Linux Links 2.0.1 Released!

It’s April the first (just!) and no, this is not an April Fools joke, Linux-Links.co.uk has been updated, on time!

This version is a complete rewrite of the server side of the website.
I have rewritten it all from scratch and have collected all the functions into one place, this means that all the settings for displaying and collecting the data is set in one place, and means that everything is displayed uniformly across the whole site.

I have updated the search function, and hopefully it will return more relevant results, its still not perfect, but it is working better now!

I have added a “help” section, but the only area it gives help on is the HTTP Status Codes that are displayed on the URL pages.
The basic structure is there and can easily be added to when more areas need to be added!

There are a couple more things I would have liked to have included, but I ran out of time!
I will add these updates when they are ready!

Ok, its now past midnight and it’s no longer April Fools Day!
Hope you believe me now! Lol 🙂

It’s Easter!

Well, it’s Easter today! I’ve got two Easter eggs, one bar of chocolate, and a bag of mini eggs, and I’ve still got one egg left to receive!
Really, I’m nearly 23, and I’m still getting excited over receiving Easter eggs, but I think its chocolate that does it, when else are we given this much chocolate, it just takes you back to childhood!

In other news, I have finally restarted work on Linux Links, now I just have the search page to complete before I finally release this long awaited version of Linux Links.
I am aiming to release the updated Linux Links on Tuesday 1st April, no joke! Honest!

I have done a few tweaks to my website and blog, a couple of them you might not notice!

The first is that I’ve separated trackbacks and pings from comments in single post view.

Secondly I have added a print CSS style sheet to both the blog and website, so if you need to print anything out you only get the main content, and not the navigation bars.
I think there is still a few more bits to change with the print style to make it more complete, but its working!

The third is that I’ve signed up for a FeedBurner account, I have already burnt my feed, and you can find it here. I have set up the redirects, so you can continue using the old address, and you will still receive the feed as normal!

There’s a few more that I have fixed or changed as I have been going around, but they don’t really effect anything!

My dad’s off to Brands Hatch this afternoon to watch the Truck racing on Monday, he’s camping over tonight and Monday night and coming back on Tuesday morning.
The Truck racing was awesome last time, and it’s something I would like to go and watch again, the thing that put me off the most is the weather, it going to be cold and wet!

That’s all for this post now, I’ll post more details when I know more!
Till then
See you

New Computer Built

If anyone has been keeping an eye on my Flickr account, you may have noticed pictures of my new computer being built have appeared!
They are the best of the ones I took, and unfortunately don’t show every step I took in building the computer.

I started the build on the fourth of March (Tuesday) by fitting the power supply, motherboard, cpu, memory and DVD drive inside the case.
Then on the eighth (Saturday) I fitted the two hard drives, and connected all the cables!

The build went quite well, I brought a few extra bits that I didn’t actually need, but at the time thought I did need! Lol!

I found a few limitations with the case during the build, one of them being the extra hard drive bay in the bottom of the case right behind the power supply, I feel it was a little cramped, and that there was barely any room for the cables coming out of the back of the power supply!

There is practically no cable management built into the case!

And finally the external drive bays, only one side of the case can be opened, which means that only one side of any drive fitted is attached, but there is some support provided to hold the drive up.

There is also the problem of the blanking plates on the front. I found I could not remove the plastic blanking plate from the outside of the case, and I couldn’t push it out from the inside because of a metal plate that had to be broken off first.
Having the metal plate there may help with the cooling, or keeping the system quiet, but maybe there should be some easier way to remove it?

That’s all I have time for in this post, but I’ll post more details when I get another chance!

Till then,
Happy computing!

Bad start to the week!

Its been a bad start to this week, I had some sort of stomach bug on Monday, I woke up not feeling quite on top of the world.

At about lunch time I was sick, sorry if any ones eating, I had only eaten cereal for breakfast that morning, and had drunk some water, so it must of been something I ate the previous day, but I have no idea what caused it.

And then I went to work on Tuesday, I was still feeling rough, but I thought it was better to be doing something rather than sitting around at home all day thinking about it.

I’m feeling much better now, and still with a computer in pieces! Lol!

Till next time
Keep healthy!

Finally got the hard drives!

I’ve finally gone and got the hard drives, and DVD drive for my new computer

And here’s a nice photo
Hard drives and DVD rewriter

The photo shows the DVD rewriter drive (top) and the two hard drives (bottom)

The details are:

DVD Rewriter: LG GSA-H66NBAL 20x DVDRW/RAM Black – SATA £13.85
Product Details: (Could not find specific details on website)

Hard Drive #1: 160GB Samsung Spinpoint SATA2 8MB £24.55
Product Details: http://www.samsung.com/us/consumer/detail/spec.do?group=computersperipherals& type=harddiskdrives&subtype=spinpointpseries&model_cd=HD160JJ
Hard Drive #2: 500GB Samsung Spinpoint SATA2 16MB £46.95 (on offer at the time normally £48.95)
Product Details: http://www.samsung.com/us/consumer/detail/spec.do?group=computersperipherals& type=harddiskdrives&subtype=spinpointtseries&model_cd=HD501LJ

That’s a total of £89.15 exc VAT
Delivery was an extra £9.95 (I chose a morning delivery)
The VAT came to £17.34
Which brings the total to £116.44

That means that the total price for my new computer comes to £369.78

Now I just have to build it now, that’ll be fun! Lol!

That’s all for this post now!
Till next time!

Slowdown!

For some strange reason the past month has been a bit of a slowdown time for me, I don’t know what it is, but I just cant seem to be able to get into anything, or do anything!

Take this blog as an example, the last time I posted was the 4th of February, two weeks since the post before.

In those three weeks I have done practically nothing, even though I have added a couple to plugins to my blog, but that’s just about it.

Linux Links is at a stand still.

The only things I do do regularly is feel tired, and work!

And its valentines this week, and I haven’t got my girlfriend anything

I’ve got this week off work, so its a good time to recharge my batteries, and build my computer!

Hopefully I’ll be back to my ways next week

Till next time, if I don’t fall asleep!

Aimlessly Wandering the Information Superhighway!

The title just about sums up what I have been doing for the last three weeks since my last post, but more precisely describes what I did on Sunday!
I have a history list as long as your arm, and I have no clue about what I was doing!

But I have signed up for Gravatar, and have finally reported that bug with WordPress.

During the past month I have managed to do more work on the next version of Linux Links, I have most of the update working, and I’m just working on the Tag page. The next section I’ll be working on will be Search.

I am also working on the problem of how to make short unique URL’s similar to tinyurl.com
I’m thinking maybe put the md5 hash in a matrix table and add up every row and column, and then use that to make up some letters.
Yes, as you’ve probably guessed, I have no idea on how to go about it, and I don’t want to just use the id of the URL in the database

Other than that, nothing much has been happening, work is still the same, we’re starting to get in a lot of Easter eggs, which seem to magically disappear, must be due to the price! And there was me thinking that people would be boycotting Cadbury chocolate and not buying it!

Untill the next time
Enjoy your Easter Egg!

Edit: I have just been told that the price of Easter eggs in ASDA have gone back up to their original price.
I have also just installed the WordPress pluginWP_MonsterID, and have edited the blog theme, so if you are signed up to Gravator your avatar will show up, otherwise you get a random monster!

WooHoo! Its Christmas Again!

The parts for my new computer arrived! It was like a second Christmas! Lol!

It was about 2pm when the van arrived. I’ve uploaded some photos onto Flickr and you can also see them on my site here

I’ve had a test fit of the PSU into the case to see if it fits, its a tight fit, but do-able!
I’m not yet ready to put it all together yet as i need to get a few other pieces first, namely a cooler for the processor, and a hard drive and some kind of optical drive (DVD/CD)

I’ll keep you posted on progress!
Till then, happy computing!

I’ve Finally Done It!

Way back in September I posted details about my new computer wish list, well I’ve gone and ordered the main parts of it, thats the CPU, Motherboard, Case, Memory, and PSU!

Processor: AMD Athlon X2 Dual Core BE-2350 2.10GHz (Retail AM2) £46.95
Product Details: http://amdqrg.getspringbox.com/gb-en/desktop/details.aspx?qsearch=true&opn=ADH2350IAA5DD

Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-MA69GM-S2H AMD 690G Socket AM2 Motherboard £34.95
Product Details: http://www.gigabyte.com.tw/Products/Motherboard/Products_Spec.aspx?ProductID=2579

Memory: Corsair 2GB PC2-6400 C4 XMS2 (2x1GB) £49.95
Product Details: http://www.corsair.com/products/xms2.aspx

PSU: Thermaltake TR2 RX W0146 450W Modular PSU £29.95

Case: Nexus Caterpillar – Silenced ATX case £41.95
Product Details: http://www.nexustek.nl/NXS-nexuscaterpillarsilentsystem.htm

Thats a total of £203.75 exc VAT
Delivery was an extra £11.86
The VAT came to £37.73
Which brings the grand total to £253.34

It should all be delivered tomorrow (Tuesday), I hope it does, it was an extra £4 for next day delivery!
When I receive the parts I’ll take some photos and upload them to my Flickr account.

Till then,
Happy computing!