JavaScript debuggers

For Firefox: Firebug

For Opera: Dragonfly

For Safari: Web Inspector (formerly Drosera)

UPDATE December 10, 2011
Was tipped off to an IE JScript Debugger by a friend: link

jQuery's .append() function doesn't work as expected, so use .val() for object string appends

Via: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/4722914/jquery-append-not-appending-to-textarea-after-text-edited/4723017#4723017

$(textarea).append(txt) doesn't work like you think. When a page is loaded the text nodes inside the textarea are set the value of that form field. After that, the text nodes and the value can be disconnected. As you type in the field, the value changes, but the text nodes inside it on the DOM do not. Then you change the text nodes with the append() and the browser erases the value because it knows the text nodes inside the tag have changed.

So you want to set the value, you don't want to append. Use jQuery's val() method for this.

$(document).ready(function(){
  $(".hashtag").click(function(){
    var txt = $.trim($(this).text());
    var box = $("#text-box");
    box.val(box.val() + txt);
  });
});

Working example: http://jsfiddle.net/Hhptn/

Great charts comparing XPATH, CSS, DOM, and Selenium code

Here (download the PDF charts in the bubble in the upper right hand corner of the page)

Selenium and username/password logins

I'm heading up an effort at my current company to write integration (browser) tests. We're using Selenium as our integration testing tool.

Here's the problem: many tests require one to log in as an administrator. But it would be crazy to check into source code an administrator username and password.

Here's a write-up of what was suggested to me

Sebastian Bergmann on PHPUnit Best Practices

A good overview:

Introduction to PHPUnit & Best Practices

View more presentations from Sebastian Bergmann

More in-depth:

PHPUnit Best Practices

View more presentations from Sebastian Bergmann

Sebastian Bergmann on Clean PHP

Clean PHP

View more presentations from Sebastian Bergmann

Interesting discussion on how Facebook does 'Dark Launching' and keeps 'Nuclear Options' available

https://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=96390263919

Great article on feature flipping

http://code.flickr.com/blog/2009/12/02/flipping-out/

Great article on the Time/Money/Quality Dilemma

http://www.startuplessonslearned.com/2008/10/engineering-managers-lament.html

Full ASCII & HTML Codes Chart

HT FlowerPoop (really, that's his nick)

Recently I had to use some HTML, PHP, & JavaScript code that mixed both single- and double-quotes (' and "). The problem was that I had to display names that at times would include both single- and double-quotes that were escaped (\' and \"), which was causing premature closure of HTML tag attributes, so what to do?

htmlentitites() didn't work
stripslashes didn't work
I wasn't allowed to replace a single quote with a backtick (`)

FlowerPoop found that ' is the ASCII representation of single quote. str_replace("'","'",) did the trick!

OS X running doggedly slow?

Suggested fixes:

1. Load up Activity Monitor
2. Sort the process list by Real Mem -- perhaps you can close something taking up tons of RAM, such as Firefox?
3. Now click System Memory near the bottom
4. Look at Inactive Memory -- if it's larger than, say, 100 MB: open Terminal and type "purge"

FYI this might require XCode

How to get access to a person's Flickr photos

The easiest way to get access to a person's shared Flickr photos is to ask the user to add you as a contact. After emailing them your Flickr username ( click here for instructions on how to get a free Flickr account if you don't have one already ) they will need to follow these steps:

To have another Flickr user add you as a contact in Flickr:

1. That user needs to log into Flickr ( http://www.flickr.com )
2. Near the top middle of the main Flickr page is "Contacts" -- to its right is a drop-down arrow. That user needs to click that drop-down arrow to open the Contacts drop-down menu.
3. That user needs to click People Search, which will be an entry in the Contacts drop-down menu.
4. That user needs to search for your email address or Flickr screen name in the search field and click the blue and white Search button just to its right.
5. Your username should appear in the search results; that user needs to click Add as Contact for your username. That will then bring up a window where that user can also designate you as Family and/or Friend.
6. That user then has to make sure photos in their Flickr photostream have been marked either as (a) public or (b) viewable by Friends or (c) viewable by Family.

You'll get an email once you're added with a bunch of links; I believe the third link is to add the user as a contact. Make sure to click the appropriate link to add the user to your Flickr contact list.

Assuming that this all works out, here's how you now look at the user's photos going forward:

1. Log into Flickr
2. Near the top middle of the main Flickr page is "Contacts" -- to its right is a drop-down arrow. Click that drop-down arrow to open the Contacts drop-down menu.
3. Now click Contact List, which will be an entry in the Contacts drop-down menu.

You should now see a list of your contacts. The user with whom you've been communicating should be listed. If you click on the username, you should see any photos that the user has listed as being viewable either:

• publicly,
• for friends, or
• for family

How to get a free Flickr.com account

1. In your web browser (Internet Explorer, Firefox, Chrome, etc.), type:
   http://www.flickr.com (or click this link: Flickr Home Page )


2. Click the big grey and pink button in the upper-right named "Create Your Account"
3. If you have a Yahoo! account, log in with that username and password.
   
   Otherwise, if you have a Google or Facebook account, you can link either of those accounts to your about-to-be-created Flickr account. You'll be requested to log into Google/Facebook, then will be prompted to grant Flickr access to your Google/Facebook account.
4. Flickr will then ask you to choose a screen name -- this is how you'll be known on Flickr. Click the continue / next button.
5. Flickr will then ask you for three pieces of information for verification purposes:
   a) First name
   b) Last name
   c) Birthdate