I’ve been working on a couple of open data projects recently - which has been very rewarding.

A couple of people have asked for some code so I’ve knocked up a quick version of the sort of thing I’ve been working on.

This code requires PHP 5.1 for the JSON functions but doesn’t need any extra libraries (pecl_http can give better error messages but is a bit of a pain to install).

The Notes field in packages returns output in Markdown format - you can convert this to HTMl with a parser available at http://michelf.com/projects/php-markdown

This isn’t production code so please test before using.

I was just reading this presentation on deploying Drupal

http://www.slideshare.net/eaton/drupal-deployment-presentation

and noticed

Drupal has a couple of modules which allow you to produce your own tinyurl.com type website - complete with your own tracking etc.

This has been extended for use by the US government at http://go.usa.com/ and the code re-released to the community.

Every now and again I find I have ssh access to one server - which has access to somewhere I need to get to - but I want direct access (eg to forward an X session)

The drush script which provides command line access to drupal functionality emits an error message when run as a cron job

tput: No value for $TERM and no -T specified

I’ve just run into the drupal cron problem again

Cron fails and the error log says

Attempting to re-run cron while it is already running.

To remove static blocks and replace with as custom block.

Implement hook_block specifying the default visibility and so on

There is a bug in Ubunty Jaunty which cause Trac to have errors.

Attachments do not work, the admin interface for milestones doesn’t work properly - and there may be other issues.

The bug report is at https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/trac/+bug/369792

And the solution is

I just started on a project that was using trac and subversion but they weren’t integrated. I love the cross referncing trac provides. It can really help explain changesets and show how an issue was resolved.

The steps to add subversion to trac are

Debian Etch has been serving me well for a few years with wonderfully easy and infrequent maintenance.

However it’s at the end of its life

http://www.debian.org/News/2010/20100121

So I’ve upgraded to Lenny following these instructions