export XML from SQL

This is the next thing I need to do for an application I am working on, won’t get to try it until next week but it looks like exactly what I am after, and quite simple! Fingers crossed.

http://www.sqlxml.org/faqs.aspx?faq=29

The Mozilla Active X control worked perfectly as can be seen in the screenshot above, the only problem is that it doesn’t seem to support xml? I opened my wordpress feed in the control and it outputted plain text, not the nested elements as it would if you opened it in firefox for example. This is what I wanted to use it for (xml with a stylesheet) so I think I’ll look for a control that supports this, most likely a Java/Swing combo. Python/ Ruby were close but I have more experience in Java and like using Java Swing GUI components. And having to worry about how the TK or QT frameworks work with each language is proberly not the best way to learn a new language .

I have been having a play with Ruby and I realling love the language and the pure OO implementation. It is very similar to JADE however I think it has already got more market interest! Especially with the Ruby on Rails framework.

Java Quotes in strings

Another one of those small things that trip you up every now and then (I always seem to forget when I need it), is having a string with quotations within it in a language such as Java. Here is how its done:

To have quotations within a string use the backslash \” before the quote.

String hello = “Hello \”Hello\” Hello”;

would produce Hello “Hello” Hello.  I think this format is used across many languages but I’m not too sure on that.

Linux – Show only directory files

Today I was asked how to only display the directories from an ls command, in a useful format. I knew to pipe the ls -l command through grep but had trouble remembering how to use grep to filter out files marked as directory. So for future reference and anyone that might use it here it is:

ls -l | grep ‘^d’

Easy

XML logging

I was thinking lastnight of projects I’d like to do and one of them was to make an XML parser that will take logs of common files such as from messenging applications, parse the file and write it to a database. I like the idea of all my logs being searchable and more secure and it also means only a very recent copy of a log needs to be stored (the old log can be removed once it’s added to the database).

I found an application on sourceforge.net called IM Sniffer that seems to do something similar, but I havn’t tired it. This application is written in Visual Basic and I’m after something more configurable, for example not just messenger logs.

I’d like to start with a (ruby? python?) script that takes a log from its default directory, parses the file and populates a database. The program I will start with is GAIM. This brought me to my next idea, what about adding XML logging to GAIM itself? This would be a very large learning curve but would give a lot of experience, what did I find?

GAIM already have a google summer of code project for this! as well as for storing logs in a database! The projects have been taken up which is fine as I don’t think I’m quite ready to take on such a project.

Will stick to the text file parsing for now Though my instant messenging isn’t really worth logging! Maby Apache?

deviantART turns 6 today

0ne of my interests is photography, I do get away from the computer every now and then A website I used to frequent was deviantART.com, a community for artists to meet and showcase their work. The community includes art of all forms from traditional to digital, application skins and wallpapers included. It’s been a while since I have used my account though and due to lack of use I have asked for it to be closed, still waiting on that!

I was looking at my friend Tom’s blog today and noticed they had turned 6 today!

The version 5 interface is a welcomed update, I personally just prefer flickr now, but as far as communities go deviantART is worth looking at if you are into art!

Tom’s posts (see links below) are worth a read as they are from the perspective of a regular and successful user.

So happy birthday deviantART!

Happy Bday dA

DeviantART v5

And I’m going to give him a free plug for his work

http://propagandhi.deviantart.com/ 

OSC Inventory

I saw the OSC Inventory application over at sourceforge.net. OSC Inventory keeps a database of a computers configuration (applications / hardware installed) will run on Windows or Linux and supports clients running: Microsoft Windows 95/98/Me/NT4/2000/XP/2003, Linux, Mac OS X,Sun Solaris, and IBM AIX. It is also released under the GPL license.

Their website also includes a very good explanation of the GPL license for people unfamiliar with it.

Open Computer and Software Inventory Next Generation

AOL released search queries

This story is doing the rounds at the moment, AOL has accidentally released 500,00 or so users search queries over the period of a couple of months. The data does not contain any personal identification associated with it, although it is grouped by user.

What this means is that if you are an AOL user (I’m assuming and hoping the majority of my readers are not), and you have searched your own name this will be included with the results. So sure, releasing what should be anonymous data is not a breach of privacy, but when you see a series of search strings as well as a full name in the list it can be assumed the search queries were made from that user.

Of course this is not necessarily the case,and you should never assume, but it does highlight the incompetence of AOL in this case.

I tried a download that was active but canceled after 20mins or so as its something I just wouldn’t use, I’m much more interested in reading the results of someone that has a ability to do a thorough analysis and report of the raw data.

AOL Releases Search Logs from 500,000 Users

AOL Releases Search Logs from 500,000 Users – Dig Submission

AOL apologizes for release of user search data

Monad / PowerShell

I’ve written a bit about how much I like using the Linux/Unix CLI and how powerful it can be, not to mention ease of use for many tasks and ease of scripting, well Microsoft now have a shell and scripting technology called PowerShell. Looks like a vast improvement from the exisitng CLI interface which is somewhat lacking.

You can read about it on the Windows PowerShell MSDN Blog.

Scripting with Windows PowerShell 

How to get Windows PowerShell RC1

Growing!

My blog was featured on the WordPress Blogs of the day >> Growing Blogs page at number 31. Quite an achievement and it shows that more and more people are reading my blog, so thanks to all my regular readers feel free to forward the url or xml feed on to anyone that may be interested!

url: http://evevate.wordpress.com

xml: http://elevate.wordpress.com/feed/

Mozilla Active X control

Yesterday I got a little sidetracked while working on a report and started helping a friend with a web-browser project (well a shell) he is working on. He had been using the Internet Explorer engine until we decided the Geeko engine would be the go. After a few Google searches we found an official Mozialla Active X control to be used in any environment that supported importing of Active X controls, In our case Delphi. We didn’t get it installed and registered as we did not have admin privlages on the computers we were using, a bit of a shame really but I don’t imagine it would be a hard install.

I looked so interesting I am planning on making a RSS feed reader based on it, will hopefuly at least have the control installed and showing a webpage by tonight.