Personal

As a developer, I very often see error messages – some of those originate from the products I develop, and I have to report them as bugs. Whenever I get an error message in a dialog, I typically take a screenshot, and add that to the bug base issue. That’s fine, but it means people can’t search for that error message in the bug base – in order to enable that, I’d usually just manually type out the error message, rather than take a screenshot. That was before. Today, I’d just press CTRL+C to copy the error dialog contents. That’s right, whenever you see a dialog in Windows, like this: You can press CTRL+C to copy, and then open up … Read more

I was pretty happy when I managed to snag Far Cry 2 for a low price on Steam, a month or so ago. Unfortunately, when I went to run the game, it never launched successfully. The splash screen appeared, and the game did momentarily appear in the task bar – but after that, the screen turns black for about 2 seconds, and then everything disappears. Kind of a disappointing experience for a newly purchased game, but it wasn’t the first time I encountered a game that refused to start. Solution To solve this, I had to carefully trigger a keyboard shortcut at the right moment. 1) Launch Far Cry 2. In my case, the splash screen appeared, and then it … Read more

Yet again, I was looking for some information online, and I found this ridiculous question and answer. While difficult to take seriously, Yahoo! Answers does at least offer a good laugh.

Mozilla Firefox has always been one of my favorite browsers. The only contender that was able to knock it from its #1 position was Google Chrome. Even though Chrome is still lacking in a few departments (extensions, bookmark management), I swear by it because of the overall performance. Plus, whenever they release a major version, I know they’ll have further performance enhancements – that’s just what they do. I also prefer the minimalistic nature of their user interface – which, as it turns out, also integrates beautifully with my operating system, Windows 7. Despite Firefox dropping to #2 in my list, I still use it regularly for web development. They have plenty of extensions to keep me coming back: Firebug, Web Developer, … Read more

As I was working on one of my personal web development projects today, I realized I would need a loading animation. Thankfully, I remembered a very useful web service I discovered a long time ago – AjaxLoad.info. The site is specifically designed to provide free, customizable loading animations – in GIF format.  They have at least 25 different types of loading animations – so if you’re looking for one, I recommend you check what they have to offer. As for the “free” factor – in case you’re wondering: there aren’t any specific licenses associated with the images, but the front page clearly states that “generated gifs are totally free for use”. That said, enjoy.

In the past, whenever I wanted to search for available domain names, I checked with individual domain registrars. While this worked, it really wasn’t optimal- every time I wanted to check another domain’s availability, I had to press Back in my browser, re-enter a domain, re-submit the request, and then I’d know. Most websites were set up like this, unfortunately. Furthermore, if I wanted to compare domain registration fees, I’d have to check multiple websites. I’m happy to say that these inconveniences are now no longer an issue. The solution lies in a site called Instant Domain Search. The webpage aims to facilitate the process of searching for a domain, and to do so, it: searches automatically as you type … Read more

Back in June 2008, I invited a friend of mine to an Iron Maiden concert here in Montreal. Since he lives in Nova Scotia, this meant that he’d be staying at my place for a few days. Over the years I’ve known him, it was very clear to me that he really enjoyed cookies… so I thought I should be equipped for his arrival: The cabinet was almost completely full – each package you see in the photo had another identical one right behind it. Needless to say, we didn’t finish all the cookies – I had to give them away to friends and family.

Sometimes I decide that I never want to re-visit a particular website ever again, and I want a way to block it indefinitely. Normally, I just learned to ignore a website simply out of self-discipline. Lately, I decided I wanted something more secure. After all, even with self-discpline, I could still accidentally visit said site from a link found on another unblocked site. I figured out a good solution: the Windows hosts file. Windows features a special file simply called “hosts”, without an extension. This file allows users to map hostnames to IP addresses. More importantly, however, is that when Windows tries to locate nodes on any given network, it will take the hosts file into consideration. It will actually consider the … Read more

A friend recently sent me a package – I couldn’t help but laugh when I saw it: I wasn’t home when this package arrived, and that meant the mailman had to leave note informing me that a package for “Refghi Power” would be waiting for me at the local post office. When I went to get it, I tried to contemplate how I would prove that I am “Refghi Power”, as all my IDs claim I’m “Matt Refghi”. Also, keep in mind that mostly everyone around here speaks French. Thankfully, the guy at the post office laughed and said he got it.

I was genuinely trying to find out if there was a way to have certain pictures of myself removed from Facebook, until I found this: I like how all the others answers were, for the most part, completely correct – and yet the chosen “best answer” is ridiculous. UPDATE January 19, 2013: Question was deleted, removed link.