- srmklive/laravel-paypal: Laravel plugin for processing payments through PayPal. Can be used separately.
I need to upgrade the Badgers and Jam checkout to support Paypal, very soon.
- Toy Town by watabou
This is also great! Same author, really hoping they link the two up, so you can generate a map, then walk through it.
- Medieval Fantasy City Generator by watabou
This is just great. Loads of options, loads of visually distinct cities to work with.
Tag: interesting
Bookmarks for April 2, 2012
- Planning a trip to Canada or the Caribbean? US Immigration may have other ideas… – News & Advice – Travel – The Independent
I await the first tales of someone's holiday being fucked up because they happened to share a name with someone who is on the US list, even despite the fact that they're not even flying near the US. I also await being allowed to deny US citizens the right to enter France.
- BBC News – 10 stories that could be April Fools pranks but aren't
Several of these are fascinating. Others are just mad. Either way, I like 'em.
- What Lies Beneath: Excavating Crossrail's tunnels | In-depth | The Engineer
This is fascinating reading. Example facts from this piece: tunnel boring machines go at about 100m per week, and have a turning radius of 250m. Inpressive enough, but in places the tunnels these things are cutting are passing with 1m of existing tunnels, which, obviously, it would be very bad if they were to hit. "Lads, we've got to start turning now, so that we're in the right place in 2 weeks time. If we're out by over a foot, were going to cause major damage to something expensive. No do-overs. Everyone ready?"
Bookmarks for February 9, 2011
- Why second-hand bookshops smell good
File under: interesting trivia I never knew. Also: "Why yes, given enough time, science *can* explain everything."
Bookmarks for January 26, 2011
- Ten Obscure Factoids Concerning Albert Einstein
Reading this made me smile. I have no other reason to link it.
Bookmarks for November 3, 2010
- Did somebody just try to buy the British government? – Charlie's Diary
I uh, don't quite know what to make of this. It sounds like conspiracy theory meets internet fraud scam on a national level. But if it's legit, and anyone from Foundation X is reading this and would like to fund me to the tune of say, 4 or 5 million quid with no strings attached, then I'm certainly willing to enter into discussions about how I would usefully use the money…
- The Do Lectures | Tim Berners-Lee
Tim Berners-Lee explains the context through which he came to computers, and makes the case that while people aren't ever going to come to thme that way again, there are still some vitally important things that we should be teaching our children about computers.
- Antony Johnston – Scrivening Comics
If you write, whether it's comics or not, I imagine that by the time you have read this article, you will understand why you need Scrivener in your life. It is hands down the best writing app I have ever encountered, and what's better is that it's surprisingly intuitive to use. Antony's article may have you thinking "god, that sounds like a lot of options, how confusing", but what I love about it is that they're not intrusive, and you can come to them as you need them. Try it just as a word processor, and you'll find that over time, you'll pick up more and more of it's features, just because they're there and easy to understand, until you wonder how you managed to write without it. Just the ability to hold my research notes in a meaningful structure alongside my actual writing, and view both at the same time is invaluable to me, never mind the bits of process tracking it enables me to do…
- The protocol-relative URL « Paul Irish
I didn't know that one could do this. It's pointless tech stuff to most of you, but I'll find it very useful.
Bookmarks for September 29, 2010
- Incredibly Depressing Mega Millions Lottery Simulator!
Do you play the lottery? Here's a little tool that will simulate playing a reasonably normal lottery for you, twice a week, for 10 years, so that you can see just how much money you're flushing down the toilet for what kind of reward.
- How to build a web widget (using jQuery) – Alex Marandon
Most of you can safely skip this one, as it'll be incomprehensible tech bollocks. Unless you're interested in good coding practice when developing Javascript for other people to deploy of their websites. No, didn't think so.
- A user’s guide to websites, part 1: If it wasn’t broken why fix it? « Rev Dan Catt's Blog
Have you ever complained (or thought about complaining, or generally just grumbled to yourself and your friends) when LJ, Facebook, Twitter, or any other large website you use changed something? Have you ever wondered "why didn't they give us the option to keep doing it the old way, if we wanted to?" Well here's a good post explaining why.
- Wrestling legend Mick Foley explains how Tori Amos changed his life. – By Mick Foley – Slate Magazine
Yeah, I know it sounds unlikely to the point of absurdity. But seriously, read this. I don't care if you don't give a shit about one of both of them are – unless you have no idea at all who both of them are (in which case, I congratulate you on waking from your 20 year coma, and welcome you to the future) they I promise you, you'll love it. It's absolutely brilliant.
Bookmarks for July 22, 2010
- Why it's never too late to be a lesbian | Life and style | The Guardian
Fascinating article on the fluidity of sexuality – the idea that people, particularly women, can, in fact, switch from hetero- to homo-sexuality in different phases of their life – that it's possible to be sincerely heterosexual, and then later, sincerely homosexual without ever being bisexual, and without devaluing one's previous sexuality.
- America's Joyous Future
I laughed like a drain.
- Bookshelf Porn
I love my iPad – I'm carrying so many books around with me these days, and it is very liberating. But I also love my bookshelves. One day, I hope to have space for my books, but I accept that this may be a fools dream, and I may have to resign myself to an iPad-based future. In the meantime, I shall stare at this with envy.
- danah boyd | apophenia » MySpace and Facebook: How Racist Language Frames Social Media (and Why You Should Care)
I've been following boyd's research for a few years now, and have been particularly interested in her data regarding class/race/gender divides in social media use, and I really hope the rallying cry that she's putting out here has some effect, because I would really like to see people stop arguing over the scope the problem, and start talking about what can be done about it. "On the internet, no-one knows you're a dog" is both a triumph *and* a tragedy, and we need to start addressing that.
Bookmarks for January 20, 2010
- Auto-appendectomy in the Antarctic: case report — Rogozov and Bermel 339: b4965 — BMJ
Ever wondered what it would be like to perform surgery on yourself? No? Why not? Well, anyway: here's a description of what it's like to have to give yourself an appendectomy. In the Antarctic. With next to no help.
- A Rant About Women « Clay Shirky
Clay Shirky opens up a serious can of worms, noting that women do not push themselves forward in the way men do. Part of me wants to say "well, *duh*". Shirky suggests that if women behaved in a more self-aggrandising manner, they'd get more equal treatment. I'm just not sure that I want to encourage any more people to behave like some of the self-promoting male pricks I've met.
- plasticbag.org: Should we encourage self-promotion and lies?
Tom Coates identifies some of the problems with what Shirky is suggesting – the problem isn't just that women don't push themselves forward, but often that the wrong people do, and what we should be focusing on is ensuring that everyone correctly advertises their own level of experience and ability – that those that *do* self-promote heavily while they can be useful, can just as often be a total pain.
- apophenia: whose voice do you hear? gender issues and success
Danah Boyd's repose to Shirky and Coates is excellent reading.
- Mass Photo Gathering – I'm a Photographer, not a Terrorist
Trafalgar Square at noon on Saturday. Anyone interested?
Bookmarks for November 24, 2009
- panGloss: Mandy and Me: some thoughts on the Digital Economy Bill
A lawyer takes the Digital Economy Bill apart.
My own idiots guide to the DEB is at 1500 words and counting, and I'm not sure I'm even halfway through yet. So: serious question – if there anyone reading this who feels it would be useful for me to produce said guide? Is a guide that tries to use short words and explain the whole business practically from absolutely first principles worth it, or are you all going to go "tl;dr" and skip blithely past it? Who is there round these parts that feels like they don't know what's going on on this subject, and would like to? - The 50 most interesting articles on Wikipedia « Copybot
Dammit, these actually *are* that interesting. An absolute mine of weird crap that illustrates that the world is a pretty damn splendid place, when you get right down to it.
- Patched mach_kernel 10.2.0 for Atom-based netbooks – InsanelyMac Forum
I will have absolutely no need of this kernel patch at any point.
- How To: Hackintosh a Dell Mini 10v Into the Ultimate Snow Leopard Netbook – Dell mini 10v hackintosh – Gizmodo
This would violate my EULA. Obviously, I would not wish to do this, because once I have legitimately purchased something, it is completely reasonable that that manufacturer dictate how I use it.
- Home – flashbake – GitHub
Tools for writers/people who generate text, rather than code, to apply more or less automatic version control to something you're working on, with tools to provide context on what was going on in your head when a given automatic commit happened.
- The Literary Gift Company
ZOMG! (As I believe the young people say.) Someone has made a website with gifts specifically for me and all my friends!
- Police routinely arresting people to get DNA, inquiry claims | Politics | The Guardian
Gosh, couldn't have guessed this would happen.
Bookmarks for September 9, 2009
- Matthieu Ricard on the habits of happiness | Video on TED.com
I have heard of this guy before, but this is a truly amazing talk.
- TEDTalks as of 09.02.09
A spreadsheet listing all the various TED talks to date, and providing a brief summary of each. Really nice way of finding talks by smart people that you may have missed.