When trying to generate an OAuth request token, I kept getting a 401 Unauthorized error with moomerman’s twitter_oauth gem.  So I decided to switch to John Nunemaker’s Twitter gem.

This brought about another problem: even if I specified that my Twitter application was web-based and set a callback URL in the app. settings, Twitter kept using the OAuth PIN-based authentication method; I wanted the callback!  The fix involved adding the auth_callback parameter to the Twitter::OAuth class, which then gets sent along with the get_request_token() call.

Here’s the monkey-patch:

module Twitter
  class OAuth
    def initialize(ctoken, csecret, options={})
      @ctoken, @csecret, @consumer_options = ctoken, csecret, options

      if options[:sign_in]
        @consumer_options[:authorize_path] =  '/oauth/authenticate'
      end
    end

    def request_token
      @request_token ||= consumer.get_request_token(@consumer_options)
    end
  end
end

I’ll go ahead and slap the old “it works for me” disclaimer on this one. =]

A WIFIGHT! chat room viewer and game archive browser.  You can even page through turns!  Not bad for an evening of coding :]

We recently moved from a warehouse in Emeryville to a warehouse juuuuust across the border in Oakland. Naturally, the first thing I did was write a poorly worded letter to the city, vaguely detailing our litter and pothole problems near the new ‘haus. The next morning (this morning, in fact) I received a reply:

Thank you for contacting the Public Works Agency Call Center regarding the email below.  Our street cleaning crew is at the location cleaning up litters and the service request for that is registered as XXXXXX.  Your service request for pothole repair on the YYYY block of Hollis street is registered as ZZZZZZ. Please contact us at (510) 615-5566 if you have further questions.

Who knew complaining to the right people about a problem would help fix it?  Here’s hoping they actually come down and do the work, and that it stays clean!  My theory is that people dump more garbage where there is already a pile, so maybe cleaning it up will resolve the situation.

Afternoon update: the sidewalks are clean and the potholes have been fixed, not even 24 hours after my complaint!  How long until the picture below returns to its garbage dump-y state?

Classic!

Since OQO, Inc. shut its doors, a lot of its customers have been left out in the cold and wondering where to go to get support.  Surely not OQO Talk, where dedicated moderators of many years have recently been de-modded with little or no explanation.

Due to this lack of support, the Cosmic CTO and I have decided to launch OQOasis.com.  There we provide hardware service and support, “like new” hardware and accessory sales, and forums where you can interact with other OQO users.  It’s very much a work-in-progress but we are dedicated to providing a useful resource; already we have the full drivers packages for all OQO models, and are working on getting a copy of the old OQO.com knowledgebase.

The OQOasis forums are already picking up steam but you could still be one of the first 100 users!  Head on over there and check it out :]

I recently upgraded from XP to Windows 7, and the latest version of Multiplicity was causing my monitors to fade to black when the mouse moved between computers.  I had the fade options disabled, so this was kinda confusing.  A quick email to Stardock tech support revealed the following fix:

On your primary computer:

-Right Click on the Multiplicity Tray Icon, choose ‘Configure’
-For each secondary you have in the list:
—Click the computer name, then the ‘Configure’ button
—Make sure that ‘Monitor Control: (Shares with)’ is set to ‘None’
—Click OK
-Click on the Interface Tab at the top.
-Make sure that ‘Darken the Screen when connected’ option is disabled.

Once you do this, right click on the Multiplicity tray icon on both machines and choose ‘Unload’. Then restart the app on both machines.

It worked like a charm here!  Thanks to Curt at Stardock for the quick turnaround and help on this one.