scripting News and Articles

Using a simple Bash script and a cron job, you can turn Photocrumbs into an automated photo sharing bot. This way, you can drop multiple photos into a separate directory, and the script/cron job combo will publish them one-by-one at specified intervals (e.g., hourly, daily, etc.).

Here is a clever little trick I picked from a Hacker New thread. Using a simple custom now() function, you can keep track of things you are currently working on.

Here is a problem: you need to give a bunch of DSC_xxx.JPG files meaningful names like Berlin_May_1981.JPG, Tokyo_Trip_1973.JPG, and so on. The mvdir Bash shell script dramatically simplifies this otherwise tedious task.

Although Raspberry Pi is not powerful enough for heavy-duty image processing, you can still put it to some photography-related uses.

You can use a dead-simple solution based on HTML pages containing the REFRESH metatag instead of a full-blown URL shortening application.

An Android device is ideal for snapping photos of receipts, handwritten notes, and white board drawings.

While there are several word count extensions for Google Chrome and Chromium (which is currently my browser of choice), none of them seem to be able to handle text selection in the File Thingie's text editor. So I hacked my own shell script that solves the problem.

If you want to add a dash of GUI goodness to your Bash scripts, you have several options. You can use Zenity or Kdialog to quickly add simple dialogs and message boxes to Bash scripts. However, both tools are rather limited, and for a more complex GUI design you might want to give YAD a try.

bitpocket may not rival dedicated file syncing services like Dropbox or Wuala, but this neat tool has a few important advantages. For starters the entire solution consists of a single Bash script which uses the good old rsync tool to perform its syncing magic.