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A Whistle Stop Tour of Git

git logo
Having just spent the afternoon showing Karin from Scream Blue Murder how to use git, I figured this would be a useful reference. It’s super quick because there is little to no explanation here, just the raw commands. It’s up to you to do a bit more research to understand what’s going on! Saying that, there should be enough here to get you working with git, even if you don’t grasp it all – just dive right in and play around.

Continue reading “A Whistle Stop Tour of Git”

Backup folders outside your sync app using symlinks

I say “sync app” as this process works on Copy, Dropbox and the like, in just the same way.

The idea is to make it appear to your sync app that a folder is inside it’s watched folder, when it is in fact somewhere else entirely.

Windows:
Use either the JUNCTION utility from Sysinternals, or the MKLINK command built in to Windows Vista, Windows 7 and Server 2008, for example:
junction "C:\Documents and Settings\User\My Documents\My Dropbox\DesiredFolder" "C:\Path\To\DesiredFolder"

mklink /D "C:\Users\Steve\Documents\Dropbox\DesiredFolder" "C:\Path\To\DesiredFolder"

Or, if you prefer a GUI, install Link Shell Extension.

OS X or Linux:
Use the ln command, for example:
ln -s /path/to/desired-folder ~/Dropbox/desired-folder

This works with files too:
ln -s /path/to/desired-file ~/Dropbox/desired-file

Another easy way to do this with Terminal is type the ln -s part, then from Finder drag the folder/file that you want into the Terminal window then drag the Dropbox folder and hit return.

Reduce the number of malicious URL requests that hit your website

If your site runs on Apache and you’re familiar with .htaccess, the 5G Blacklist is an effective way to secure your site against malicious HTTP activity.

[Update: The 6G Blacklist is now available.]

The 5G Blacklist is a simple, flexible blacklist that checks all URI requests against a series of carefully constructed HTAccess directives. This happens quietly behind the scenes at the server level, saving resources for stuff like PHP and MySQL for all blocked requests.

Simply add the following code to your site’s .htaccess file. Make sure you make a copy of your existing file before making any changes.

Email settings

Normally we would set this up for you, but if you want to use a new device (to access your mail on your phone for example), you will need the following settings:

Incoming Server
Server Type: IMAP
Incoming Server: imap.trippnology.net
IMAP port: 143
IMAP port with SSL enabled: 993

Outgoing Server
Server type: SMTP
Outgoing server: smtp.trippnology.net
SMTP port: 25 or 587

Other settings
Outgoing server (SMTP) requires authentication (user name and password)
Optional: Secure SMTP encryption using TLS (using either port)

Username: Your full e-mail address
Password: Your e-mail account password

Note for Apple users: You will also need to manually enter your account details under SMTP (sending) server too.

Instructions for setting up your new account

If you get stuck, give us a shout.