Since the early days of the web, I’ve often used the JavaScript Enkoder form by Hivelogic to obfuscate my e-mail address in order to protect it from spammers.  The problem is that because it’s based on JavaScript, it’s not super-compatible with WordPress pages and posts.

Fortuitously, I ran across a PHP plugin version written specifically for WordPress.  It’s called PHPEnkoder.  So now, any plaintext e-mail addresses as well as any mailto: links on the website are now automatically encoded using the Javascript Enkoder.  Fantastic!

This is what my e-mail address looks like when it’s been “enkoded.”

<script type="text/javascript">
//<![CDATA[
<!--
var x="function f(x){var i,o=\"\",l=x.length;for(i=0;i<l;i+=2) {if(i+1<l)o+=" +
"x.charAt(i+1);try{o+=x.charAt(i);}catch(e){}}return o;}f(\"ufcnitnof x({)av" +
" r,i=o\\\"\\\"o,=l.xelgnhtl,o=;lhwli(e.xhcraoCedtAl(1/)3=!97{)rt{y+xx=l;=+;" +
"lc}tahce({)}}of(r=i-l;1>i0=i;--{)+ox=c.ahAr(t)i};erutnro s.buts(r,0lo;)f}\\" +
"\"(5),5\\\"\\\\{w`qyjj'.x\\\\-\\\\\\\"n\\\\ZZOT\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\VTwOTXA]7P01" +
"\\\\\\\\22\\\\0s\\\\14\\\\0q\\\\21\\\\0N\\\\]FSA06\\\\07\\\\00\\\\\\\\77\\\\"+
"1L\\\\~p|5|sv`baI|disj34\\\\0F\\\\25\\\\04\\\\01\\\\\\\\32\\\\05\\\\03\\\\\\"+
"\\23\\\\05\\\\03\\\\\\\\0L6W01\\\\\\\\03\\\\06\\\\02\\\\\\\\\\\\n@\\\\`?px8" +
"8$7>'f=*2-'_K\\\\U\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\(\\\"}fo;n uret}r);+)y+^(i)t(eAodrCha.c(x" +
"deCoarChomfrg.intr=So+7;12%=;y++)y55i<f({i+)i+l;i<0;i=r(foh;gten.l=x,l\\\"\\"+
"\\\\\"\\\\o=i,r va){,y(x fontincfu)\\\"\")"                                  ;
while(x=eval(x));
//-->
//]]>
</script>

The other problem I solved this afternoon was the implementation of a prayer requests form for the CCFAF.  It’s built on Google Docs technology, which I then embedded using an <iframe> into the WordPress post.  The problem wasn’t creating the form, that’s easy enough.  The problem was figuring out how to get notified each time the form was filled out.  But I ran across this article, and now we should be good to go.

Go try it out!  When someone fills out the form, I automatically get an e-mail notification.  Then I can either pray for it directly, or have someone from the Board pray for them.  Excellent!  Technology at its finest: serving the Kingdom of God.

I wanted to be able to see 100 or 1,000 comments at a time.  So I went searching around for a solution.  The first solution that came up seemed about right (yay for Google!):

The page described a method of editing the code on the edit-comments.php file.  I’m very capable of editing php files, so that wasn’t the issue.  My issue was that there had to be an easier way.  I don’t want to have to edit a php page every time I want to change the number of comments. Additionally, the post was written for WordPress 2.7, and Charlene’s blog is already on 3.x

The next few Google results were either support tickets, or WordPress plug-in pages.  “I shouldn’t have to install a plugin for this!” I thought to myself.

Then, wayyy down on the 2nd or 3rd page of search results I found what I was looking for: “Change Admin Pagination on Posts, Pages and Comments“.  It alerted me to the fact that since WP 2.8, there has been a Screen Options button that looks like this:

Clicking that, in turn shows this:

As it turns out, I’m able to increase the 20 to 100, or 1,000 or whatever.

So now you know, you don’t need a plug-in, and you certainly don’t need to edit code.  If you’ve got the latest version of WordPress, you’re good to go.

I’m not making any promises, but I’m gonna try to post more often. There’s so much going on, I think a lot of it deserves some attention.  I was looking back over my posting history, and realize that I used to post some really interesting (to me at least) stuff on a fairly regular basis.  My goal is to get back to that.

A quick glance on the right side with my Archives shows that I was able to do at least one post every month from February 2008-May  2010. What happened in May? Not really sure, but I did start work at DayNine in April 2010, and that may have led to a higher level of busy-ness, which in turn led to a lower level of posting.

In any case, we’ll see what happens. But here goes nothing…

But it got a nice upgrade tonight. I enabled the WPTouch plugin, so now whenever you browse from a mobile device, it’ll look super slick. Enjoy!

His two most recent posts are about shoes.

Anyways, welcome to WordPress and blogging, Andy. Keep it up!

Keep up the blogging Jay, can’t let the content go stale.

Without further ado, I give you an article about Brian Wong and USDA Prime beef at Costco.

“How in the world!?!” you ask. Again, it all goes to this blog.

So here’s the story:
In July 2008, I found USDA Prime beef at Costco. I wrote about my incredible discovery as well as a follow up post with pictures, and my adventures in cooking it.

A year passes by, and a reporter with the Wall Street Journal is on the story regarding the abundance of USDA Prime available at the retail level, i.e., Costco, Whole Foods, etc. She types something along the lines of “I found prime beef at costco” or maybe even “prime beef at costco“, and finds that I’m in the top few results. (Today, the first search puts me second on Google’s search results. The second search puts me right at the top–even ahead of Costco itself.)

She sends me an e-mail that looks something like this:

From: Katy McLaughlin
To: Brian Wong
Date: Thu, Jul 9, 2009 at 11:05 AM
Subject: Wall Street Journal reporter read your blog and wants to talk to you

Hi Brian,

I’m a reporter at the Wall Street Journal.  I read your comments on your blog about finding USDA prime beef at Costco and being excited about cooking it.  I’m doing a story about this and wondered if I can interview you.

Would you let me know how to contact you asap?

Thanks so much in advance.

Katy McLaughlin
Special Writer
Wall Street Journal

What in the world? Then I get a phone call from her.  It’s a restricted number, so I was a bit wary, but I’m curious so I pick up. She introduces herself as Katy McLaughlin, and basically repeats the e-mail contents. It wasn’t the greatest time for a conversation since I was in the middle of work, so I asked her if I she could call me back.

Still taken aback by the whole thing, I figured it was a joke. Some funny person doing some funny business.  But then as any good member of Generation Y would do, I Googled her. And I looked her up on LinkedIn. The results seemed to affirm her claim.

I was eager to talk to her, so later that day I called her back. We talked for a good 20 minutes, and she asked me all kinds of questions, like how I found it, whether I was surprised, how I cooked it, etc.

Then I asked her when the story would be published. She indicated it would be sometime this week, but couldn’t give a definite answer.  She offered to e-mail me when it came out. I thanked her, and we hung up.

Fast forward to yesterday, and out of curiosity, I shot Katy an e-mail to inquire about the status of the article. I hadn’t pushed the “Send” button more than 30 seconds before I got another e-mail in my inbox:

Tomorrow Brian, and you are in the story.  It will be in Personal Journal.  Thanks so much.

Seriously? Wow!

So there you have it folks. On this day, July 15, 2009 yours truly was quoted in a Wall Street Journal article on beef that made the front page of the “Personal Journal” section.

For those rumor mongers among you, we’re not pregnant. But it’s something pretty exciting, and it directly relates to this blog.  I’ll keep you posted.

Frankly, it made them look like they were in prison. What to do? Take a dive into the code of course!

This was actually made easier by a nifty little utility called Firebug. It’s billed as a tool for web development, so in this instance, it definitely served it’s purpose.

I right-clicked on a smiley chose “Inspect Element” from the menu, and that brought up a window that showed me that the style of this image was dictated by the style.css file, and the img selector. It had a border of 1 pixel all around:

img {
border:1px solid #000000;
}

Firebug also showed me the code that was used to display the smiley:

<img class="wp-smiley" alt=":-)" src=.../>

Ah ha! They’re all tagged with the CSS class “wp-smiley”. That’s great because it means I could customize the CSS to remove the border.

So I hopped into the style.css file and added a new bit of code:

img.wp-smiley{
border:0px;
}

That means that for each img tag with the wp-smiley class, the border should be zero pixels.

And there you have it. Smiley’s without borders! Happy coding!