Recursively Delete Selected Files or Folders In Windows

I was looking around for a way to recursively delete files and folders of a specific name in Windows. For example, imagine having “/folderA/folderB/file1.doc” and “/folderA/folderC/file1.doc”, and I wanted to remove all instances of file1.doc. Now imagine this file1.doc being presented in hundreds of folders. Deleting each file manually would drive anyone crazy.

I know Unix has a more powerful commandline interface, so operations like this should be a snap, but I was certain Windows had a similar functionality too. So I went about searching for a simple solution to do so. I was so intent on finding a simple batch file or DOS command that would do the recursive delete that I didn’t think of anything else until it suddenly slammed into me like a bullet train.

I could just use the search function in Windows! Yes that’s right — the normal Windows search is already a powerful enough function that accepts wildcards and does recursive searching. So I went to Windows search, specified my folder, and put in my filename. Sure enough, all the hundred or more instances of that file popped up almost instantly. From there it was just a matter of selecting all of them and deleting them. Everything took less than 10 seconds!

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Best Free PHP Forum Script

The best PHP forum software has got to be vBulletin, because it has unparalleled features and support. The only problem is it costs over a hundred dollars. So that may be a problem if you’re just starting out.

It used to be that the single largest competitor to vBulletin was phpBB, but it’s no longer the case. Recently I discovered a few VERY good free php forum scripts. I’m really amazed by them because all these scripts are lightweight, elegant, and fast! If you are looking to start your own forum, then these are the best free forum scripts that you can find. In no order of preference, they are:

1. PunBB
2. Vanilla
3. BBPress

One thing that you MUST consider, however, is the future of your website. These relatively-new forum scripts have a rather different backend structure as compared to vBulletin — and looking through the current database importer scripts that vBulletin provides, only phpBB can be seamlessly imported into vBulletin with ease.

So if you’re looking to upgrade to something like vBulletin, then these forums might not be such a good idea. If you’d like something safer, go with phpBB. It’s free, it’s feature-packed, and it has a huge community that provides support and mods free. In fact, one hugely popular free mod for phpBB is a free WordPress and phpBB bridge plugin.

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Connecting SpeedTouch ST536 with Wireless Router

So I switched from cable to ADSL, but didn’t check if my wireless router could work out of the box. Well, it turned out that it could because I could surf the Internet just fine, or so I thought.

By not changing the settings to accomodate the ADSL modem, there was a weird phenomenon happening that caused frequent time-outs, FTP uploads failing, MSN messages not being sent or received properly, message loss, and the dreaded Page “Unable To Display” message in your browser until you refresh.

With such a host of problems, I did more research on my network configuration and tried to get my SpeedTouch ST536 ADSL modem to work with my Belkin wireless router properly. In fact, I was about to flash the SpeedTouch and get everything working in a bridge-mode setup until I discovered that there was an easier way!

If you think about it — the SpeedTouch can actually function as a router, and you can just use your wireless router as an access point. It means you don’t really fully maximise your router’s capabilities, but by using this setup, you ensure the fastest and most optimal way to configure your network.

How To Configure Your Wireless Router

In order for this configuration to work, you’ll need to do just a few things, in this order:

1.) Change your wireless router’s IP to 192.168.1.2 (it most probably was 192.168.2.1 or 192.168.0.1 etc.)
2.) Disable DHCP (dynamic IP assignment) in your wireless router’s configuration panel
3.) Plug the ST536 modem’s cable into your wireless router’s LAN port (not WAN port or MODEM port). This is the same type of port that your computer is connected to your router by.
4.) Disconnect and connect any computers that are currently connected to your network.

Done! This method worked for me, and I’m darn happy with my network now!

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How to Learn and Use Regular Expressions (Regex)

Whoever would have thought that something that looks like gibberish would actually have such powerful usages. Look at this example:

\d\d[/]\d\d[/]\d\d[ ][-][ ]

Would you believe that it’s actually an expression that matches anything of the format of “12/06/08″? Amazing.

I’ve been putting off learning about regular expressions (regex) for the longest time because it seems overly complicated — but I was forced to learn more about it after a recent application demanded of it. And boy was I glad to have finally jumped into it — it’s simply one of the best ways to search for any text pattern.

With regular expressions, you can search for any number of characters, specify whether it’s a number or letter, and even specify a range, like only accept alphabets between B and E. Or only numbers from 1-5.

So if you think about it, the sample regular expression string up there can actually be improved upon. For instance, since the date format is dd/mm/yy, we know that dd can go higher than 31, nor can it go lower than 1. And similarly, we know that for mm, it’s between 01 to 12. The tricky part is yy, because it can vary, depending on how you’re going to use this date. If your application’s more geared towards the future, then keeping the first digit to 0 or 1, and the 2nd digit from 0 to 9 should be just fine.

So as you can see, if you’re a developer, then regular expressions (regex) should be something that you are very familiar and comfortable with, because it makes your life so much easier!

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Book Safe to Keep and Hide Valuables (Cash, Jewelry, etc)

I remember when I was much younger, and I happened to watch this movie where one of the characters stowed some secret item in a book safe. The much-younger-me was very much the impressionable and easily astonished kid, and if I don’t recall wrongly, I was extremely surprised when I first discovered the book safe.

I thought it was an absolutely ingenious idea.

Books were meant for reading and I never did explore the possibilities of actually having a fake book to store valuables in. The premise was simple — have a fake book, or a real book with a hole cut into it — and then storing your cash and valuables inside that book safe.

For book safes like that, a lock or combination wouldn’t even be possible. These book safes depend on security by obfuscation, which, is entirely inadequate. The complete system is based on the assumption that another person will not chance upon your book safe by accident.

That said, I know it sure as heck is a great conversational piece. And it’s cool.

Interested? Amazon has it, so you can get your very own book safe.

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Does Ireland Have Postal / Zip Codes?

I was packing a parcel to be sent to Ireland when I realised that there was something missing. There wasn’t any postal code! So I thought that I had the address wrong, so I double-checked it again. But the strange thing was that it was correct!

So I went online, and did a bit of research on zip codes in Ireland. Well it turns out that there are no postal codes for most of Ireland! That’s right, Ireland has no postal/zip codes, except in Dublin. The city of Dublin is divided in postal codes 1-24.

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All-Ett vs The Big Skinny Review (Slim Men’s Leather Wallets Review)

Yay! My new wallet from The Big Skinny came in the mail today. I’ve been on the search for a new wallet to replace my old one for a long time because I felt that it was just too thick.

The search was made more difficult because I had a certain set of criteria that I was looking out for. Namely, the new wallet must be:

• Super thin / slim
• Look good and presentable with any kind of attire
• Preferably compartmentalised
• Have a convenient compartment for cash notes

For that reason, I decided that I had to get a leather wallet, and the wallet should have a full-sized compartment for holding cash. None of those money clips because I think a little privacy is good, and none of those half-sized pockets that require you to fold your cash, because I don’t like fumbling with cash while I’m trying to make payment or collect change.

Well, so I shortlisted my choices to finally between either the All-Ett (Check out the choices available here ), or the Big Skinny (See the Big Skinny). I made my ultimate decision the Big Skinny because it released a leather version just as I was about to buy.

This choice of leather turned out to be a bad idea because leather is inherent thicker, which actually goes against my first criteria (that the wallet must be super thin / slim). So the Big Skinny turned out to be just marginally slimmer than my original leather wallet.

Perhaps I should have chosen the All-Ett (Check out the choices available here ) or the original version of the Big Skinny wallet (See the Big Skinny) instead.

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