Beware - CANCEL Hostgator hosting service is not easy

By BXTra |

I just recently got a problem with Hostgator. At first, I understood them and decided to move to somewhere else. But then, I got a hard time canceling my account with them. (Already filled a second CANCELLATION form yesterday to cancel my account.) Until now, I'm still waiting for them to confirm my cancellation. That already took me three days and don't know when should this situation end.

Let me tell you what I faced with Hostgator from the beginning :

Script to Migrate PHPNuke to Drupal - UTF8 to UTF8

By BXTra |

Update (Feb 25, 08): New Version 0.04w that included 2 lines of code below can be downloaded -> HERE .

I need to port a website in PHPNuke 7.8 to Drupal 5.7. I've searched all over and found a script to do that from this website. The latest version on that website is 0.02w. The script works great but with a problem, the language that is not English didn't import correctly. All those non-english characters show as "?" So, that imported data can't be used.

Then, I continue looking for more information and found a newer version which is 0.03w from this website. This newer version gave me the same problem.

I, then, looked into the script, checked my database. I found that the data on my temporary PHPNuke database is UTF8. (It has been converted when I imported into MySQL.) So, what I need to do is to import data from UTF8 to UTF8. The migration script didn't write to do that. So, I put these two lines into the script line 280 (in Migration Script version 0.03w) :

$result = mysql_query("SET NAMES utf8", $link);
$result = mysql_query("SET CHARACTER SET utf8", $link);

The script near line 280 (With 2 more lines of code) will look like below :

	//Connect to MySQL
	$connected = true;
	$link = @mysql_connect($host, $username, $password);
	if (!$link)
	{
		failure("Connection to MySQL could not be made. Edit this file and make sure that the database settings are correct.");
		echo " Error returned by MySQL (if any): (" . mysql_errno() . ") " . mysql_error() . " \n";
		$connected = false;
		if (isset($_GET["section"]))
		{
			exit();
		}
	}
	$result = mysql_query("SET NAMES utf8", $link);
	$result = mysql_query("SET CHARACTER SET utf8", $link);
	
	// if you have php5 and the "tidy" module, this will clean up user text for you.
	function tidyhtml($str)
	{

Test the migration script and it works perfectly now.

Note 1: You can convert MySQL data in PHPNuke to UTF8 using import feature under phpMyAdmin. (When import, select "Character set of the file" to what it original is.) After imported, those data will be UTF8. Then, use script with 2 more lines above to convert data to Drupal.

Note 2: My tested computer runs on Windows XP with the following software installed
     - phpMyAdmin 2.11.0
     - MySQL 5.0.45
     - Apache 2.2
     - PHP 5.2.4

Note 3: What I did is to import users and stories, not forum or anything else. That means I didn't test the script if it works with those functions or not.

Drupal 6.0 released

By BXTra |

Drupal 6.0 Download

After one year of development we are ready to release Drupal 6.0 to the world. Thanks to the tireless work of the Drupal community, over 1,600 issues have been resolved during the Drupal 6.0 release cycle. These changes are evident in Drupal 6's major usability improvements, security and maintainability advancements, friendlier installer, and expanded development framework. Further, from bug fix to feature request, these issues follow-through on the Drupal project's continued commitment to deliver flexibility and power to themers and developers.

What's new

The Drupal 6.0 release contains many improvements, some visible from the first click, and others hidden beneath the hood. While the complete list of changes is too lengthy to list here, we have included just a few of the reasons we're so excited about Drupal 6.

Drupal 6 RC4 is now available

By BXTra |

Drupal 6 RC4 is now available HERE

Drupal 6 RC4 Release Note

We are proud to present the fourth release candidate of Drupal 6.0. Building on the extensive testing of the third release candidate, we have discovered and fixed a number of critical issues, including errors during search indexing in languages with accented characters, the display of unpublished content in menus and book outlines, and localized menu data being saved into the database. Thanks to the cooperation between the jQuery and Drupal communities, we have also updated the version of jQuery to be included with Drupal 6 to the latest 1.2.3 release. I want to publicly thank jQuery's John Resig and his team for providing a new jQuery release in time for Drupal 6!

Although I had hoped that the third release candidate would be our last before Drupal 6's official release, our priority is to ensure that Drupal 6 is the fastest, most stable, and feature-filled version of Drupal yet. We've translated your experiences with the previous release candidates (including my own upgrade of drupal.hu) into a number of bug fixes, and will be watching closely for any other last-minute issues. I'm again hopeful that this will be the final release candidate before the official release of Drupal 6.0.

Drupal 6 RC3 is now available

By BXTra |
Drupal 6 RC3 is now available HERE Drupal 6 RC3 Release Note We are proud to present the third release candidate of Drupal 6.0. We hope that this will be the final release candidate before we can make an official release of Drupal 6.0. Since the second release candidate, we have fixed various issues including JavaScript performance problems, cleaned up menu updates, added several improvements to the update.module, and added a memory requirements check to update.php. We have even added some small usability improvements since RC2. Status of some of the most well known modules: CCK has a Drupal 6 compatible development version available for testing purposes, and a beta release is expected to be available soon, while a final, stable release will likely be delayed until a 6.x release of Views is ready for testing (more status information). Views is undergoing major changes, and will likely not be ready before the middle of February at the earliest.

Drupal 5.7 is now available

By BXTra |
Drupal 5.7 is now available HERE Drupal 5.7 Release Notes * #208700 by pwolanin. Fix bad backport of #194579. Modified to use Form API. * #118569 by bevan: document how should one set RewriteBase, if under a VirtualDocumentRoot. Backport by Bart Jansens. * - Patch #115606 by Junyor, thesaint_02: added support for PHP 5.2's 'recoverable fatal errors'. * #209409 by Heine, webernet, dww: more accurate register globals value checking

Sun to Acquire MySQL for $1 Billion

By BXTra |
Sun Microsystems will pay US$1 billion for Swedish software company MySQL, whose open-source database is used for some of the most widely visited Web sites in the world. Sun said the deal will augment its position in the enterprise IT market, including the $15 billion database market. Sun said MySQL's product line will help it give further support to the open-source Web application platform known as LAMP, the acronym for the Linux OS, Apache Web server, MySQL database and the PHP/Perl programming languages. MySQL's strength in software-as-a-service offerings -- where applications are delivered over the Internet through a Web browser -- are also a plus, Sun said. Databases are crucial for Internet-based applications in sites offering a range of services, from e-commerce to social networking.

Drupal 4.7.11, 5.6 and 6 RC 2 are now available

By BXTra |
Drupal 4.7.11 and 5.6 are now available HERE Drupal 4.7.11 and 5.6 now require PHP version 4.3.5 or higher. Drupal no longer support servers with the PHP directive register_globals set to on. Attempts to install Drupal 5.6 when register_globals is enabled will fail. Current installations will continue to function, but will display an error on administration pages and the status report. Drupal 4.7.11 Release Notes

DRM-Free Music Plays for Microsoft. Sorry, Apple

By BXTra |
Apple CEO Steve Jobs is getting exactly what he asked for nearly a year ago: industry movement away from DRM music. But the DRM freedom he wanted is looking more like DRM freedom from Apple. There has been a whole lot of shakin' going on the last two weeks with respect to DRM-free content: * Warner made its library available to Amazon, as unprotected MP3s * Sony BMG announced plans to release its catalog DRM free * In second quarter, Napster will go back to its MP3 roots, with a library available in the unprotected format

Back from the dead: CompUSA assets snapped up by TigerDirect

By BXTra |
CompUSA will live on, thanks to a deal with electronics marketer Systemax. Systemax, which owns popular computer parts reseller (and CompUSA competitor) TigerDirect, announced yesterday that it has entered into an agreement to purchase the CompUSA brand, trademarks, and e-commerce business. It also plans to acquire select assets and retail stores from the company, and says that it expects to close various parts of the deal throughout the first quarter of the year.