Press "Enter" to skip to content

Richy's Random Ramblings

Personal: Pancake Recipe

November 19, 2003
Leave a Comment

Whilst I’m logged into Richy’s Random Ramblings content management side 😉 and in the “Aid to Memory” train of thought – I thought I’d just note down this Pancake recipe. Ok, it’s months away to Shrove Tuesday (the traditional time for Pancakes), but I really like Pancakes but can never seem to have a recipe to hand – but no more… 😉

Anyway – the recipe should make 12 pancakes, but I managed to squeeze just 3 out of the ingredients (saying that, packets of “batter mix” which say 8 pancakes gives me 3 pancakes as well so…)

This is a “quick and simple” recipe so don’t expect “perfect pancakes” from it(!)

You will need: Around 100g of plain flour (3.5oz), 1 egg, half a pint of milk (300ml), a little bit of salt and some butter or frying oil.

  1. Sift the flour and salt into a bowl. Make a well in the middle and add the egg
  2. Mix and add the milk until the batter is smooth
  3. Warm up frying pan and coat the base lightly with oil/grease/butter. Add batter to cover base of frying pan. Cook until the pancake moves freely (around a minute). Flip pancake over (or toss it if you are feeling daring). Cook again until golden (around 30/45 seconds).
  4. Serve with sugar (yum) and lemon juice
  5. Eat pancake whilst cooking the next one: repeat until batter runs out then make some more 😉

Techy: Recursive Find and Grep

November 18, 2003
3 Comments

Here’s another little Linux “script snippet” I’ve needed over the past few days: basically, give it a directory/folder and it’ll search all the files in that directory for a set word, words, phrase (or even a string of characters). Very handy if you can tell that a server obviously knows about the domain, but try as you might – you can’t figure out which site the domain name belongs to (as it’s an add on domain and the dratted Ensim control panel won’t allow you to show it). Quick search on the Apache configuration folder and bingo!

I’m entering it here so a) if anybody else needs it, they can easily find it by searching for things such as “grep”, “recursive”, “search”, “linux”, “files” and “find”, and b) so I don’t have to bother remembering the syntax myself 😉

find [start folder name] -type f -exec grep ‘[text you are searching for]’ {} \; -print

Quick explanation:

  • “find XXX”: search the following folder(s)
  • “-type f”: for file(s)
  • “-exec”: then run the following command:
  • “grep ‘search text’ {} \;” use the grep function to search the file for the text
  • “-print” and then display the file name and details

Drunken Ramblings: BBC News Lead Story

November 14, 2003
Leave a Comment

Just watching the BBC 10 O’Clock News on BBC 1, and their lead (10minute) story was the fact that Rupert Murdoch may not support Tony Blair and the Labour Party on the run up on the next election. However, he has not said he will not support them, nor has he said that he will support the Conservative Party (the “Tories”): just that his support may not be necessarily relied on by Tony Blair (watch the RealMedia interview)

In other words – a non-story: nothing really interesting happened but quite a few plugs for Sky Broadcasting (or, as it should be called, BSkyB or, as it’s parent corporation is better known Stateside “Fox Corporation Inc”).

So why report on such a non-story? I’ve got no idea: but did you know that the BBC and Sky Broadcasting are partners in the “Freeview” Digital Broadcasting venture… Hmmm, I’m not saying the BBC may be “grovelling” or bias, but I might just possible be thinking it – but you can’t rely on it 😉

Fun: Microsoft Users Need Your Help

November 12, 2003
Leave a Comment

Whilst checking that my entry about chmod was published correctly, I noticed the following Google Adword/Adsense being displayed on the page (it’s a “PSA”/Public Service Announcement one, which basically means I won’t get paid for any click thrus 🙁 ):

MSAA needs your support
to help people with
MS lead a better
life. Help us today!
msaa.com

Are MS (Microsoft) products really that bad that people with Microsoft need assistance this much?

(yeah, yeah, I know, it’s really for the Multiple Sclerosis Association of America, but still 😉 And they’ve got a buggy website, Internet Explorer [yes, I know it’s an MS product itself, but I’m still at work] reports a number of “problems with layers”: an error I hadn’t seen before)

Techy: Recursive CHMOD of Folders

November 12, 2003
5 Comments

I’m currently in the midst of moving a large number of websites from one Red Hat Linux web server (an Ensim machine) to another Red Hat Linux web server (this one powered by Cpanel) , but the chmod (file permissions) of the “public_html” (web root, web docs, htdocs whatever) folder is incorrect on the new server. So, instead of chmodding over 200 files “by hand”, I’ve used the following little script (just run from the command line):

find . -type d -name public_html -exec chmod 0755 {} \;

Basically it searches (using find recursively (ie it checks folders and sub folders/directories and sub directories) for a directory (-type d) called (-name) public_html and when it does it runs the command (-exec) chmod 0755 (which sets the permissions so that the owner can read, write and execute/open the folder and all other users can read and execute/open the folder).

Simple eh? 😉