NoboxMedia The South African HTTP magazines
Media24 goes opensource with Drupal?
It’s not too often we see large media companies embracing Open Source technologies, so it is really great to see one of South Africa’s large media houses embracing Drupal, an Open Source CMS.
This morning I read an Aricle on bizcommunity outlining the launch of gotravel24.co.za. In general the site promotes travel in and around South Africa. GoTravel24 also allows users to create travel blogs (Using their existing blogging platform),book hotels, rental cars, flights and find specials etc.
What got me really interested in the site, was the voting feature - A Drupal module! At first I thought it must be the script from which the Drupal voting module was based, however upon further investigation I found references to Drupal in the source.
Google launches Code University
Well perhaps it is not so much a launch as a re-launch. Mid 2007 Google launched an educational program. At the time it was called ‘Google Code for Educators’. Google has now re-designed the site and re-launched as the Google Code University. The site is aimed at helping educators and students alike become more familiar with the technology behind Google and the internet in general. It is a repository of computer science educational material including tutorials, lecture slides, and videos.
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Two local blogs get a face lift
I recently updated NoboxMedias design. I don’t want to go on too much about my design, however, Nobox is not alone.
Along with my new design I assisted TechMongrel.com and TheOpenSurgery.com in jazzing up their blogs. We got together one night for a few drinks, a braai and look at their blogs. We quickly put together a new logo and changed the color scheme of TechMongrel.com . TheOpenSurgery.com needed a new logo and theme. We soon found an appropriate design, put together a fun logo, changed the color scheme and presto, a fresh new look. Please take the time to check these sites out, they have some great content and a written by well informed individuals.
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Pull meta and title from a page using PHP
This is a simple PHP script I compiled for a little side project.
The script returns the title and meta data of a page by using a function called ‘get_meta_tags’ and a string search for the title.
I imagine it is similar to what many social bookmarking sites and content aggregators do to pull information when registering a site or submitting a link. I rate this coupled with an RSS aggrigator and the image pulling script could make the basis for a good content aggregator (I have never made a content aggregator so I don’t know too much about this). I would love to know if Afigator.com or Amatomu.com would be interested in pulling images along with posts (I belive technorati does this.)
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Springleap SEO competition update
Well it is the first day I have checked Google since I posted my Springleap article. I see Bandwidthblog is still holding strong, however, viralmarketer and imod slowly creeping up there. I also see Nobox up there in 8th place - whoohoo! When I posted the Springleap article we were initially listed on the fourth page, should you type springleap in Google. I have my doubts whether anyone will knock springleap.com off first place, but we will see…
The Springleap web based image manipulation bundle
For a while now I have been wanting to share a few scripts to help visitors with image manipulation. Only thing is I did not want to list out all the tricks I have learned without any context. Recently, a South African site called Springleap launched. Springleap allows visitors to upload t-shirt designs. Visitors then vote for the designs and the winners get paid - good old cash prizes. They have now opened a SEO competition to help create a little hype around the local blogging community. Whoever gets the highest ranking for a post about Springleap wins R2500. So this got me thinking. As far as I can tell (I am no SEO guru), the best way to get a good ranking in Google, is to have allot of well recognized and established sites linking back to my post. The best way I know how to do this is to write a good scrip/tutorial and submit it to the hundreds of script sites. So, this is the plan - this article will use Springleap as a case study to explain the practical implementation of the following scripts. This will give me a chance at winning, provide a little support for a local start up and most importantly, help you with image manipulation.
Pull and save an image on your server from any site
This is a little script I’ve been playing with. I’m using it on my pet project GoGuide.co.za, a social bookmarking site. The plan is for the site to pull a thumbnail image of a submitted URL’s page. The script scans specified sites for the first image with a width greater than 200px. I suggest 200px as in most cases blogs and news sites will not have any images with widths greater than 200px other than in their content.
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Nobox first time SABlogAwards finalist
Wow, I’m thrilled to be nominated as a finalist in no less than two categories of the SABlogAwards!
I launched Nobox in November last year and as such this is my first time as a nominee.
I must say it is quite an honor to be listed with some of SA’s coolest blogs, however, it would be a really insane honor to win - So vote for Nobox!
Good luck to all the finalists and may the most worthy win!
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Massive AJAX Country/Area Drop-down List
I recently came across a useful post by a fellow South African blogger. Mike had compiled an XML list of almost all countries and their associated areas. Often I have had to produce an county/area option on registration forms, but have struggled to find a complete list. I took mikes XML list, converted it to CSV and imported to it to a MySQL database. I then found a fairly simple AJAX expanding selection script and connected it to the data in the database. The result is a database driven AJAX selection tool which re-generates the list of areas based on the country the user selects.
>> Demo
>> Download Source
This script was adapted from the following sources:
The AJAX form script:
http://www.skillfusion.com/articles/ajaxDropdown.php
XML country/area list:
http://www.darwinshome.za.net/blog/2008/02/08/country-selection-list-with-sate-and-province/
I deleted my database and I’m an idiot
Yesterday was quite a day. You may notice a few articles are missing. After a long days work, large amounts of caffeine and flu medication pumping through my veins, I some how managed to delete the NoboxMedia database - don’t laugh, grunt or roll your eyes. This is the first time I have deleted an important database, it was not fun. The moment I realized what I had done, my mind slowly initiated the ‘developer shut down phase’. I simply smiled, left my desk, made a cup of tea and imagined myself feeding the ducks at Emmarentia dam (Learnt this trick in varsity). (more…)
Latest scripts from the Nobox Vault
For a while now I have been wanting to share a few scripts to help visitors with image manipulation. Only thing is I did not want to list out all the tricks I have learned without any context. Recently, a South African site called Springleap launched. Springleap allows visitors to upload t-shirt designs. Visitors then […]
This is a little script I’ve been playing with. I’m using it on my pet project GoGuide.co.za, a social bookmarking site. The plan is for the site to pull a thumbnail image of a submitted URL’s page. The script scans specified sites for the first image with a width greater than 200px. […]
The cool hover effect is what gives it character. Take a look, you might like it.
An open source unobtrusive javascript tool for easy handling form validation and input masking.
Simple way to accomplish blade interface on xbox 360 with javascript and css.
An accordion implementation which also features drag/drop functionality.
Can now specify action of toggling each accordion element, without closing others.
A jquery plugin that will emulate a step by step wizard like the windows wizard.
provided with the full download of moofx, to use its ajax capabilities along with the effects.
Users can navigate through their action history and undo their actions at any time.
