Using VLC to Convert WMA to MP3 for free

Jul 28 2010

I rarely need to convert files on my Mac, but when I do, I seem to think I have to find some type of weird audio program to help. My usual pattern to solve this problem was to go onto google.com and put in "convert wma to mp3" and hope for the best. But tonight was different. While playing around with the program VLC, I noticed a menu item that I have never used before: "Streaming/Exporting Wizard". This option allows for doing just as it suggests, but after playing around with some options, I found out that VLC can convert WMA files to MP3 files!

Here are the steps:

  1. Open the WMA file(s) in VLC
  2. Goto File -> Streaming/Export Wizard
  3. Choose "Transcode/Save to file" and click Next
  4. Choose "Existing playlist item" and highlight the items you want converted and click Next
  5. Because I was converting audio, I used the "Transcode audio" option
  6. Set the codec to "MP3" and choose your bitrate (I went with default of 192) and click Next
  7. Set your encapsulation to "RAW" and click Next
  8. Set your destination directory and click Next and it should start converting!

Afterwards I used Automator to rename my files from "Song Title.wma.raw" to "Song Title.mp3" by:

  1. Dragging the audio files onto Automator
  2. Adding "Rename Finder Items"
  3. Set the operation of the "Rename Finder Items" to "Replace Text"
  4. Find = .wma.raw
  5. Replace = .mp3
  6. Click Run!

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My favorite Trac-Hacks

Jul 22 2010

Here is a list of my favorite Trac-Hacks:

  • Advanced Ticket Workflow
    • Extends the list of operations for the ticket workflow
  • Batch Motify
    • Modify many tickets from a report
  • Flexible Assign To
    • Custom list of contacts built from a python file
  • Ini Admin
    • Graphical interface to the trac.ini file
  • Ticket Guidelines
    • Include a wiki page at the top of the new ticket page for passing information to all users
  • Trac Custom Field Admin
    • Interface for adding or removing custom fields to the ticket form
  • Trac Date Field
    • jQuery based date picker with lots of options in the Ini Admin
  • Trac Drag Drop
    • When using FireFox, dropping files onto the webpage displaying a ticket will process each file and have it attached to the ticket
  • Trac Keyword Suggest
    • Automatic drop down of the keywords with option to have limits placed
  • Trac Private Tickets
    • Extends the permissions module to limit users of viewing tickets
  • Trac Theme Engine
    • Allows for using various themes or making your own

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WebTrends UI logging to monitor user activity

Jul 22 2010

WebTrends Analytics 8.x is a Windows based log analyzer to produce graphs and reports of your website traffic. As your users are generating reports, it is helpful to find out what they are doing. Here is how you can accomplish this task:

  1. Goto 'System Managment -> Role Settings'
  2. Click on UI Server
  3. Enable 'Use local settings'
  4. Place a checkbox in 'Enable Tomcat logging'
  5. The log files are located in: 'c:\Program Files\WebTrends\common\jakarta-tomcat\logs\tomcat*.log

To modify the tomcat logging settings:

  • c:\Program Files\WebTrends\common\jakarta-tomcat\conf\server.xml

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Modifying the Trac email notification file to show a custom date format

Jul 20 2010

I really like the Trac project management software. Recently I have been using it very much and customizing it to fit my needs at work. In regards with the notification system, I found that the default format was not acceptable and a custom one was desired. I added the following code to the file "/usr/lib/python2.4/site-packages/trac/ticket/templates/ticket_notify_email.txt" to have a nice date in the template:

{% python

    from genshi.builder import tag
    from trac.util.datefmt import format_datetime
    import time

    def custom_time(value):
        return format_datetime(t=value, format='%H:%M:%S', tzinfo=PST)

%}

${custom_time(ticket.time)}

My entire file looks like the following:

{% python

    from genshi.builder import tag
    from trac.util.datefmt import format_datetime
    import time

    def custom_time(value):
	return format_datetime(t=value, format='%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S', tzinfo=PST)

%}
{% choose ticket.new %}\
{%   when True %}\
On ${custom_time(ticket.time)} PST, a ticket with the summary of '$ticket.summary' was created by '$ticket.reporter' and assigned to $ticket.owner .
{%   end %}\
{%   otherwise %}\
{%     if changes_body %}\
${_('Changes (by %(author)s):', author=change.author)}

$changes_body
{%     end %}\
{%     if changes_descr %}\
{%       if not changes_body and not change.comment and change.author %}\
${_('Description changed by %(author)s:', author=change.author)}
{%       end %}\
$changes_descr
--
{%     end %}\
{%     if change.comment %}\

${changes_body and _('Comment:') or _('Comment (by %(author)s):', author=change.author)}

$change.comment
{%     end %}\
{%   end %}\
{% end %}\

--
${_('Ticket URL: <%(link)s>', link=ticket.link)}
$project.name <${project.url or abs_href()}>
$project.descr

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Olive snacks for paeties

Jul 11 2010

Warmed kalamatta olives with fennel seeds are very good with sliced bread topped with garlic and parsley butter.

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