Less Stupid Than Yesterday

Elevator Conversation They say you learn something new every day. This is my attempt to document that. More Detail If you do learn something new every day, how long do you remember it for? That's a lot of things to store. This is my store of "learned things". I like Steve Makofsky's description of his blog as "backup of my brain". Even More Detail My other thought was about Steve Yegge's comment that "I sucked, and I still do, although hopefully less every year." Steve's talking about coding, but I think it works for every aspect of your life. After all, replace the word "code" with your chosen profession in this quote from Jeff Atwood and you've got what this site is all about: "You should be unhappy with code you wrote a year ago. If you aren't, that means either A) you haven't learned anything in a year, B) your code can't be improved, or C) you never revisit old code."

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Wordpress Edit Links (11/06/2017)

I haven’t done this for a while now, but I was thinking about where to store some useful nuggets I’ve come across while learning Wordpress and it occured to me that that is exactly what this is for.

In Wordpress, there’s a button at the bottom of articles that, if you’re logged in, gives you quick access to edit the article. It uses this function:

edit_post_link()

It’s all very, but what if you want to change what it says?

Turns out, it’s easy enough:

edit_post_link('New text')

I’m impressed by how good the Wordpress documentation is actually - especially since a lot of the code is horrible old php.

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Dynamic Vbscript Arrays (25/06/2013)

For some reason, you can't do this in vbscript:

x = 15  Dim demoArray(x) 

It throws this error:

Microsoft VBScript compilation (0x800A0402)  Expected integer constant

Instead, you have to do this:

x = 15  Dim demoArray()  ReDim demoArray(x) 

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MOVs in Sony Vegas (26/05/2013)

I use Sony Vegas for video editing. It's a great application: really simple, and somehow much more intuitive than Premier Pro or Avid.

By default, when you install it on Windows, it can't read mov files, because Windows doesn't come with the driver, so, sadly, you need to install Quick Time.

For some reason though, at least with my version of Sony Vegas (8), there's a problem with the latest version of QuickTime, and Vegas can only get the sound, not the video from MOV files.

The solution is to install an old version of Quick Time. I've used 7.62 in my latest project, and that worked fine, so anything older than that is fine. 

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Vbscript line breaks (03/02/2012)

Usually, in vbscript, a line break is

vbCrLf 

 But that's actually a new line and a carriage return, so to be on the safe side, if you want to get rid of line breaks, it's best to also remove:

vbCr

vbLF

too 

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Extracting Files from VHD (13/01/2013)

Still messing around with Virtual Hard drives today, I needed to get a large file off of a VHD (and actually, I needed to add a file to it as well).

I always find virutalisation a little tricky, but discovered today you can add VHD files as virtual hard drives in Windows 7.

Just go to Computer Management, then click on Disk Management On the Action menu, select Attach VHD and you're away. It'll appear in My Computer, like any other drive.

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Compacting Access without Access (10/01/2013)

I needed to compact an Access database on a machine that doesn't have Access installed.

It turns out there's a Microsoft command line tool that can do this quite easily: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/295334

The syntax is quite simple:

jetcomp.exe -src:"C:\database.MDB" -dest:"databasec.MDB"

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Pinning to Start Menu (09/01/2012)

It's always annoyed me that some items in Windows 7 wouldn't allow you to pin them to the start menu. It turns out, if you hold down shift while you right click you get the option to pin anything to the start menu.

I feel silly now for not knowing that. 

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Internet Sharing with Microsoft Virtual Machine 2007 (03/02/2013)

I'm thinking of reinstalling Windows 7 (yes, I know 8 is out, but I don't want it). New Year, new OS. God I know how to party.

When I install a new OS, I always install it onto a virtual machine first. To test it, and also because my install disc is one I customized a bit.

So, I cranked up Microsoft Virtual Machine 2007 and installed Windows 7. All was fine, except I couldn't connect the virtual machine to the Internet. I tried setting the network adapter to NAT as Google advised, and nothing.

Then I found someone mentioning that there's a feature on your network adapter to enable virtual sharing. So I fired up Networking Sharing Centre. 

Clicked on the active connection 

Clicked Properties

And ticked "Virtual machine network services".

Low and beyond, the wireless network adapter was now an option on the virtual machine and I was away.

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Command Line ImageMagick (23/12/2012)

For some websites that I run I fairly regularly need to resize some photos to a certain width. ImageMagick is a great application for command line image manipulation.

The syntax to convert a file to a specific width and the corresponding height (which is what I want to do) is:

convert InputName.jpg -resize 550x Outputname.jpg 

What I've found useful is running command line scripts through vbscript:

Set wshShell = WScript.CreateObject("WSCript.shell") wshShell.Run "cmd.exe /C convert InputName.jpg -resize 550x Outputname.jpg", 0, True

I know you can do all sorts of clever things from the command line, but not quite as many as vbscript can. I find it really useful to be able to access all of the vbscript logic, and read and write text files and so on, while at the same time being able to issue commands to the command prompt.

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Converting days to Numbers in Excel (15/11/2012)

I have a spreadsheet, with a list of days in it. I want to sort them by their order in the week (ie, Monday - Sunday), but Excel being Excel, it seems them as words and sorts them in alphabetical order.

I've had a bit of a play and found two functions I never really use, both of which can do this:

Match

=MATCH(A1,{"Monday","Tuesday","Wednesday","Thursday","Friday","Saturday","Sunday"},0) 

This is neat and  concise, but just returns the array element number.

Lookup

=LOOKUP(A1,{"Friday",5;"Monday",1;"Saturday",6;"Sunday",7;"Thursday",4;"Tues day",2;"Wednesday",3}) 

 A bit longer, but allows you to return arbitrary values, not just the array position.

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Automating Photoshop (08/11/2012)

I've been obsessed with automating and scripting things for a while now. I know it's weird, but I actually enjoy scripting. It's precise, it's quick it's efficient.

I've been using vbscript a lot, since you can automate most core components of Windows, you can automate Microsoft Office and also, it's very easy. It has a syntax that really makes sense to me. There aren't lots of curly braces, which I'm not a big fan of.

However, today, by chance, I discovered that you can automate much of Photoshop too using Actions. It essentially works by creating a Macro. You click on Window => Actions and then you can record a new action. I wish I'd known this yesterday when I went through and recoloured 26 images. But oh well, you live and learn. So I'll be less stupid next time, which is all I can hope for.

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New lines in Notepad2 (31/10/2012)

I've always been a big fan on Notepad2. It's far better than the standard Notepad, has syntax highlighting, more features and is very fast.

It's also just a single executable file and tiny. There are plenty of notepad replacements, but this one is so simple, that it's my go to replacement.

One thing I've often wanted to do though, is add or remove line breaks. I've never managed to do this before, but today I realised it's actually very simple, I was just being stupid.

I came across a blog that reminded me how to do it. There are a couple of different new line characters: \r or \n, but if you want to add them in, you just need to remember to tick "Transform backlashes".

Brilliant. Another minor inconvenience solved.

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Listing Tables (15/10/2012)

I needed to list all the tables in a SQL Server instance today.

It turns out, it's not that hard:

EXEC [sp_tables]

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Check if a window is open (09/10/2012)

This script runs in the background and stays there until "My Shared Folder" is opened, and then it pops up and says it's opened. "My Shared Folder" doesn't have to be  the active window, it just needs to be open.

   Set oShell = CreateObject("WScript.Shell") DO UNTIL Done = "Yes"   If oShell.AppActivate("My Shared Folder") Then     Done = "Yes"     Wscript.echo "My Shared Folder is Open"     wscript.sleep 300   End If LOOP

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Excel Passwords (17/09/2012)

I needed to write a script to remove passwords from Excel files today (I did know, the password, this wasn't a cracking exercise).

The function is pretty self explanatory. it takes two arguments, and removes the password.

Filenamewithpath  = "D:\VBscripts\test.xlsx" Password             = "6tg4HHE"

RemovePassword Filenamewithpath,Password

FUNCTION RemovePassword(Filenamewithpath,Password)

Set objExcel = CreateObject("Excel.Application")  objExcel.Visible = FALSE  objExcel.DisplayAlerts = FALSE

Set objWorkbook = objExcel.Workbooks.Open(Filenamewithpath,,,,Password)  objWorkbook.Password = ""  objWorkbook.SaveAs Filenamewithpath  objWorkbook.close

  set objExcel = nothing   set objWorkbook = nothing 

END FUNCTION

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Shape Constants in Excel (07/09/2012)

So, I've been messing around automating Excel recently. And one thing I've discovered is that Microsoft has loads of "constants" which don't work in vbscript.

It's kind of annoying - but it does mean it helps with identifying what, say, 53, will do (it draws a box with an arrow).

Luckily, there's a list of them all, which I'm duplicating here, just in case the original site disappears.

msoShapeMixed -2  msoShapeRectangle 1 msoShapeParallelogram 2 msoShapeTrapezoid 3 msoShapeDiamond 4 msoShapeRoundedRectangle 5 msoShapeOctagon 6 msoShapeIsoscelesTriangle 7 msoShapeRightTriangle 8 msoShapeOval 9 msoShapeHexagon 10 msoShapeCross 11 msoShapeRegularPentagon 12 msoShapeCan 13 msoShapeCube 14 msoShapeBevel 15 msoShapeFoldedCorner 16 msoShapeSmileyFace 17 msoShapeDonut 18 msoShapeNoSymbol 19 msoShapeBlockArc 20 msoShapeHeart 21 msoShapeLightningBolt 22 msoShapeSun 23 msoShapeMoon 24 msoShapeArc 25 msoShapeDoubleBracket 26 msoShapeDoubleBrace 27 msoShapePlaque 28 msoShapeLeftBracket 29 msoShapeRightBracket 30 msoShapeLeftBrace 31 msoShapeRightBrace 32 msoShapeRightArrow 33 msoShapeLeftArrow 34 msoShapeUpArrow 35 msoShapeDownArrow 36 msoShapeLeftRightArrow 37 msoShapeUpDownArrow 38 msoShapeQuadArrow 39 msoShapeLeftRightUpArrow 40 msoShapeBentArrow 41 msoShapeUTurnArrow 42 msoShapeLeftUpArrow 43 msoShapeBentUpArrow 44 msoShapeCurvedRightArrow 45 msoShapeCurvedLeftArrow 46 msoShapeCurvedUpArrow 47 msoShapeCurvedDownArrow 48 msoShapeStripedRightArrow 49 msoShapeNotchedRightArrow 50 msoShapePentagon 51 msoShapeChevron 52 msoShapeRightArrowCallout 53 msoShapeLeftArrowCallout 54 msoShapeUpArrowCallout 55 msoShapeDownArrowCallout 56 msoShapeLeftRightArrowCallout 57 msoShapeUpDownArrowCallout 58 msoShapeQuadArrowCallout 59 msoShapeCircularArrow 60 msoShapeFlowchartProcess 61 msoShapeFlowchartAlternateProcess 62 msoShapeFlowchartDecision 63 msoShapeFlowchartData 64 msoShapeFlowchartPredefinedProcess 65 msoShapeFlowchartInternalStorage 66 msoShapeFlowchartDocument 67 msoShapeFlowchartMultidocument 68 msoShapeFlowchartTerminator 69 msoShapeFlowchartPreparation 70 msoShapeFlowchartManualInput 71 msoShapeFlowchartManualOperation 72 msoShapeFlowchartConnector 73 msoShapeFlowchartOffpageConnector 74 msoShapeFlowchartCard 75 msoShapeFlowchartPunchedTape 76 msoShapeFlowchartSummingJunction 77 msoShapeFlowchartOr 78 msoShapeFlowchartCollate 79 msoShapeFlowchartSort 80 msoShapeFlowchartExtract 81 msoShapeFlowchartMerge 82 msoShapeFlowchartStoredData 83 msoShapeFlowchartDelay 84 msoShapeFlowchartSequentialAccessStorage 85 msoShapeFlowchartMagneticDisk 86 msoShapeFlowchartDirectAccessStorage 87 msoShapeFlowchartDisplay 88 msoShapeExplosion1 89 msoShapeExplosion2 90 msoShape4pointStar 91 msoShape5pointStar 92 msoShape8pointStar 93 msoShape16pointStar 94 msoShape24pointStar 95 msoShape32pointStar 96 msoShapeUpRibbon 97 msoShapeDownRibbon 98 msoShapeCurvedUpRibbon 99 msoShapeCurvedDownRibbon 100 msoShapeVerticalScroll 101 msoShapeHorizontalScroll 102 msoShapeWave 103 msoShapeDoubleWave 104 msoShapeRectangularCallout 105 msoShapeRoundedRectangularCallout 106 msoShapeOvalCallout 107 msoShapeCloudCallout 108 msoShapeLineCallout1 109 msoShapeLineCallout2 110 msoShapeLineCallout3 111 msoShapeLineCallout4 112 msoShapeLineCallout1AccentBar 113 msoShapeLineCallout2AccentBar 114 msoShapeLineCallout3AccentBar 115 msoShapeLineCallout4AccentBar 116 msoShapeLineCallout1NoBorder 117 msoShapeLineCallout2NoBorder 118 msoShapeLineCallout3NoBorder 119 msoShapeLineCallout4NoBorder 120 msoShapeLineCallout1BorderandAccentBar 121 msoShapeLineCallout2BorderandAccentBar 122 msoShapeLineCallout3BorderandAccentBar 123 msoShapeLineCallout4BorderandAccentBar 124 msoShapeActionButtonCustom 125 msoShapeActionButtonHome 126 msoShapeActionButtonHelp 127 msoShapeActionButtonInformation 128 msoShapeActionButtonBackorPrevious 129 msoShapeActionButtonForwardorNext 130 msoShapeActionButtonBeginning 131 msoShapeActionButtonEnd 132 msoShapeActionButtonReturn 133 msoShapeActionButtonDocument 134 msoShapeActionButtonSound 135 msoShapeActionButtonMovie 136 msoShapeBalloon 137 msoShapeNotPrimitive 138 

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Automating Excel (04/09/2012)

When I'm outputting text or data, I tend to output it into text files. They're simple and clean. But people often want Excel files. Yeah, I don't understand it either.

I sat down today and had a look at writing extra data to an Excel file, and found that adding data to the last line isn't always simple.

set objExcel = CreateObject("Excel.Application") Set objWorkbook = objExcel.Workbooks.Open(FILENAME)  objExcel.Sheets(SHEETNAME).Select LastRow = objExcel.ActiveSheet.UsedRange.Rows.Count  objExcel.Cells(LastRow + 1, 1).Value = "Test value" objExcel.ActiveWorkbook.Save objExcel.ActiveWorkbook.Close objExcel.Application.Quit

This function loads an Excel file, finds the first blank row and writes to it, then saves and closes the file. And does so, all invisibly to the user.