Praveen Kumar Sinha +

Issue: Installing ree ruby via rvm in ubuntu 11.10

2011-12-17T10:38:00.008+05:30

So if you have tried installing REE on Ubuntu 11.10 something like

praveen@praveen-laptop:~$ rvm install ree
Installing Ruby Enterprise Edition from source to: /home/praveen/.rvm/rubies/ree-1.8.7-2011.03
ree-1.8.7-2011.03 - #fetching (ruby-enterprise-1.8.7-2011.03)
% Total % Received % Xferd Average Speed Time Time Time Current
Dload Upload Total Spent Left Speed
100 184 100 184 0 0 107 0 0:00:01 0:00:01 --:--:-- 567
100 7713k 100 7713k 0 0 32397 0 0:04:03 0:04:03 --:--:-- 33764
ree-1.8.7-2011.03 - #extracting ruby-enterprise-1.8.7-2011.03 to /home/praveen/.rvm/src/ree-1.8.7-2011.03
Applying patch 'tcmalloc' (located at /home/praveen/.rvm/patches/ree/1.8.7/tcmalloc.patch)
Applying patch 'stdout-rouge-fix' (located at /home/praveen/.rvm/patches/ree/1.8.7/stdout-rouge-fix.patch)
Applying patch 'no_sslv2' (located at /home/praveen/.rvm/patches/ree/1.8.7/no_sslv2.diff)
ree-1.8.7-2011.03 - #installing
ERROR: Error running './installer -a /home/praveen/.rvm/rubies/ree-1.8.7-2011.03 --dont-install-useful-gems ', please read /home/praveen/.rvm/log/ree-1.8.7-2011.03/install.log
ERROR: There has been an error while trying to run the ree installer. Halting the installation.

and now that you will follow the log you will notice some dependencies not met and hence installation failed, some thing like this.

Checking for required software...
* C compiler... found at /usr/bin/gcc
* C++ compiler... found at /usr/bin/g++
* The 'make' tool... found at /usr/bin/make
* The 'patch' tool... found at /usr/bin/patch
* Zlib development headers... not found
* OpenSSL development headers... not found
* GNU Readline development headers... not found

but as per suggestion

* To install GNU Readline development headers:
Please run apt-get install libreadline5-dev as root.

Package libreadline5-dev is not available, but is referred to by another package.
This may mean that the package is missing, has been obsoleted, or
is only available from another source.
So instead install libreadline-gplv2-dev

* To install GNU Readline development headers:
Please run apt-get install libreadline-gplv2-dev as root.

And you are good to go :)

These information are not tough to find but summarizing it just in case some body is in need of it in a quicky!

What the hell! Can't serialize a Mysql object with Marshal in Ruby

2011-11-17T11:02:00.006+05:30

Okey so got this strange information late in night at about 3.50am and it took more than 2 hrs for me to surrender. uff :D
and this is something that came in picture

`dump': no marshal_dump is defined for class Mysql (TypeError

and this is a small code snippet which will give you this situation

require "rubygems"
require "mysql"

class RandomClass
def initialize
@db_instance = Mysql.real_connect("hostname", "username", "password", "database_name")
end
end

random_class = RandomClass.new
a = Marshal.dump(random_class)

and there you are, so one can't serialize a object with MySql object in it and with the set of finding i can even say that serializing even with yaml is also not possible.

So work around to this that i can suggest is to do a close of live mysql object in the method itself so that at any give time when object will be passed to serialization using Marshal.dump there would be no live MySql object to hinder with serialization :)

try this piece of snippet now

require "rubygems"
require "mysql"

class RandomClass
def initialize
db_instance = Mysql.real_connect("hostname", "username", "password", "database_name")
db_instance.close
end
end

random_class = RandomClass.new
a = Marshal.dump(random_class)

And this should work :)

How to create .rvmrc file

2011-08-09T13:52:00.001+05:30

rvm --create --rvmrc ruby-1.8.7-p352@gemset

Execute above command from the rails directory with obviously correct ruby version and gemset :) and enjoy

How to enable Mongrel instead of Webrick for Rails3 app

2011-06-02T23:59:00.004+05:30

To enable mongrel instead of Webrick for Rails3 application add following lines in Gemfile of the app

#Use mongrel as the web server
gem 'mongrel', '>= 1.2.0.pre2'

and do a bundle install and then of you start the server.. mongrel would be booting instead of Webrick

Revert back to Default look n feel of Ubuntu 11.04

2011-05-16T10:29:00.009+05:30

Well guys i am back again.. and this time it is pretty fast :).
I downloaded Ubuntu 11.04 and after installation complete also tried installing desktop effects available (and runs fabulously good) in previous version of Ubuntu. And this time to using synaptic manager the installation was a breeze but the effect was something else :D

In 11.04 there is common menu-bar and then there is vertical side bar looks more like windows 7(but vertically placed) so i don;t know(if i am able to run those eff3cts successfully) how will they react with UI... well that is a future thought.

But the current situation was my fresh install of Ubuntu 11.04 was messed up and now i was not able to view the menu-bar and there is no bar from where i can try to fix it.. run dialog box was also not coming in picture on press of Alt + F2.

And the last resort was to again redo the install(which was expensive in terms of time consumed) so what to do. This is what i did and it worked for me.. hope it works for you too (if you ever get dirty with effects on Ubuntu)

Step 01: Right click on desktop and click on "Create a launcher"(because i was only able to see the desktop.. a blank desktop!!)
Step 02: Provide name as "Terminal" and command as "gnome-terminal" and click on OK.
Step 03: Now double click the newly created launcher to open up a console terminal(with no head bar and no menu bar)
Step 04: Issue following two commands one by one.
gconftool --recursive-unset /apps/compiz-1
gconftool --recursive-unset /apps/compizconfig-1

Wait for some time and you will get native UI back on Ubuntu 11.04 (if not try log-out and log-in back) :)
Well my thoughts stopped working when i lost the panels and menu-bar of 11.04 and this thing came first in my mind and it worked (for me). If there is/are any thing much better than this(which i am obviously unaware of) please provide that too in comment.. it may help somebody.

Till that time chaow!

"Error establishing a database connection" from wordpress even when db credentials are correct

2011-05-11T00:28:00.004+05:30

Yes i got hit by this just today!!

Let me tell you guys one thing i am not that much into Wordpress for any reason. But one of my blog is on Wordpress and obviously i am not the person who manages it but i do look into technical stuff if it goes out of hand(of my buddy)

Encountered a strange problem where in an existing install of Wordpress(which is about 1 year old) showed a message "Error establishing a database connection" in complete page, all of a sudden. wooohhhh!!!

and then i tried looking out for any changes in wp-config.php(which stores db credentials) but they all were fine. I crossed checked it by manually connecting to the db with credentials provided from console and yes i was able to connect to but Wordpress was telling me that it didn't.

I thought lets take a backup of the existing database and then try to debug it (so that in case i loose some data during this play i am in a position to recover too) but there was something waiting for me.... ufff!!!!

mysqldump -u some_user -psome_password xxxxxxxxx_blog > xxxxxxxxx_blog.dump.sql

and i got this in response

mysqldump: Got error: 145: Table './xxxxxxxxx_blog/xxxxxxxxxblog_options' is marked as crashed and should be repaired when using LOCK TABLES

so due to some activity we have blog's options table all messed up... so what to do!!

Answer is go to /var/lib/mysql/
and run myisamchk on the tables mentioned that should fix it.

something like..

sudo myisamchk -r ./xxxxxxxxx_blog/xxxxxxxxxblog_options

with output:

- recovering (with sort) MyISAM-table './xxxxxxxxx_blog/xxxxxxxxxblog_options'
Data records: 210
- Fixing index 1
- Fixing index 2
Data records: 208

and whola!!! my blog is back :D

Hope this must have helped you in anyway or the other.... will be back soon with more life like post.. these computer tech blogs.. uff uff!!

How to install ruby 1.9 and rails with RVM

2011-02-09T14:14:00.002+05:30

Just follow these steps

ruby -v
mkdir -p ~/.rvm/src/ && cd ~/.rvm/src && rm -rf ./rvm/ && git clone git://github.com/wayneeseguin/rvm.git && cd rvm && ./install
rvm install 1.9.1
rvm list
rvm 1.9.1
rvm 1.9.1 --default
rvm system
gem install tzinfo builder memcache-client rack rack-test rack-mount erubis mail text-format thor bundler i18n
gem install rails --pre
rails topscore
cd topscore
rails server
gem install sqlite3-ruby
rails generate scaffold game name:string
rake db:migrate

and you are done :)
taken from http://railscasts.com/episodes/200-rails-3-beta-and-rvm

How to make a remote call synchronous in Rails

2011-02-02T10:25:00.008+05:30

new Ajax.Request('/controller/action?username=praveen', {asynchronous:false, evalScripts:true, parameters:'page_offset=' + page_offset + '&authenticity_token=' + encodeURIComponent('e060znd6JcrMCU6Bf4ZZnfyBac4tl1YXQ6HuEHZGY58=')});

What to do to get that "asynchronous:false" thing in your link_to_remote or any other helper function available in rails :)

I know its not a big thing and there is/are very few requirements to make an Ajax call synchronous but one might face this requirement sometimes, and the answers is

<%=remote_function(:url => {:controller => "controller", :action => "action", :username => "praveen"}, :type => :synchronous, :with => "'page_offset=' + page_offset") -%>

And you are done... so now till the time this thing is taking place, everything in browser will be waiting to complete the process first and then only proceed next.
Hope you stumble on me looking in for me.

How to handle wrong car parking!

2011-01-20T16:05:00.005+05:30

I am back but not with any thing on computer but for car commuters.

Have been putting up in Delhi for around i think 12 years now and it has been phenomenal and i love Delhi as it is but there are challenges to deal with everyday and rather than showing anger and swearing on it, it would be good if we try to resolve them in some what funny manner and i did :)

Well addressing to all those owning a car(vehicle) and thinking blank road is car parking area(in Delhi), just before leaving for office today i saw a parked Mahindra Scorpio consuming the rest of road which was half flooded with building materials (as a house construction is going on, common! in areas of Delhi).

But i need to get way so that can reach office i can't take my car from that 1.5 feet of space. Me and my mom tried looking in for that super talented person who has parked his/her car and was lost by now and even by so many queries from neighbourhood no one knew about it and now it was high time i should be doing something about it rather than shouting on air but my love towards cars didn't allowed me to break the car but how can i teach lesson to this person now.

So what i did is that 1 took two a4 blank sheets of paper and stick it with glue (like people paste movie posters) on drivers side of windshield and wrote.. "Hope next time your intelligence can use parking sense!! All the best"

and then i took my car from back road and believe me taking car from that place required 3 people to assist me to drag my car inch by inch(it was that narrow)

But later on came to know form my dad, that driver appeared after about 1hr and was shocked to see it. My mom, dad and even my sister was like all over him and he accepted his mistakes and it took about 20 mins to takes those two sheets out from his windscreen and i don't know whether text written, was even understood by the driver or not. and hopefully this will keep a guard on him next time doing a wrong parking..

So i dealt with it this way.. how about you?

2 steps to install sqlite 3 on ubuntu for ruby

2010-12-30T16:22:00.001+05:30

open a console and write two steps one by one

sudo apt-get install sqlite3 libsqlite3-dev
sudo gem install sqlite3-ruby

And you are done :)

MTNL broadband not opening certain websites

2010-10-07T20:04:00.008+05:30

:) then what to do.. i just got one MTNL TriBand broadband unlimited connection for my home in Palam Colony, New Delhi. Everything was great except that it was not opening certain web links like linkedin.com, assembla.com, cricketnirvana.com most of the time and within two days of installation, frustration was so severe that i looked up for google for any help(mind you MTNL,Delhi people they are awesome at NOT resolving any issues like this)
On a random look out for solution i found two things..
1. Change PrimaryDNS and SecondaryDNS to 208.67.222.222 and 208.67.220.220 respectively
and
2. Change TCP MTU Option(in interface page of ADSL router) to 1400

and Final step, Do a restart (one of the option in 'Maintenance' page)
and see if it works for you.. it worked for me :)

Just for information i am having a ADSL router of Sterlite(Firmware Version :2.11.38.0(UE0.C2)3.9.9.5)(provided by MTNL) and am using my own netgear wifi router on top of it,

How to Stop an Ajax request in prototype.js

2010-10-04T20:40:00.009+05:30

Question is what will you do if you are using prototype.js(which is not having any abort method) for making a Ajax request and due to some circumstance you want to abort the ajax request raised. Well one can think that this is a narrow requirement, why will anybody need to do this because in the meantime request will be done and one might be having the response in return from server.

I hit this corner case where page content was loading from an Ajax request and which after rendering was firing another Ajax request to update the paginate-r(which is also self firing the request on response completion), but to my surprise i was not able to control the "Ajax request to update paginate-r" and hence i am creating the self firing request but am not able to destroy them.

And i don;t know for what reason there is no "ajaxRequest.abort()" method. And i found the answer from a narrow corner of http://blog.pothoven.net/2007/12/aborting-ajax-requests-for-prototypejs.html and it worked and just to increase the find-ability of this solution am re-writing the post.

introduce a method abort like this for prototype.js

Ajax.Request.prototype.abort = function(){
this.transport.onreadystatechange = Prototype.emptyFunction(); //prevent state change callbacks from being issues
this.transport.abort(); //abort the XHR
Ajax.activeRequestCount--; //updates the request counter
};

and then in your code
write it somewhere so that it is executed only once

<script>
var cw_paginator_request = null;
</script>

and then to assign the request if null else abort the request and fire a new request, like this

<script>
if(cw_paginator_request != null){
cw_paginator_request.abort();
}
cw_paginator_request = <%=remote_function(:url => {:controller => "some_controller", :action => "update_paginator", :id => @selected_id }) -%>;
</script>

Hopefully it might help somebody in need :)

Now what will you interpret from this?

2010-07-13T13:48:00.001+05:30

This is from the showcase of a bookstore in CP, Delhi. What you(hindi reading) all can interpret from this?

3 step Memcache install in ubuntu with rails binding

2010-05-24T06:44:00.002+05:30

#To Install memecache

sudo apt-get install memcached

#To restart memcahce

/etc/init.d/memcached restart

#To install ruby binding gem to memecache

sudo gem install memcached

and to start memcache automatically on system startup

sudo gedit /etc/default/memcached

# Set this to yes to enable memcached.

ENABLE_MEMCACHED=yes

3 step RMagick install in rail/ubuntu

2010-05-22T21:38:00.004+05:30

sudo apt-get install imagemagick
sudo apt-get install libmagick9-dev
sudo gem install rmagick

yes thats it :)

Mirrored text is fine but why upside down

2010-05-04T06:52:00.010+05:30

It has been really a while now.. have posted something here :) but its better late than never..
This post is about one of the head turning material that i got while i was going in for tea break on the other side of road (we do so because its small fun break even though we have very good pantry)

And i was wondering this is to seek attention of viewers and will act as publicity stunt or some more un-understandable logic behind it!! what you say??

Released BrokenCompass

2009-10-20T00:22:00.004+05:30

So finally after much of ifs and buts and all hesitation have released a version of BrokenCompass.. Full text search engine built using ruby on rails and serving ruby on rails app.

Some of the features which are available as of now in this first release are..

Able to work with all databases for which ruby in rails have no issues(examples shown in links uses mysql)
Availability of extended_mode which allows to search in any particular attribute(from set of attributes which is used while in index creation)
In extended_mode queries can have logical "&"(pronounced as 'and') and "|"(pronounced as 'or') between them(Not operator is not available still, but working out to release in next version).
One can assign weight to set of attributes depending upon requirements and in response get weighted result and also sorted in descending order of weight of record.
By default 20 records are returned as query response(which can be altered)
look_in_brokencompass static method is attached to rails model to get inference of instantaneous parameter set. And to find using brokencompass static method is find_with_brokencompass("searchterm", :brokencompass = {}) and many other..

Here are few links(if interested, will be helpfull)
BrokenCompass: How to go about it
BrokenCompass - Install instructions

BrokenCompass: How to go about it

2009-10-19T23:14:00.014+05:30

Once you are done with installation and index creation for brokencompass, can play around with the search capabilities of it..

Point 01. ruby script/console
==> Output

Adding BrokenCompass Version: 1.0
Loading index... [broken_compass/advertisment.index]

Point 02. Searching in all fields, i.e not using extended_mode

Advertisment.look_in_brokencompass("train")

==> Returns an inference hash like this

{
# Time elapsed in the execution(in seconds)
:time_elapsed=>0.00617599487304688,

# Field(s) which is/are available for indexing
:fields=>["location", "title", "description"],

# Weight given to different attributes to ranks result items
:column_weight=>{:description=>10, :location=>10, :title=>10},

# Count of total records found
:total_record_count=>44,

# Boolean field to unload indexes from memory once query is fired
:eager_unload=>false,

# Boolean field for extended_mode, set to true when using attribute(column) level searches
:extended_mode=>false,

# Boolean field for PLURAL forms of search word
:plural_forms=>true,

# Result set with weighted scores
:weighted_records=>[[14844, 20], [17445, 20], ... , [15148, 10]]}

# Limit to result set
:limit=>20,

# Offset to result set
:offset=>0,
}

Point 03. Searching in extended mode i.e specifically in some attribute(from the attributes used in sql query for index creation)

Advertisment.look_in_brokencompass("'job'@title", :extended_mode => true)

==> Returns an inference hash same as above

{
:column_weight=>{:description=>10, :location=>10, :title=>10},
:total_record_count=>1419,
:time_elapsed=>0.0523371696472168,
:fields=>["location", "title", "description"],
:eager_unload=>false,
:limit=>20,
:extended_mode=>true,
:offset=>0,
:plural_forms=>true,
:weighted_records=>[[14607, 20], [17685, 20], ...... , [13727, 10]]
}

Point 04. Searching in extended mode and also using other possible options

Advertisment.look_in_brokencompass("'job'@title", :extended_mode => true, :offset => 4, :limit => 5, :column_weight => {:title => 40, :description => 20})

==> Returns an inference hash same as above

{
:column_weight=>{:description=>20, :location=>10, :title=>40},
:total_record_count=>1419,
:time_elapsed=>0.0521509647369385,
:fields=>["location", "title", "description"],
:eager_unload=>false,
:limit=>5,
:extended_mode=>true,
:offset=>4,
:plural_forms=>true,
:weighted_records=>[[17947, 80], [17946, 80], [9597, 80], [12556, 80], [25975, 80]]
}

Point 05. To retrieve data results from above mentioned conditions and critriea

Advertisment.find_with_brokencompass("'job'@title", :brokencompass => {:extended_mode => true, :offset => 4, :limit => 5, :column_weight => {:title => 40, :description => 20}})

==> Returns an result-set array of type Advertisment

Point 06. To user "and" & "or" operators in extended mode

Advertisment.look_in_brokencompass("'job'@title | 'career'@description", :extended_mode => true, :offset => 4, :limit => 5, :column_weight => {:title => 40, :description => 20})

==> Returns an result-set array of type Advertisment

Advertisment.look_in_brokencompass("'job'@title & 'career'@description", :extended_mode => true, :offset => 4, :limit => 5, :column_weight => {:title => 40, :description => 20})

==> Returns an result-set array of type Advertisment

In case of any further queries please contact me at praveen[dot]kumar[dot]sinha[at]gmail[dot]com

BrokenCompass - Install instructions

2009-10-19T22:04:00.017+05:30

BrokenCompass up and running in flat 5 mins

Step: 01
Install BrokenCompass plugin

ruby script/plugin install http://brokencompass.googlecode.com/svn/trunk

from inside of rails app root directory.

Step: 02
Add BrokenCompass configuration yml file
Create file

config/brokencompass.yml

Add content like

#brokencompass.yml............. STARTS
index-sources:
advertisment:
sql: "select id,title,description,location from advertisments"
table_name: advertisments

query:
sql: "select id,content,dynamic_fields from queries"
table_name: queries

# Database connection adapter
connection_adapter:
adapter: "mysql"
host: "localhost"
username: "username"
password: "password"
database: "myapp_development"

#brokencompass.yml............. ENDS

Note:
0. Nothing is optional in the yml(everything is mandatory)
1. Add as many items in index-sources as you want, but every item name should match model names(for which they will be used).
2. Make sure to include the Id field so that index created can be mapped to record identifier.
3. Provide the connection adapter details in connection_adapter section(so as to answer, where to read data from)
4. If you are not minding the spaces in yml(then you have messed up the configuration, so don't try to remove spaces :) from yml, wanna know more about yml? )

Step: 03
Run rake task to create indexes for the first time

rake brokencompass:create_index

from inside of rails app root directory.

Step: 04 (This is required, when one is re-creating the indexes from scratch)
Run rake task to re-create indexes

rake brokencompass:index

from inside of rails app root directory.

Step: 05 (To delete any of the indexes so created, delete corresponding "xxxx.index" file from broken_compass
from inside of rails app root directory.

BrokenCompass

2009-10-09T10:18:00.003+05:30

New in-memory full text search engine in ruby and in rails "BrokenCompass".
Coming soon....
keep an eye on this space..

svn: This client is too old to work with working copy

2009-07-29T23:06:00.009+05:30

Hello folks,

I am still very much alive, i don't know ho missed me or not(am sure no one :D). There is lot happening in life now-a-days will talk about it later, first a quickie about SVN.

If you are working on some project then you must be aware of something called SVN, it is an open source version control system. Recently got hit with something really weired.

I work on Ubuntu but as my ubuntu doesn't have anything even close to 80% of tortoise SVN i tried using windows for that(using virtual windows and samba) to carry on my SVN activities that is really really easy when it is done using TortoiseSVN.

But the time i tried "svn update" from Linux shell command it gave me

praveen@praveen-laptop:~/NetBeansProjects/projectone$ svn update
svn: This client is too old to work with working copy '.'. You need
to get a newer Subversion client, or to downgrade this working copy.
See http://subversion.tigris.org/faq.html#working-copy-format-change
for details.

And i was like what to do now, so followed the instruction and it worked(at least worked for me :) ). So what i did is

Step 01: Downloaded a file ~~http://svn.collab.net/repos/svn/trunk/tools/client-side/change-svn-wc-format.py~~ http://svn.apache.org/repos/asf/subversion/trunk/tools/client-side/change-svn-wc-format.py
Step 02: Executed the following command
praveen@praveen-laptop:~$ python change-svn-wc-format.py /path/to/project 1.5
i.e my project got downgraded to version 1.5

And it worked :)

AS NOTE: usage: change-svn-wc-format.py Working_Copy SVN_VERSION

Next Time something like this happens, you know how to do it.

How to run GPRS from airtel on ROKR E6 motorola

2009-06-01T00:32:00.010+05:30

Hey hi guys and gals,
Just after a long time i am writing something on mobile device, actually it is something which shows how stupid I am :D
I was planned to go for a small trip to my home town (I will write a post about it too, but for the time being 'the issue').
I live in Delhi(India) and so this is something for the locale or some one who is facing almost the same that i faced about a week ago, and it was of how to make GPRS active on my best Motorola rokr e6(where it is very much assumed that i have an Airtel post paid mobile connection). I was in urgent need of some way or the other to connect to net as have lot and lot of dependency on it and even if i am off from office i have work to do :D (sounds as if i am very busy person, let me be :D) so i opted for GPRS from my mobile and i know e6 comes with GPRS features, but some how or the other it was not working.
I asked airtel people about it, they were just resending the setting to my phone, which was very much accepted and installed too but the main issue was still there "GPRS was not working", according to them this is all they can do and there was actually not in that, they were sending a GPRS connection premade with the name of "Mobile-office" which contained an APN: airtelgprs.com and an primary gateway ip: 202.56.231.117 and the port was 8080 and nothing more nothing less but damn it was not working, call center executive were helpless what to do so again and again tried different hooks but nothing worked out and i again called the executive and she said something which made me feel how stupid of me, being so much in technology was not able to figure out this small thing and it was that i have to manually enable the GPRS, which is manually accessed from the bar which shows the reception quality, programs and players running and which by default is placed just below the top set of icons, enabled the GPRS from there and restarted my phone(which call center guys usually asks to do) and it worked :)

Sometimes even i can skip something which is right in front of my eyes or one can right in front of my screen (it happens with developers).
So guys or gals if you have faced something stupid like this please comment and let every body know :), at least i did
chow people it is the to hit bed, I am dead tired right now after this vacation :D

Some life updates

2009-05-08T00:39:00.009+05:30

Actually this month is happening... as life is as usual.
Just resigned from MPST(MPS Technologies Limited) and am stretching my legs and thank god that even summers are chilling now-a-days so it is all very pleasant.
and I voted too this central elections (it is only applicable if you known about current Indian political status of India).
And ya the most happening thing that i did this week was i took the test drive of Toyota innova, and to be fare i thought i was disappointed for the gear knob vibrations from toyota but latter on, i thought every other car is only way behind it.... so why give it a bad name.. so it is good and perfect if you care about your family and wanna visit places.. it is a nice car that's for sure.
And as was expected, I also visited the tata showroom to ask in for tata most famous car after nano, exactly the safari The tata safari... and not going against my expectations, they didn't had any car to give the test drive and according to them they give test drive on vehicles which are ordered for other customers, now that's bad.
And here is a car comparison that i have not done before..
Innova is

good interiors
good exteriors
not so good vibrating gear in diesel
it doesn't rules the road
No 4*4 wheel drive
but very stable and great family car
Service is prompt i will buy innova if i can park it in near future

About Safari

"Reclaim you life" slogans fits in, but is life so lost??
Great exteriors and equally bad interiors
finish is not finished yet, come on guys increase the price by 2 lakhs but don't decrease the expectations
Why is roof mounted AC looks as if it is not part of roof (learn something from innova)
Service (Needs a big big improvement)
And please do have a separate car to test drive

:)

I was so mentally boosting myself to buy a safari but they have shattered my dreams, what to do and why to do!! both questions are playing

Any how people its late in night and that too of no-work... i want to fit my "Reclaim your sleep" slogan now.

bbye and good luck

Pretty urls with name or title in ruby on rails

2009-05-02T09:49:00.022+05:30

Hi folks,

Something on which is very old.. might not be very interesting for many of you who are into rails development. I am talking about the pretty-urls the SEO stuff(forget all this, it is for good readability of url).

So what my basic funda that i have gathered from last three years is that, every resource is identified by an identifier in rails(generally called id, in terms of database), but displaying the id doesn't sounds legal to me.. so to hide the ids and to have a nice looking readable

we can have title or name fields in the database's relation(table) and to make use of pretty urls, we make corresponding column like stripped_title or stripped_name.
create a file "make_pretty_url.rb" in initializers in config and append the following code.

puts "===================================================="
puts "Adding engine to make pretty url(s)"
puts "===================================================="
module ActiveRecord
class Base
after_create :make_or_update_pretty_url_name

def make_or_update_pretty_url_name
parent_column = nil
stripped_column = self.attributes.collect {|x| x.to_s.include?("stripped_") ? x : nil}.flatten.compact.first
if stripped_column
parent_column = stripped_column.gsub("stripped_","")
if self.send(parent_column)
self.send("#{stripped_column}=",stripp_it(self.send(parent_column)))
if self.class.find(:all, :conditions => ["#{stripped_column} = ?",self.send(stripped_column)]).length > 0
self.send("#{stripped_column}=","#{self.send(stripped_column)}-#{self.id.to_s}")
end
self.send("save")
end
end
end

def stripp_it(str)
str.strip.downcase.gsub(/[^a-z0-9]/,"-").gsub(/(-)+/,"-").gsub(/(-)+$/,"")
end
end
end

it will automatically create stripped_{column_name} and will take care of duplicates and instead of using find_by_id(), find_by_stripped_{column_name} will be used to get the resource and "make_or_update_pretty_url_name" method will also be available for any manual work too.

Hope this just adds in the knowledge base of stuff, and if there is anything about it, let me know through comments..

RAILS: interning empty string

2009-04-17T11:44:00.008+05:30

Hi folks,

Really after a long time, writing a post on ROR (even a simple post). AN the reason for delay.. work as usual and secondary i want people to educate on an error, with the statement as "interning empty string" something showing thing like this.

Being from IT industry and not much into literature, first thought came in my mind after hitting this error was "what does interning means?" and the answer from dictionary.com says "to restrict to or confine within prescribed limits" which just meant some breakage of boundary of something and i am the culprit( as always :)) )

But an ware of what i did, started hitting Ctrl + Z (to undo my bad deeds :))) but no luck!! just nothing.. i was like what!! what is that which is not getting undone over here and even google search was showing some very unresponsive result... so was left alone to trigger army against this.
And finally i got the answer and it was...

If you have a partial defined something like "_partial_name.html.erb" everything is fine till the time you don't append an extra dot to the partial file name something like "_partial_name..html.erb" it will through "interning empty string" even if you don't render the partial anywhere

So guys and gals next time try to be more concentrated on renaming a partial, because it can lead to something where even google searches don't have a definite answer to.

That is it for the day.

Happy coding and happy engineering