My First Chrome Extension!

I started learning Chrome Extensions last week and haven't stopped since! And here is my first Chrome extension:

https://chrome.google.com/extensions/detail/jljcgbhckfkcjngjdmadimlkfjgoacal?hl=en-gb

It's called Miniclip Improved. It fixes all the adds (removing their 'stains') on miniclip.com.

Please Try it out!

flash vs. html 5

Ok,

HTML 5 is the new thing. Everybody is talking about it (well, the geeks are!). And there are arguments saying that html 5 is more power full than flash and will someday take over it.

When I first heard this argument I looked into it a bit! and decided that I prefered html 5 because it is open, unlike flash. I also preferred it because of the new elements:

etc. And the CSS3 curved-corners.

Then, somebody said to me "Ok, html5. WOW!! What can it do? Because all have seen is promises. Promises that it will replace flash. Promises that it will make websites better. But, I haven't seen any answers. Utube still uses flash and the html 5 version crashes."

So, I thought about that. What has html 5 done? this? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6wRUFJ9TKWA.

I am now in the middle. I like the new tags, and css3 but I also think that atleast at the moment flash is better for games and video.

Google Chrome after-virus effect

Before the chrome problem:

Ok, I got a virus. I was sadly using Windows (I needed IE), and I went to a website which somehow got onto my system. It installed XP antimalware 2010 and basicly wrecked my machine.

So, I reinstalled. Which was surprisingly simple. Only a case of a booting CTRL > F10 and reinstalling. So, I then restored all my programs and files(which I had obvously backed up earlier). Then, I went into Google Chrome and went to one of my client's websites.

Then, the virus returned. Somehow, when it had primarily got onto my PC, it had found the registry file(lying around in my folder) with the username and password, and then redistributed itself. So, I changed all my passwords and blanked the contents of the website(I had a backup which I later restored to it, luckily!).

So, I removed the virus for a second time. I did not reinstall this time, because I didn't deem it necessary. But, that had concequences:

Opening Chrome:


So, I opened chrome after a victorious complete removal of the virus(so it seemed), and a popup came up saying I had a virus. At the same time Windows Defender(My favourite anti-virus) said there was a virus. But, when I killed the pop-up, defender was fine. I even did a full scan and it said it was fine. Ok, then ran msconfig and I found an odd startup application. Sadly I forgot the name. But I looked it up on the internet and it said it was a virus!

So, I found the file, removed it and rebooted. The problem persisted and the file was back!

I removed the file again, and it still persited, so I booted of a puppy linux cd, reached into the hard drive and deleted the file. Hey Presto! It worked.

The real problem:


Now, I opened chrome and it said loading. I was impatient so I opened another tab and hit the 'Home' button. Still, it did not work. It only did an odd thing to the bookmark toolbar. So, I tried firefox, and I accessed the internet.

Now everywhere I looked, the solution was to and --disable-sandbox, which worked. But not very well. For it also set loose bookmark sync which meant that you may randomly be brought to one of your bookmarks when you clicked on a links.

So I read further into 'sandbox' and it looked as if it disabled chrome's own little security 'firewall', which was the last thing I wanted. So, I removed chrome.

Don't worry! That wasn't my solution. In the end I found this forum post, which linked to this executable which removes the problem, and lets you browse with chrome in peace and with the sandbox on!

I hope this helps anyone out there!

What I like about the Lynx

Ok, you have probably heard a-lot of things about the new Ubuntu, but this is just another one from a slightly different point of view. Here is my little list of things I liked(or disliked) about Lucid Lynx:

• The New Theme: I hate purple. I absolutely detest it. But, after I saw the way it was used in this version, I think it works brilliantly with Ubuntu.
• The Yahoo thing. You may have heard all the things they were going on about with Ubuntu switching to Yahoo, and I'm really happy they switched back(because I hate Yahoo Search!). The only good thing ever got from yahoo was geocities which is now gone!
• Gbrainy: I agree, there were a little too many games in older versions of Ubuntu. I don't mind only having 6 games. I also think that gBrainy is worth 5 games in one!
• The boot speed.  Now I thought Karmic was fast! Lucid is 10 seconds(literally!) booting on my machine.
• Gimp: I love gimp. Use it daily, and I hate the fact that they got rid of it. To me F-spot is a rusty Picture Manager and terrible at editing. Ok, maybe get rid of Gimp. But at least bring in something like MsPaint!

Sorry that I haven't been posting much lately. Other things to do!

Chrome: Web Developer's Paradise

If you have chrome and you have never gone Page > Developer > Developer Tools, You've missed half the cake. So far, almost all of my problems have been fixed using this built in 'program'. Waaayyy more powerful than firebug. I use it all the time. And I suppose all I'm saying to you is "try it out if you haven't tried it before!".

A Pig of a sub-menu drop-down problem

I was asked to make a drop-down on a website the other week. And I have spent ages trying to do it. It is a pig. Ok, the first thing I did is I went to www.sspxseminary.org (only for the drop-downs), and I had a look at how they did their drop-downs. Their drop-downs 'scroll' out and are compatible in all browsers.

So, naturally, I had a look to see if I could get their code. There is loads of scripts controlling it. Fat, big amounts of flashy code. Hated it! I gave up because of the size and the fact that I could barely get my head round it!

So, I went on to something else,something simpler. I downloaded some code of of a website and it said 'COPYRIGHT! do not remove this comment!', so I stopped using that code!

Next I decided to make my own code using Document.getElementdBybyId. And I found a simple hide element function in javasript. I perfected it with css, another function and VOILA! I had it working! The drop-down popped out when you hovered over it with OnmouseOver and went away with OnMouseOut. very Nice!

Then the problem's started to become clear! When you scrolled down and hovered over the link, it showed the drop-down in the wrong place, you couldn't reach it without it disappearing! And it didn't work in Internet Explorer! Ok, back to square 1!

So, I then(gave up!) googled 'html submenus'(or something like that!) and I eventually(eventually) found this place, and I found a multi-browser compatible piece of code. So, I messed around with that. This time, I was a little more successful.

So, this one gave me a way to have multiple sub-menu's by throwing the emement 999px to the left instead of hiding it. A little more unprofessional, but it worked! And it was also more compatible than the previous one. My first little problem with it was that it was made for lists, and my menu was in a table. So I had to put a list inside a table to fix that. Then I had to position it, that was eally a pig! But in the end it worked and this is the css I used(No javascript!):


/*Submenu styles:*/
#nav, #nav ul {padding:0;margin:0;list-style:none;text-align:left;}
#nav li ul {height:100px;width:80px;padding:3px;position:absolute;background:url(theme/rim.gif) no-repeat bottom;left:-999px;z-index:+1;}
#nav li:hover ul {left:50%;margin-left:86px;top:198px;}


I hope this help's all the geeks who read my posts(And thanks for reading them too) !

I am now a web developer!

Hello World! I am now developing two websites for two different people. I am now very happy! So, just to say, you may get a few developer's tricks from this blog in the future!

Crunchbang Linux Review

I did not expect much when it came to Cunchbang, but of course, I was proven wrong. I like the 'openbox' DE, the use of keyboard short-cuts integrated into the user environment, and I express my inner geek by saying 'it's cool'!

So, I tried out crunchbang 9.04 and 10.4 beta 1 today and I found them both brilliant operating systems(allthough I have not yet completely got my head round them!)

Bye!

Just another week

If anybody actually reads this blog. You may have realised that I haven't been posting for ages. Well, on Easter I will start up again!

The Great Cat

Ubuntu Lucid Lynx, today was the first time I tried a pre-Complete OS, and guess what, It didn't work! I put the .iso of Alpha 3 onto my USB and It booted, I said 'try without installing', and in the end all I had was a cursor and a line of code. Good first impression!