Archive for May, 2006

The latest release of Googlebar Lite is now available. There are a total of 11 bug fixes (several of which are fairly major), 3 new translations, and a few new options. Here’s the full change log:

• New option allows user to set a custom Froogle top-level domain.
• New dialog warns when form-history is disabled and search history is enabled. Form history is required to maintain a search history in Googlebar Lite.
• Added a Portuguese: Brazilian (pt-BR) localization.
• Added a Russian (ru-RU) localization.
• Added a Turkish (tr-TR) localization.
• Removed some unused style rules.
• The Googlebar Lite widget used in the customize toolbars dialog now uses a new icon.
• Made a few tweaks to the about box.
• Bug Fix: The search modifier keyboard shortcuts (Ctrl+Enter, Shift+Enter, Ctrl+Shift+Enter) were not working.
• Bug Fix: The "Remember last combined menu search type" option was not being correctly applied to searches performed from the search box using the keyboard.
• Bug Fix: The "Use custom Google News domain" option was not working properly.
• Bug Fix: The search box in the Noia theme did not render correctly.
• Bug Fix: Toggling the combined search or up buttons caused the toolbar’s height to change in some cases.
• Bug Fix: The search box now uses a reasonable height when placed on a toolbar with large icons.
• Bug Fix: When Googlebar Lite was dragged to the customize toolbars dialog, the resulting widget was improperly sized.
• Bug Fix: The customize widget became invisible when dragged into the customize toolbar using the Noia theme.
• Bug Fix: Corrected some translation errors in the Catalan (ca-AD) translation.
• Bug Fix: Corrected the locale identifier for the Catalan (ca-AD) translation.
• Bug Fix: Corrected some corrupt strings in the French (fr-FR) translation.

Beginning with Googlebar Lite 4.0, an interesting problem has cropped up with the search history edit box. Take a look at this screenshot sent in by a Googlebar Lite user:

See how the drop-down marker is all the way to the left of the search box? The actual edit control has been resized to 0, while the popup element (which should be invisible) has been resized. I can get this problem to occur on demand using the Charamel theme. What’s most frustrating is that I cannot make it go away. I’ve tried forcing the edit control’s style via CSS, but the rules get ignored. I’ve built a bare bones toolbar from scratch to try to isolate the problem, to no avail. This is apparently a problem with the autocomplete textbox itself. A Firefox bug? Perhaps. If you happen to run into this problem, there are three courses of action you can take, none of which are very appealing:

1. Use the default theme (if you already aren’t). I have yet to see this using the default theme, although my dad has run into it using the default (he uses large fonts in Windows, however, so that might be the difference).
2. Disable search history.
3. Use Googlebar Lite 3.3.

Again, none of these solutions are ideal.

Do you know what’s going on here? Know of an existing bug in Bugzilla that references a similar problem? Found a workaround or a fix? Please let me know! I will continue to investigate this issue, but I don’t see a fix at this time. If only everything would just work as it is intended to …

Another minor release of CoLT (1.3.2) is now available, adding two new translations: Spanish (Spain) and Russian.

I have also updated the comparison table for the various Google search toolbar extensions available for Firefox. Googlebar Lite now weighs in at a surprisingly lean 1/8 the size of the official toolbar. Not bad!

The Simpsons is the greatest television show of all time, regardless of what the clowns at TV Guide say. I mean, how can you go wrong with quotes like this?

Skinner: And, in a gutless act of political correctness, pizza day will now be known as Italian-American sauce bread day.
Italian Chef: Ah, now that’s a-sensitivity. Right Giuseppe? [the monkey claps...] Giuseppe is such a happy monkey!

Homer: I’m not looking for fame or glory. I’m just trying to buy that stairway to heaven Jesus sang of.
Flanders: That was Led Zeppelin.
Homer: Psh. Get back to your bong hippie.

Homer: So, a graduate student, huh? How come you guys can go to the moon but you can’t make my shoes smell good?

That kind of writing is simply classic. The greatest episode of all time? Quite possibly, Homer: Bad Man. It just doesn’t get much funnier than that.

A new build of CoLT is now available, adding 4 new translations. Props to BabelZilla for the help in getting these translations created.

The .htaccess file that Apache provides turns out to be quite a useful tool in combatting referral spam. I’ve just added a few new filters to the ruleset for this site, blocking several gambling related websites. So if the URL you’re coming from consists of a gambling term, you’ll most likely be blocked. Although it’s a pain having to update the list every so often, I’m able to keep most spammers at bay with this technique. If you’re having similar problems with spam on your blog, I highly recommend the following:

• Spam Karma Plugin for WordPress
• Blog entry on using .htaccess to combat spam

Be forewarned that .htaccess can do bad things if you screw it up. You should be fairly familiar with regular expressions before you even attempt to edit said file. I highly recommend Jeffrey Friedl’s book Mastering Regular Expressions if you are unfamiliar with the world of reg-exes.

Half-Life 2: Episode 1 began preloading today yesterday and I’m seriously considering pre-ordering it over the Steam network. There’s something rather appealing to purchasing software online: no travelling to a store and no waiting for a package in the mail. It’s instant gratification, pure and simple. Lots of people seem to dislike the fact that the game is “locked” until June 1 (the official release date), but that doesn’t bother me too much.

One thing that I dislike is the fact that I don’t get a game box. I know that may sound silly, but I have quite a collection of boxes (I have nearly as many as I have computer games). Having a game box provides a tangible token of ownership for something that is intangible. My collection is unfortunately still packed away in boxes from our move; otherwise, I would post some pictures.