George's Technology Blog
» Smart Phones, Web Design, Google or whatever
Using PHP to grab the Referer
Jun 18th
You can use PHP to track how someone got to a specific page by grabbing the referring page, called the referer. Use this code to get that info:
<?php
$myReferer = $_SERVER['HTTP_REFERER'];
?>
NOTE: Watch the code above, depending upon my current CSS in my current theme the single quotes or even double quote may change to fancy quotes which will need to be edited if you cut-n-paste the code.
MORE info available on PHP.net’s $_SERVER manual page
CSS: All Caps
Jun 16th
Need to have all caps and CSS seems the best way to do it? Maybe you don’t want to re-code an entire menu (like me today!).
Use this:
.allcaps {text-transform: uppercase;}
… and there’s no need to re-type a bunch of text links.
MORE INFO
Resize Desktop Icons in Windows 7
Jun 15th
I’ve got a new computer running Windows 7 Home Premium and at 1024×768 the desktop icons seemed huge. I found a nice shortcut to resize the desktop icons (I still don’t know the “right” way) that is right quick and intuitive.
Resize Desktop Icons in Windows 7
First, click the desktop once in an empty area to give it “focus”. Next, hold down the CTRL button and scroll with the mouse wheel. Scroll forward (up) to increase icon size, scroll backward (down) to decrease desktop icons and make them smaller. Note this will resize the icons – not the text under them.
Now I’ve also changed my screen resolution to 1280×1024 and they look even better, but I think I’ll monkey around with the size of the icon text some later.
Chrome Plus Gmail Equals LIVE Popout Windows
Jun 10th
Gmail is reminded us about popout windows back in March (when reading an email, chatting in Gmail, composing a message, replying , and forwarding email), adding that they had sped up page loading on email popout windows. They also mentioned that when you log out of your main Gmail window, that your popout windows also “expire”, or are logged out.
Today’s post Long lived new windows points out that Chrome users can now forget that last detail, and when they have logged out of the main Gmail window, their popout windows continue to be logged in.
MORE
Fast new windows
OTHER RECENT POSTS
Making it easier to video chat, voice chat, and group chat in Gmail
Google Maps previews in Gmail and Google Buzz
Gmail sweatshirts
Gmail Triumphs in the UK
May 6th
The UK and Google win in the UK…
Since “gmail” is 50% fewer characters than “googlemail,” we estimate this name change will save approximately 60 million keystrokes a day. At about 217 microjoules per keystroke, that’s about the energy of 20 bonbons saved every day!
You might be wondering what I’m talking about, and its the new option for UK users of GoogleMail to switch from their @googlemail.com addresses to @gmail.com addresses. If you ‘re a Brit and want to make the switch, there’s a screesnshot below, and if you want more details have a read of the official Gmail post: Google Mail is becoming Gmail in the UK.
PHP: Find Server and Domain Paths
Apr 27th
For building sites that can more easily be moved from one server to another, and allows simpler updating of common information like email address and phone number of the client.
Here’s some PHP to generate paths: both server paths and domain paths good for use in all sorts of ways for include and require statements.
<?
// for INCLUDE statements – this is the local server path
$urlPATH = “http://” . $_SERVER['SERVER_NAME'];
$srvPATH = $_SERVER['DOCUMENT_ROOT'];
include ($srvPATH.”/config-settings.php”);
?>
More later.
Gmail Drag-n-Drop Attachments
Apr 19th
Beginning 4/15/2010 if you use Firefox or the Google Chrome browser you can drag and drop attachments into your email. Drag and drop attachments onto messages on the Gmail blog has some nice screenshots (minis below) of exactly how simple the new process is.
Its not working in FF 3.6.x for me, but I do have lots of add-ons. It worked great in Chrome, though. Great thing is that you don’t need to go into Gmail Labs or settings, its already activated.
PHP Do Until – Do While
Apr 16th
The PHP Do While, just a quick post so I can find this later without Googling…
<?
$i = 0;
do
{
// do something
}
while ($i > 0);
i++;
?>
MORE
PHP Do While on PHP.net
