WebDev3000 » Other License

ScriptArtist

Codrut Nistor — Tue, 27 Jul 2010 11:20:57 +0000

Sometimes, I really think about starting a career in programming, and the only reason for this is my laziness. Just think about this – when I write stuff, I have to write it all by myself, and I only quote various sources from time to time. On the other hand, programmers have sooo many code generators at their disposal that sometimes, creating a fully featured application is more about messing with a code generator and then checking the resulting code, rather than writing a lot of code by yourself…

While ScriptArtist may not be free, I chose to tell you about it today because it has a decent price, a lot of useful features, and – don’t laugh – I really love its name. Sure, branding may not be everything, but it’s something that matters more and more these days…

… and if you didn’t feel like clicking the link above, no problem – here’s a short excerpt of the official mumbo-jumbo: “ScriptArtist is a powerful PHP and AJAX code generator that allows you easily to generate the PHP scripts connected through MySql database. ScriptArtist helps you save a lot of developing times to create the completed CRUD operations (Create, Read, Update, & Delete), easily generates web forms (email or contact form) retrieved information from either database fields or user-defined fields and many more.”

For the full features list, you should take a look here. Speaking for myself, everything looks fine. If you’re planning to try this PHP/AJAX generator, you should know that it works on XP/2003/Vista, requiring IE 6 or later, while your server should have PHP 5/MySQL 5 or later, no matter if it’s a Linux- or Windows-based one. That’s all, folks – enjoy ScriptArtist!

Bubble Engine

Codrut Nistor — Mon, 19 Jul 2010 09:33:11 +0000

Some say bubbles are useless when it comes to graphic effects for your site, but I disagree with that. Sometimes, they can be really funny, just like a bubble bath – somehow useless, but surely a lot of fun! Today, I’ll give you a hint about a free bubbles generator. Unfortunately, it only works with websites, because if it would have been able to turn a regular bathtub into one with bubbles, I wouldn’t be in front of my computer right now…

Bubble Engine comes at no charge, version 1.0 being released about two weeks ago and providing a pretty rich collection of adjustable settings, like the size, looks, position of the bubbles generated. While adding bubbles to a page can be pretty fun, you can also include BubbleMachines.js to your code and then get some draggable graphics able to create bubbles. Is this cool, or what? Cool or useless, I know what some friends of mine might say…

… but if you’re still wondering about this neat jQuery plugin (jQuery Easing is also required), I think you should go ahead and take a look at the Bubble Engine demo available here. That’s all, folks!

Compatibility: all major browsers with Java enabled, of course

Lucid Desktop

Codrut Nistor — Fri, 16 Jul 2010 14:18:34 +0000

A few years ago, Web-based operating systems promised to become the way of the future. Unfortunately, most of those who were making everyone go “Wow!” back then disappeared in the meantime, so it’s always good to see new ones rising from the ashes. This time, it’s about Lucid (Lucid Desktop, if you like it long…), a rather old one, since Dojo Foundation, the company behind it, has been around since 2006.

According to its official webpage, “Lucid is a free, open source web desktop, or webOS,” offering a bunch of features everyone would expect from a WebOS, including remote access to your files, Twitter/RSS feeds updates, an even the ability to create Web apps with just a few clicks! To make everything even more interesting, Lucid offers a powerful permissions system and filesystem quotas, so setting up a multiuser environment based on it should be as easy as possible…

… and since I mentioned “setting up,” let me add that Lucid should work with any Web server that has support for PHP5 (PHP4 is not supported) and any of the popular database servers (mySQL, pgSQL, SQLite). For additional information, feel free to browse the documentation, available here. That’s all, folks!

Google Font Directory

Codrut Nistor — Thu, 27 May 2010 07:27:55 +0000

Less than a month after Google Analytics Application Gallery, Google strikes again! That time, it was about various apps for Google Analytics, now it’s all about fonts, since the name says it all – Google Font Directory.

Another Beta product from the Internet search giant, Google Font Directory allows you to browse all the fonts from the tiny collection already available via the Google Font API. Just as it happened with the Application Gallery I mentioned earlier, there’s not much to see here now, but things will surely change in the future. Why am I saying this? Think about the two sides of the coin: to font creators, Google Font Directory offers a quick way to reach a lot of people looking for free fonts, while web designers will surely enjoy having access to such a resource that contains fonts covered by an open source license!

For a bunch of details and sample code, please click one of the large text snippets located on the main Google Font Directory page. That’s all, folks!

Pictoico

Codrut Nistor — Wed, 05 May 2010 12:56:57 +0000

I know this may not be exactly what most developers dream of getting for free, but having some simple yet clean looking icons at your disposal is always a good idea, and that’s why today I’ll point you to Pictoico…

Since everyone seems to be for or against globalization these days, Pictoico is for it, or so it seems. Why am I saying this? Just take a look at what they are saying – “We have been trying to properly communicate the visual way all the way from prehistoric days. Fast forward to today’s reality still shows a lack of proper manners in communication: being simple, easy to understand, quick and effective in conveying the message.” To put it in other words, they are trying to define their own symbol style that’s globally accepted. Will they succeed? That’s what remains to be seen…

… but now, what we have is this: over 100 pictograms freely available, with a plan to add up to 1000, all of them available in the SVG and AI formats. The only downside seems to be the fact that you can only use them freely in non-commercial projects. Oh, well, everything seems to have some limits, right? Good to know about this resource, anyway, and I can only hope you agree and will find some good use for Pictoico’s collection.

Qutensil

Codrut Nistor — Tue, 04 May 2010 12:53:42 +0000

If you’re into using Javascript toolsets, then you surely have to take a look at Qutensil, shortly referred to as “Q.js.” The reason? Well, according to its official page, this toolset “was developed from dissatisfaction with the existing toolsets.”

Good, so what’s so special about it? “Not that there aren’t any good styled sliders or color pickers out there, but there is no library combining them all in one system,” or at least that’s what the team behind it says. Here’s a quick features list: growl-like user messaging system, raphaël-based color picker, slider, tooltip system, draggable window and alert / confirm / prompt windowing system. Not bad at all, don’t you think?

Using a dynamic stylesheet system able to generate the CSS declarations on demand, but only for the modules active at that time, Qutensil is free only for personal use, and requires Prototype.js and Scriptaculous to work properly.

Compatibility: Firefox 3.0+, Safari 3.0+, Opera 9.5+ and Internet Explorer 7.0+. Internet Explorer 6 and lower are not supported and won’t get support in the future, either.

CS-Cart

Codrut Nistor — Wed, 28 Apr 2010 16:00:52 +0000

One of the most interesting things I’ve read about the near and not-so-near future is the forecast regarding evolution of commerce. What about it? Well, online shopping becomes more and more popular, especially in emerging countries, and the same happens with ecommerce shopping cart solutions. Today’s choice is called CS-Cart, and if you were thinking about starting your own online shop… this will surely come in handy!

While it’s not free, CS-Cart is “an “out of the box” ecommerce software solution with easy-to-use functionality that allows to start selling online immediately,” packing a features set that includes support for a majority of popular payment systems and shipping providers such as Google Checkout, PayPal, Authorize.Net, FedEx, USPS and many others, as well as some of the latest ecommerce innovations, such as one-page checkout, AJAX-based web interface, or block manager.

The price of a license is $285, payable through PayPal, credit card or wire transfer. For additional information, don’t hesitate to visit the official page mentioned in the previous paragraph. If you’re going to setup a new store with this solution… or another, there’s only one thing remaining to be added: good luck & many happy customers!

Glyph Lab

Codrut Nistor — Fri, 23 Apr 2010 18:27:12 +0000

I love free icons, but who doesn’t? Unlike other freebies, free icons are usually great, at least that’s what I can say. Unfortunately, others are not always like that – think about freely available articles or wallpapers. Oh, well, you can’t always get what you want, but if it’s icons you need… then glyphlab.com could be one of those excellent online resources that make me wonder “Why do they give so much goodies for free?” over and over again…

So… what’s so special about these guys? Please, allow me to quote the site itself – “We’ve made icons for everyone from small freelance software developers to large multi-national companies – for a diverse range of disciplines and applications.”

Currently, over 600 stock icons are available from Glyph Lab, and the set of 623 icons can be purchased for only $149. A set of 21 icons is available for download right away, so you can preview the goodies you’ll get for the decent amount of money I mentioned above.

Other than stock icons, you can also get custom-made icons for your own needs, but when it comes to the price… it may depend on a lot of factors, but one thing’s sure: Glyph Lab is one icon resource you should always keep in mind. That’s all, folks!

FindIcons

Codrut Nistor — Thu, 25 Mar 2010 12:53:14 +0000

One of the freelance tasks I always enjoyed to handle is icon creation. Sometimes, it even pays really good, but it’s not about the money, but the fun. On the other hand, if you need icons for some project, the idea is to keep costs as low as possible, and so I ended up on FindIcons.com, an excellent resource for designers looking to get some free icons or entire icon sets…

Using this resource is as easy as 1-2-3 – just open the main page in your favorite browser, type in a keyword, and then click Search and check your results! As I write this, FindIcons has over 300,000 icons and 2,100 icon sets, both number continuously growing, of course. That’s not bad at all, especially if we think about the formats and sizes available (up to 256X256 pixels, usually using the ICO or PNG formats).

To make things even more attractive, FindIcons offers a bunch of filters, allowing you to sort your results by size, color, style or license type, but the cookie on top of the cake is the online converter that allows you to download the icons you need in virtually any popular format, including BMP, GIF, JPG, PSD and so on. Sweet!

These being said, I hope there are only a few minutes remaining until FindIcons will find its way into your bookmarks collection…

CuteNews

Adrian — Thu, 26 Nov 2009 12:56:58 +0000

If you want to integrate a news system to your website, you should take a look at Cutenews. Cutenews is a great news management system and the most important thing, it uses flat files to store its database. This way you don’t need a MYSQL server. It supports comments and archives that can be organized by months. Also it supports search function, file upload management, backup & restore, IP banning, flood protection and more.Not only it supports comments, but also you can use smilies, avatars and HTML code. All of these can be inserted using its WYSIWYG editor.

For enhanced security the names in comments are password protected. Also CuteNews offers flood protection and you can ban the IP of users who post offensive comments. CuteNews offers spam protection with random bot word. This is done very simple: people will have to fill in this word before the comment can be added to the database. This word is a generated String of letters and numbers. This protection is similar to reCaptcha. The main difference is that in reCaptcha users will have to introduce a scrambled code from an image.

The installation is very simple. Download the script, unzip it and upload it to the hosting server. After that go to www.yoursite.com/cutenews/index.php , login and that is all.

The main problem with this script is the price: $39.95.