Author: Shawn Wilsher

The man behind the site.

Categories
Firefox Growl

Growl and Firefox

Well, about an hour ago I checked in some code into the Growl subversion repository for an extension that will get Growl working with Firefox. There is still a minor issue with it, and sadly the issue prevents it from working, but I think that can be solved sooner rather than later.

As of now, the only thing it does is enable the download complete notification to work. You might say “but we’ve already got that!“, but I assure you that my approach is much better. First of all, it doesn’t require that you have growlnotify installed anywhere. It uses the same code that I’m using for Bug 362685, with a few changes for it to work on the 1.8.0 and 1.8 branches (Firefox 1.5 and 2.0 respectively).

I’m starting off small, but it can get much more advanced as things go on. This will, of course, be more useful for extension authors (as consumers) as opposed to browser functionality (the only thing nsIAlertsService is used for is the download complete notification). I can add more notifications down the line though, and I also plan to support at least Thunderbird, and maybe even Sunbird too! I’ll try to keep anyone interested in this updated here.

Categories
Personal

Life

A lot has been going on lately for me, and while I’m on top of things, a few little things keep slipping through the cracks. So far, I’ve managed to stay on top of my homework though. Here is a brief overview of what I’ve got going on.

School

Having two coding classes may just be the death of me this term, however. The one seems fairly simple but the catch is that it’s a new language for me. Java isn’t too bad though, it’s just a matter of getting the semantics down. The other coding class is Data Structures and Algorithm’s, and to be quite frank, it’s a lot of work. Between homework assignments and projects, it’s keeping me very very busy.

I also have a rather fun class that deal with logic gates, but the lab for the course is a bit time consuming. I do enjoy the material though, and it almost makes me wonder if I should be doing Computer Engineering as opposed to Computer Science Engineering. I think I’m in the right program though :)

Work

I picked up a job while here at the University. Actually, I’ve got two going on three, but that’s besides the point. Right now I’m officiating soccer for the IM Department at the school. It isn’t great pay compared to other soccer games, but it’s not terribly difficult. I’m still doing games for MSPSP out here and actually have one tomorrow. On top of that, one of the travel soccer organizations is going to get me set up to do some of their games as well. It is rather nice to have an income while in school (in years past I have not had one).

I also picked up a nice freelance job to write an extension for Firefox. I cannot yet get into the details, but the pay is great and there isn’t a big rush on it. I love getting paid for things that I enjoy doing!

Rooster Teeth Site Extender

I have not forgotten about my most popular Firefox extension. There’s a new release nearly ready right now. I’m just waiting for any kind of feedback from my beta testers (which I have heard nothing from!). The new version will have a few nice new feature updates that I think everyone will enjoy.

Trunk, which is where most of the development goes, is a different story. It seems that many don’t like how I’ve got the newer editor working. It’s not done, so we’ll have to see what they say down the line. I think I’m crazy for having two active branches for development seeing as how I’m the only developer.

Site

I’ve been using Google Calendar for some time now, and I recently got around to adding a page that will let other people view my schedule as well. I’m not sure if that’s a good thing or not, but time will tell. You can find it here or in the sidebar. The cool thing about Google Calendar is that you can control what events are private and what events are public.

———-

I’ll try to update a bit more on things in the future, because updating once every month and a half is getting old fast.

Categories
Code Firefox Personal

Web Forms 2.0

I’ve recently picked up the task of implementing part of the Web Forms 2.0 spec from the WHATWG. So far I’ve got some work done on the RepetitionEvent Model and the RepetitionElement interface.

Well, my initial plans were to use XBL to implement a large portion of the code as per conversations with my co-conspirator Alex. Well, bz brought up an intersting point – XBL isn’t applied to elements that have a CSS property of display:none. Well, seeing as how repetition templates are supposed to be hidden with that CSS property, I couldn’t use XBL.

As a result, I get to test my knowledge of C++. Yey! I’d like to state right now that my skills in C++ are not great. In fact, I have very little expereice with it. I mean, I only have had two classes in C++, and one was a very basic course. I feel it goes without saying that I really have my work cut out for myself.

All is not lost, however. There are some really useful tools that are making this so much easier. For example, lxr lets me easily look at existing code and see how things are done the “right” way. Then, there is always a ton of documentation available on Devmo, XUL Planet, and occasionally Google comes into play. Then of course I always have the wonderful folks on irc in #developers. Folks like biesi, bz, and timeless have helped me countless times, and I am really greatful.

This is going to be a long and and winding road, but it will be very beneficial for me. I’ve already learned a lot, and I’ve got a lot more to learn.

Categories
Personal Technology

Google Spreadsheets

Last week I was helping a local political candidate with his fund raiser dinner. I knew that I would be manning the donations table and figured it would be a good idea to just type the information up right away instead of giving it to the candidate to do at a later time. So I grabbed my mother’s laptop and took off to the dinner. I knew that she didn’t have MS Office on there, but I figured it wasn’t a big deal since Quattro Pro was installed on it.

After helping setup a bit, I figured it would be a good idea to get the spreadsheet all set-up. Upon opening Quattro Pro, I was informed that the trial had run out and I needed to purchase the product. Crap. I thought she got the full version, but I didn’t have time to find out. Luckily, the place had WiFi, so I figured I’d just go download Open Office and install that. About a minute into the download I realized that I could sit here, wait for the download to finish, and then install it and waste about 20 minutes, or I could just use Google Spreadsheets.

I had never used or read any reviews about it, so I wasn’t sure what to expect. I was pleasantly surprised, however. It’s no Excel, but it got the job done. The best part was that you can download it as an xls file, csv file, or as an HTML file.

They have several functions too, like SUM and AVERAGE, but I couldn’t figure out how to get DATE to work. Overall I was impressed with the service, but it still needs some work and better documentation. If you are ever in a bind and need some type of spreadsheet software though, consider using Google Spreadsheets.

Categories
Mozilla Personal

No really, I’m still here

I’ve been doing a lot of work, which takes away from time I could actually post something interesting here.

That, however, is exactly why I am writing now! I’m embarking on something new yet again (did I mention I like being busy and have a lot of projects ongoing?). As many of you may know, I have been fixing bugs in the Mozilla Code base. Primarily, those bugs are dealing with the DOM Inspector, which is a wonderful tool that can solve a lot of weird issues you might come across. I find it especially useful dealing with large documents because the DOM is often too complex to just understand by looking at the source code. If you haven’t seen it before, I strongly suggest you at least take a look.

Anyway, what I am wondering is how many people actually have heard and use the DOM Inspector? I know a lot of my friends didn’t even know about it when I asked them (these are my technical friends, so I kinda expected them to know), so this is somewhat of a feeler. Your feedback is greatly appreciated!