How To Enable Half Star Ratings in iTunes

If you want to get those fancy half star ratings in Itunes you can follow these instructions to get them on either Windows or Mac.

Windows

1. Close Itunes
2. Find Itunesprefs.xml and open it using Notepad
3. Find <Key>User Preferences</key><dict>
4. Under that line add: <key>allow-half-stars</key>
5. Under that line add: <data>dHJ1ZQ</data>
6. Save the file and Open Itunes

Mac

1. Open up Terminal (in Application/Utilities)
2. Make sure iTunes is closed
3. Type the following line: defaults write com.apple.iTunes allow-half-stars-bool TRUE
4. Hit enter
5. Close the terminal and fire up iTunes

Streaming Live Video of any sports, PPV, NBA, MLB, NFL game online

How to Watch live sports online.  NBA, UFC, MLB, NFL, PPV Streaming Video

Sometimes you find yourself away from home without the comforts of your couch, universal remote, and large paid television selection.  Fear not, there are many online cowboys streaming your favorite channel to a free online service for your viewing pleasure. 

Like finding anything online, your first stop in the search box.  The search box on Justin.tv to be more specific.  Justin.tv is an online service that allows anyone to stream themselves online and enterprising users have figured out ways to pump anything through that video pipe. So take any flash enabled browser and head on over.  Do a search using good keywords; for example, if you were searching for an NBA game feature the Boston Celtics, you would search for.. duh.. “Boston Celtics” and you might append NBA on the end.  

Another key feature is there categories, clicking on the sports category brings up the most viewed content, and generally, the most viewed content is the best content.  So if your searching for a Cricket video stream from Pakistan you will be able to find it.

Once inside one of the many populated sport channels, let the chat room come to your attention.  You can find scores of other streams, high quality feeds and aggregation sites for your desired sports through links provided in the chat by other users.  Just try not to get Rick-Rolled.

Get Track back on your Twitter with Twitter Spy!

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

Twitter Spy is an excellent way to get xmpp streaming and track functionality back on your twitter.  You can use an jabber compatible IM client, even Google Talk or Gmail.  I use Adium for this on the Mac and Pidgin is an excellent alternative for Linux and Windows users.

Here is how to set it up for your Google Account

To get it set up in Google Chat (the IM feature with in GMail. This will work for Google Talk as well):

1. In Gmail, go to the chat sidebar and paste in twitterspy@jabber.org

2. In the popover that opens, click Invite to Chat

3. You will get another window, click Send Invites

This will generate an auto response for twitterspy and twitterspy will then become a friend that you can IM with. First thing to do is IM ‘help’ (no quotes) and you will get a list of the things you can do:

autopost    Enable or disable autopost
follow    Follow a user
help    Get help for commands.
lang    Set your language.
leave    Leave (stop following) a user
off    Disable updates.
on    Activate updates.
post    Post a message to twitter.
search    Perform a sample search (but do not track)
track    Track a topic (summize query string)
tracks    List your tracks.
twlogin    Set your twitter username and password (use at your own risk)
twlogout    Discard your twitter credentials
untrack    Stop tracking a topic
watch_friends    Enable or disable watching friends.
whois    Find out who a particular user is.

You can then then use twlogin to log into twitter via TwitterSpy in Gtalk. Then you can post new messages to Twitter.

For example, if I want to track the techganghow, I simply IM: track techgangshow 

This will show all posts with techgangshow in it, except those posted by the user techgangshow.

Become a Twitter Power User today!

Create Gorgeous Screencasts with Screenflow

Are you an Apple/OSX user looking to make screencasts?  Check out Screenflow from flip4mac.com. It is an incredibly robust suite of tools for creating and editing screen captures for your website or clients.

Here is some information from there site:
Using a unique new screen capture system, powerful enough to capture the contents of your entire desktop at the same time as your video camera, microphone and computer’s audio, you’ll be creating incredible screencasts in no time.
The finished result is a QuickTime movie, ready for publishing to your website or blog.
Feature Highlights
	Record from desktop, a video camera, microphone & computer’s audio simultaneously
	Powerful editing tools
	Highlight using ‘Callouts’
	Position video in 3D
	Easy narration of presentations
	Highest quality exporting
	Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard Only
	And much more…

How to stream XM on your iPhone

Requirements: 

Windows OX (XP, Vista, 2000, 2003)

iPhone (1st Gen or 2nd Gen)

uXM and uSirius - http://www.millardsoftware.com

Orb - http://www.orb.com

 

Download and install uXM and/or uSirius as directed by the installer

Download and install Orb as directed by the installer

Set a static IP address on the computer that is going to be serving the streams

 

Configure uXM and/or uSirius:

Launch the application and click the start button to start the application.

Click on the URLs button and click on the Channels tab.

Select the station to be streamed from the Channels drop-down box. Make sure that

“MMS stream is selected underType. This has to be set to this for Orb to play

correctly.

Choose the bandwidth for the stream (high has better quality sound, but takes up more

bandwidth).

Click the Clipboard button to copy the URL to the clipboard

 

Configure Orb:

Launch Orb and create an account if you do not already have one.

Open the Web interface and click on the Open Application link next to the home button

and select Audio.

Click on Favorite Channels under Internet Radio.

Click on the Add Custom link at the top to add a custom stream.

Give your channel a Name (i.e. XM71)

Paste in the URL copied from uXM or uSirius and click Submit and the channel will be

added to the list.

 

iPhone Setup: 

Open Safari and navigate to http://mycast.orb.com and log in.

Select Audio from the menu and select Internet Radio Favorites

Select Station and wait for play button to appear over the radio tower icon in the upper

left next to the station name.

Press the ply button that appeared over the radio tower icon and the player will

launch.

Press play in the player and the stream starts.

 

Other Notes:

Works great over WiFi and 3G, but a little spotty over Edge

Totally free except if your paying for WiFi access 

  

Streaming XM or Sirius to iPhone 

Can also play stations from the browswer on any computer by going to your Orb

account.

Orb offers interfaces for PS3, XBox360, and Wii

How-To Run a Script on Any website

Have you ever wondered how people test websites for multiple combinations of data.  Or are you more nefarious and wish to rig an online vote?  In any case, every developer needs to check out Selenium.

Selenium is a piece of software and Firefox plugin that allows you to record a set of actions and apply logic to the steps to create a custom script in a matter of second.

Check out the video.