Archive for December, 2009
AskTheAdmin Exclusive Cheapo Deals for Last Minute Geek Shopping.
Dec 19th
Did you wait until the last minute to grab your holiday gifts well maybe it wasn’t the worst thing check out these awesome offers from Xbox 360′s to computer parts back to things for the little ones check them out and know that a itty bitty kick back will hit our Commission Junction accout so we can give out some goodies for the holiday season:
These Deals from Buy.Com are Valid 12/18 to 12/22
More >
AtA upgrades to WordPress 2.9 today.
Dec 19th
I have learned my lesson some time back and now keep my wordpress updated as quickly as a day after release. We have a mirror site for testing first and I can announce safely that the automatic upgrade works nicely and without a hitch. There are a bunch of new features, security improvements and overall speed enhancements.
Batch Plug-in Update in Word Press
When Word Press introduced one click upgrade for pluggins, it was like Christmas in July. But this time maybe on the actual Christmas or perhaps slightly earlier with the release of Word Press 2.9, we will now be able to upgrade multiple pluggins with one click from our WordPress Admin Panel.Optimize/Repair Database Functionality
WordPress has added a new feature to the core which allows you to repair and optimize your database. In order to activate this function, you will need to add this line in your wp-config.php
define(‘WP_ALLOW_REPAIR’, true);
Once you have added it, you will now be able to run the script which is located at this URL:
WordPress Recycle Bin / Trash
Regardless of whether you are a PC user, or a Mac user, we have all had moments when we accidently deleted something really important. But good thing about the operating systems is that they have something where our trash is stored at. In PC its called a recycled bin, and in Mac it is called the Trash, regardless of what it is called, the fact that we can restore it is what matters. WordPress has now added a similar functionality for the posts, pages, and the comments. Instead of permanently deleting these, you can now trash it and then later on empty the trash once you are completely done with what you were doing. By default WordPress will empty the trash every 30 days, but you can change the time limit by simply entering the following code in your wp-config.php:
define( ‘EMPTY_TRASH_DAYS’, 10 );
Image Editor
The image editor is something that a lot of users were waiting for and it is included in this release. This editor will let you make simple changes such as cropping, rotating, scaling, etc.
Ability to add Post Thumbnails
You have probably seen many sites displaying posts on the homepage with a post thumbnail. Or many sites having the post thumbnail next to each post in their index. Before version 2.9, it was done through custom fields. In this release, you can simply add the thumbnail when writing the post and displaying it in the template is even easier.
In order for you to have this functionality available in the admin panel, you must have a theme that supports this function. It is really simple to add support for this feature and we will have a full tutorial on this coming up soon. You will need to visit your theme’s functions.php and add the following code:
Yes you can install Windows 7 from a USB drive.
Dec 18th
Our buddy over at Bauer-Power was able to install Windows 7 directly from his USB drive. Check out his method below:
I was having some performance issues on my Dell Mini 9 recently and decided to start doing some optimization. One of the things I was going to do was change the Page file settings from system managed, like they are by default, to a static size.
Well, I had filled up my drive, and didn’t have enough room to do that, so I decided to re-build my Dell Mini. Why not? It’s the weekend, and I didn’t have anything important save on it anyway. So like normal, I pull out my external DVD drive that I purchased with my netbook, and began trying to re-install. That is when I started having problems.
This actually happens every time I try to install anything via CD or DVD on the Dell Mini. The external drive that came with it is hit or miss. I looked online, and it appears to be a common issue with the Dell Mini. Let me tell you it is frustrating as hell!
The good news is that I can boot off of a USB stick no problem. In fact, that is how I install my Bauer-Puntu partition on the Dell Mini. What about the Windows half though? Well it turns out it is fairly easy to make a bootable USB Windows 7 install stick!
All you need is a Windows 7 install DVD, and a 4GB USB Flash drive. Don’t have one? You can get a Bauer-Power one here: Bauer-Power 4GB USB
Better yet, you get one for only $10.99 $5.65 from Amazon here: 4GB USB
Once you have your materials, just do the following:
- On another computer, open a command prompt as administrator
- Plug in your 4GB USB thumb drive
- Run DiskPart
- Type List Disk and hit enter (Note the number of your drive, e.g. Disk 1)
- Type Select Disk 1and hit enter (Where 1 is the number of your disk)
- Type Clean and hit enter
- Type Create Partition Primary and hit enter
- Type Select Partition 1 and hit enter
- Type Active and hit enter
- Type Format FS=NTFS and hit enter (This will take a while)
- Type Assign and hit enter
- Type Exit to quit DiskPart
Once that part is complete, keep your command prompt open and pop in your Windows 7 DVD, then do the following from command line:
- Type in F: and hit enter (Where F: is the drive letter of your DVD Drive)
- Type CD Boot and hit enter
- Type Bootsect /NT60 M: (Where M: is the drive letter of your USB Flash drive)
- Now copy the contents of your Windows 7 DVD to your thumb drive and you are ready to install from USB!
After performing the above steps, I recommend creating an image of your install thumb drive so you don’t have to remember all of the above later. To do that just download Roadkil’s Disk Image tool, and save an exact copy of your USB stick to your hard drive some place. If you ever need to use it again, you can re-image your USB stick with the same tool.
Are you a Dell Mini user? Are you having problems with your external DVD drive? Know of an easier tool to create a Windows 7 install USB thumb drive? Hit me up in the comments!
[via Bauer-power ]
AskTheAdmin has been hacked by the Iranian Cyber Army
Dec 18th
Well um not exactly. Google Trend’s might have influenced my title :)
That headline should have been that Twitter was hacked and down for a good portion of the evening due to the fact that the Iranian Cyber army seems to have hijacked their domain. If you use the same password from your twitter account on other services now would be a great time to go in there and change it. When browsing to Twitter yesterday you would have seen this text:
Iranian Cyber Army
THIS SITE HAS BEEN HACKED BY IRANIAN CYBER ARMY
But they have regained control of their domain and posted this update on their status blog (http://status.twitter.com/) last night:
Update (11:28p): Twitter’s DNS records were temporarily compromised but have now been fixed. We are looking into the underlying cause and will update with more information soon.
After a few big name sites have had this happen to them you think people would start locking their domain’s settings! Could this have been avoided? Do you have more information? Are you part of this terrorist group? We want to hear from you in the comments!
IP Subnet Mask Quick Cheat Sheet
Dec 17th
Besides the fact that I am studying for another Microsoft test and staring at subnets all day long – I also get asked on a regular basis how many addresses can i get from a /24 subnet or what does 255.255.255.0 mean.
Let me break it down for you real quick like:
When you use 255.255.255.0 as your subnet you are limiting yourself to a network containing all the same ip’s except for the last number. Like 192.168.1.0 where the 0 changes. And using 255.255.0.0 Would limit you to the last two digits changing like 192.168.0.0 . Are you with me? It gets a little more complex with different subnets but here is a quick breakdown for you:
| Hosts | Netmask | Amount of a Class C | |
|---|---|---|---|
| /30 | 4 | 255.255.255.252 | 1/64 |
| /29 | 8 | 255.255.255.248 | 1/32 |
| /28 | 16 | 255.255.255.240 | 1/16 |
| /27 | 32 | 255.255.255.224 | 1/8 |
| /26 | 64 | 255.255.255.192 | 1/4 |
| /24 | 256 | 255.255.255.0 | 1 |
| /23 | 512 | 255.255.254.0 | 2 |
| /22 | 1024 | 255.255.252.0 | 4 |
| /21 | 2048 | 255.255.248.0 | 8 |
| /20 | 4096 | 255.255.240.0 | 16 |
| /19 | 8192 | 255.255.224.0 | 32 |
| /18 | 16384 | 255.255.192.0 | 64 |
| /17 | 32768 | 255.255.128.0 | 128 |
| /16 | 65536 | 255.255.0.0 | 256 |
Check out this IP Subnet Tool Calculator – MINT! http://www.syrex.co.za/ipcalc/
Gmail tip – send email directly to a label from anywhere.
Dec 16th
I recently made the switch from my private email server to Google for Applications. This made Gmail my primary mail client and I have dedicated some time to mastering all of it’s features – and there sure are a bunch. Today’s tip will show you how to simply and easily auto-label your incoming messages to your account. Before I get into how let me tell you why I want to do this…
I send emails from my HTC Tilt2 to my Gmail account from NewsBreak. This is a RSS reader and these stories are story ideas. So I created a label in Gmail called StoryIdeas.
Next all I have to do is send an email to Karl+StoryIdeas@MyDomain.com and the email will automatically be labeled for you without any other intervention! Awesome!
Do you have a Gmail tip – send it in to tips at AskTheAdmin dot com!
