Sunday, May 1, 2011

Introducing Nodeler

After over a month of work I'm ready to subject my latest work, Nodeler, to the criticisms of the first 50 people who sign up using the Invite Code MakeRocketGoNow. ;)

Here's a video introduction to Nodeler. Otherwise read on...



What is it?
At it's heart I kind of think of it as a higher level, zero configuration service (Apple calls theirs Bonjour).

What good does that do me?
If you're a developer, it will allow you to register your application or game as a "node" that can request to be paired with other "nodes". A node can be anything from a game node requesting to be paired with a controller node to a video web site node requesting a remote control node.

You're not a developer?
Today, there are three Chrome extensions plus a Pacman game you can try.
  1. Nodeler Keyboard: allows you to accept keyboard input on any web page from a remote device.
  2. Nodeler Rdio Remote: allows you to remotely control the Rdio player. Play, pause, mute, and skip forward and back are currently supported.
  3. Nodeler Amazon Video Remote: allows you to remotely control the Amazon Video On Demand player. Play, pause, skip forward and back are currently supported.
  4. Pacman: I've modified Dale Harvey's excellent HTML5 Pacman app to be controllable via a Nodetroller (what I like to call the applications used to provide input to the above Chrome extensions).
You are a developer?
Send me an email if you're interested in using the Nodeler API. Once your Nodes are registered and authenticated via OAuth there are currently just two API calls. Node A submits a PairRequest and then Node B calls GetPairRequests.  The protocol used to communicate between nodes is up to you. If you need a central communication server I hope to offer the Nodeler Central's Node.js server in the near future. This is what the current nodes use. I'm still working out how I want to charge for usage of the Nodeler Central communication server but I do plan to have a free plan.

You're still reading and want to know what technologies this was built with?
Just C# and Javascript. ;)

The Nodeler web site and API are hosted at AppHarbor and were built with:
The server the Nodes communicate through is built using:
The Chrome Extensions use:
The iPhone app that I'm just finishing up was built using:
How can I find out more?
Follow me or Nodeler on Twitter for updates.

Would love to hear feedback on how I can improve the product!


    Tuesday, April 19, 2011

    Using RazorJS with MVC3

    I've been working on a project where I've managed to accumulate 1200+ lines of javascript in my View file. There are two reasons for this:
    1. Since the application is still in development I don't have to worry about the browser caching JS files if the code is in the View.
    2. I often have Url.Action and other snippets of Razor mixed in with my javascript. 
    I was just getting to the point where I was ready to move this code to its own .js file but I was worried about how to deal with the Razor that was mixed in. Thanks to John Katsiotis's (aka djsolid) RazorJS project I now have a solution!

    Installation is easy, just use Nuget to add RazorJS to your solution in Visual Studio. The command line to do is:

    Install-Package RazorJS

    By default @Url.Action will not work and you'll get the error:
    error CS0103: The name 'Url' does not exist in the current context

    To get it to work add the following at the top of your javascript file.
    @{
        var Url = new System.Web.Mvc.UrlHelper(System.Web.HttpContext.Current.Request.RequestContext);
    }
    

    If you run into other errors you should be able to use similar workarounds. If you do use other workarounds, let me know and I can add them to this post.

    UPDATE: In version 0.4.2 you no longer need this work around for the UrlHelper. Thanks to John for adding this so fast!

    Wednesday, April 6, 2011

    Sort Table Rows By Drag and Drop Using jQuery

    jQuery UI allows you to make a list of elements sortable, but if you want to use it to sort table rows you have to do a few workarounds. This is the code I started with.

    $(document).ready(function () {
    
        //make table rows sortable
        $('#myTable tbody').sortable({    
            helper: function (e, ui) {
                ui.children().each(function () {
                    $(this).width($(this).width());
                });
                return ui;
            },
            scroll: true,
            stop: function (event, ui) {
                //SAVE YOUR SORT ORDER                    
            }
        }).disableSelection();
    
    });
    
    


    The helper function (courtesy of The Foliotek Dev Blog) fixes the width of the row which collapses as soon as you remove it from the table.

    This should work for most scenarios, but I've found a bug in Firefox where the row will jump up and float above the cursor when there are scrollbars present on the web page. It seems to be a position issue caused by parent elements of the table. I still haven't figured out exactly what the magic combination is that causes this but I can replicate it with HTML5 Boilerplate when using the default style sheet and table below.

    I've replicated the bug on jsFiddle here:
    http://jsfiddle.net/cdeutsch/2Yxw2/

    <div id="container">
    <header>
    
    </header>
    <div id="main" role="main">
        <div style="position: relative;">
        <table id="myTable">
            <tbody>
            <tr>
                <td>1</td>
                <td>Blah Blah Blah Blah</td>
            </tr>
            <tr>
                <td>2</td>
                <td>2222 22222 22222 2222 22222</td>
            </tr>
            <tr>
                <td>3</td>
                <td>Test Test Test Test Test</td>
            </tr>
            <tr>
                <td>4</td>
                <td>4444 4444 4444 4444 4444</td>
            </tr>
            <tr>
                <td>5</td>
                <td>Hi Hi Hi Hi Hi Hi</td>
            </tr>
            <tr>
                <td>6</td>
                <td>Bye Bye Bye Bye Bye Bye Bye</td>
            </tr>
            </tbody>
        </table>
        </div>
    </div>
    <footer>
    
    </footer>
    </div> <!--! end of #container -->
    
    

    If this happens use the code below (inspired by this Stackoverflow question with some tweaks) to fix the issue.

    Try it in jsFiddle here:
    http://jsfiddle.net/cdeutsch/WysJL/

    $(document).ready(function () {
        //make table rows sortable
        $('#myTable tbody').sortable({
            start: function (event, ui) {
                //fix firefox position issue when dragging.
                if (navigator.userAgent.toLowerCase().match(/firefox/) && ui.helper !== undefined) {
                    ui.helper.css('position', 'absolute').css('margin-top', $(window).scrollTop());
                    //wire up event that changes the margin whenever the window scrolls.
                    $(window).bind('scroll.sortableplaylist', function () {
                        ui.helper.css('position', 'absolute').css('margin-top', $(window).scrollTop());
                    });
                }
            },
            beforeStop: function (event, ui) {
                //undo the firefox fix.
                if (navigator.userAgent.toLowerCase().match(/firefox/) && ui.offset !== undefined) {
                    $(window).unbind('scroll.sortableplaylist');
                    ui.helper.css('margin-top', 0);
                }
            },
            helper: function (e, ui) {
                ui.children().each(function () {
                    $(this).width($(this).width());
                });
                return ui;
            },
            scroll: true,
            stop: function (event, ui) {
                //SAVE YOUR SORT ORDER                    
            }
        }).disableSelection();
    });
    
    

    Hope this helps someone. Took me about 1/2 a day to fix the Firefox issue.

    Saturday, March 26, 2011

    Sensitive Web.config Settings + GitHub + AppHarbor

    So I learned some lessons with having an open source project (WatchedIt.net) on GitHub that is also being deployed to AppHarbor using the same Git repository.

    Number one tip. Do NOT save any sensitive information in any source file that you check into the repository. Even if you make a single commit locally with the sensitive info and then undo it with another commit, do NOT push it to GitHub without removing the history because your history will be sent to GitHub with a normal push. This page on GitHub can help you with that.

    Once we make sure our application does not have any sensitive info we need a way for AppHarbor to know our settings. The easy settings to handle are the Application Settings. AppHarbor has a Configuration Variables page where you define Key/Value pairs in your Web.Config you want AppHarbor to replace. For instance for WatchedIt I store my Twitter Key and Secret tokens like this in the Web.Config that is checked into Git and pushed to GitHub.

    <appSettings>
        <!--Site Settings-->
        <add key="ApplicationName" value="WatchedIt" />
        <add key="Twitter_Consumer_Key" value="YOUR_KEY" />
        <add key="Twitter_Consumer_Secret" value="YOUR_KEY" />
    </appSettings>
    

    Then I configure AppHarbor to replace Twitter_Consumer_Key and Twitter_Consumer_Secret with the real values and everything just works. This is pretty straight forward and covered by AppHarbor here.

    The setting that challenged me though was the connection string. I use Entity Framework Code First running on SQL CE to develop WatchedIt locally. My connection string in the Web.Config I check into Git looks like this:

    <connectionStrings>
        <add name="SiteDB" connectionString="Data Source=|DataDirectory|SiteDB.sdf" providerName="System.Data.SqlServerCe.4.0" />
    </connectionStrings>
    
    

    If you use an AppHarbor SQL or MySQL DB, AppHarbor says it will replace your connection string based on the name property. For some reason this didn't work for me and I think it's because it doesn't change the providerName property. So since AppHarbor also supports Web.Config transformations and Thomas Ardal has created a nice little webconfig transformation tester, I decided to combine the two features and see what would happen. To my delight it worked! Here is the code I placed in Web.Release.config to make it work:

    <connectionStrings>
        <add name="SiteDB" connectionString="" providerName="System.Data.SqlClient" xdt:Transform="Replace" />
    </connectionStrings>
    

    Now I don't have to worry about accidentally pushing my database connection string to GitHub for the world to see and while developing locally Visual Studio will use my SQL CE DB.

    This is just another example of why I love AppHarbor! I strongly recommend trying them out if you haven't yet!

    ....And one more thing. A big thanks to Michael Friis of AppHarbor for changing by DB password after "the incident". These guys rock at customer service!

    Tuesday, March 22, 2011

    Get Mime Type From File Extension using C#

    I thought this would be built into .NET but I guess it's not. The first way to do this is to use the registry like Kaushik Chakraborti does.

    Since you may have security issues with doing that on a shared hosting provider I decided to take the list of Mime Types I found at FeedForAll (which appears to be link bait but oh well) and make a C# Dictionary out of them.

    This comes in handy if you want to do something like this in MVC:

    public ActionResult Image()
    {
        string filePath = "SOME-FILE.png";
        return base.File(filePath, MimeTypes.GetMimeTypeOrDefault(System.IO.Path.GetExtension(filePath), "binary/octet-stream"));
    }
    
    


    You can find the latest version of this library on GitHub.

    using System;
    using System.Collections.Generic;
    using System.Linq;
    
    /// <summary>
    /// Dictionary of Mime Types by File Extension.
    /// Created by CDeutsch.
    /// License:
    /// http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
    /// Original list created from here:
    /// http://www.feedforall.com/mime-types.htm
    /// </summary>
    public static class MimeTypes
    {
        public static Dictionary<string, string> MimeTypeDictionary = new Dictionary<string, string> 
        {
            {".ai", "application/postscript"},
            {".aif", "audio/x-aiff"},
            {".aifc", "audio/x-aiff"},
            {".aiff", "audio/x-aiff"},
            {".asc", "text/plain"},
            {".atom", "application/atom+xml"},
            {".au", "audio/basic"},
            {".avi", "video/x-msvideo"},
            {".bcpio", "application/x-bcpio"},
            {".bin", "application/octet-stream"},
            {".bmp", "image/bmp"},
            {".cdf", "application/x-netcdf"},
            {".cgm", "image/cgm"},
            {".class", "application/octet-stream"},
            {".cpio", "application/x-cpio"},
            {".cpt", "application/mac-compactpro"},
            {".csh", "application/x-csh"},
            {".css", "text/css"},
            {".dcr", "application/x-director"},
            {".dif", "video/x-dv"},
            {".dir", "application/x-director"},
            {".djv", "image/vnd.djvu"},
            {".djvu", "image/vnd.djvu"},
            {".dll", "application/octet-stream"},
            {".dmg", "application/octet-stream"},
            {".dms", "application/octet-stream"},
            {".doc", "application/msword"},
            {".dtd", "application/xml-dtd"},
            {".dv", "video/x-dv"},
            {".dvi", "application/x-dvi"},
            {".dxr", "application/x-director"},
            {".eps", "application/postscript"},
            {".etx", "text/x-setext"},
            {".exe", "application/octet-stream"},
            {".ez", "application/andrew-inset"},
            {".gif", "image/gif"},
            {".gram", "application/srgs"},
            {".grxml", "application/srgs+xml"},
            {".gtar", "application/x-gtar"},
            {".hdf", "application/x-hdf"},
            {".hqx", "application/mac-binhex40"},
            {".htm", "text/html"},
            {".html", "text/html"},
            {".ice", "x-conference/x-cooltalk"},
            {".ico", "image/x-icon"},
            {".ics", "text/calendar"},
            {".ief", "image/ief"},
            {".ifb", "text/calendar"},
            {".iges", "model/iges"},
            {".igs", "model/iges"},
            {".jnlp", "application/x-java-jnlp-file"},
            {".jp2", "image/jp2"},
            {".jpe", "image/jpeg"},
            {".jpeg", "image/jpeg"},
            {".jpg", "image/jpeg"},
            {".js", "application/x-javascript"},
            {".kar", "audio/midi"},
            {".latex", "application/x-latex"},
            {".lha", "application/octet-stream"},
            {".lzh", "application/octet-stream"},
            {".m3u", "audio/x-mpegurl"},
            {".m4a", "audio/mp4a-latm"},
            {".m4b", "audio/mp4a-latm"},
            {".m4p", "audio/mp4a-latm"},
            {".m4u", "video/vnd.mpegurl"},
            {".m4v", "video/x-m4v"},
            {".mac", "image/x-macpaint"},
            {".man", "application/x-troff-man"},
            {".mathml", "application/mathml+xml"},
            {".me", "application/x-troff-me"},
            {".mesh", "model/mesh"},
            {".mid", "audio/midi"},
            {".midi", "audio/midi"},
            {".mif", "application/vnd.mif"},
            {".mov", "video/quicktime"},
            {".movie", "video/x-sgi-movie"},
            {".mp2", "audio/mpeg"},
            {".mp3", "audio/mpeg"},
            {".mp4", "video/mp4"},
            {".mpe", "video/mpeg"},
            {".mpeg", "video/mpeg"},
            {".mpg", "video/mpeg"},
            {".mpga", "audio/mpeg"},
            {".ms", "application/x-troff-ms"},
            {".msh", "model/mesh"},
            {".mxu", "video/vnd.mpegurl"},
            {".nc", "application/x-netcdf"},
            {".oda", "application/oda"},
            {".ogg", "application/ogg"},
            {".pbm", "image/x-portable-bitmap"},
            {".pct", "image/pict"},
            {".pdb", "chemical/x-pdb"},
            {".pdf", "application/pdf"},
            {".pgm", "image/x-portable-graymap"},
            {".pgn", "application/x-chess-pgn"},
            {".pic", "image/pict"},
            {".pict", "image/pict"},
            {".png", "image/png"},
            {".pnm", "image/x-portable-anymap"},
            {".pnt", "image/x-macpaint"},
            {".pntg", "image/x-macpaint"},
            {".ppm", "image/x-portable-pixmap"},
            {".ppt", "application/vnd.ms-powerpoint"},
            {".ps", "application/postscript"},
            {".qt", "video/quicktime"},
            {".qti", "image/x-quicktime"},
            {".qtif", "image/x-quicktime"},
            {".ra", "audio/x-pn-realaudio"},
            {".ram", "audio/x-pn-realaudio"},
            {".ras", "image/x-cmu-raster"},
            {".rdf", "application/rdf+xml"},
            {".rgb", "image/x-rgb"},
            {".rm", "application/vnd.rn-realmedia"},
            {".roff", "application/x-troff"},
            {".rtf", "text/rtf"},
            {".rtx", "text/richtext"},
            {".sgm", "text/sgml"},
            {".sgml", "text/sgml"},
            {".sh", "application/x-sh"},
            {".shar", "application/x-shar"},
            {".silo", "model/mesh"},
            {".sit", "application/x-stuffit"},
            {".skd", "application/x-koan"},
            {".skm", "application/x-koan"},
            {".skp", "application/x-koan"},
            {".skt", "application/x-koan"},
            {".smi", "application/smil"},
            {".smil", "application/smil"},
            {".snd", "audio/basic"},
            {".so", "application/octet-stream"},
            {".spl", "application/x-futuresplash"},
            {".src", "application/x-wais-source"},
            {".sv4cpio", "application/x-sv4cpio"},
            {".sv4crc", "application/x-sv4crc"},
            {".svg", "image/svg+xml"},
            {".swf", "application/x-shockwave-flash"},
            {".t", "application/x-troff"},
            {".tar", "application/x-tar"},
            {".tcl", "application/x-tcl"},
            {".tex", "application/x-tex"},
            {".texi", "application/x-texinfo"},
            {".texinfo", "application/x-texinfo"},
            {".tif", "image/tiff"},
            {".tiff", "image/tiff"},
            {".tr", "application/x-troff"},
            {".tsv", "text/tab-separated-values"},
            {".txt", "text/plain"},
            {".ustar", "application/x-ustar"},
            {".vcd", "application/x-cdlink"},
            {".vrml", "model/vrml"},
            {".vxml", "application/voicexml+xml"},
            {".wav", "audio/x-wav"},
            {".wbmp", "image/vnd.wap.wbmp"},
            {".wbmxl", "application/vnd.wap.wbxml"},
            {".wml", "text/vnd.wap.wml"},
            {".wmlc", "application/vnd.wap.wmlc"},
            {".wmls", "text/vnd.wap.wmlscript"},
            {".wmlsc", "application/vnd.wap.wmlscriptc"},
            {".wrl", "model/vrml"},
            {".xbm", "image/x-xbitmap"},
            {".xht", "application/xhtml+xml"},
            {".xhtml", "application/xhtml+xml"},
            {".xls", "application/vnd.ms-excel"},
            {".xml", "application/xml"},
            {".xpm", "image/x-xpixmap"},
            {".xsl", "application/xml"},
            {".xslt", "application/xslt+xml"},
            {".xul", "application/vnd.mozilla.xul+xml"},
            {".xwd", "image/x-xwindowdump"},
            {".xyz", "chemical/x-xyz"},
            {".zip", "application/zip"}
        };
    
        /// <summary>
        /// Returns the Dictionary entry that matches the Extension.
        /// </summary>
        /// <param name="Extension"></param>
        /// <returns></returns>
        public static KeyValuePair<string, string> FindByExtension(string Extension)
        {
            return MimeTypeDictionary.SingleOrDefault(oo => oo.Key.ToLowerInvariant() == Extension.ToLowerInvariant());
        }
    
        /// <summary>
        /// Returns the MimeType that matches the Extension. If no match is found an error is thrown.
        /// </summary>
        /// <param name="Extension"></param>
        /// <returns></returns>
        public static string GetMimeType(string Extension)
        {
            var rslt = FindByExtension(Extension);
            if (!string.IsNullOrWhiteSpace(rslt.Value))
                return rslt.Value;
            else
                throw new ApplicationException("Unknown Extension.");
        }
    
        /// <summary>
        /// Returns the MimeType that matches the Extension. If no match is found the default value is returned.
        /// </summary>
        /// <param name="Extension"></param>
        /// <param name="Default"></param>
        /// <returns></returns>
        public static string GetMimeTypeOrDefault(string Extension, string Default)
        {
            var rslt = FindByExtension(Extension);
            if (!string.IsNullOrWhiteSpace(rslt.Value))
                return rslt.Value;
            else
                return Default;
        }
    
    
        /// <summary>
        /// Returns the Dictionary entry that matches the MimeType.
        /// </summary>
        /// <param name="MimeType"></param>
        /// <returns></returns>
        private static KeyValuePair<string, string> FindByMimeType(string MimeType)
        {
            return MimeTypeDictionary.SingleOrDefault(oo => oo.Value.ToLowerInvariant() == MimeType.ToLowerInvariant());
        }
    
        /// <summary>
        /// Returns the Extension that matches the MimeType. If no match is found an error is thrown.
        /// </summary>
        /// <param name="MimeType"></param>
        /// <returns></returns>
        public static string GetExtension(string MimeType)
        {
            var rslt = FindByMimeType(MimeType);
            if (!string.IsNullOrWhiteSpace(rslt.Key))
                return rslt.Key;
            else
                throw new ApplicationException("Unknown Mime Type.");
        }
    
        /// <summary>
        /// Returns the Extension that matches the MimeType. If no match is found the default value is returned.
        /// </summary>
        /// <param name="MimeType"></param>
        /// <param name="Default"></param>
        /// <returns></returns>
        public static string GetExtensionOrDefault(string MimeType, string Default)
        {
            var rslt = FindByMimeType(MimeType);
            if (!string.IsNullOrWhiteSpace(rslt.Key))
                return rslt.Key;
            else
                return Default;
        }
        
    }
    
    

    Friday, March 18, 2011

    Ruby Cheat Sheet for .NET Developers

    ....or anybody who sucks at OSX/Linux.

    I've been learning Ruby on Rails over the last couple of months and when you've been programming on Windows with Visual Studio for as many years as I have it's a major learning curve to switch to programming Ruby on OSX or Linux. So I've created a cheat sheet to help me with all the little details I routinely have to look up.

    Ruby on Rails Command Line

    Preview Site:
    rails server
    Preview Site as Production:
    rails s -e production
    Test DB and be able to rollback changes:
    rails console --sandbox
    Reset DB:
    rake db:reset
    Modify DB for real:
    rails console
    View ActiveRecord Raw SQL:
    tail -f log/development.log
    Migrate Development DB
    rake db:migrate (DEV)
    Migrate Test DB
    rake db:test:prepare
    Migrate Production DB
    rake db:migrate RAILS_ENV=production
    Create a New DB Migration:
    rails generate migration [MIGRATION NAME] 
    rails generate migration add_email_uniqueness_index
    View Routes:
    rake routes
    Start Autotest:
    autotest


    Output debug info in Model:
    logger.debug @user.attributes.inspect
    Add Debug info to Layout:
    <%= debug(params) if Rails.env.development? %>
    Routes:
    NAMED ROUTE            PATH
    users_path             /users
    user_path(@user)       /users/1
    new_user_path          /users/new
    edit_user_path(@user)  /users/1/edit
    users_url              http://localhost:3000/users
    user_url(@user)        http://localhost:3000/users/1
    new_user_url           http://localhost:3000/users/new
    edit_user_url(@user)   http://localhost:3000/users/1/edit

    RESTFUL Routes:
    GET      /photos           index     display a list of all photos
    GET      /photos/new       new       return an HTML form for creating a new photo
    POST     /photos           create    create a new photo
    GET      /photos/:id       show      display a specific photo
    GET      /photos/:id/edit  edit      return an HTML form for editing a photo
    PUT      /photos/:id       update    update a specific photo
    DELETE   /photos/:id       destroy   delete a specific photo


    Assign if variable is undefined:
    ||=  
    @current_user ||= user_from_remember_token
    Variable Scope:
    $            A global variable
    @            An instance variable
    [a-z] or _   A local variable
    [A-Z]        A constant
    @@           A class variable
    http://www.techotopia.com/index.php/Ruby_Variable_Scope 


    Upgrade to the latest version of rvm
    rvm update --head
    Install a version of Ruby
    rvm install 1.9.2
    Working with gemsets
    rvm info                        # show the current environment
    rvm 1.8.7                       # use the ruby to manage gemsets for
    rvm gemset create project_name  # create a gemset
    rvm gemset use project_name     # use a gemset in this ruby
    rvm gemset list                 # list gemsets in this ruby
    rvm gemset delete project_name  # delete a gemset
    rvm 1.9.1@other_project_name    # use another ruby and gemset
    Default for Project:
    echo "rvm 1.9.1@MyProject" > ~/projects/MyProject/.rvmrc

    Add gem to Gemfile
    Run:
    bundle install
    or 
    bundle update
    or (for self contained)
    bundle pack


    Extract tar.gz:
    tar -zxvf yourfile.tar.gz
    Find a file:
    find . -name "controller.rb" 
    http://helpdesk.ua.edu/unix/tipsheet/tipv1n10.html
    Delete Folder:
    rm -rf
    Add JPG File Extension to Multiple files:
    for f in *; do mv "$f" "$f.jpg"; done

    Remove file from repo:
    git rm --cached


    GitHub

    Checkout:
    git clone git://github.com/crdeutsch/MVC3-Boilerplate.git
    Publish:
    git push origin master


    Enable Git Flow
    git flow init
    Start a Feature
    git flow feature start myfeature
    Finish a Feature
    git flow feature finish myfeature


    Create App:
    heroku create
    Publish:
    git push heroku master
    Migrate DB:
    heroku rake db:migrate
    View Logs:
    heroku console
    File.open('log/production.log', 'r').each_line { |line| puts line }


    Compile CSS:
    compass compile
    Watch project for changes and compile whenever it does:
    compass watch


    New site:
    staticmatic setup my_site
    Preview:
    staticmatic preview my_site
    Build:
    staticmatic build my_site

    OSX

    Screen Capture:

    Full Screen:
    Hold down Apple key ⌘ + Shift + 3 and release all
    Portion of your screen:
    Hold down Apple key ⌘ + Shift + 4 and release all key
    Application window:
    Hold down Apple key ⌘ + Shift + 4 and release all key
    Now, You will see the mouse cursor will change to +
    Press the space bar once


    This list is far from comprehensive, but it's pretty much everything I've had to google at least once to figure out and I plan to keep adding to it as I progress.

    If you have some nuggets to share add them to the comments.

    If lots of people want to contribute we should probably move this to a different format (Wiki, Markdown?) but until then I'll keep maintaining it here.

    Saturday, March 12, 2011

    Make reCAPTCHA Smaller

    I don't recommend this solution BUT if it's your only option he's how to make reCAPTCHA smaller.

    First you'll need to use a custom theme. Add the following before the form element:

    <script type="text/javascript">
    var RecaptchaOptions = {
        theme : 'custom',
        custom_theme_widget: 'recaptcha_widget'
    };
    </script>
    

    Next add the HTML for the custom widget where you want it to show up inside the form.

    <div id="recaptcha_widget" style="display:none">
    
       <div id="recaptcha_image"></div>
       <div class="recaptcha_only_if_incorrect_sol" style="color:red">Incorrect please try again</div>
    
       <span class="recaptcha_only_if_image">Enter the words above:</span>
       <span class="recaptcha_only_if_audio">Enter the numbers you hear:</span>
    
       <input type="text" id="recaptcha_response_field" name="recaptcha_response_field" />
    
       <div><a href="javascript:Recaptcha.reload()">Get another CAPTCHA</a></div>
       <div class="recaptcha_only_if_image"><a href="javascript:Recaptcha.switch_type('audio')">Get an audio CAPTCHA</a></div>
       <div class="recaptcha_only_if_audio"><a href="javascript:Recaptcha.switch_type('image')">Get an image CAPTCHA</a></div>
    
       <div><a href="javascript:Recaptcha.showhelp()">Help</a></div>
    
     </div>
    
     <script type="text/javascript"
        src="http://www.google.com/recaptcha/api/challenge?k=your_public_key">
     </script>
     <noscript>
       <iframe src="http://www.google.com/recaptcha/api/noscript?k=your_public_key"
            height="300" width="500" frameborder="0"></iframe><br>
       <textarea name="recaptcha_challenge_field" rows="3" cols="40">
       </textarea>
       <input type="hidden" name="recaptcha_response_field"
            value="manual_challenge">
     </noscript>
    

    This is standard code from the reCAPTCHA documentation up to this point. The trick I used to make the img and div tags smaller is to set the width in CSS with the !important flag. Add this CSS to your page.

        #recaptcha_image,
        #recaptcha_image img 
        {
            width: 200px !important;
            cursor: pointer;
        }
        #recaptcha_image img:hover
        {
            position: absolute;
            width: 300px !important;
        }
        .recaptcha_only_if_image,
        .recaptcha_only_if_audio
        {
            display: block;
        }
    

    This will make the reCAPTCHA fit in a space a little over 200px wide. I've added an img:hover style to make the image full size when the mouse rolls over it. The :hover style doesn't work on older browsers though so the next step would be to use jQuery to make the image bigger on hover or click. I'll leave that up to you to figure out. ;)