http://www.paulbutler.org Wed, 13 Feb 2008 21:49:43 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en A while ago I posted a PHP implementation of a Diff algorithm I came up with[1]. Since it was well received, and it's a useful little algorithm to have, I created a Python version as well. There are a few performance improvements as well. The PHP version creates an array in ... http://www.paulbutler.org/archives/simplediff-in-python/ After spending a lot of time in Scheme, it's hard not to think in recursion. So recently when I started to improve my Python skills, I missed having Scheme optimize my tail recursive calls. For example, consider the mutually recursive functions even and odd. You know a number, n, is even ... http://www.paulbutler.org/archives/tail-recursion-in-python/ JSSpamBlock and ImageScaler were both originally one-day projects that turned out to be a bit more popular than I expected. Recently I have neglected to update them at all, but with reports of ImageScaler not working on WordPress 2.3, I decided to put a day aside and make some changes ... http://www.paulbutler.org/archives/jsspamblock-20-imagescaler-11/ I just noticed a trackback from Brandon Cheketts about a PHP script he has released that lets you incorperate functionality similar to JSSpamBlock in any website, called bcSpamBlock. He also released a WordPress plugin based on JSSpamBlock that uses the script. Although both plugins take advantage of the same limitation of ... http://www.paulbutler.org/archives/jsspamblock-like-protection-for-any-website/ This blog has been a bit slow since I started school, partly because of the extra work but also partly because the "just for fun" projects I have been working on have gotten larger. At the same time, I hate to neglect my existing projects to start other ones. Given ... http://www.paulbutler.org/archives/imagescaler-10/ I have been following the progress of a start-up called microPledge for a while now. The site lets you post an idea for software you would use and pledge money towards its creation. I came across a proposal for a piece of software that lets you copy an image from ... http://www.paulbutler.org/archives/image-re-hoster/ WordPress has a cool WYSIWIG editor that lets you easily resize images by dragging the corner around. The problem is that WordPress does not actually resize the image, it just tells the browser to display it smaller. This means that the full sized image is being sent to the browser, ... http://www.paulbutler.org/archives/proper-image-resizing-for-wordpress/ I came across a post on the Powerset Blog recently about garden path sentences, or sentences that lead you down the wrong path through a string of words with multiple meanings. For example, The complex houses married and single students and their families In this case, most readers would probably think complex ... http://www.paulbutler.org/archives/garden-path-sentences/ I felt like coding today, so I put together a little hack from an idea I have had for a while. What I came up with is a web search (powered by Google), that loads new search results as you scroll the page down. Try it, it's actually pretty cool. Here ... http://www.paulbutler.org/archives/endless-google-search/ The way JSSpamBlock has evolved since I first released it has reminded me why I love open-source. From day one, I had users pointing out bugs and features they would like added, sometimes even submitting a fix for the bug or adding a new feature in themselves. Here are some ... http://www.paulbutler.org/archives/jsspamblock-modifications/