2013 – Swarley's Blog

How to embed third-party widgets such as Mixcloud into WordPress

Post author:swarley
Post published:22 September 2013
Post category:Web Development WordPress
Post comments:0 Comments

There are now a huge number of third-party content providers that offer the ability to embed their content into your own website. YouTube is no longer the only media streaming service that you might want to include in one of your pages. Many other competing media streaming providers are now offering an API that should make it easy to embed their content. However, the question is what is the best way to include their content in one of your WordPress pages?

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Using the Numark Mixtrack Quad with TRAKTOR PRO 2

Post author:swarley
Post published:18 September 2013
Post category:DJ Hardware DJing
Post comments:67 Comments

The Numark Mixtrack Quad

The Numark Mixtrack Quad is a 4 channel digital DJ controller with a built-in audio I/O device that was released in Spring 2013 and marketed as the only controller in its class and price range that offers 4 channel capabilities.

It is essentially a 4 channel version of the Numark Mixtrack Pro II, which is itself the second version of the infamous Mixtrack Pro, reportedly the world’s best selling digital DJ controller. With upgraded platters and touch-sensitive backlit drum pads, the Mixtrack Pro II is widely regarded as the current standard for entry level DJ controllers, so the Mixtrack Quad comes from an excellent pedigree. Numark has been producing innovative DJ equipment for 40 years, so they clearly know what they’re doing and have an enviable track record for producing both pro and consumer kit.

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How to embed your Mixcloud profile in your WordPress Blog

Post author:swarley
Post published:2 September 2013
Post category:Social Media WordPress
Post comments:0 Comments

Mixcloud is a fantastic online music streaming service that allows you to share your DJ mixes over the internet for free. Unfortunately, most WordPress social media widgets don’t yet seem to support linking to Mixcloud profiles out-of-the-box, so for the time being you might need an alternative solution.

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How to wrap basic HTTP authentication with PHP

Post author:swarley
Post published:26 March 2013
Post category:Authentication
Post comments:1 Comment

Suppose you have a file hosted on an Apache server that is protected by Basic HTTP Authentication, often via an old-school ‘.htaccess’ file, to prevent anonymous users from downloading it without a valid username/password. Then someone asks you to wrap that protected file download with some kind of GUI, maybe a simple HTML form to gather some standard user data (e.g. name and email address). The trouble is once the user has submitted the form they then get prompted separately by the browser to enter a username/password for the HTTP authentication, and this two step process is a bad user experience and looks unprofessional. What you really want to do is ask the user for the username and password as part of the first form, and then just supply those credentials behind the scenes so the download just starts once the form has been submitted. I was recently asked to solve this exact problem, and there simply wasn’t time to address this properly with a nicer solution.

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How to add Google Authorship to a single author WordPress Blog

Post author:swarley
Post published:24 March 2013
Post category:Social Media WordPress
Post comments:2 Comments

Google Authorship is a great new way to boost your online presence by associating your Google+ profile with any web content that you create, so that Google automatically displays your Google+ profile next to any of your content listed in search results. It can help you to attract new followers, and help people to easily find other content that you have produced. Google have also added new “Author Stats” to their Webmaster Tools so that authors can easily see how often their own content is being discovered in Google search results.

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