The Red Frog Blog

I ran across two annoying problems when setting up a new Trac project on our xserve today. Thought I’d share my solutions in hopes of helping someone. Our xserve runs OS X Server 10.4.11, and we’re using Trac version 0.11b2.

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Just saw a great documentary that I thought I’d review (in an attempt to win Tyler’s “blog today!” contest). It’s called “My Kid Could Paint That“, and it’s about a 4-year old girl named Marla from Binghamton, New York who has an amazing ability to create beautifully mature abstract paintings. A quick summary from NetFlix (my main source for DVDs):

Amir Bar-Lev directs this thought-provoking documentary about a precocious 4-year-old artist whose abstract works have drawn critical comparisons with modernist greats such as Kandinsky, Picasso and Pollack — and whose talents have already profited her more than $300,000. Is her gift with a paintbrush just an illusion, or is she truly an artistic visionary trapped in the body of a child?

Inspiration or manipulation??? I won’t reveal to you what happens because Amir does a wonderful job of telling the story as it unfolded… but let’s just say it’s not so pretty at the end. Amir gives a balanced take on the events and leaves you as the viewer to decide what really happened. And it’s the kind of movie that you just have to talk about immediately after watching it. Admittedly, I was also really intrigued because of the local proximity of the story.

So add this right to the top of your Queue, this is a must-see documentary!

REALTORS….

Get agency-wide property listings on your website with our IDX integration special! Click the link directly below to read about the details and pricing or download as a PDF file.

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MAMP is an awesome program that allows you to install Apache, MySQL and PHP with just a few clicks on Mac OS X. It’s a really easy way to set up a local development environment, or to get a dynamic website running a laptop (which is something we recently had to do for a client).

Apparently there’s a bug in the current version (1.7.1) that causes MAMP to stop working even though the MAMP window reports Apache and MySQL running with a green light. When you try to load up pages in a browser you’ll get an unable to connect message like “Firefox can’t establish a connection to the server at localhost:8888“. Stopping and starting the Apache and MySQL services doesn’t fix the problem and even restarting your Mac doesn’t help! You may not even be able to get MAMP to stop running. Here’s how to fix the bug…

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I’ve gathered together some of my all-time favorite Mac programs for you to check out! In no particular order I give you…

1. Little Snitch

I’m the kind of person who just likes to know when my computer is accessing the internet. Especially when trying out new software that I’ve never used before. Little Snitch is awesome because it alerts me any time a program on my computer wants to access the internet. In such a case, a little pop-up alerts me to the program that is attempting access along with the URL and port # of the attempted request. From this pop-up window you can choose to allow or deny the request. Now I feel safe knowing that I’m in control of my computer’s access to the web.

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