Unitny is a web service that does the opposite of what ‘tiny’ sites do. It simply returns the original Url for a given shortened Url. Why? Why not use the shortened URL? The main reason is, in some countries, some ISP’s are blocking this kind of sites (tiny sites) for a claim of security issue.

Here is where Saleh Alzaid came with a legal idea in those ISP point of view, to solve that issue. Simple, convenient and cleaver those words can describe the Unitny service.

Since Unitny’s API makes the development possible and handy, many Unitny’s users have developed add-ons/plug-ins for a variety of OSs and/or software. Because I loved the Idea of Unitny and I like trying something new(like Ubiquity) I made a Ubiquity command (“untiny”) that uses the Unitny service.

First of all if you don’t know what Ubiquity is then visit Ubiquity's web site. If you already have Ubiquity, you might notice the subscription notification while you are in this page.

On how to use it, there are many ways to use Ubiquity command. The easiest way, is to highlight the link then use the Ubiquity combination, “ctrl+space” is the default, then type “untiny”. The preview of the command will show the original URL. While executing the command will open the original URL.

Have a nice Unitny day :D

Continue reading "Untiny & Ubiquity"

I know most of you hate Windows Live Installer, Like I do.  Because it dose not work behind a proxy without the ways that will be described in this post.

WinHTTP:

After debugging WLInstaller, I found out it uses WinHTTP modules to get MSI information and packages.  And as you might know WinHTTP is a Windows service that can be configure using other utilities.

WinHTTP Configuration Utilities:

• ProxyCfg (Pre Vista OS, e.g. XP)
• NetSH  (Vista OS)

ProxyCfg:

• Make sure to configure your Internet Explorer to work with your current proxy and your credential have been saved (if your proxy uses one).
• Open the Command Prompt
• Type "proxycfg -u",  then press 'Enter'
• Close Command Prompt

thanks Snakodus

NetSh:

• Make sure to configure your Internet Explorer to work with your current proxy and your credential have been saved (if your proxy uses one).
• Open Command Prompt
• Type "netsh winhttp import proxy source=ie",  then press 'Enter'
• Close the Command Prompt

And that's it now open WLInstaller and enjoy Micro$oft products :)

Continue reading "Windows Live Installer (WLInstaller) behind proxy!"

Many people out there are using Windows Live Messenger as IM, and for some reason they need to open more than one instance (polygamy).  But that does not work without a patch for Windows Live Messenger.  In this post, I'll explain how to patch your own Windows Live Messenger by yourself.  Some may say there are patches already exist out there, my answer; I don't trust it because it might contain Spyware :) .

Tools:

• Debugger (OllyDbg)  {for the dirty work} :p
• Hex Editor (xvi32)  {if you know the address for the magic line}

The short way (for WLM 8.5):

• Copy & Rename Windows Live Messenger "msnmsgr.exe" to something else; let say "msnmsgr-multi.exe"
• Open msnmsgr-multi.exe by Hex Editor (maybe xvi32)
• Go to Address {8CF06}
• Replace {0F 84 BA 77 00 00}
• With {90 90 90 90 90 90}
• Save it!
• That's it, enjoy your Window Live Messenger

The long way (if you don't know the magic address!):

• Open OllyDbg
• then Open then "msnmsgr.exe"
• Open "intermodular calls"; By right-click on CPU Window --> Search For --> All intermodular calls
• Sort "intermodular calls" by "Destination", then type "CreateEvent"

• Click the first "CreateEvent" to highlight it in CPU Window
• You will notice Eventname of CreateEvent is "MSNMSGR",  locate the GetLastError that come after our CreateEvent 

• Our magic line is the 2nd line after GetLastError  {JE xxxxxxxx}.   x = hex number
• Double-Click that line then replace {JE xxxxxxxx} with {nop} and make sure "Fill With NOP's" is Checked then click Assemble then Cancel

• Now we are done, the only thing left is to save the changes; right-click in CPU Window; Copy to executable --> All modification; then select "Copy All"
• Then from the window that poped up; right-click --> save to file --> rename it if you want ( I usually do, in case I need the original one) , let say "msnmsgr-multi.exe"
• Close OllyDbg and enjoy your Windows Live Messenger

Continue reading "Polygamify Your Windows Live Messenger (Multi-MSN)"

After click on that it will download Firefox 2.0.0.14 and this the link:

http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/products/download.html?product=firefox-2.0.0.14&os=win&lang=en-US

But I have been able to download Firefox3 after modifying the part "product=firefox-2.0.0.14" to "product=firefox-3.0" in the link.

http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/products/download.html?product=firefox-3.0&os=win&lang=en-US

/clap Firefox3 Team ;)

Continue reading "Firefox3 Version 2.0.0.14!!"

Qt is one of the best GUI Widget cross-platform libraries that I ever worked with ;).

At some point, I was in need for a Combo box with a list of Checkbox item.  And that had not been provided as out-of- shelf widget.  For some reason, one of them as in the following quotes:

 “a combo box is a way to represent a single selection, not to hide other GUI elements”.

First let understand the QComboBox. The Combo box usually has two main parts:  current item view and items view (popup) .  Current view is view displaying the selected item.  While items view display a list of items to be select. 

Now let work with the items view to handle item as checkbox rather than a label ;).  In order to customize our items view we need to assignee an item delegate to the items view.   And that led us to create a customized (inherited) QItemDelegate let called CheckBoxListDelegate:

Then we need to tell our combo box to use that delegate as default delegate for the items view that it own.   Also we need to change the way it display the selected item.  Header of our CheckBoxList will look like:

And the implementation:

And that’s it ;) see it in action:

• Download Soruce Code

Continue reading "CheckBox in QComboBox"

Don't Reinvent the wheel!

After digging in CMake modules, and more specifically Qt once ( FindQ4.cmake , UseQt4.cmake also FindQT.cmake).  I found something really interesting in those modules!! They are smart modules ;).  If you read my previous post CMake & Qt4 (Q3Support) and read this, you will see how stupid I was by "Reinventing the wheel" ;).

Let get to the point!!

As we know ( I'm assuming you are familiar with Qt)  that Qt having many Modules e.g. ( Core, GUI ,Qt3Support,Network,SQL,XML,Test )  and lot other. And not necessarily that you need all of them in one project. It depends on the needs of your project.  Anyway, FindQt4 & UseQt4 come with very handy Macros to defined and include those modules with clean and cleaver way.

Basically you need three steps to instruct CMake about Qt.

First step tell CMake what Qt Modules you need. By setting Qt Modules' variable to 'true'. And the following are the available Qt Modules' variable:

• QT_USE_QT3SUPPORT
• QT_USE_QTASSISTANT
• QT_USE_QTDESIGNER
• QT_USE_QTMOTIF
• QT_USE_QTMAIN
• QT_USE_QTNETWORK
• QT_USE_QTNSPLUGIN
• QT_USE_QTOPENGL
• QT_USE_QTSQL
• QT_USE_QTXML
• QT_USE_QTSVG
• QT_USE_QTTEST
• QT_USE_QTUITOOLS
• QT_USE_QTDBUS
• QT_USE_QTSCRIPT

e.g.:

SET(QT_USE_QT3SUPPORT true)

Note that 'Core' and 'GUI' Modules libraries are loaded by default.  In case you don't need to load them you can see the following variable as need to true:

• QT_DONT_USE_QTCORE
• QT_DONT_USE_QTGUI

Next step is to include the Qt need files. This done by only one statement:

INCLUDE(${QT_USE_FILE})

And the last step is the link the libraries need. This done by adding '${QT_LIBRARIES}' to linking statement.

e.g.:

TARGET_LINK_LIBRARIES(CMakifyQt3S ${QT_LIBRARIES} )

Example:

If you recall CMakeLists.txt from”CMake & Qt4 (Q3Support) “:

# Qt Includes
    INCLUDE(${QT_USE_FILE})
    INCLUDE_DIRECTORIES(${QT_QT3SUPPORT_INCLUDE_DIR})

# Current Project Include
    INCLUDE_DIRECTORIES(${CMAKE_CURRENT_SOURCE_DIR})
    INCLUDE_DIRECTORIES(${CMAKE_CURRENT_BINARY_DIR})

# Generating UI's
    FILE(GLOB Forms_UIS RELATIVE ${CMAKE_CURRENT_SOURCE_DIR} UI/*.ui)
    QT4_WRAP_UI(Forms_UIS_H ${Forms_UIS})

# Sources files
    FILE(GLOB Sources RELATIVE ${CMAKE_CURRENT_SOURCE_DIR} *.cpp)

# Qt Definitions
    ADD_DEFINITIONS(${QT_DEFINITIONS})
    ADD_DEFINITIONS(-DQT3_SUPPORT)

# Output
    SET(ALLSRC ${Sources} ${Forms_UIS_H})
    ADD_EXECUTABLE(CMakifyQt3S ${ALLSRC})
    TARGET_LINK_LIBRARIES(CMakifyQt3S
                  ${QT_LIBRARIES}
                  ${QT_QT3SUPPORT_LIBRARY}
     )

So after fully utilizing CMake Qt' Modules, the CMakeLists.txt will be as follow:

# Qt Modules
    SET(QT_USE_QT3SUPPORT true)

# Qt Includes
    INCLUDE(${QT_USE_FILE})

# Current Project Include
    INCLUDE_DIRECTORIES(${CMAKE_CURRENT_SOURCE_DIR})
    INCLUDE_DIRECTORIES(${CMAKE_CURRENT_BINARY_DIR})

# Generating UI's
    FILE(GLOB Forms_UIS RELATIVE ${CMAKE_CURRENT_SOURCE_DIR} UI/*.ui)
    QT4_WRAP_UI(Forms_UIS_H ${Forms_UIS})

# Sources files
    FILE(GLOB Sources RELATIVE ${CMAKE_CURRENT_SOURCE_DIR} *.cpp)

# Output
    SET(ALLSRC ${Sources} ${Forms_UIS_H})
    ADD_EXECUTABLE(CMakifyQt3S ${ALLSRC})
    TARGET_LINK_LIBRARIES(CMakifyQt3S ${QT_LIBRARIES})

Continue reading "CMake & Qt4 Modules"

Updated: this post is obsolete, go to  CMake & Qt4  Modules .

Assumption:

Let assume we have a legacy Qt3 system and has been ported to Qt4 with Q3Support Module successfully. Also we want to CMakify it.

Problem:

After following the instructions that is available on the Internet like QtNode. We MIGHT end up with the following compilation errors:

* Error(1): 'Q3somthing' : No such file or directory

• 'Q3MainWindow': No such file or directory

* Error(2) :  'something' : is not a member of "Qt"

• 'ToolBarDock' : is not a member of 'Qt'
• 'Dock' : is not a member of 'Qt'

Solution:

in CMakeLists.txt

For Error(1) add the following :

# Qt Includes
    INCLUDE(${QT_USE_FILE})
    INCLUDE_DIRECTORIES(${QT_QT3SUPPORT_INCLUDE_DIR})

For Error(2) add the following:

# Qt Definitions
    ADD_DEFINITIONS(${QT_DEFINITIONS})
    ADD_DEFINITIONS(-DQT3_SUPPORT)

-DQT3_SUPPORT  almost two days to figure it out ending up with reading QT source-code.  So I hope this will help you.

Example:

I made example for this purpose also to show the simplicity and the power of CMake as cross-platform make system.

Windows Vista & NMake(VS2008)

Linux & Make(gcc)

Example File: CMakifyQ3S

Continue reading "CMake & Qt4 (Q3Support)"

تابع القراءة "كتاب: ابدأ LINQ"

Yes, now my site powered by Graffiti CMS (Beta 2). And bye bye Community Server , because it’s huge and I was only use 10% or less of it features. You can manage the site in very clever way. Also the installation is Copy-paste-story. Again, give Graffiti a try ;)...

Continue reading "Welcome Graffiti CMS"

oh I mean wow!! While I'm having a break( timeout ) , I downloaded the Graffiti ( public beta 1 ). And that happened after I watched the Quickstart Videos (sp. themes) . It really look promising. I even thought about switching to Graffiti as a replacement of the huge Community server ;). I'll continue...

Continue reading "Graffiti CMS Ouch!"