Webmaster Tips at WebDesign10.com

How to Add a Border to an Image in GIMP

Webmaster Tips — Sun, 22 Jun 2008 16:30:36 -0400

There are at least a couple of ways to add a border to an image in GIMP. I'll describe two ways below — one method is easier but it modifies the image size slightly; the second method keeps the original image size, but has more steps.

The sample image for this tutorial is a screenshot from uncyclopedia.org. The starting dimensions of the image are 490x260 pixels.

Here is the original image without a border:

The Script-Fu Filter Method

The filter to add a border is in Filter > Decor > Add Border:

You will then have options to set the width of the border. In this case I'm adding a 2px black border around the image:

This method adds to the dimensions of the image. Adding a 2px border around the original 490x260px screenshot expands the image dimensions to 494x264px:

Once you have used a filter, you can repeat it on other images by pressing Ctrl-f. That makes this the fastest way to add a lot of borders with GIMP. The only drawback with this method is that it changes the image dimensions.

The Shrink-selection & Layer Method

This 2nd method has more steps, but it keeps the original image dimensions.

First press Ctrl-a to select the entire image. Then go to the menu item Select > Shrink and shrink the selection by 1 or 2 pixels depending on how thick you want the border.

Then press Ctrl-i to invert the selection. Press Ctrl-l (lowercase L) to bring the layers window into focus. Create a new layer with the default settings:

The border will be added to this new layer.

Press Shift-b to choose the paint bucket tool. Choose the color you want to use for your border. Then zoom into the image and click inside the selected border area on your image. In th following image I'm zoomed in 800% so that I can fill the 2px wide selected area around the image:

Here is the final result. It is the screenshot with a 2px black border around it, but the border is painted over the image so that the image still has it's original dimensions, 490x260px:

Jon Stewart video on Obama rumors

Webmaster Tips — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 14:06:19 -0400

Jon Stewart, one of the last sane voices on TV?

Via Huffington Post.

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Webmaster Tips — Thu, 22 May 2008 01:09:03 -0400

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10 Top Drupal Sites

Webmaster Tips — Sun, 04 May 2008 15:47:58 -0400

Here are 10 examples of top-notch, high profile Drupal Web sites. This post is intended to give a quick example of what is possible with Drupal.

The Onion

Lime.com

Ubuntu.com

Ubuntu.com used to be Plone, but they switched to Drupal:

Yahoo Research

Mplay.com

The New York Observer

Fast Company

Warner Bros Records

Popular Science

Team Sugar

Teamsugar.com is a great Drupal site, and it looks like they may still be running Drupal 4.7!

How to Find Your php.ini File

Webmaster Tips — Sat, 26 Apr 2008 04:56:28 -0400

When overriding your php.ini file, it helps to know where your server's current php.ini file is. Just run the following command in the terminal to locate your php.ini file:

php -i | grep php.ini

You should get output something like this:

# php -i | grep php.ini <tr><td class="e">Configuration File (php.ini) Path </td>t<d class="v">/usr/lib/php.ini /<td/><tr<>/code>


(I highlighted the path to the php.ini file.)
To copy the above php.ini file to your current directory use the following command:
cp /usr/lib/php.ini .



Ascii Art Aquarium Screensaver for Linux: Asciiquarium!
Webmaster Tips — Fri, 28 Mar 2008 03:44:26 -0400
I found an interesting ascii aquarium screensaver for Linux terminals called Asciiquarium.


I installed it tonight and took some screenshots:
A ship, castle and goldfish:


A whale:


A large shark:


A sea monster:


Asciiquarium is a short Perl program that runs in a terminal.  To download it, make sure that you have Term::Animation.  On Ubuntu Linux, that means typing sudo cpan and then install Term::Animation.
The go to your downloaded Asciiquarium file (it's just a Perl program in text format) and chmod +x in a terminal to make it executable.  Then type ./asciiquarium to start the program.
There is also a version of Asciiquarium as a KDE screensaver.  There is also a version for Mac called MacAsciiquarium.  Check it out!

    



How Flash Cookies Threaten Your Privacy
Webmaster Tips — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 08:34:29 -0400
Web sites are embedding bugs into your computer that track you even after you have cleared your browser's privacy settings.
These bugs are called Flash Cookies, or Local Shared Objects.  Web sites use them to track you because they know that most people don't know about them and that they can track you even after you have cleared your privacy settings.
Web sites that use Flash cookies to bypass users' cookie privacy settings should be publicly flogged.
Examples of sites that use Flash cookies to remember your personal data even after you clear your cookies and privacy settings:

VistaPrint
Yahoo Images
YouTube
ge.com
and many others — often without saying so in their privacy policies.

Flash Cookies and Privacy
The Electronic Privacy Information Center has a good page of information on Flash cookies:
Recently, users have become more vigilant in purging cookies from their computers. According to a Jupiter Research study, 58% of online users have deleted cookies from their computer and 39% of users do so on a monthly basis. This regular "cookie tossing" is causing direct marketers to see more invasive methods to track individuals. One of those methods is to set a "Local Shared Object," also known as a "Flash cookie" to track individuals. Simply put, the idea behind this tracking is to set two cookies on the user's machine--a standard cookie that the consumer may erase, and a second Flash cookie that the user probably will keep, because the existence of Flash cookies is not well known....
This practice is highly deceptive. By deleting cookies, consumers are clearly rejecting attempts to track them. Using an obscure technology to subvert these wishes is a practice that should be stopped. Cookies have many beneficial purposes and can make the end user's web experience better. Websites should be honest and up front about how they use cookies, and they should respect the decisions of those users who do not want to be tracked via cookies.
VistaPrint's privacy policy admits that they use Flash cookies, and says:
If you have Macromedia Flash installed on your computer, we will also use a file called a Flash Object to store your unique customer code and record locater on your computer. Unless deactivated by you, the Flash Object provides us with a backup method for recognizing you in the event that we are unable to identify your cookies.
In other words, it bypasses your choice to clear browser cookies and tracks you regardless of whether you have turned on your browser's privacy settings.
The Core Problem is Browsers
One of the core problems is that browsers do not clear Flash cookies at the same time the user clears other browser cookies.
For information about where your Flash cookies are stored, see this Wikipedia page.  It has good criticisms of Flash cookies:
Flash Player uses a sandbox security model, but, contrary to some definitions, the application does not ask the user's permission to store data on his hard disk. This may constitute a collection of cookie-like data that may include not only user-tracking information but any personal data that the user has entered in any Flash-enabled application, whether it be stand-alone or Web-based.
Consumers often see cookies as an invasion of privacy and resent having them loaded into their computers without permission. While we have learned to delete traditional cookies, most are unaware of LSOs, and don't know how to disable them. Users who delete traditional cookies may find those cookies resurrected because of Adobe/Macromedia's LSOs. Since LSOs, unlike traditional cookies, have no expiration dates, the information resurrected in those cookies may persist indefinitely.
Useful Firefox Extensions
There is a Firefox extension called Objection that allows you to clear Flash cookies.  It shouldn't be a separate step though; Firefox should clear Flash cookies when it clears your regular cookies.  I found that it cleared the Flash cookies out of my ~/.macromedia/Flash_Player/#SharedObjects/ directory (Ubuntu Gutsy), but that when I visited Macromedia's Flash cookie manager (below), the cookies were still detected on my computer.  The Objection extension apparently isn't clearing all of the history/cookie data.
Another useful Firefox extension for managing Flash is Flashblock which blocks all Flash by default, with the option to enable it in specific cases.
How to Remove and Block Flash Cookies
If you want to destroy all Flash cookies on your computer and prevent new ones from being created, go to this page which is Macromedia's Flash control panel.  You can manage your Flash settings from that Web page.  A full tutorial is here.
After you have blocked Flash cookies, you will be presented with the option to reject them whenever a Flash movie tries to set them:

The Solution
Obviously, Web sites should not be trying to bypass their visitors' privacy settings.
The ability to clear Flash cookies along with regular Web cookies is something that should be built into browsers.  The default setting in browsers should be to delete Flash cookies whenever the browser is shut down.

    



Why VistaPrint Is Creepy
Webmaster Tips — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 12:48:35 -0400
UPDATE: It looks like might be done with Flash cookies - a technique of bypassing a browser user's "clear cookies" preferences.  More about Flash cookies here:

"Bypassing user intent like this is scummy, plain & simple."
I agree with that statement.
I followed up this post with a page about Flash cookies.
(For a complete list of updates and comments, please scroll down.)
I went to buy some business cards on Visatprint.com and noticed very weird behavior from the site.
Even though I had logged out, cleared cookies since my last visit to Vistaprint, my name would appear on the home page of the site whenever I visited it.
Here is a screenshot of the home page, with a key to the numbers:



My name appearing on the home page of vistaprint.com without my logging in.
My saved password filled into the box by Firefox
My saved business card designs displayed on the home page of Vistaprint without my having logged in.  Cookies had been cleared several times since last logging in.


I think that Vistaprint.com might be using AJAX to grab my password out of the autofilled form and logging me in without my permission.  I'm trying to think of another way that they could recognize my visits, but I can't think of one.
I don't like that a site is displaying my confidential information on their homepage without my permission (i.e., pressing the "Sign in" button).  I'm not sure if it's a security risk, but it's creepy.  It's a violation of the user's password data.
I tried loading the home page in a browser that didn't have my password saved, and Vistaprint didn't display my confidential data on its home page.
I contacted them through their contact form but never heard back, so now I'm posting my question online.  Why is VistaPrint displaying my confidential information on their homepage without my logging in?


UPDATE: It doesn't look like AJAX, and I'm not sure how they are doing it. (16 March 2008)
The point is not whether it is AJAX or not.  It's that the site is showing personal data that should only be visible behind a login page.
UPDATE: From the comments below it looks like they may be spying on your computer with Flash cookies.  Regular cookies are easily removed, but using Flash cookies gives visitors no easy way to clear their saved data.
Some of the comments below appear to be from VistaPrint, but they have not openly responded.

    



Get Clicky: Free Web Stats
Webmaster Tips — Tue, 26 Feb 2008 03:44:26 -0500
Clicky is a great free Web stats program that you can use to get detailed information about your Web site's visitors.


Clicky has a slick "Web 2.0" interface and features:


The best use of Clicky stats is to find out very detailed information about your visitors.  For example, you can list your visitors and see exactly where they came from and where they went on your site:

You can get a detail view of each visitor with a map of their location, browser information, and a list of pages that they visited:

One of my favorite features is called Clicky Spy — a live view of what pages are being visited that is constantly updated with AJAX:

Best of all, Clicky is free!

    



Why You Should Never Use 1and1.com Hosting
Webmaster Tips — Sat, 23 Feb 2008 11:18:46 -0500
UPDATE: I'm now going through another 1and1.com incident where my server has been down for over 36 hours.  I don't host large sites there, but still have a few mini sites there that I didn't move yet.  I highly recommend avoiding 1and1 hosting.
I have a so-called "1&1 Premier Professional Package" hosting package on 1and1.com hosting.  It's supposed to be equivalent to their so-called "Developer" hosting package.
Tonight's experience was the last straw and I'm going to give you a few reasons why you should never use 1and1.com for hosting.


I've had many problems with 1and1.com's tech support over the years.  Tonight's issue was that the .htaccess file rules were not working on 1and1.
I was trying to remove the file extensions from PHP files so that a URL like http://example.com/about would execute the file http://example.com/about.php.
This is the code that works perfectly on my localhost and on Dreamhost, but that sends 404 errors on 1&1 hosting:
RewriteEngine On

RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f

RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d

RewriteRule ^(.*)$ $1.php [L]
I spent an hour on the phone with a 1&1 tech support staff who had difficulty even finding the correct directory on the Web server.  For a while he was telling me that there was no .htaccess file (because he was looking in the wrong place).
I told him that 1and1 has an unusual server configuration and that .htaccess rules like AddType application/x-httpd-php .html don't work on 1&1.  (You have to use the unusual AddType x-mapp-php4 .html.)
So I called them just wanting to know how they had modified their servers  so that the standard mod_rewrite code above wasn't working.
To keep the story short (the phone call was over an hour long), I will just cut to the conclusion: he told me that I needed to link to about.php and to reconfigure my .htaccess file.
It sounded like he was just repeating what his boss was telling him without really understanding what he was saying.  He kept saying that I was linking to "a folder called about" when I needed to link to about.php.  I tried to explain that /about is a file, not a "folder" — it does not have a trailing slash... and that I didn't want .php file extensions because I was going to later upgrade to a CMS (Drupal) that doesn't have .php file extensions.
He wouldn't put me on the phone with a manager and said "this is a scripting issue, not a server issue".  He said that 1and1.com servers could read any .htaccess file.  I started to explain the issue about how 1and1 can't read AddType application/x-httpd-php .html and that I had to call them to get a workaround, but after a little more arguing we got cut off.
1and1.com cannot read any .htaccess file.  The following .htaccess code works on my laptop's localhost Apache as well as on Dreamhost, but creates 404 errors on 1&1 — Options -MultiViews creates 500 errors:
RewriteEngine On

RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f

RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d

RewriteRule ^(.*)$ $1.php [L]
Past Problems With 1and1.com Hosting
Terrible Customer Service
This isn't the first serious issue I've had with 1and1.com.  I remember calling them once to ask them why I couldn't download their free software anymore, and the supposed "tech support" told me that it was impossible that I had ever downloaded it.  I told him that it had been offered for free when I signed up and that I had downloaded it before.  He told me I had to send them money to get it shipped by CD.  By the end of the conversation he was angrily telling me that it was impossible for me to have ever downloaded their software.  Basically calling me a liar.
Tech Support Without Technical Knowledge
Other times I've called their "tech support" and had to talk with people that didn't have much of a tech background and who didn't know what they were talking about.  Like the guy above who told me /about is a "folder" and that I needed to link to /about.php.
"Too Many FTP Connections"
Any Web host that bans your IP for editing more than one file at a time over FTP is crap.  GoDaddy.com and 1and1.com are the only two hosting companies that consistently ban my IP for doing this.
I like to edit more than one live file over FTP/sFTP at a time — perhaps a PHP file and a CSS file at the same time.  If you try to do that with 1and1.com (or GoDaddy) you are likely to get your IP address temporarily banned.
Site5, Bluehost, and other hosting companies don't have that problem.  Every cheap host has problems of one kind or another, but 1and1 is really one of the worst hosting companies that I've used in 5 years of building Web sites.
Do you have a 1and1.com horror story?  Please add a comment below.
UPDATE: A few minutes after I posted this I deleted 4 files over sFTP with Konqueror and then tried to rename two files and 1and1.com banned my IP address for too many FTP connections!