Laravel Goodies

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Here’s the list of packages that make Laravel development even easier.

Development

PHPUnit – require-dev or require in composer.json 

"phpunit/phpunit": "~4.0"

and then run tests in cli directly from installed binary: 

vendor/bin/phpunit

PHPSpec – require-dev or require in composer.json 

"phpspec/phpspec": "~2.1"

and then similar to PHPUnit, run the tests using binary in vendor/bin

vendor/bin/phpspec desc App/Test

Profiling / debugging – laravel-debugbar

IDE auto-completion / PHPDoc – laravel-ide-helper

Faker – use to seed Database with realistic Data.
require-dev or require in composer.json 

"fzaninotto/faker": "1.4.*@dev"

and then just get an instance 

$faker = Faker\Factory::create();

and use it to fake just about anything.
Continue reading →

AI Web Develoment

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Here is a fancy new project: the world’s first AI platform that designs websites. And the Worlds very first AI developer seems to speak English and have a sense of humor 🙂

Here is what they say on their website:

This is not a website builder. This is your personal AI web developer. Its first masterpiece is the website you’re looking at right now.

Sure thing it makes sense to look into the code, turns out there are actually some helpful comments in English, like these:

// Don't follow link
      event.preventDefault();

or even like these:

catch (e) {
    // noop
  }

Man, it’s Super-Future-Cyberpunk-Christmas-Today, this things seems like fun until it actually decides to take over the world.

Fix No Sound in Steam for Linux Problem

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There is an issue with Steam for Linux that seem to be persistent on machines with HDMI enabled displays or similar unused HD audio inputs.

Steam for Linux seems to use these controllers despite them being ignored by the system, which results in weirdly muted games while YouTube as well as any sound tests are loud and clear.

To fix this issue open sound settings and select analog controller or (for pulseaudio sound server) install pulseaudio volume control

sudo apt-get install pavucontrol

under “Output Devices” check if it tries to use the HD audio controller to output sound, go to “Configuration” and disable the HD audio controller profile so that analog audio will always be used.

Update: Local Subdomains under Ubuntu 14.04 Linux and Apache 2.4

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Here we went through the Ubuntu 13.10 process, Ubuntu 14.04, though using the same Apache 2.4, again has a small thing that have to be done differently:

Config files in sites-available have a .conf (and not .config) extension
gksudo gedit /etc/apache2/sites-available/project.conf

As for the rest, previous Ubuntu 13.10 Tutorial can be used for newer Ubuntu as well.

Local Subdomains under Ubuntu Linux and Apache 2.4 Tutorial

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The whole process was described in this article, but there are few quirks to fix in newer Ubuntu (namely 13.10 / Apache 2.4).

  1. Every config file in sites-available has to have a .config extension now, so instead of
    sudo nano /etc/apache2/sites-available/project
    use
    sudo nano /etc/apache2/sites-available/project.config
    if upgrading fist add the extension to the /etc/apache2/sites-available/project config file, then delete /etc/apache2/sites-enabled/project and re-run “sudo a2ensite project” / restart apache.

  2. If your project root is located in your home directory you might get a persistent 403 / Forbidden error, that (weird as it is) has nothing to do with Linux permissions. To fix it add “Require all granted” directory directive. Here is how the new config file might look:
    <VirtualHost *:80>
    DocumentRoot /home/user/project
    ServerName project.localhost
    <Directory /home/user/project>
    AllowOverride All
    Order allow,deny
    Allow from all
    Require all granted
    </Directory>
    </VirtualHost>

So here are updated instructions for Ubuntu 13.10+ (and maybe some older versions). Continue reading →

Outernet – globally available source of information

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A Media Development Investment Fund (MDIF) project, Outernet will use a network of small satellites to transmit selected Internet data to any Wi-Fi-enabled device anywhere in the world at no cost.

By leveraging datacasting technology over a low-cost satellite constellation, Outernet is able to bypass censorship, ensure privacy, and offer a universally-accessible information service at no cost to global citizens. It’s the modern version of shortwave radio, or BitTorrent from space.

Sounds like fun, let’s hope it works out.