Notify all phpBB users at new post

Last weekend I made a little hack for the phpBB software. Now every time a user makes a new post to our phpBB-forum, ALL users are notified by email. Since we have a closed board, there a only a few users and a few comments a day.

Instructions:
- Locate the file includes/functions_posting.php
- Find this code in the file:

Click to read more ...

Finder keeps crashing and appearing

My finder keeps appearing in front every minute, since this morning. While working in a program, suddenly the Finder appeared and I had to select the program again I was working in. Very annoying! After inspecting the crashlog, it seems to repeat every 90 seconds.

The only change on my system was the automatic update of Quicktime last night. While searching the forums on the internet, is seems that the latest version of Quicktime does not feel happy with Stuffit AVR.

The solution is to stop the Stuffit deamon. Go to your preferences pane, at the bottom, click the Stuffit AVR icon. Select stop. That solved my problem!

Disable the OS-X boot sound

Have you ever booted your MacBook in a train, plane or other public environment? Just after pressing te power button, your Mac produces a sound like a complete orchestra, placing you in the middle of an public attraction.

There is an add on for the system preferences panel called StartupSound.prefPane which you can find on http://www5e.biglobe.ne.jp/~arcana/software.en.html. This software enables you to control the volume of the startup sound of your Macintosh computer from Mac OS X.

Enjoy the silence!

Called by +882... ? Warning for fraud!

This morning I received a call from the number +8821321334. It rang once and disconnected. I suspected a network failure and almost reflexively hit the callback button on my phone.

Curious as I am, however, I decided instead to Google the +88 or +882 prefix to see which country that prefix belonged to. Surprise: No such country! A subsequent Google for the complete number +8821321334 reveals information identifying the number as part of a comprehensive fraud. This is not a number belonging to a country but rather a number that calls an expensive satellite connection.

The owners of the number apparently randomly dial phone numbers and hang up, hoping for you to call back. There are stories of people paying twenty Euro's or more per call.

Easy crontab with @ parameter

Today I had a 'ah erbelnis' (german)! Every time when I had to edit my crontab I had to count the five stars: months, hours etc. But take a look at...

man 5 crontab

We can use the @-parameter at the crontab:
Instead of the first five fields, one of eight special strings may appear:

string meaning
------ -------
@reboot Run once, at startup.
@yearly Run once a year, "0 0 1 1 *".
@annually (same as @yearly)
@monthly Run once a month, "0 0 1 * *".
@weekly Run once a week, "0 0 * * 0".
@daily Run once a day, "0 0 * * *".
@midnight (same as @daily)
@hourly Run once an hour, "0 * * * *".

Isn't that easy? Especially the @reboot, now we even can initiate reboot commandsat user level!