Muenchian Method grouping in XSLT

• July 1, 2009
• James Skemp

I owe a deal of thanks for figuring out the Muenchian Method of grouping in XSLT (1.0) to Jeni's article Grouping Using the Muenchian Method. It took, however, a while for me to get my mind around the method completely, and some experimentation, which I'm sharing below. Specifically I was looking to get a listing of tracks, from my iTunes Playlists to Xml application's output, and group them by album.

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jQuery: Query an Xml document and output data

• May 3, 2009
• James Skemp

I back-dated my first piece of jQuery code, but have decided not to with my second. Anyways, I had a hard time finding code, written in jQuery, to pull data from an Xml file and add it to a page. Combining a couple of tutorials online, I created the following (on April 27). This was for a message, so I started out with the Xml file, creating something like this:

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Upgrading Subversion 1.5.x to 1.6.0 on Windows Vista - checklist

• March 23, 2009
• James Skemp

The following is how I went about performing an upgrade of Subversion 1.5.4 to Subversion 1.6.0. For this I'll be continuing to use the current Windows build of Apache 2.2.x, TortoiseSVN, and of course Subversion. At this time, that's Subversion 1.6.0, TortoiseSVN 1.6.0, and Apache 2.2.11. Determine current setup. Opening the Apache Service Monitor will show the version of Apache and Subversion. In my case, that's 2.2.10 and 1.5.4, respectively. Opening TortoiseSVN's menu and selecting About will display the current version.

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Microsoft Log Parser timestamp formats

• February 6, 2009
• James Skemp

The following article covers the timestamp format specifiers accepted by Microsoft Log Parser. Date Year y, yy, yyy, yyyy = last 1, 2, 3, or 4 digits, relative to 2000 Month M = no leading zero MM = leading zero MP = leading space MX = no leading zero, or with or without zero when parsing MMM = 3-character abbreviation MMMM = full name of month Day d = no leading zero dd = leading zero dp = leading space dx = no leading zero, or with or without zero when parsing ddd = 3-character abbreviation dddd = full name of day Time Hour h or H = no leading zero hh or HH = leading zero hp or HP = leading space hx or HX = leading zero, or with or without leading zero when parsing Minute m = no leading zero mm = leading zero mp = leading space mx = leading zero, or with or without leading zero when parsing Second s = no leading zero ss = leading zero sp = leading space sx = leading zero, or with or without leading zero when parsing Millisecond l = no leading zero ll = leading zero lp = leading space lx = leading zero, or with or without leading zero when parsing Nanosecond n = no leading zero nn = leading zero np = leading space nx = leading zero, or with or without leading zero when parsing Other tt = AM/PM ?

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Disabling Messenger auto sign-in on the Xbox 360

• January 19, 2009
• James Skemp

Shortly after logging into Xbox Live the Xbox 360 will attempt to log into Windows Messenger, by default. While I tried to find how to disable this, all of the articles I found were irrelevant, since they were written during the 'blades' interface. Here's how I stumbled on it. Press the Xbox button on your controller. Go to the Settings tab. Select Profile. Select Auto Sign-In. Select Disabled under Windows Messenger. For some reason I had to do this a couple of times for it to stick.

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Shadow Hearts: From the New World leveling information

• December 27, 2008
• James Skemp

A leveling 'guide' for Shadow Hearts: From the New World is now available; Shadow Hearts: From the New World leveling. Not only should it have been written up and posted a while ago, it gave me a good chance to use XSD (XML Schema Definition). I tried creating one for my tracking my vehicles' gas usage, but failed. Having worked through the issues on this one, I think I now know what I did wrong.

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How to get started with Microsoft Log Parser

• November 7, 2008
• James Skemp

I've written about Microsoft Log Parser before, and even started a site around it. But, I noticed the other day that I hadn't written on how to get started with this powerful tool. Getting Log Parser The current version of Log Parser is version 2.2, which you can download from Microsoft. Installing Log Parser While it says supported operating systems are "Windows 2000; Windows Server 2003; Windows XP Professional Edition," it appears to run fine on Windows XP Home Edition and Windows Vista (at least Ultimate has been personally confirmed).

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.NET DataSet dump (C#)

• October 18, 2008
• James Skemp

One thing that I really like about ColdFusion is the powerful cfdump. Use the cfdump tag to get the elements, variables, and values of most kinds of ColdFusion objects. Useful for debugging. You can display the contents of simple and complex variables, objects, components, user-defined functions, and other elements.  Of all the tags in ColdFusion, cfoutput is probably the only tag that I use more. Unfortunately, most other languages, JavaScript and .

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Backing up my iTunes library - how I do it

• October 14, 2008
• James Skemp

Here's how I backup my iTunes library. My environment I have a HP Pavilion a620n with Windows XP Home, SP3, where I do my iTunes purchasing and copying to my iPod. I have an iPod Classic, 80 GB, that I manually sync from my a620n. I have a HP Pavilion a6360t with Windows Vista Ultimate, SP1. I have a HP Pocket Media Drive, 160 GB. My method I do most of my work on my XP machine.

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Subversion 1.5.3 and TortoiseSVN 1.5.4 released

• October 12, 2008
• James Skemp

The newest versions of Subversion and TortoiseSVN were released just last week. My install guides for Subversion on Vista (and another with Subversion on Vista with Apache 2.2.x) and TortoiseSVN on Vista are still applicable. If installing Subversion with Apache 2.2.x, make sure you stop Apache before replacing files.

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