Trying out OpenDNS service 1 November 2006, 02:22
Posted by Orhan in : Geeky Techy Stuff , add a comment2nd UPDATE: The problem was with internet service provider (charter). Started using OpenDNS again. So far so good, again 
11/16/2006
UPDATE: Experienced delays and a lot of unsuccessful loading attempts with correct urls. Stopping for the time being. I will give it a try again later. 22:13 10/31/2006
I decided to give the OpenDNS, a free -and claimed to be fast- DNS service a try. It has been 5 minutes or so and so far so good
What OpenDNS says: (more…)
Auburn vs Florida, Oct 14 2006, Great game! 15 October 2006, 16:45
Posted by Orhan in : General , add a comment
Fix broken ipod by putting into a freezer! 26 September 2006, 22:18
Posted by Orhan in : Geeky Techy Stuff , 6 commentsAfter I recovered my data from a failed external hard disk, I told my story to people around me, enjoying the surprize effect it had on them. It has been almost a few months now, and I almost totally forgot about the fun fix until my advisor, Dr. Smtih, told me even a funnier freezer story.
Her son’s ipod recently decided not to start at all. He tried everything but could not bring the thing back to life. Then she says she told him to put it in the freezer, because she knows that it fixed my external hard disk. He had nothing to loose so he puts it in a sealed bag, into the freezer, and forgot the ipod in there for 2 days.
The end? NOW THE IPOD WORKS!! Hah haa. I have heard and personally experienced the phenomenon of hard disks being repaired by putting into the freezer but an IPOD??
If you are experiencing similar problems with your pod, try the freezer. You have nothing to loose (DO IT AT YOUR OWN RISK though!).
I stopped using ZoneAlarm 22 September 2006, 14:55
Posted by Orhan in : Geeky Techy Stuff , add a commentThe last three updates of ZoneAlarm firewall software corrupted something on my cmoputer. It started to shut down in 10 minutes or so, and I was unable to update any drivers. To fix it, I had to reinstall service pack 2. I switched to using Comodo firewall and am very happy for now.
The problem seems to be with versioins 6.5.722.0, 6.5.731.0 and 6.5.737.0. I will check back with ZoneAlarm just to see if they recognize and fix the issue.
Others having similar issues:
How to convert a RadioShack soldering iron to a fine tip soldering iron 5 September 2006, 03:53
Posted by Orhan in : Geeky Techy Stuff , 1 comment so farI needed to perform a repair procedure on a Dell Inspiron 5150 to fix the “Power cuttoff, shutdown, crash when laptop is moved or tilted…” problem, as described at http://www.hardwareanalysis.com/content/topic/43678/
All I needed was a sodlering iron with an extremely fine tip to be able to resolder a 14 leg surface mount integrated circuit on the motherboard. (more…)
Stattraq plugin for Wordpress 29 August 2006, 21:23
Posted by Orhan in : Geeky Techy Stuff , add a commentI started using the stattraq plugin to collect statistics about my blogs. There was a problem with character encodings in summary and search string result pages, though, since I post in Turkish in some blogs. If you are having similar issues, the following fix could also work for you.
I was able to fix the character encoding issues I had with Turkish characters like this:
Edit summary.php under the wp-stattraq/reporter directory. Find:
htmlentities(stripslashes($row->post_title)); and change it to
htmlentities(stripslashes($row->post_title), ENT_COMPAT, ‘UTF-8′);
Also, in the query_strings.php, find:
htmlentities($row->search_phrase) and change to
htmlentities($row->search_phrase, ENT_COMPAT, ‘UTF-8′)
Wordpress plugin: recent posts list with short titles 24 August 2006, 16:53
Posted by Orhan in : Geeky Techy Stuff, WP-Plugins , 24 commentsUpdated: 06/18/2007 - Ver 1.06
For those who have experienced problems with WP 2.2, try this version 1.06..
——————————————————————————
I have searched for a long time and was unasble to find a plugin that can display recent posts with short titles so that the list is read one post per line.
Then I realized this was a good opportunity to write my own (and first) Wordpress plugin.
What it does is that it lists the recent posts just like wp_get_archives() function but an additional parameter sets the limit of the post title length as characters. Only the first X characters of the post title is displayed. The full name can still be read if the mouse is pointed on the links.
Current Version 1.06: -strip_tags on shortened titles eliminates html tag errors, this version should also work with no problems in WP 2.2
—V1.06 Download oden_latest_posts.txt (rename to oden_latest_posts.php)
Version 1.05: Converted for WP 2.1.x to fix a bug which caused static pages to appear in the list. I am not sure if it will work with WP ver. 2.0.x! WP 2.0.x users, do not upgrade at this time if you do not have any problems.
Version 1.04: Added offset feature. Skip the first n posts when listing. Also, when you move along the pages, it automatically skips the posts on thatpage too.
—V1.04 Download oden_latest_posts.txt (rename to oden_latest_posts.php)
Installation:
- Put oden_latest_posts.php file under wp-contents/plugins folder
- Activate ODEN latest posts in admin panel plugin area
Usage:
oden_wp_get_archives(…, $title_limit=XX, $oden_offset=XX);
where XX is the number of characters you would like to limit the post titles in the recent posts list.
Example:
<?php if($paged || is_home()) _e(’Earlier Posts’); else _e(’Recent Posts’); ?>
<ul><?php oden_wp_get_archives(’type=postbypost&limit=20 &title_limit=34&oden_offset=10′); ?></ul>
Note: put no space before &title_limit. I had to put a space because it did not fit here!
Demo: In the side bar recent/earlier posts.
Hope someone else finds it useful too!
KMU-30A Review 1 August 2006, 07:22
Posted by Orhan in : Geeky Techy Stuff, Review , 2 comments
I have been wanting to post my eperiences about the KMU-30A regular phone adapter for skype but I also had been kind of lazy. Today I received a comment asking about the KMU-30A’s performance from azn, so azn, this is for you.
First of all, I purchased this item for my family back home so that they could speak to me on a regular phone set when I call them, and also they can call me on Skype much easier with the speed dial set up. I have only spent a few hours setting it up and assigning speed dials etc. and have been away from it since then.
Having said that, lets move on to the review.
Posting from Paris Charles De Gaulle Airport 25 June 2006, 09:34
Posted by Orhan in : Travel , add a commentI missed my flight to Istanbul, had an extra 2 hours so I purchased wifi access from Orange (needed to make a few Skype calls.) Seems to work fine..
Will be posting here as much as I can during the next two weeks while touring Turkiye.
Have you seen a busy intersection? 23 June 2006, 10:17
Posted by Orhan in : General , add a comment