Handy script: lbl – the missing cli for LocalWP

Local, the development environment for WordPress by LocalWP is great, but I am a terminal type of person. So I adapted an earlier script to work with the new Local version.

This script lets you do (nearly) all you need to do with Local from the CLI. Surely, a click of a button is not hard? true. But why use the mouse when you can use the keyboard. For instance

lbl ssh
opens a new Terminal shell specifically for the site you are in. (not chrooted, but it is set-up correctly).
lbl db
opens Sequel Pro with the correct database.

And there is much more ;) Continue reading “Handy script: lbl – the missing cli for LocalWP”

New toy – almost done – FluxEngine – stand-alone

Hello all.

Yes, I know. It’s been a long time since my last post, but I have a good reason. I have been busy, very very busy with a new 3D project.

Base on the fantastic work of David Given (https://cowlark.com) on FluxEngine I am in the process of developing a stand-alone device to read/write floppydisks (both 5,25 and 3,5 inch) to/from disk images. Please see David’s website on FluxEngine for more information on this part of the project.

You would say that the FluxEngine is the most difficult part made easy by David, and yes, that is true. What I am bringing to the party is the housing, fully 3D printed, the electronics to make it stand-alone, power supply, cooling etc. Interested? Please read on :)

Continue reading “New toy – almost done – FluxEngine – stand-alone”

This just in: Contact-Form-7 (WordPress) Vulnerability – 5 million websites at risk – CVE-2020-35489

A vulnerability has been discovered in Contact Form 7 that allows an attacker to upload malicious scripts. The publishers of Contact Form 7 have released an update to fix the vulnerability.

Unrestricted File Upload Vulnerability…

Noooo, I’m not going to steal/copy/plagiarize this article, just read the article on CVE 2020 35489 on searchenginejournal.com.

But I do have something to add. Continue reading “This just in: Contact-Form-7 (WordPress) Vulnerability – 5 million websites at risk – CVE-2020-35489”

Migrating from SVN to GIT. It has been done before, …, but has it?

Recent changes in policy re-ignited our quest to migrate away from Subversion to GIT, as GIT is much more powerful for branching and merging e.t.c.

Migrating from Subversion is not very hard; you just start over, right? So you want to lose all the project history? I don’t think so.

The migrated GIT-repository should include all history, all commit messages, all tags, all branches. How do you do that? Continue reading “Migrating from SVN to GIT. It has been done before, …, but has it?”

Connecting a Synology MR2200ac to an RT2600ac fails – SOLVED

I recently replaced my trusty Synology RT1900ac with a “great, problem solving, multi-room Wi-Fi kit” from Asus, the Lyra MAP-AC2200. “The best of the best”. Yeah, … right.

Product photo of the very good but not very powerful Synology RT1900ac. At time of writing, no longer available and for good reason; get yourself an RT2600ac! You will not regret it.
Out with the old …

The problem with my apartment is that is about 60 years old, and some rooms are behind load-bearing walls. Not load-bearing for my ceiling, but load-bearing for the entire complex. Like 20cm thick reinforced concrete! Wi-Fi is problematic there. So this multi-room Wi-Fi set would solve that problem.

Product photo of the not-so-great-in-a-Wi-Fi-jungle: the Asus Lyra MAP-AC2200 Multi-Room Wi-Fi kit. Works fantastically in a free standing structure or an office building...
… in with the new.

Well it did; I got Wi-Fi, strong, fast, … for about 2 hours. Then a reboot of the closest Lyra node was needed. On top of that, incoming connections to the main node would no longer get through after about 4 days, so twice a week a full reboot of all nodes was needed, just to get a little Wi-Fi. After 6 months of this getting worse and worse, I was done. [Edit: turns out there is so much Wi-Fi signals here, the Lyra set gets confused … It’s a Wi-Fi jungle out here …]

In the end I had ping-spikes and drop-outs like crazy; sitting right next to the main node, pinging my ISP Modem through the Wi-Fi;

Still of a WhatsApp video I shot to show a friend the superb Wi-Fi you get with an Asus Lyra MAP-AC2200 kit.
What the hell, Asus? You call this “superb Wi-Fi coverage”? This is a ping from Laptop -> 1 meter open air -> Asus Lyra Main Node -> 2 meters ethernet cable -> ISP Modem.

Playing online games was simply impossible. So I took out my RT1900ac again and settled with Wi-Fi being poor or even non-existent in some rooms.

A few days ago, however, I had enough of that too and I took a leap and bought the Synology RT2600ac + MR2200ac combo. The set-up of the RT2600ac was a breeze, but I had seen that before, as this works exactly like the RT1900ac. In fact; I downloaded a configuration backup on the RT1900ac, uploaded it to the RT2600ac and done. Unplugged the old, installed the new. All done.

Product photo of the fantastic Synology RT2600ac
The Synology RT2600ac Router

Well, almost; I still had the Mesh-node MR2200ac to set-up.

Product photo of the Synology MR2200ac Mesh router; you can use this without an RT2600ac as well, it has the FULL SRM software on it.
The Synology MR2200ac Router / Mesh node

That should be a breeze, too, right? Well, not so much… Continue reading “Connecting a Synology MR2200ac to an RT2600ac fails – SOLVED”

Safari bug – error pages getting zoomed

Hi all.

Yeah, I know. It’s been over a year since my last entry. I’m not the person to monetise online presence, I just post stuff about problems I faced and how I solved them. No biggie, right?

Well, for a few weeks now my error pages looked like this: Continue reading “Safari bug – error pages getting zoomed”

Handy script: lbf

[Edit: This script is defunct since Local rebuilt the application and ditched the virtual machine. This script works only with the old “Local by Flywheel”  and not with the “Local Lightning” app. For the latter, see my lbl script]

Local (by Flywheel) is great, but for a terminal type of person as I am, I find it way more convenient to SSH into a VM and use the WP-CLI to perform WordPress tasks. With a platform like Vagrant, one has the

vagrant ssh
command to shell into the virtual environment.

With Local, you can do this with the push of a button in Local, but as said, I like the terminal better.

lbf ssh
is waaaaay faster than going to the Local app, find the site, click the SSH button.

But wait, there is much more ;) Continue reading “Handy script: lbf”

WordPress REST-API nonce-sense.

Working with the WordPress REST-API is HELL. There. I said it. It is powerful, it is secure, it is everything a developer needs, but for the love of [fill in your favorite deity here], WordPress, be consistent!

Using the REST-API requires authentication. Well, that’s not a problem. Just create a route to log-in and one to log-out. WordPress has functions to do that.

wp_signon()
and
wp_logout()

The first hurdle is getting the WordPress REST API to function. Oh, wait, you need a nonce ?! Well, thank you WordPress for this ‘security’-measure. For everything else in WordPress the authentication cookies you get when logging in to /wp-admin are enough, but for REST-API you need a nonce … the F why !?

Sorry, but this is just NONCE-SENSE! Pun intented. If only it were funny. Continue reading “WordPress REST-API nonce-sense.”

Google Tag Manager restart after AJaX page-reload

Quick Tip

So you have this very fast AJaX page loader (InstantClick) on your website, but you want to use Google Tag Manager and track your pageview with Analytics etc; here’s how you reset Tag Manager and re-load it after your AJaX page is loaded; Continue reading “Google Tag Manager restart after AJaX page-reload”

Spring cleaning :) SpaceChem solution archive migrated into WordPress blog

After careful (not) thought and with relative ease (again: not) I have migrated the SpaceChem solutions into this blog. As visitor, you should not notice other than a change of design (or rather: lack of design).

Does this change the solutions? NO :) They are still the same three-or-more-year-old solutions.

Nor does this migration give any guarantee on the functionality of the solutions after all this time.

It’s just something I had to do, getting rid of old, bad, ugly, baseline PHP code.

So you might think, “then why the hell are you bothering us with this?”. Well, good question. Got no answer. Consider this blog-post un-written :P

Enjoy your weekend all! (or your week, if you read this on a working-day, or your holidays, if the internet carrier pigeons have brought this message to you around a holiday, or maybe even your birthday! Is it your birthday today? It is? well happy birthday!)

Alright, enough babbling for today.

Laters.

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