use to find points of interest, find the cheapest gas, check the weather, or find an area brewery
• Sort of like: Aroundme and Cheap Gas! for the iPhone
• Cost: FREE, but ad-supported.

WorldMate

• There is no WorldMate for Android. What: As Elliott explains, WorldMate offers a bunch of features, including a currency converter, flight updates, integration with Google maps, and an online travel planner with the ability to consolidate your itinerary.
• Sort of like: Um, WorldMate for iPhone.
• Cost: Most features are FREE. Some require a $39.99 subscription.

WeatherBug

• What: Location-aware weather reports for 8,000 U.S. cities. Displays the current temperature in the Android status bar.
• Sort of like: He didn’t mention a weather app, but I am including one anyway.
• Cost: FREE, but ad-supported. Don’t like ads? Try The Weather Channel‘s application.

BistroMath

• What: Determine who owes what and how much to tip — in case you’re not down with using the built-in calculator.
• Sort of like: CheckPlease!
• Cost: FREE

Unfortunately, a FREE flight tracker isn’t yet available for Android. But if you really need one, FlightStats costs $5.99.

Do you use a travel-related Android application? Tell us in the comments.

OpenGoo is a mash-up of sorts, combining several open source projects and packages — such as Reece Calendar, Slimey (presentations) and FCKEditor(text editing) — into one suite. [Via OStatic]

Mac users can replace XAMPP with MAMP.* For portable apps, there’s the OS X Portable Apps suite.

If you need an offline blogging tool, you can try the ScribeFire extension for WordPress.

What are your tips for web-working without a connection?

*Yes, Mac OS X has a web server installed, but MAMP makes things easier in my experience.

For this tutorial, you will need:

• A Zen Cart-based shopping cart
• A Google Analytics account and the tracking code for both conversions and page views.
• Experience with PHP and MySQL programming

Also check out Google’s support article How do I track e-commerce transactions? and become BFFs with the Zen Cart wiki.

Creating a custom functions file

Create a file to house your custom functions. Name it whatever you’d like (with a PHP extension, of course). Put it in your includes/functions/extra_functions/ directory.

A word of caution: I created these functions with my own SQL, outside of the Zen Cart framework. There may be a better way to do it.

In the file you created above, add the following code:

# get the product ID out of session key
function custom_get_prodId($productkey){
	$pid = explode(':',$productkey);
	return $pid[0];
}

#get the product data
function custom_get_product($prodID,$return='all'){
	global $db;
	reset($data);
	$q = sprintf("SELECT
			pd.products_name,
			pd.products_description,
			cd.categories_name, p.products_price
			FROM categories_description AS cd, products AS p, products_description AS pd
	 		WHERE  p.products_id = 183
   				AND p.master_categories_id = cd.categories_id
   				AND p.products_id = pd.products_id",$prodID);
	$res = $db->Execute($q);
	return $res->fields;
}
# get the current user's data
function custom_get_userinfo($custID){
	global $db;
	reset($data);
	$q = sprintf("SELECT
			ab.entry_street_address,
			ab.entry_postcode,
			ab.entry_city,
			ab.entry_state,
			c.countries_name,
			c.countries_iso_code_2
			FROM address_book AS ab, countries AS c
			WHERE customers_id=%d
			   AND ab.entry_country_id = c.countries_id
				  ",(int)$custID);
	$res = $db->Execute($q);
	return $res->fields;
}

Adjust the names of the tables if you have added a custom table prefix during your Zen Cart configuration. We’ll use these functions to get us the user data and product data we need.

Edit the checkout success and global footer files

Add the conversion tracking code — provided by Google Analytics — to the checkout success page template. It’s located in your templates directory, includes/templates/YOUR_TEMPLATE_DIR/templates/tpl_checkout_success_default.php.

Also add the regular Google Analytics tracking code to your footer file (found in includes/templates/YOUR_TEMPLATE_DIR/common/tpl_footer.php).

Below your Google Analytics code, but also in your footer file, add the code below.

<?php
# do this on the checkout success page only.
if($_GET['main_page'] == 'checkout_success'): 

$userdata = $_SESSION['cart'];
$moreud = custom_get_userinfo($_SESSION['customer_id']);
?>
<script type="text/javascript">
pageTracker._addTrans(
    "<?=$userdata->cartID; ?>",
    "www.YOURDOMAINNAME.com",
    "<?=$userdata->total; ?>",
    "",
    "<?=$_SESSION['shipping']['cost']; ?>",
    "<?=$moreud['entry_city'];?>",
    "<?=$moreud['entry_state'];?>",
    "<?=$moreud['countries_name'];?>"
  );
<?
# for each product ID key in the userdata session
foreach($userdata->contents as $k=>$v):
	/*
	the product id gets stored as an array key as xxx:funkymd5key
	ex: 183:fw920e8ktw327uio67xew9mn. custom_get_prodId extracts
	the product id part of that key.
	*/
	$pid = custom_get_prodId($k);
	$data = custom_get_product($pid,'all');
?>

 pageTracker._addItem(
    "<?=$userdata->cartID; ?>",
    "<?=getProdId($k); ?>",
    "<?=strip_tags($data['products_name']);?>",
    "<?=$data['categories_name'];?>",
    "<?=number_format($data['products_price'],2);?>",
    "<?=$v['qty']; ?>"
  );
<? endforeach; ?>
pageTracker._trackTrans();
</script>

<?php endif;
} // flag_disable_footer
?>

I have only used the new interface for a grand total of ten minutes, but I can safely say that the 2.0 version of Gmail’s mobile app is a worthy upgrade. I’m using GMail mobile on a Nokia N80, running the S60 platform, 3rd edition.

What’s new?

The hot new feature is, undoubtedly, support for multiple accounts. The first version of Gmail Mobile only supported one account at a time (though, technically, you could have just logged in using a different account). Version 2.0 includes a menu option for adding additional accounts.

I’m also digging the ‘Mobile Drafts’ feature. Several times I have started an e-mail message in the car or on the train, only to have to stop mid-message because the light changed, or I reached my stop. With mobile drafts, I can return to the message later. A HUGE improvement over version 1.0.

Also new: The ‘Show data use per session’ feature. For those mobile users (outside of the U.S., mostly) who have metered, not unlimited, data plans, this feature is a little bit of a Godsend.

Another improvement: Speed. This version of the Gmail Mobile application feels faster than the previous one, even when using a secure connection.

Gmail mobile 2.0 is available as an application for Android, Symbian, Windows Mobile, Blackberry and iPhone.

Possibly related: My essential mobile applications

OS X comes with its own encryption feature known as FileVault. But in my experience, FileVault can cause some performance issues. If you don’t regularly log out of your machine, you may find yourself running out of hard-drive space faster than you should. Recovering that space is easy, but can take half an hour or more in some cases.

TrueCrypt avoids FileVault’s disk space issue by giving you the option to encrypt your data one file at a time. [Via Lifehacker]

Miro, formerly known as Democracy Player, likes to compare itself to the on-demand video service Joost. The two are quite different, however. Joost is very much on-demand television over the Internet with chat and sharing features. Joost’s shows are, for the most part, full-length programs provided by major media brands. But Miro is essentially a feed reader for video. Think of Miro as an open-source version of iTunes with less of a focus on audio.

With Miro, you can subscribe to channels via RSS. Most of the content available via Miro is high-quality video podcasts or television segments, not 30-or-60-minute television shows. Some of the content providers are big brands, though. ABC News, the NBA, and Wired TV produce just a few of the videos available. And many, if not most of these videos are ad-free.

As with iTunes, Miro lets you create playlists. You can also import videos from your hard drive into your Miro library. And though it’s not a highlighted feature, Miro can also manage and play audio files.

Want to share your channel line up with friends or between computers? Not a problem. Just export or import your feeds with an OPML file.

My favorite feature is Miro’s integration with major video sharing sites. You can search Yahoo! Video, Google Video, Youtube, Revver, and Blip.tv (among others), and import the search results’ RSS feed as a channel. True, RSS feeds from search are a feature of the aforementioned sites, but I like the ability to search and save from within the user interface.

Is it worth switching to Miro from iTunes or Joost? I think it complements Joost’s programming, but it doesn’t have any of Joost’s social features and lacks the heavier-hitters in Joost’s content lineup. Miro trumps iTunes for video playback, but iTunes still wins for music management. If you have an iPod, sticking with iTunes is a bit of a no-brainer. And because Miro’s channels are RSS, you can watch a good deal of its content by subscribing through iTunes. But it is open source, and that means a lot to many people.

Have you test-driven Miro? Do you prefer your Internet video in short bursts, or in a more TV-like experience. What software or web applications do you use to view the video podcasts you follow? Do we really need a desktop-based RSS feed reader for video? Say what you mean and mean what you say in the comments.