Getting a Blip.tv Thumbnail from the Embed URL

Here’s a function I wrote to get the thumbnail URL for a Blip.tv video when all you have is the embed URL. It can parse the embed URL out of a larger block of text (e.g., a blog post). It doesn’t use their API, which makes it easier to setup, but also means it might […]

Switching to a Dvorak Keyboard

The standard QWERTY keyboard layout was designed for typewriters in the 1800s with the purpose of preventing the type bars from jamming. They achieved this by arranging the keys in such an inefficient pattern that the operator was slowed down to the point where they couldn’t type fast enough to jam the the bars. So why […]

jQuery document.ready() Fires Twice

There’s a bug in jQuery 1.4.3 that causes document.ready() to fire twice if there’s an unhanded exception. You can avoid it by wrapping the code that is throwing the exception inside a try/catch block.

Comprehensive WordPress Multisite Migrations

Warning: This hasn’t been updated since 2011. It should still be somewhat useful, but you’ll likely need to do additional research and testing on changes since then. Migrating multiple standalone installations of WordPress into Multisite can be relatively easy if you don’t need it to be perfect. The Codex has a basic guide and Stephanie […]

Installing Additional Software on Endian Firewall

Endian doesn’t ship with gcc, apt or yum, so it can be kind of confusing at first if you’re trying to figure out how to install some extra packages. It comes with Smart Package Manager, which you can use to install CentOS binary RPMs from http://mirror.centos.org/centos/4/os/i386/CentOS/RPMS/ (CentOS 4) or http://mirror.centos.org/centos/5/os/i386/CentOS/ (CentOS 5). Try the version 4 first. […]

Using the Underscore in MySQL Queries

The underscore is a special character in MySQL, and it can be used to match any character in comparison operations. If you’re not aware of this, it can throw you off when trying to search for it inside records.

Backing Up Files and MySQL Databases on Linux Servers

You’d think I’d have this memorized by now, but I always mess up the syntax and have to spend a few minutes digging through man pages or wading through search results to find it.

tar -czf [output-file.tar.gz] [input-directory]/
mysqldump -u [username] -p [database name] > [filename]

Adding reCAPTCHA to a Kentico Form

Google reCAPTCHA in a BizForm Tutorial shows how to use reCAPTCHA in a Kentico CMS form. Note my comment in the thread about needing to reference the reCAPTCHA library; if you don’t you’ll get an error saying that it can’t find the assembly.

Theme Metadata not Parsed Correctly

If you create a style.css file for a WordPress theme on a Mac OSX server it will use Mac line breaks (\r) instead of Unix (\n) or Windows (\r\n) ones. get_theme_data() won’t parse the metadata correctly, and it will be look messed up in the admin panel, or break the theme entirely. If your text […]

Developing Mobile Sites

If a client wants their site to be mobile-friendly (and is actually willing to pay for it), then the best way is to create a separate site designed specifically with mobile users in mind. Little Springs Design discusses this in their article about Mobilizing vs Miniaturizing. If the client’s on a tight budget then you’ll […]

myisamchk Error 22 on Windows

If you want to repair tables in a MySQL database, the docs say that you can just run myisamchk –silent –force */*.MYI. That doesn’t work under all version of MySQL for Windows, though, so you may get an error saying, “Error: 22 when opening MyISAM-table ‘*.MYI’. ” If you do, you can run this command […]

MySQL Service Crashes After Drive Failure

If a hard drive fails while MySQL is trying to write to the disk, the database could get corrupted. If that happens then you might see the MySQL service crashing every time when the first request is made after it starts. The error log might display something like this: InnoDB: Database was not shut down […]

Associative Arrays in JavaScript

JavaScript doesn’t support true associative arrays, but because data types are defined as objects, the common syntax works. This is a bad practice, though. You should just create a new object.

Conflict Between Comodo Firewall and Cisco VPN Client

There’s a conflict between Comodo Firewall and the built-in firewall in Cisco’s VPN client which can cause blue screens. You’ll see a DRIVER_IRQ_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL error caused by inspect.sys or vsdatant.sys. One way to work around it is to install the VPN client without the built-in firewall: msiexec.exe /i vpnclient_setup.msi DONTINSTALLFIREWALL=1 The other way is to remove vsdata.dll, vsinit.dll and vsdatant.sys […]

IE Pixelates Text During Javascript Animations

If you’re performing a JavaScript animation effect on an element (e.g., jQuery’s fadeIn/fadeOut), you may notice that the text briefly pixelates in IE. You can fix that by setting a background color on the element.

404 After Saving Custom Post Type

There’s an active bug related to custom post types and permalinks in WordPress 3.0.3. Here are the conditions that it exists under: Permalinks include %postname% A custom post type exists with an empty value for the slug key on the rewrite array A post/page/etc has been saved after the custom post type was installed You’ll […]

Sub-pixel letter-spacing in CSS

There’s a thread on the Sitepoint forums about the smallest amount of letter-spacing you can use. Most of the responses are useless, annoying and wrong, but #36 finally gives a good answer. Most browsers only support integer pixel values for letter-spacing. This is a problem because, when it comes to letter-spacing, there’s a big difference between […]

Distributing Fonts Via @font-face

Instead of using images, Flash or JavaScript to replace normal text with non-standard fonts, you can now use CSS’s @font-face rule. It will tell the browser to download the fonts and render the text using them. Internet Explorer uses the EOT format and everyone else uses TrueType, so you need to declare the sources in […]

Cross-Domain AJAX Requests

Browsers prevent standard AJAX calls across domains for security reasons, but you can make JSONP calls instead. If you’re using jQuery you just need to add ‘callback=?’ to the url: $.getJSON('http://some-foreign-server.net/ajax-handler.php?param1=foo&param2=bar&amp;callback=?', function(data) { // do stuff } ); Then setup the request handler to prepend the callback parameter to the response and wrap it in […]

Force HTTP requests in WordPress

I was working with a hosting client who wanted all of his pages to load via HTTP, except for a shopping cart. mod_rewrite rules are probably the most efficient way to do that, but we were having trouble getting that working, so I wrote a quick WordPress plugin to redirect HTTPS requests to HTTP, but allow […]

Ian Dunn

WordPress Developer

Author Archives: Ian Dunn

Getting a Blip.tv Thumbnail from the Embed URL

Switching to a Dvorak Keyboard

jQuery document.ready() Fires Twice

Comprehensive WordPress Multisite Migrations

Installing Additional Software on Endian Firewall

Using the Underscore in MySQL Queries

Backing Up Files and MySQL Databases on Linux Servers

Adding reCAPTCHA to a Kentico Form

Theme Metadata not Parsed Correctly

Developing Mobile Sites

myisamchk Error 22 on Windows

MySQL Service Crashes After Drive Failure

Associative Arrays in JavaScript

Conflict Between Comodo Firewall and Cisco VPN Client

IE Pixelates Text During Javascript Animations

404 After Saving Custom Post Type

Sub-pixel letter-spacing in CSS

Distributing Fonts Via @font-face

Cross-Domain AJAX Requests

Force HTTP requests in WordPress