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Twitterbar Update

Matt 4 March 2011 Projects, Twitterbar Comments Off

Right, it seems that my little twitterbar project seems to have caught on and there are a fair number of users (in the double digits, at least). If you don’t know what I’m talking about, look at http://tb.riotnet.co.uk .

I do have plans to update it, fix some bugs and make it better, but at the moment I haven’t got the time. I’m more focused on my university coursework, and rightly so. That’s not going to be finished until the 31 March at the very earliest. Then there’s the exam period starting in May which I will be concentrating on. However, during April I will aim to fix some of the bugs in twitterbar.

Things that will be done and/or looked into are:

- Fixing the retweet bugs. If you do a retweet, it doesn’t show. I think I know what the problem is, but I need to look into it. I might do that sooner than April since it shouldn’t take much to fix.

- OAuth. It needs to be looked at. At the moment, I am using no authentication, just the standard twitter API’s. That means I’m limited in the number of API calls per IP address, not per user. Which means if there’s too many users, it will crash and burn. I need to look into OAuth, because then the limit will be based per user, not per IP. The call rate will be increased as well from ~150 to ~500 last time I checked. How I’m going to do this, not a clue. Work in progress.

- Proper domain name maybe?

- New themes? Depends how creative I feel.

If there’s anything else I’ve missed, comment and let me know. If you have a design you want to submit, do let me know as well.

-Matt

OvercomplexSuperTwitterMania

Matt 14 October 2010 Blog Comments Off

  Twitter’s API’s have got way overcomplex quickly, and it’s not fun to play with. I still fail to understand how oAuth works with Twitter, despite their FAQ tutorial explaining the differences between Basic Auth and oAuth and using postcards to demonstrate it.

What’s set me off today? Well on WordPress I have a plugin called Twitter Tools, which allows me to have twitter status’ on the sidebar, and it’s pretty good and simple. It also allows me to send tweets when I post a blog post, like this one. Very useful, highly recommend (http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/twitter-tools/)

However Twitter have overcomplicated things with security and their API access, which makes setting up Twitter Tools with the new settings a royal pain. (Basic Auth is now history). Before, I could just enter username, password, done. Now, I have to register my blog as an application. Madness eh. The steps to do this isn’t friendly either. twitterregplextwittercomplex

These are the steps I had to follow. First I had to register the blog as a full fledged application, then I had to get four different keys.

Simple is the way forward. Obviously not too simple because that can cause serious security concerns, but oversupermassivehypercomplicated isn’t the way either.

At least Twitter Tools works again, until the next big change.

flupl 1.8 live

Matt 27 August 2010 flupl Comments Off

Not exactly flupl 1.0, nor exactly where I’d like flupl 2.0 to be, so 1.8 will do.

What’s changed?

  • New layout. I’ve finally got it to look fairly decent, ish. Still probably work to do on the interface front, but it’s personally an improvement
  • Backend is simplified, taken out nearly all duplication when I was being lazy and so on.
  • API is nearly ready, now the backend has been simplified.
  • My Account actually does something now!
  • Recent files on the homepage now shows the last eight files uploaded, with a thumbnail and when you put your cursor over the thumbnail, you get file stats
  • Site displays fine on all major browsers, including IE.

image

Ideally, I would have liked to have released flupl 2 fully, but I felt where I was at the moment was an improvement enough for me to release it. Things going into flupl 2.0 include a shortened direct link with working j.mp if wanted, file management (i.e. delete your file), and a preview page for images and other files. Any suggestions please do mention it.