This is a demonstration video of django-xmin, a concept for an alternative administrative interface for Django, written in JavaScript using the ExtJS.

OS X has a nice functionality called services which allow you (and applications you install) to expand the functionality of your system by adding commands, which will be visible in a special menu. Services may also be available in contextual menus, for instance when you right-click on a file or folder in the Finder.

Services menu in Finder

You may want to check your Google Analytics data programmatically. This allows you to write some logic around your analytics data, such as sending e-mails in certain situations or just providing a status update for you to inspect without the hassle of logging into your account with a browser.

For a simple example, I use a utility called GeekTool to display certain information, such as incoming email, directly on my desktop for quick reference. I decided to also display updates of my Analytics profiles in this way, displaying a daily summary of unique visitors for each site I monitor. The end result looks like this:

Google Analytics unique visitor counters displayed by GeekTool

It is sometimes beneficial to run two or more web sites or subdomains of a site from a single Django code base. Each Django app in the project can then power a website on a different domain, but all the apps can still share a single database with a single administrative interface.

Every web developer knows this story… Microsoft arrived late to the Internet party, but they huffed and they puffed… and they bundled their browser in with their dominating OS… and they blew down the house which Netscape built. After this, they congratulated themselves for winning the Browser wars and proceeded to sit on their laurels for over half a decade.

I made a video tutorial on how to make a Linux virtual machine on Windows using Virtual Box. Take a look…

The Bash shell prompt in your Terminal is very highly customizable and can display a wide variety of useful information. This is what my prompt looks like and how to create it.

[09:10:11] user@host ~/Desktop +

Anybody who cares about their data understands, that data “is not safe, unless it exists in at least two copies”. This redundancy can be achieved by keeping various backups, but it’s clear that the only backup scheme which works is the “set it and forget it” kind. If you are technical enough to build your own NAS, or if you run Linux on your desktop, you probably know about RAID, fake RAID, and software RAID. Using RAID makes your backup strategy completely transparent and your data safe and happy.

The Dock in OS X has quite a few hidden features, which are not accessible through its simple System Preferences panel. Here are some of them.

As I was standing in that office, I could barely stop myself from a burst of laughter. I managed to contain myself and turn the laugh into a big smile as I approached the lady with whom I was going to talk. But inside I was roaring with laughter at the serious lady behind her little desk, with the little stacks of papers arranged neatly and her little coffee mug, her telephone, the guard standing watch by the door, the signs on the walls, the whole shebang.