Motivated by this question at StackOverflow: RegExp PHP get text between multiple span tags, I decided to help.

Recently I got a Mac mini. I still hadn’t played with PHP on Mac and to debug my answer to that question I needed a way to test the code. So I thought: why not also give PHP a try on Mac OS since its my main OS today? Oh, good idea, go learn something new… :D

The first thing I did obviously was recurring to Google and searching for something that could help me get there.

I hit a pretty good tutorial to enable PHP on Mac at About.com written by Angela Bradley that gets to the point: How to Install PHP on a Mac. Along the way I had to solve only one minor thing described in the caveat section at the end of this post.

You see that the title of this post has the word installing (well I thought I had to install it – that was my first reaction), but in fact it could be the word enabling because PHP is an integral part of Mac OS X Snow Leopard and we just need to enable it as you’ll see soon.

Here we go. Follow these steps:

1 - Enabling the Web Server
PHP works hand in hand with a webserver. Mac OS already comes with Apache web server and so we just need to enable it. To do so, open System Preferences in the Dock. Then click the 'Sharing' icon in the Internet & Network section. Check the ‘Web Sharing’ box.

Figure 1 - Web Sharing option under the Sharing configuration in System Preferences

Now type this address in your browser: http://localhost/. You should get a message that reads: It works!

2 - Enabling PHP
PHP also comes bundled in Mac OS, but it’s disabled by default. To enable it we need to edit a hidden system file located in this path: /private/etc/apache2/httpd.conf.

I used BBEdit text editor to edit such a file (note that I marked the box Show hidden items in the screenshot below):

Figure 2 - Editing the hidden system file httpd.conf with BBEdit

Now within that file search for:

libexec/apache2/libphp5.so

Delete the character # in the start of the line so that that entire line should now read:

LoadModule php5_module          libexec/apache2/libphp5.so

Save the file.

3 - Testing the installation
There’s nothing better to test the PHP installation than using its own information. To accomplish this, write a one liner simple .php file named test.php with this content:

<?php phpinfo() ?>

Place this file inside your personal website folder. Mine is located in this path:

/Users/leniel/Sites/test.php

Now let’s test this page by typing its address in the browser:

http://192.168.1.103/~leniel/test.php

As you see, the address points to my personal website as seen in Figure 1.

When you run this simple .php page you should get something like this:

Figure 3 - Testing PHP installation with its own configuration’s information

If your PHP installation is OK, the test page will display PHP's information. If it displays the page code, you need to restart the Apache server.

You can restart Apache by entering the following in Terminal:

sudo apachectl restart

Try to reload the page again. Everything should work.

Well done!. Now you can play with PHP on your Mac computer and write some neat codez. :)

Caveat
When I tried to restart Apache server I got the following error:

ulimit: open files: cannot modify limit: Invalid argument

I resorted to this solution: Mac OS X 10.6.5 broke my apachectl

Last time I showed you the Practical use of CountIf with Google Docs Spreadsheet.

Today I’m showing a practical use of a function called Right that can help you in a lot of situations.

Consider this sample spreadsheet:

I’m using the above spreadsheet to keep track of my progress during online theoretical practice tests for my first driver’s license.

I like math so I wanted to know how many tests people have taken or how many tests have been served by the server since my last test.

The Right function is being used in the column named ‘’Tests since last’’ starting at the second practice test I’ve taken. For example, the actual formula in cell C4 is this:

C4 = right(B4, 7) - right(B3, 7)

Let’s break this thing and explain each piece:

B4 contains the URL that points to the practice test I took. In this case the URL is this:

http://www.provadetran.com.br/simulado_termino.php?simulado=4396981

As you see, there’s a number at the end of the URL. This number has 7 digits of length and is a sequential that identifies each test. This allows me to go to the test to review what I did right and what I did wrong at a later time.

Well, to answer that intriguing question I need to subtract this number from the number present in the URL just above cell B4, namely B3. Now look at the formula in cell C4 above. It does just that. The right function is giving me the last 7 characters of the URL. Last because it gets the characters from right to left. If you wanted to get the first 7 characters you’d use the left function instead.

The right function has this form: RIGHT(text, number). It defines the last character or characters in a text string. Text is the text of which the right part is to be determined. Number (optional) is the number of characters from the right part of the text.

Easy to understand, isn’t it?

Let’s do the math making the substitution of values:

C4 = right(B4, 7) - right(B3, 7)
C4 = 4396981      - 4396181
C4 = 800

Now I know that from the time I took the first practice test on 11/25 to the second test on the same day but at a different time 800 tests have been served. This is more of a curiosity metric than anything. I like math anyways. :o)

This was a simple and practical use of the right function that came in handy in this situation.

Motivated by this question on StackOverflow - Disable radio button depending on date, I decided to help and here I’m with another code snippet post.

This time I show you how to use jQuery UI and its Datepicker control to control a set of radio buttons (only 2 in this post to make things easier) that have their state (enabled/disabled) changed depending on the date selected by the user.

Here’s the code:


<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>

    <meta charset="UTF-8" />
    
    <title>jQuery UI - Datepicker & Radio Buttons</title>

    <!-- Linking to jQuery stylesheets and libraries -->
    <link rel="stylesheet" href="http://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jqueryui/1.8.7/themes/base/jquery-ui.css" type="text/css" media="all" />

    <link rel="stylesheet" href="http://static.jquery.com/ui/css/demo-docs-theme/ui.theme.css" type="text/css" media="all" />
   
    <script src="http://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jquery/1.4.4/jquery.min.js" type="text/javascript"></script>

    <script src="http://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jqueryui/1.8.7/jquery-ui.min.js" type="text/javascript"></script>
   
    <script src="http://jquery-ui.googlecode.com/svn/tags/latest/external/jquery.bgiframe-2.1.2.js" type="text/javascript"></script>

    <script src="http://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jqueryui/1.8.7/i18n/jquery-ui-i18n.min.js" type="text/javascript"></script>

</head>

<body>

    <script>

    $(function()
    {
        $("#datepicker").datepicker
        ({          
            // Event raised everytime a date is selected in the datepicker
            onSelect: function(date)
            {
                // Self explanatory :) - used to get today's date
                var today = new Date();

                // Business logic to change radio buttons' state                 if($("#datepicker").datepicker("getDate") > today)
                {
                    $("#radioButton1").attr('disabled', true);
                    $("#radioButton2").attr('disabled', false); 
                }
                else
                {
                    $("#radioButton1").attr('disabled', false);
                    $("#radioButton2").attr('disabled', true); 
                }
            }
        });

        // Just setting the default localization for the datepicker
        $.datepicker.setDefaults($.datepicker.regional['']); 
    });
    
    </script>

    <p>Date: <input id="datepicker" type="text"></p>

    <input id="radioButton1" type="radio" value="myValue1" name="radioButton1"/>Radio button 1<br/>
    <input id="radioButton2" type="radio" value="myValue2" name="radioButton2"/>Radio button 2

</body>

</html>

If you wanted to control the state (checked/unchecked) you’d have to make a small change in the code as follows:


// Business logic to change radio buttons' state                 if($("#datepicker").datepicker("getDate") > today)
{ 
    $("#radioButton1").attr('checked', true); 
    $("#radioButton2").attr('checked', false);  
} 
else 
{ 
    $("#radioButton1").attr('checked', false); 
    $("#radioButton2").attr('checked', true);  
}


When you open the page for the first time you get this screen:

Figure 1 - Page when viewed for the first time (both radio buttons are enabled)

If you pick a date that is greater than today’s date, Radio button 1 is disabled (turns to gray) and Radio button 2 is enabled according to the logic implemented.

Figure 2 - Radio button 1 is disabled (turns to gray) and Radio button 2 is enabled

Otherwise, Radio button 2 is disabled and Radio button 1 is enabled:

Figure 3 - Radio button 2 is disabled and Radio button 1 is enabled

Hope you make good use of it.

Just out of curiosity I wanted to know how many words I have already translated from English to Portuguese in respect to Translating ScottGu's Blog to Portuguese.

This appeared to be a great chance to play with Google Translator Toolkit (GTT) API since I use GTT to translate Scott Guthrie’s posts.

GTT gives me the number of words it finds in the source document. I could count them one by one but that’d be a tedious task. Don’t you think? That’s what computers are for.

Google Translator Toolkit is a pretty good tool because it helps translators translate better and more quickly through one shared, innovative translation technology. It uses machine translation when possible and still allows human intervention.

When a document is uploaded for translation, GTT pretranslate the doc with a combination of previous translated docs by human translation (translation memories), machine translation, etc. Great technology put to work here. That’s why I’ve chosen it.

Given the above, the translated word count I’m interested won’t be an exact figure but it does show a realistic figure about my work as a translator. So let’s find this magic number using GTT API.

Basically what one needs to write a GTT client app is very well described at Google Translator Toolkit Data API v1.0 Developer's Guide. Pay special attention to the Getting Started section as it teaches you how to set up the Google client library. Refer to this: Getting Started with the Google Data Java Client Library.

Now I’m using a Mac and so I played with GTT API with Eclipse for Mac OS if you mind. The programming language is Java and the following code creates a console application.

This is the code I wrote to satisfy my curiosity:

import com.google.gdata.client.gtt.*;
import com.google.gdata.client.gtt.DocumentQuery;
import com.google.gdata.data.gtt.*;
import com.google.gdata.util.*;

import java.io.IOException;
import java.net.URL;

/**
* @author Leniel Macaferi
* 12-11-2010
*/
public class GttClient
{

    static final String DOCUMENTS_FEED_URI = "http://translate.google.com/toolkit/feeds/documents";

    public static void main(String[] args) throws IOException, ServiceException
    {
        try
        {
            GttService myService = new GttService("GoogleTranslatorToolkitClientApp");

            // Your Google username and password go here...
            myService.setUserCredentials("YourUserName", "YourPassword");

            URL feedUrl = new URL(DOCUMENTS_FEED_URI);

            DocumentQuery query = new DocumentQuery(feedUrl);

            // Send the query to the server.
            DocumentFeed resultFeed = myService.getFeed(query, DocumentFeed.class);

            printResults(resultFeed);
        }
        catch (AuthenticationException e)
        {
            // TODO Auto-generated catch block
            e.printStackTrace();
        }
    }

    /**
     * Iterates the document feed and prints some information to the console screen.
     * @param resultFeed
     */
    private static void printResults(DocumentFeed resultFeed)
    {
        System.out.println("...done, there are " + resultFeed.getEntries().size()
                + " documents matching the query in your inbox.\n");

        int i = 1;
        int totalWords = 0;

        for (DocumentEntry entry : resultFeed.getEntries())
        {
            System.out.println(String.valueOf(i++) +  ") "
                    + "id = " + entry.getId().substring(DOCUMENTS_FEED_URI.length() + 1)
                    + ", title = '" + entry.getTitle().getPlainText() + "'"
                    + ", number of words = '" + entry.getNumberOfSourceWords().getValue() + "'");

            totalWords += entry.getNumberOfSourceWords().getValue();
        }

        // Here's where I satisfy my curiosity... :D
        System.out.println("Total words translated so far = " + totalWords);
    }
}

As you see the code is straightforward.

Make sure to replace the strings YourUserName and YourPassword to match your GTT login information.

When I ran the code, this was the output I got:

1) id = 00001vipkz2ce0w, title = 'a-few-quick-asp-net-mvc-3-installation-notes.aspx', number of words = '482'
2) id = 0000082e1f41udc, title = 'add-reference-dialog-improvements-vs-2010-and-net-4-0-series.aspx', number of words = '399'
3) id = 0000206w1a7tog0, title = 'announcing-entity-framework-code-first-ctp5-release.aspx', number of words = '2165'
4) id = 00001qlrxh63jls, title = 'announcing-nupack-asp-net-mvc-3-beta-and-webmatrix-beta-2.aspx', number of words = '1500'
5) id = 00001zm1lv1meio, title = 'announcing-silverlight-5.aspx', number of words = '784'
6) id = 00001vgl6hzbwg0, title = 'announcing-the-asp-net-mvc-3-release-candidate.aspx', number of words = '1999'
7) id = 00001rtmq1go4cg, title = 'asp-net-4-seo-improvements-vs-2010-and-net-4-0-series.aspx', number of words = '1113'
8) id = 00000snuf95gd8g, title = 'asp-net-mvc-2-model-validation.aspx', number of words = '2925'
9) id = 00000joo5ihwykg, title = 'asp-net-mvc-2-release-candidate-2-now-available.aspx', number of words = '549'
10) id = 00000si5lunjbi8, title = 'asp-net-mvc-2-released.aspx', number of words = '524'
11) id = 00000f8wakzalts, title = 'asp-net-mvc-2-strongly-typed-html-helpers.aspx', number of words = '705'
12) id = 00000en7g3nkvls, title = 'asp-net-mvc-2.aspx', number of words = '619'
13) id = 00001so4spobfnk, title = 'asp-net-mvc-3-layouts.aspx', number of words = '1817'
14) id = 00001snnr32adc0, title = 'asp-net-mvc-3-new-model-directive-support-in-razor.aspx', number of words = '792'
15) id = 00001vldns8skqo, title = 'asp-net-mvc-3-server-side-comments-with-razor.aspx', number of words = '653'
16) id = 00001r2yti5z4sg, title = 'automating-deployment-with-microsoft-web-deploy.aspx', number of words = '3784'
17) id = 00000m0if2iqmtc, title = 'built-in-charting-controls-vs-2010-and-net-4-series.aspx', number of words = '637'
18) id = 000010zzw2fq1a8, title = 'cleaner-html-markup-with-asp-net-4-web-forms-client-ids-vs-2010-a', number of words = '1725'
19) id = 00001ih7gktv6kg, title = 'code-first-development-with-entity-framework-4.aspx', number of words = '5365'
20) id = 00001r7ki4lh05c, title = 'debugging-tips-with-visual-studio-2010.aspx', number of words = '1692'
21) id = 0000151qr16itj4, title = 'download-and-share-visual-studio-color-schemes.aspx', number of words = '311'
22) id = 00001ibpvmetdkw, title = 'entity-framework-4-code-first-custom-database-schema-mapping.aspx', number of words = '1930'
23) id = 00001f6hlprohz4, title = 'introducing-asp-net-mvc-3-preview-1.aspx', number of words = '2833'
24) id = 00001so0gu8f3ls, title = 'introducing-razor.aspx', number of words = '3312'
25) id = 00000ug44uvcow0, title = 'javascript-intellisense-improvements-with-vs-2010.aspx', number of words = '930'
26) id = 00000jtavmijvgg, title = 'jquery-1-4-1-intellisense-with-visual-studio.aspx', number of words = '179'
27) id = 00001q9k1j435s0, title = 'jquery-templates-data-link-and-globalization-accepted-as-official', number of words = '828'
28) id = 00000b4mu45b4e8, title = 'microsoft-ajax-cdn-now-with-ssl-support.aspx', number of words = '309'
29) id = 00000ao1rdg9dds, title = 'my-presentations-in-europe-december-2009.aspx', number of words = '1684'
30) id = 000010q75bisw74, title = 'new-lt-gt-syntax-for-html-encoding-output-in-asp-net-4-and-asp-ne', number of words = '977'
31) id = 00000lubanp79c0, title = 'no-intellisense-with-vs-2010-rc-and-how-to-fix-it.aspx', number of words = '449'
32) id = 00000tqxxxv1h4w, title = 'optional-parameters-and-named-arguments-in-c-4-and-a-cool-scenari', number of words = '841'
33) id = 000010ydwjqjzeo, title = 'pinning-projects-and-solutions-with-visual-studio-2010.aspx', number of words = '667'
34) id = 00001wjhyhw29ds, title = 'search-engine-optimization-seo-toolkit.aspx', number of words = '711'
35) id = 000007lw738nbwg, title = 'searching-and-navigating-code-in-vs-2010-vs-2010-and-net-4-0-seri', number of words = '1305'
36) id = 00000e1cqi0ta0w, title = 'silverlight-4-demos-from-my-pdc-keynote-now-available.aspx', number of words = '613'
37) id = 00000743lq060hs, title = 'url-routing-with-asp-net-4-web-forms-vs-2010-and-net-4-0-series.a', number of words = '1045'
38) id = 000020npa0inls0, title = 'using-ef-code-first-with-an-existing-database.aspx', number of words = '2520'
39) id = 00001vo9oowkpvk, title = 'Using-Server-Side-Comments-with-ASP.NET-2.0-.aspx', number of words = '460'
40) id = 00000eafvti4sn4, title = 'visual-studio-2010-and-net-4-0-update.aspx', number of words = '391'
41) id = 000017d48tqvpc0, title = 'visual-studio-2010-productivity-power-tool-extensions.aspx', number of words = '682'
42) id = 000008fncz9zpc0, title = 'vs-2010-and-net-4-0-beta-2.aspx', number of words = '590'
43) id = 000007m1ubf8zcw, title = 'vs-2010-code-intellisense-improvements-vs-2010-and-net-4-0-series', number of words = '734'
44) id = 00000jxh5t9ebr4, title = 'vs-2010-net-4-release-candidate.aspx', number of words = '748'
45) id = 00001r3ulw3aygw, title = 'vs-2010-web-deployment.aspx', number of words = '1352'
46) id = 000008sxc7ta800, title = 'wpf-4-vs-2010-and-net-4-0-series.aspx', number of words = '3171'

Total words translated so far = 59801

If I was to charge for those translations and considering that each word translated costs $ 0.07 (market price), this fast math gives how much I’d have accrued so far:

59801 x 0.07 = $ 4,186.07

$ 4,186.07 / 46 = $ 91.00 average per doc translated

That’s a lot of money, but as you know already I do not charge a thing to translate ScottGu’s blog. That’s something I do to help others and to keep myself up to date.

Hope you liked the curiosity that made me write this post, the reasoning regarding the math and of course this simple java console application.

Notes
It’s important to mention that I started using GTT on Oct 17, 2009, that is, more than a year after I started translating Scott’s posts. According to my records, I have translated in fact 77 posts so far since April 2008. Those remaining 31 posts ( 77 - 46 = 31 ) didn’t figure in the math above. :(

GTT cold have folders just like Google Docs so that one could organize their translations by client or whatever.

I tried to get only 100% translate completed documents but GTT doesn’t give me this info. It’s true even if I mark the translation as complete. Although GTT shows 100% complete in its UI, when I read the value of entry.getPercentComplete() it gives me not 100% but what is described at Word count and translation completion. So I had to consider every document even those that I still need to finish translating.

Download
You can download the sample app with the necessary libraries at:

https://sites.google.com/site/leniel/blog/GoogleTranslatorToolkitClientApp.zip

This post is where I’ll maintain useful things that I usually do in my day to day while using the computer and that I find nice to know about. They can save you some mouse clicks and most important: save you time.

As time passes by, this page will grow. :)

Adobe Acrobat

How to select only the text of a column of a table in a PDF file?

shift+option and select the text with the mouse.

iTunes

How to go to Current Song playing in iTunes?

command+L

or

You can right click the time bar and select Go to Current Song context menu option.

How to Delete duplicate songs from iTunes?

option+delete and select Keep File

How to delete Album’s embedded artwork from all tracks at once?

Select all tracks from the album. Right click over anyone of them and select the Get Info menu option. Now check the checkbox on the left side of the Artwork field (see screenshot below). Click OK and voila, iTunes will delete the artwork embedded in each file so that you can add a new/bigger/better artwork. This way you avoid having duplicate artwork making iTunes show the only one you want.

How to create a playlist using a Finder folder?

Select the folder in Finder and drag it to iTunes icon in the dock. iTunes icon will blink. Wait a second or two. iTunes will be the active window (I consider iTunes is already open in the background before you perform this operation). Keep holding the mouse button. Now drag the folder to the Playlist section in iTunes left bar and release the mouse. As you see in the picture, I’m dragging and dropping a folder called My MP3 folder to iTunes PLAYLISTS section. When iTunes recognizes that you want to create a playlist from a folder it’ll highlight its left bar. This let’s you know that it’s time to release the mouse button and drop the folder there.

Mac OS

How to open a docked application at startup time/login?

Right click the app icon in the dock and select Options –> Open at Login.

How to search anything in your Mac from anywhere?

command+space This will bring Spotlight.

How to put Mac to sleep?

option+command+eject

How to go to any folder in Finder by its address/path (like Windows Explorer address bar)?

Right click Finder icon in the dock and select Go to Folder. Type or paste the folder path and click Go.

Added on 5/14/2011

How to copy the full path of a file or folder in Finder (really useful in software development)?

Use this fantastic Copy Full Path automator service workflow by Marcus Barnes. Read his post for more info.

Learn more about Automator in this post: Automate tasks in Mac OS with Automator

How to show hidden files in Finder?

In Terminal type:

defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles TRUE

killall Finder

Added on 5/24/2011

How to open a terminal command window starting from the current folder you have open in Finder?

Use cdto. Download it here.

cdto is a small app that opens a Terminal.app window cd'd to the front most finder window. It’s designed (including it's icon) to be placed in the Finder window's toolbar as shown below (mouse cursor is over it):

In one of my previous posts I embedded a Google spreadsheet in the post to show you a practical use of the CountIf function. Read it here: Practical use of CountIf with Google Docs Spreadsheet.

This time I’m going to use Microsoft Office Web Apps, Google’s competitor when it comes to online documents.

Excerpt taken from Microsoft Office Web Apps site:

Whether you’re in the office, at home, or on the road, Microsoft Office Web Apps help you get more things done virtually anywhere and anytime. These convenient online companions to Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and OneNote offer you an easy way to access, view, and edit documents directly from your Web browser.

I first read about embedding Microsoft Web Apps documents through Office Web Apps blog post Embedded Excel and PowerPoint Available Now on SkyDrive. Then I went to this post dedicated to Excel: Embedding Excel Web App in your own web page or blog. This last post shows some good samples of the power that embedded spreadsheets gives you.

My intent is to highlight a really important feature that Google is currently missing in its service: cell references (line numbers and column letters) in online published documents.

Take the same Excel spreadsheet from last post but now hosted in the cloud by Office Excel Web App:

As I used cell references throughout that last post to explain things, it would be really useful if Google spreadsheet had cell references so that users could spot the cell I was referring to instantly.

You can see above that Excel Web App does show cell references making the overall user web experience better.

For example, above I allow you to edit (AllowTyping=True) the contents of this spreadsheet on the fly. I also allow you to sort the table contents (AllowInteractivity=True). The modifications you make are valid only in this session. If you close or reload the page your changes won’t be saved. This is really nice. A lot of possibilities emerge from this.

Changes you make are reflected in the spreadsheet. Try for example adding one more TL class in cell D5. The cell color will change to yellow. You’ll see that cell I17 will have its value changed. It’s going to be -1. The formulas are being updated automagically. You can even see the formulas by double clicking a specific cell that has a formula.

One thing I noticed is that color formatting rules applied to cells are kept as you define in Excel Desktop App (Excel Web App counterpart). I tried to configure these rules in Excel Web App but I couldn’t find a menu option that would allow me to change them.

It’s important to mention that although great part of Excel Desktop App features aren’t available for configuration online, Excel Web App still honors Excel Desktop App configurations you make in your workbook. This is cool!

If you're curious, this is the code I'm using to embed the spreadsheet in this post:

<iframe src="http://r.office.microsoft.com/r/rlidExcelEmbed?su=-6822816632184108919&Fi=SDA1507C6BFF0A0889!186&AllowInteractivity=True&AllowTyping=True" frameborder="0" width="525" height="475" scrolling="no"></iframe>

If you want to learn more about the options available to embed an Excel Web App workbook in your site or blog, take a look at: Customize how your Excel workbook is embedded.

Last time I showed you how to Automate tasks in Mac OS with Automator. I used Automator to create a simple workflow that helps moving MP3 files to iTunes folder. Check that here.

Now I have another task to Automator.

This is the description of what I want to accomplish or the problem description if you prefer:

I often download some free legal MP3 files from the internet for evaluation, more specifically from Indie Rock Cafe (great great site by the way :D - check it out if you like Indie Rock music). I use IndieRockCafe mainly to discover bands that I’ve never heard about. It’s being a great experience so far. I’ve come to know some really good bands that, else I would never hear a song of theirs.

To download those MP3s I use DownThemAll that is a really nice piece of software that works beautifully with Firefox. I wrote about DownThemAll in Automate the download of a list of URLs/links. Although I didn’t write how to download only MP3 files with DownThemAll, this post gives you an idea about the purpose of DownThemAll. I’ll write about how to download only specific kind of files (MP3 in this case) using DownThemAll, but that’s another post. Probably I’ll detail this download process I’m mentioning here.

As I was telling you, I often do the same task, that is, I go to IndieRockCafe, click on DownThemAll icon in my Firefox toolbar and tada, the download of IndieRockCafe’s recently added MP3s just start. DownThemAll will download only page links that point to MP3 files saving these MP3 in a single folder called IndieRockCafe.

After the download I used to select all the files within that folder and drag and drop them inside an iTunes playlist called IndieRockCafe. iTunes is wise enough to tell me that some files are already part of the playlist and gives me the option to skip them adding only new files into that playlist. Doing so I always have a fresh playlist with the latest files of IndieRockCafe. It works, but it has a lot of manual steps.

Yesterday I thought: the above steps are a perfect fit to be automated with Automator.

Let’s create a workflow:

1 - Go to the Applications folder and select Automator.

2 - You’ll be presented with the following screen to choose a template for your workflow. Select Folder Action as the template.

Figure 1 - Types of templates available to create an Automator workflow (Folder Action)

3 - In Folder Action receives folders and files added to, select the folder you want. In my case it is the IndieRockCafe folder.

4 - Now select Music in Library list and then select Import Files into iTunes under the Actions list. Drag this action to the workflow area in the right.

5 - Select Existing playlist and the playlist you want the files to go to. As I wrote above I already have a Playlist called IndieRockCafe inside iTunes. So I selected it.

6 - Go to the File menu and select Save. Give the workflow an appropriate name, e.g. IndieRockCafe.

The following screenshot shows the Folder Action workflow configured:

Figure 2 - IndieRockCafe.workflow configured according to the six steps described above

7 - Now that the workflow is created, there’s a last step required to orchestrate things: go to the IndieRockCafe folder and right-click it. Select Services > Folder Actions Setup… Make sure you attach the IndieRockCafe workflow to this folder as shown in Figure 3:

Figure 3 - Attaching IndieRockCafe.workflow in Folder Actions Setup

Make sure you click the Enable Folder Actions checkbox too:

Figure 4 - Enabling Folder Actions and turning IndieRockCafe.workflow ON for the IndieRockCafe folder

… and we’re done! As you see this is totally life saver.

Every new MP3 that gets added in my IndieRockCafe folder through DownThemAll or that I manually place in this folder will be automatically added in IndieRockCafe playlist.

Task successfully automated!

I’m a music lover and I hope you can take advantage of it too.

Important
DownThemAll creates file segments ( *.dtapart files ) while downloading. DownThemAll splits the file into several parts and then downloads each segment of the file individually, which gives you better speed from servers, especially those that choose to limit your download speed. This behavior will cause the workflow created above to fail because iTunes won’t recognize those parted files when trying to import them. To solve this problem, do the following:

In Firefox Tools menu choose More dTa Tools and then select Preferences.

In tab Advanced and under Temporary files choose a directory to store those dtapart files. See screenshot below to have an idea:

Figure 5 - Using a temporary folder to store DownThemAll file parts or segments

Doing the above, DownThemAll will store those partial files in a separate folder. When it finishes downloading a file it will join its parts and then will move that file to the IndieRockCafe folder I specified in the workflow. Now iTunes will import the MP3.

Note
Folder action workflows are saved in
/Users/YourUserName/Library/Workflows/Applications/Folder Actions

Download
You can download this workflow at:
https://sites.google.com/site/leniel/blog/IndieRockCafe.workflow.zip