I believe they included the ability to create and edit the VMs in VMware Player for a few reasons. One of which is that they probably noticed people were either getting the trial version of VMware Workstation or just downright pirating it to do the editing or creating of VMs. The other reason is that VirtualBox maybe starting to eat into VMware’s userbase and since it lets you edit, create and use VMs all in one program, it made sense to have VMware Player do the same. And the same could be said about Virtual PC. Another benefit is that now that there is a GUI for editing the VMs for probably their most popular free program, there will probably be less people having to search and post on their support forums for configuring it manually by editing the VMX file by hand. Want to expand or contract the Virtual Hard Drive size, it can now be done in VMware Player. Although if you need to convert a VM from another program, you’ll need VMware Converter, but that it makes sense that program is seperate.

New Features

• Virtual Machine with Easy Install — Create a virtual machine and install any supported guest operating system with Easy Install.
• New User Interface — Use the new user interface to create virtual machines and edit virtual machine settings.
• Windows 7 — Create and run Windows 7 32-bit and 64-bit virtual machines using VMware Workstation. VMware Workstation has been enhanced for performance and to take advantage of the new Windows 7 features including Live Thumbnails and Aero Peek.
• Aero Glass — A new Windows Display Driver Model (WDDM) graphics driver has been developed for Windows Vista and Windows 7 virtual machines. The WDDM driver can display the Windows Aero user interface, OpenGL 1.4, and Shader Model 3.0. For more information on the VMware recommended graphics hardware, see the VMware Workstation User’s Manual.
• Windows XP Mode Compatible — Import a Windows XP Mode virtual machine using VMware Player 3.0 and run the virtual machine without being prompted to enter a Windows XP license key. VMware Player enables the Windows XP Mode virtual machine to take advantage of more than one processor, render high-end graphics, integrate seamlessly with Unity, and transfer files easily with drag and drop, and shared folders. VMware Player also has the ability to run concurrently with Windows XP Mode.
• 3D Graphics Improvements for Windows XP guests — OpenGL 2.1 and Shader Model 3.0 support is now available for Windows XP virtual machines. The XPDM (SVGAII) graphics driver works with Windows XP, Windows Vista, and Windows 7. However, only Windows XP virtual machines
  install the XPDM graphics driver by default. To switch graphics drivers in the guest operating system, see How to Switch Between SVGAII and WDDM Drivers.
• Multiple-Monitor Display — Virtual machines can now take advantage of multiple monitors.
• Advanced Linux Sound Architecture (ALSA) — ALSA significantly improves the sound of virtual machines running on a Linux host and streams the audio from each virtual machine on a separate channel so that multiple virtual machines can be heard simultaneously.
• Drag and Drop Enhancements — Drag and drop enhancements include support for new file types including images and formatted text and extend the existing ability to drag and drop files to a broader set of guest and host operating systems.
• On-Demand VMware Tools Download — On-demand download capability provides the latest VMware Tools for the guest operating system. This feature reduces the overall download size of VMware products by downloading only the required set of VMware Tools and enables VMware to release new versions frequently.
• Virtual Printing — Print from virtual machines without mapping network printers or installing printer drivers in the virtual machine. With virtual printing enabled in the virtual machine setting, all of the printers installed on the host operating system are available in the guest operating system. This functionality is enabled through a partnership with ThinPrint, Inc.
• VIX API for VMware Player — Software vendors can use the VIX functionality to add their own interface to the VMware Player menu bar.

which was adapted from a BASIC program from the Astronomical Computing column of Sky & Telescope, April 1994
*/
function isdayofmonth($month, $day, $year)
{
$dim = array(31, 28, 31, 30, 31, 30, 31, 31, 30, 31, 30, 31);
if ($month != 2)
{
if (1 <= $day && $day <= $dim[$month - 1])
return true;
else
return false;
}
$feb = $dim[1];
if (isleapyear($year))
{
$feb++;// is leap year
}
if (1 <= $day && $day <= $feb)
{
return true;
}
return false;
}
function isleapyear($year)
{
$a = floor($year - 4 * floor($year / 4));
$b = floor($year - 100 * floor($year / 100));
$c = floor($year - 400 * floor($year / 400));
// possible leap year
if ($a == 0)
{
if ($b == 0 && $c != 0)
return false;// not leap year
else
return true;// is leap year
}
return false;
}
// compute moon position and phase
function moon_posit($month = null, $day = null, $year = null)
{
$moon = array();
if(!isdayofmonth($month, $day, $year))
{
$moon['errors'] = 'Invalid date';
}
else
{
$moon['errors'] = null;
$age = 0.0;// Moon's age in days from New Moon
$distance = 0.0;// Moon's distance in Earth radii
$latitude = 0.0;// Moon's ecliptic latitude in degrees
$longitude = 0.0;// Moon's ecliptic longitude in degrees
$phase = '';
$zodiac = '';
$YY = 0;
$MM = 0;
$K1 = 0;
$K2 = 0;
$K3 = 0;
$JD = 0;
$IP = 0.0;
$DP = 0.0;
$NP = 0.0;
$RP = 0.0;
// calculate the Julian date at 12h UT
$YY = $year - floor((12 - $month) / 10);
$MM = $month + 9;
if ($MM >= 12)
{
$MM = $MM - 12;
}
$K1 = floor(365.25 * ($YY + 4712));
$K2 = floor(30.6 * $MM + 0.5);
$K3 = floor(floor(($YY / 100) + 49) * 0.75) - 38;
$JD = $K1 + $K2 + $day + 59;// for dates in Julian calendar
if ($JD > 2299160)
{
$JD = $JD - $K3;// for Gregorian calendar
}
// calculate moon's age in days
$IP = normalize(($JD - 2451550.1) / 29.530588853);
$age = $IP * 29.53;
if ($age < 1.84566)
$phase = 'NEW';
else if ($age < 5.53699)
$phase = 'Evening crescent';
else if ($age < 9.22831)
$phase = 'First quarter';
else if ($age < 12.91963)
$phase = 'Waxing gibbous';
else if ($age < 16.61096)
$phase = 'FULL';
else if ($age < 20.30228)
$phase = 'Waning gibbous';
else if ($age < 23.99361)
$phase = 'Last quarter';
else if ($age < 27.68493)
$phase = 'Morning crescent';
else
$phase = 'NEW';
$IP = $IP * 2 * pi();// Convert phase to radians
// calculate moon's distance
$DP = 2 * pi() * normalize(($JD - 2451562.2) / 27.55454988);
$distance = 60.4 - 3.3 * cos($DP) - 0.6 * cos(2 * $IP - $DP) - 0.5 * cos(2 * $IP);
// calculate moon's ecliptic latitude
$NP = 2 * pi() * normalize(($JD - 2451565.2) / 27.212220817);
$latitude = 5.1 * sin($NP);
// calculate moon's ecliptic longitude
$RP = normalize(($JD - 2451555.8) / 27.321582241);
$longitude = 360 * $RP + 6.3 * sin($DP) + 1.3 * sin(2 * $IP - $DP) + 0.7 * sin(2 * $IP);
if ($longitude < 33.18)
$zodiac = 'Pisces';
else if ($longitude < 51.16)
$zodiac = 'Aries';
else if ($longitude < 93.44)
$zodiac = 'Taurus';
else if ($longitude < 119.48)
$zodiac = 'Gemini';
else if ($longitude < 135.30)
$zodiac = 'Cancer';
else if ($longitude < 173.34)
$zodiac = 'Leo';
else if ($longitude < 224.17)
$zodiac = 'Virgo';
else if ($longitude < 242.57)
$zodiac = 'Libra';
else if ($longitude < 271.26)
$zodiac = 'Scorpio';
else if ($longitude < 302.49)
$zodiac = 'Sagittarius';
else if ($longitude < 311.72)
$zodiac = 'Capricorn';
else if ($longitude < 348.58)
$zodiac = 'Aquarius';
else
$zodiac = 'Pisces';
// so longitude is not greater than 360!
if ($longitude > 360)
$longitude = $longitude - 360;
$moon['age'] = round($age, 2);
$moon['distance'] = round($distance, 2);
$moon['latitude'] = round($latitude, 2);
$moon['longitude'] = round($longitude, 2);
$moon['phase'] = $phase;
$moon['zodiac'] = $zodiac;
}
return $moon;
}
// normalize values to range 0...1
function normalize($v)
{
$v = $v - floor($v);
if ($v < 0)
{
$v++;
}
return $v;
}
?>


And to use it, you can do something like this

<?php
include('moon2.php');
$date = time();
$year = date('Y', $date);
$month = date('n', $date);
$day = date('j', $date);
$moon = moon_posit($month, $day, $year);
//debug results
echo '<pre>';
print_r($moon);
echo '</pre>';
if ($moon['errors'] === null)
{
//output and format what you want
}
else
{
//handle error how you want, perhaps give error message and then show today''s moon info
}
?>


I haven’t figured out how to get the percentage of illumination of the moon though.

Well one way to get around this is to setup an RSS feed for the data you are caching or outputting and access it with a query string such as “?rss=2.0″ or http://example.com/index.php?rss=2.0. Then you can check to see if the RSS variable was passed and output a RSS feed with just enough data for a feed, no need to put sensitive data in there or anything. I would suggest putting in a ttl node in the RSS feed and set it to something the aggregators like Google Reader, should obey (that way they hit your page more or less frequently, depending on your needs). The item portion of an RSS feed only needs a title or a description, although its probably a good idea to put some kind of guid in there (check the RSS 2.0 spec for more info on creating RSS feeds).

Anyway here is some sample code. It isn’t complete but gives you an idea what I mean.

if ($_GET['rss'] == 2.0)
{
//create RSS 2.0 feed
header('Content-Type: text/xml');
$output = '<' . '?xml version="1.0"?' . '>' . "\n";
$output .= '<rss version="2.0">' . "\n";
$output .= '<channel>' . "\n";
//...
//process your data and output it into RSS 2.0 format
//...
$output .= '</channel>' . "\n";
$output .= '</rss>';
}
else
{
//process your data as normal
}


Then to make sure the page is hit often, place your RSS feed into Google Reader or Bloglines or some other RSS aggregator. Then your site will be visited often and forced to update. No one else really needs to know about your RSS feeds, unless you want them to be public as well.

Author is myworkaddress@example.net

Author: 1

Posted title: Some Blog Post Title

Mission complete. Message 1 deleted.

Thus, if you are using your a email address you’d like to keep private and you are emailing wordpressposts@example.com, that email address has the possibility of showing up to people. Which is not good if you email from the same email address that checks the posts. And even worse if you email from a email address for a user in WordPress and has the rights to post contents because the email will get “publish” status rather than “pending” and will go live on the site. And if someone has the email address that is a user and has posting rights, they can easily send fake emails from that address, because all WordPress checks is the From or Reply-To line (whichever it finds first).

It’s easy to prevent it from showing email addresses by opening up wp-mail.php and looking for this line of code

echo '<p>' . sprintf(__('Author is %s'), $author) . '</p>';


And this line of code

echo "\n<p>" . sprintf(__('<strong>Author:</strong> %s'), esc_html($post_author)) . '</p>';


And then you could comment those lines out by putting // in front of both of them.

I understand WordPress outputs this information so you can see logged from any cron jobs you have setup or if you visit the page manually, as a way of just knowing whats going on. However, it could be done better to prevent the addresses from being shown to everyone. A simple solution is to setup a query string and have a secretkey (don’t make this your blog’s password however). For example, lets say your blog is installed at http://example.com/, we are going to know require the following URL to check Posts via e-mail http://example.com/wp-mail.php?secretkey=abc123. And if someone doesn’t send the right secretkey, it won’t check the email address or echo anything out.

So before this line of code

/** Make sure that the WordPress bootstrap has run before continuing. */


Let’s add

if ($_GET['secretkey'] != 'abc123')
exit();


Feel free to change the secretkey to whatever you wish. You can also change it to be called something other than secretkey. If you have a cron job, you’ll have to point to that new URL as well http://example.com/wp-mail.php?secretkey=abc123. If you use the secretkey method you can leave the lines where it echoes out the email address if you like (the 2 lines I showed you could comment out).

Ematic EM102VID 2GB MP3 Video Player

Anyway, I’ve had this device for a few months now and it’s held up. Since then many reviews of this device have had people say that there is no way to browse music except by pressing next and forward. This is not true, what you have to do is press the Power button once (you have to hold Power for a few seconds to turn the device off) and the menu will come up. From the Menu you can pick: Repeat, 6-Band Equalizer (you can use presets or tweak it manually), 3d (I think it attempts to add some dimension to the music), Play Rate (how fast the music plays) and File. Using the File option you can browse through the music in a text based folder layout, it’s not the most elegant way, but it works good enough. You can put files on the device either by MSC or MTP mode which is activated by pressing the Play button while its connected via USB to your PC. I wasn’t able to play music on the device while charging, except by browsing to the files on my PC and playing them in an music player (WinAmp or Windows Media Player).

To get back to the other sections (main menu) in the Player you have to hold the Play button for about 2 seconds, then you are greeted with the sections one by one: Music, Photo, Movie, Voice, FM Radio, Mic. Record, E-Book, Settings, Delete and About. I really didn’t mess with the Photo or Movie options much, it comes with some sample music, photos and a video when you first get the player. I did convert a few videos just to see how they turned out and they were ok, the device comes with a CD with some program you have to use to convert your videos to MTV format. MTV files will be larger than AVI or other video formats and from what I know it’s basically just a huge collection of images that it plays to simulate the video while the audio plays. But I didn’t really get this device for photos or video. The FM Radio can automatically create preset stations for you by scanning through. The E-Book feature will remember the last file you opened and has an option to automatically go to the next screen after a few seconds. However I didn’t find it all that useful, the screen is way too small to read on and long words are broken without any hyphenation to let you know it did so, but it’s there if you want to try it out. You can change the Microphone Recorder’s quality in the Settings Menu incase you want smaller files. Audio quality sounded good to me, but you might want some better quality headphones, the ones it comes with aren’t that great. It will remember what music file it played last and where in the file it stopped (how many minutes and seconds into the audio file). It also has a button shared with the Microphone record button that lets you loop a song by setting a start and end point.

The buttons on the outside: Back, Forward, Play/Pause, Volume Up, Volume Down, Hold (you can lock the device so no accidental pushes on the buttons change anything), Power and Microphone Record. There is also a headphone jack, reset hole, Mini-USB connection and it looks like it might be possible to put some kind of loop or chain on the device at the top. The buttons are raised up so its easy to find them, even if you aren’t looking at the device. The battery I would say lasts about 7 hours. All and all for $27 this is a good deal, I just wish they offered a 16gb or 32gb model.

• 1.5″ Color Display
• 2GB MP3 Video Player
• Holds over 8 Hours of Music, 3 hours of Video or 2,000 Pictures
• Built-In Rechargeable Li-Polymer battery
• Includes In-ear type earphones
• ID3 Tagging and Lyrics synchronization during music playback
• Windows 1998/2000/XP Compatible/Vista Ready
• MAC Compatible
• High Speed USB 2.0
• E-Book function allows you to browse ,TXT files
• Skip-Free Video and Music Playback
• Supports Video Playback of AVI, MP4, MPG, WMV using the included conversion CD
• Supports Playback of MP3, WMA, WAV, MTV, BMP, Jpeg, and DRM Protected WMA Music files
• Multi-Language User Interface including English, Spanish, and many more
• Voice Recording (Built-In MIC)
• Flash Storage capabilities
• Extended Battery Life
• Available in Blue (EM102VIDB), Green (EM102VIDG), Red (EM102VIDR) and Pink (EM102VIDP) (Although their website shows Black (EM102VIDBL), Orange (EM102VIDO), Yellow (EM102VIDY) and Gray (EM102VIDGY) also available)

This picture “Deadlock” was taken in the rainforest of Belize by David Maitland who was named 2008 Wildlife Photographer of the Year.

No need to have the W3C mess with their validator just to work with all the possible browser extensions. This would most likely introduce bugs and cause too much of a headache for them.

Here are 2 things you can do to get by the errors

1. Put all your CSS3 rules in a css3.css file and then when you validate everything in your regular .css files should pass and the css3.css should fail.
2. Or put a /*CSS3*/ comment for each CSS3 rule you have in your style sheet, so when it gives an error you know why. This would work best if you put each css3 rule on a separate line.

However, it is not without faults. The biggest problem right now is that there are duplicate music files, because many songs are spelled differently or differ by a few seconds. It’s really annoying to try to clean up your queue of the duplicates, because you end up losing how far foward or back you are in the navigation. The other issue is that their music library isn’t as in depth as Pandora and definitely not as huge as Last.fm’s. I’ve also noticed that the “Recent songs listened to” RSS feed you get will only pull songs if they fit a certain time period, so if you go without using Grooveshark for awhile that feed will be empty, rather than remembering what you last listened to.