Chris Owens

Recreate Database – Ruby on Rails

Hey everyone,

Due to an issue with a few migrations in a dev environment I needed to recreate the database. A quick Google search revealed that it is possible to do this in a single line:


#Execute via console
rake db:drop db:create

Copy Syntax Highlighting to Word

Hey everyone,

In a previous post I gave a quick example of how to copy syntax highlight from Notepad++ to word (http://www.whatibroke.com/?p=192), I’ve recently been made aware of a slightly easier approach:

http://tohtml.com/

Simply copy your code here, select your language and then paste to word.

Let me know if you come across any others.

Setup RVM on Ubuntu – Ruby on Rails

Hey everyone,

I’ve just done a fresh install of RVM using the guide below. There were a few dependencies missing, but other than that it all went pretty smoothly.

Link: http://stjhimy.com/posts/10-five-quick-steps-to-set-up-rvm-with-rails-2-and-rails3

Next time I do an install I’ll try to document the whole thing, but for now that link is probably one of the better/simpler guides I’ve come across. If you have any problems please leave a comment below and I’ll try to get back to you.

UPDATE:

Just another guide I’ve come across that seems to work well, this one is a complete “start to finish” one:
http://rails.vandenabeele.com/blog/2011/11/26/installing-ruby-and-rails-with-rvm-on-ubuntu-11-dot-10/

Heroku Timezones – Ruby on Rails

Hey everyone,

Just a quick post on how to adjust the timezone on Heroku, comes in handy when using the log files.

#Console
$ heroku config:add TZ=Australia/Brisbane

There is a fairly detailed StackOverflow post at the following link if anyone is interested in more info:
http://stackoverflow.com/questions/2719330/why-does-heroku-log-using-the-server-time-rather-than-the-rails-time-zone

The language options can also be found on the following wikipedia page:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_tz_database_time_zones

Oracle – Number of Weekdays Between Two Dates

Hey everyone,

Just a quick post on how to select the number of weekdays between two dates:

SELECT temp_tbl.days
--SELECT COUNT(temp_tbl.days)
FROM (          
        SELECT (TRUNC(TO_DATE ('01/08/2012', 'DD/MM/YYYY'), 'dd') + LEVEL - 1) days
        FROM DUAL
        CONNECT BY LEVEL = 2
      AND TO_CHAR(temp_tbl.days, 'D') <= 6

Rails Casts #142 Paypal Notifications

Hey all,

I ran into a bit of an issue in Rails Cast #142. I received the following error while testing the IPN:

WARNING: Can't verify CSRF token authenticity
Completed 500 Internal Server Error in 2ms
app/controllers/payment_notifications_controller.rb:11:in `process_ipn_payment'

Simply replace the following line with the alternative below it:

#Payment_Notifications_Controller.rb
protect_from_forgery :except => [:create]

#Payment_Notifications_Controller.rb
skip_before_filter :verify_authenticity_token, :only => [:create]

Sending Email – PL/SQL

A quick post on how to send an email with PL/SQL.

There’s a LOT of documentation available at the following link:
http://www.orafaq.com/wiki/Send_mail_from_PL/SQL

PROCEDURE EMAIL_ERROR_REPORT IS
       
       /* Create vars */
       v_From        VARCHAR2 (80) := 'test@test.com';
       v_Recipient   VARCHAR2 (80) := 'me@me.com';--REPORT_RECEIVER;
       v_Subject     VARCHAR2 (80) := 'test subject';
       v_Mail_Host   VARCHAR2 (30) := 'smtp.test.com';
       v_Mail_Conn   UTL_SMTP.Connection;
       crlf          VARCHAR2 (2) := CHR (13) || CHR (10);
    BEGIN

       /* Define connection */
       v_Mail_Conn := UTL_SMTP.Open_Connection (v_Mail_Host, 25);
       UTL_SMTP.Helo (v_Mail_Conn, v_Mail_Host);
       UTL_SMTP.Mail (v_Mail_Conn, v_From);
       UTL_SMTP.Rcpt (v_Mail_Conn, v_Recipient);
       UTL_SMTP.Data (
          v_Mail_Conn,
             'Date: '
          || TO_CHAR (SYSDATE, 'Dy, DD Mon YYYY hh24:mi:ss')
          || crlf
          || 'From: '
          || v_From
          || crlf
          || 'Subject: '
          || v_Subject
          || crlf
          || 'To: '
          || v_Recipient
          || crlf
          || crlf
          || 'some message text'
          || crlf
          ||                                                       -- Message body
            'more message text'
          || crlf);
       UTL_SMTP.Quit (v_mail_conn);
    EXCEPTION

       /* Catch exceptions */
       --WHEN OTHERS THEN         
    END;

Cannot Generate Tempfile – Ruby on Rails

Ran into the following problem, still not too sure what caused it but this seems to have fixed it:

Error

cannot generate tempfile `/home/chris/cartsite/tmp/cache/assets/sprockets%2Fd585a06e2ee6203ccb04c8b84150d14d20120804-8682-7q77nb-9'

Just run the following:

$ rake tmp:clear

Let me know if you come across the cause, I’d be interested to know.

Paypal Platform Ruby SDK – Adaptive Payments

Hey everyone,

This is the SDK for PayPal adaptive payments. I’ve just uploaded it to *hopefully* make it a little easier to find. Please note that it has not been updated recently and that there are a few changes to be made. The StackOverflow post below provides a few examples:

StackOverflow Post:
Adaptive Payments with Ruby

I’ll try to list any others as I come across them, but if you’ve got some of your own please let me know and I’ll try to keep the post up to date.

Download SDK here:
Paypal Platform SDK

Error #1:

Internal Server Error

undefined method `debug_rjs=' for ActionView::Base:Class

Remove the following line from your development.rb config file:

PayPalPlatformRubySDK::Application.configure do
  # Settings specified here will take precedence over those in config/environment.rb

  # In the development environment your application's code is reloaded on
  # every request.  This slows down response time but is perfect for development
  # since you don't have to restart the webserver when you make code changes.
  config.cache_classes = false

  # Log error messages when you accidentally call methods on nil.
  config.whiny_nils = true

  # Show full error reports and disable caching
  config.consider_all_requests_local       = true
  #config.action_view.debug_rjs             = true <---- Comment this line out (no longer supported)
  config.action_controller.perform_caching = false

  # Don't care if the mailer can't send
  config.action_mailer.raise_delivery_errors = false

  # Print deprecation notices to the Rails logger
  config.active_support.deprecation = :log

  # Only use best-standards-support built into browsers
  config.action_dispatch.best_standards_support = :builtin
end

Paypal IPN History:
For some reason the IPN history button often won’t appear in the sandbox, use the following link to view it:
https://www.sandbox.paypal.com/us/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_display-ipns-history

IPN Notifications:
Just a warning for anyone else setting up payments with PayPal, the sandbox IPN is extremely flaky. It has gone down twice in the last six months for weeks at a time, with no warning or error messages. If you’re not receiving the IPN check out the forums to make sure it’s not down.

has_secure_password error – Ruby on Rails

Ran into the following error while using has_secure_password:

/usr/lib/ruby/gems/1.8/gems/bundler-1.0.21/lib/bundler/rubygems_integration.rb:143:in `gem': bcrypt-ruby is not part of the bundle. Add it to Gemfile. (Gem::LoadError)

Thankfully the error is pretty self explanatory, you simply have to add the gem bcrypt-ruby:

chris@chris-VirtualBox:~/cartsite$ gedit Gemfile

#Add gem to Gemfile
...
gem 'bcrypt-ruby'
...

#Run bundle install
chris@chris-VirtualBox:~/cartsite$ bundle install
Using rake (0.9.2.2) 
Using i18n (0.6.0) 
Using multi_json (1.3.6) 
...
Using uglifier (1.2.4) 
Your bundle is complete! Use `bundle show [gemname]` to see where a bundled gem is installed.

Then you should be right to go, let me know if there are any issues.