jontukontar

Thus far I’m on chapter 3 of Definitive XML Schema. From what reviewers have said, up till chapter 9 most of this stuff is background information on XML Schemas. Although chapter 3 does bring up the subject of XML Name Spaces (xmlns) which I will talk about in a moment or so.

Yesterday, I was given a Mighty Mouse by a customer. Most non-Apple computer users might consider this a non-issue but it was really nice. To begin with the mouse retails for $50 USD (which I no longer have to spend) and it gives me the ability to do right clicks. Which makes dealing with certain things (eg. zipping files together) much easier. {Hey, no snickering!}

Also yesterday, I watched MacBreak’s video cast and found a nifty piece of software for Safari users. What I didn’t realize, until later, was that my preferred browser Camino already has that kind of functionality built in (this also applies to Firefox users).

In a nutshell, the software allows you to type a “keyword” into the address/location bar and have that mapped to a specific URL. What is even more impressive about this is that you can append to the URL additional data (which follows the keyword). This makes is particularly useful for search queries.



How to do this is easy but it takes some looking and configuration to set it up.

1. Open Bookmark Manager
2. Create a new Bookmark
3. Bring up it’s Properties/Info
4. Put the desired “keyword” into the Keyword/Shortcut field
5. Fill out other fields as desired

To make “appendable” links, you first get a search URL and then replace your keyword with %s.


XML Name Spaces

Most who monitor this blog, probably also watch malfeas, so this will be some explanation on a comment I made there.

In simplest terms, a “name space” is a container in which you can hold: attribute, elements, and values. This makes it easier to combine two different XML files together in a single document. (Like last weeks example of charms and sorcery being combined into a single file.)

Name spaces typically take the form of a URL but that URL doesn’t have to point to anything in particular (or at all, for that matter). XSL and XSD documents are both “name space aware”, so in order to use them you have to add any necessary name spaces.

EDIT: Oh, one thing that I almost forgot. Attributes can be assigned to a specific name space (they don’t necessarily inherit from their parent element).

My wonderful week started with my X-box 306 flashing three red lights. In consideration that this was a launch console, I had hoped that it would be repaired this time at no cost. Go figure, I was wrong and it's going to cost me $140 + S&H.  When I look at the expenses that I have for the rest of this month, I'm not sure that I can swing paying for it.  However, if I don't then I have $400 in games that are completely worthless.

Much to my annoyance, Wal-Mart has let me down on shipping "The Compass of Celestial Directions, Vol. 2:  the Wyld".  It is still listed as out of stock and they continue to have no idea when (read: if) it will ship.  Supposedly, they are going to call me today to discuss the situation but considering last time, I don't expect to be contacted.  Then again it may be karma biting me in the rear about the last book.

I'm also having a three-way and two part problem with my MacBook, Camino, and Microsoft which has no current solution.  The gist of the bug is that Camino grabs a language list from OS X (e.g. en, de, es...) when it starts.  This list is passed to websites in order to automate language selection.  The problem is that my language is technically coded as "en-us" (not "en") and so Microsoft's website doesn't recognize it.  It travels along the list of languages and selects the first one that it does recognize, in this case "de".  This part can be fixed by specifying "en-us" in the "about:config" page but it has to be done each time you load Camino.

The second part of that problem is that, even though Camino is Gecko based, it won't display the elements correctly.  What I end up with is a single column that contains all the elements on the page.  This causes significant problems when browsing the Xbox homepage.  Although, Firefox still displays it correctly.

PS.  This is my first LJ post and as such is not as interesting as I would like it to be.

Edit:  Apparently, you can add "United States English" as a language in the International System Preference.  Oddly enough, this is not the default action even though you are required to select your language and locality during installation / initial setup.