Products

Products

• Simple classified ads module for Drupal 4.7 and Drupal 5- I've created a simple classified ads module for Drupal 4.7 and Drupal 5. It is now in use on a large number of Drupal-based sites.

  Background

  My classified module creates a new node type ('ed_classified') and associates an expiration timestamp with all nodes of that type. Borrowing from the image.module image gallery scheme, it creates and associates a custom taxonomy with the classified ads. Site administrators then need to create child taxonomy terms for each classified ad category. As with any Drupal taxonomy, ad categories may be nested to arbitrary depth.
• WhyReboot-

  Why Reboot?

  WhyReboot is a small (~100KB) Windows application that helps you decide whether to reboot your computer after running an installer. It does this by displaying a list of "pending file operations" (rename, delete, etc) that will occur after rebooting your computer. Quite often, no reboot is really needed.

  You can download the utility by clicking the file attachment link at the end of this article.

  December 18, 2006 news flash: Version 1.0.1.537 now available. See our news release for more information.

  Ministry of Silly Prompts

  "Would you like to restart your computer now?" Arguably the most aggravating prompt displayed by your Windows-based computer.

  You know, when I woke up this morning, I said to myself, "I think I'd like to reboot my computer several dozen times today."

  Why should you have to reboot your Windows-based computer so many times when installing software? Why do Microsoft Windows installers create such a mess?

• IECacheList Lite-

  Display the contents of Internet Explorer's index.dat files, including 'lost' and hidden content

  Current Version: 1.0.2.0

  Overview

  Have you ever wondered about the contents of the Internet Explorer ("IE") cache? Wanted to know if the cache is really empty when you tell (or ask) IE to delete temporary files? Want to know what's kept in those INDEX.DAT files that are stored in your user profile?

  IECacheList Lite is a command line utility that will examine the contents of Internet Explorer's index.dat files and display them for you. The method used by IECacheList is designed to ensure that no 'hidden' or lost information escapes detection.

  The interesting thing about these files is that the IE cache tends to accumulate dead information, some of which remains even after you tell Internet Explorer to empty the cache, clear the history, delete cookies, etc. This causes the index.dat file to grow over time, accumulating these 'lost' bits of data on your hard drive(s). Another oddity is that IE seems to leave multiple copies of index.dat in different locations on the computer's hard drives, perhaps due to changing configuration or service patches.

  
  

  These problems have been attributed to a number of causes: 'bugs' in IE's cache management code, malicious data gathering by Microsoft, etc. See Google search: "index.dat hidden" for juicy details along with a dose of paranoia.

  In any case, it's never a good idea to accumulate bits of your surfing history, cookies, and other information scattered all over your system. Knowing about the information that is stored on your computer is a good way to become better aware of the need to clean this data from time to time. IECacheList is a good way to learn about it.

  ---

  Capabilities

  
  • Quickly display Internet Explorer cache, history, cookies index.dat file contents for currently logged in user account.
  • Allows logging of output to a text file for later use.

  Download

  Click here to download the latest version.

  System Requirements

  IECacheList Lite has been tested on Internet Explorer versions 5 through 7, on Windows 9x/ME, 2000, and XP.

  NOTE: Windows NT4 systems may have some problems depending on the installed version of Internet Explorer. We have not tested on Internet Explorer version 4, although it should work. IECacheList Lite does not work with Internet Explorer version 3 or earlier.

  Related links

  • PurgeIE - clean IE's cache
  • CacheSentry - monitor IE's cache and remove some 'dead' info
  • E-evidence forensic tools list
• Find Compressed Files-

  Locate NTFS compressed (or uncompressed) files on your system

  Overview

  I was interested in locating all the compressed files in my \Winnt (%SYSTEMROOT%) directory, as I was concerned that the Disk Cleanup utility had compressed often-used system components, which could result in a significant performance degradation.

  The built-in command line utility compact.exe that is included with Win2k and XP (and perhaps NT4) produced output that I found less than useful -- it was too verbose for my purposes (I wanted to generate a list of files, one per line).

• Insert AdSense Ads Automatically in Drupal Nodes and Teaser Lists-

  Here's a useful Drupal module that tweaks a node's body or teaser to insert an inline AdSense ad, when a node is rendered on a full page or teaser list.

  This allows site administrators to enable automatic insertion of an AdSense ad into the page without the content editor having to insert inline [adense] filter tags, or having to edit a site's template.php (or other template files.) This offers a big advantage, as you can change the ad format, group, and channel on the fly without hand-editing each node (which is the only way I can think of doing it if you are using inline filters). Another advantage is that you can enable/disable the inserted AdSense with just a click of the mouse - no need to edit each node.

• PMMon - Monitor Win32 Power Management Events-
  Mentioned on Daily Cup of Tech 1/10/2007
  PMMon monitors your system for Win32 power management events that are sent to all application windows, under the WM_POWERBROADCAST window message. These messages are then decoded and displayed in a log window. Where possible, the delta between previous and current values are shown. The current battery power level (if available) is shown in a colored bar at the top of the window.
• Windows System Tray Scan Utility-

  What programs are running your system tray?

  This command-line utility for Windows XP or Server 2003 will tell you which programs have inserted themselves into your "system tray"*.
  
  It generates a list of PIDs, the program's location, and the number of visible and hidden icons for each program that has inserted itself into your system tray.

• Drupal adsense_injector.module download (and source code)-

  News flash:

  Now hosted on Drupal.org CVS/Project repository. Please visit the Drupal.org project page for latest releases, bug/issue reports, etc.
  Now hosted on Drupal.org CVS/Project repository. Please visit the Drupal.org project page for latest releases, bug/issue reports, etc.
• Customize Drupal's 'read more' teaser link placement (Drupal 4.7 or Drupal 5)- Here's a standalone module to provide the customization described at AngryDonuts.com. You can see it in use on this site.
• New WhyReboot version (1.0.1) released-

  December 18, 2006 News flash: Version 1.0.1.537 of our popular free utility WhyReboot is now available for download.

  As before, it helps you determine whether you need to reboot your Windows computer after running an installer.

  This version adds several UI enhancements requested by users: copy to clipboard, window resizing, word wrapping in log output, and several other UI enhancements.

  Other enhancements are in the works, so please stay tuned!
  

• SysTrayScanCmd 0.0.9.2b released-
  
  Version 0.0.9.2.b (Beta) of the Windows shell tray scan utility is now available. This command-line utility provides a list of programs that have placed icons in the Windows shell tray, including the path to the executable file.
• MyBlogLog for Drupal 4.7- I've created a simple MyBlogLog module for Drupal 4.7. This module provides the following features:
  • Inserts the MyBlogLog tracking javascript into generated pages - no need to hand-edit your template's page.tpl.php file, or manually create a block to inject the tracking javascript.
  • Provides the "Recent Reader" widget block (includes configuration options - color, width, # rows, etc.)
  • Disable visitor tracking for Administrators and other users on a per-role basis (prevent skewed stats due to admin or other roles' visits.)
  
  

  ... and more

• Help for the weary Drupal developer: api.drupal.org and drupal.org OpenSearch plugins -
  
  I've created some Drupal-specific OpenSearch plugins for Firefox (and IE7, too!). They provide Drupal.org and api.drupal.org search integration in browsers supporting the OpenSearch search plugin protocol. They are useful when searching for Drupal API routines or other Drupal development subjects. Install them as you would any other OpenSearch plugin...