Summary

The Vox MP3 Linker is a Greasemonkey script provides a direct link to the mp3 on the URL of a given Vox-hosted mp3 song. This script is intended to let users play the mp3 in an alternative media-player plugin for their browser (as opposed to the flash-based plugin provided by Vox). This script should not be used to illegally download mp3 files.

Please note this script assumes the vox audio file that was uploaded was a .mp3 file. If it was a different audio format, this script may not provide a proper link to the file, or the file may not play back correctly in your media player.

Screenshots

Example of mp3 page with new link to the mp3 file

Download

The Greasemonkey script can be found for download here. Make sure Greasemonkey is installed prior to trying to install this user script.

Feedback

If you have questions, comments, or suggestions on how to improve this script, please leave a comment here or send me an email at ross…@gmail.com .

Summary

The Vox Homepage Reorder script is a Greasemonkey script designed to reorder the Vox homepage (once you are logged in) to include the most popular/useful modules “above the fold”, and place the modules that don’t get updated frequently and/or are less useful down near the bottom of the page. Reorganizing the items means people will not have to scroll down as often, and will be able to see things like the QotD and VoxHunt prompts without having to scroll down at all.

Screenshots

Example of normal Vox homepage, prior to introduction of script.

Example of Vox homepage, after using the script.

Download

The Greasemonkey script can be found for download here. Make sure Greasemonkey is installed prior to trying to install this user script.

Feedback

If you have questions, comments, or suggestions on how to improve this script, please leave a comment here or send me an email at ross…@gmail.com .

Check out my archive of hacks here, for a list of posts in this category, or look at individual items in my “Best Of” sections, below.

Ross’ “Best Of” Hacks (Developed by Ross)

1. Avoid starting up memory-hogging applications accidentally

Ross’ “Best Of” Hacks (Discovered by Ross)

1. Pocket-sized Thumb Calendar (for Moleskins or other use) by Adam Sporka
2. A quick-and-easy way to back up blog posts

Summary

Vox Recent Activity Collapser is a Greasemonkey script designed to streamline the Vox Recent Activity page. Instead of seeing the full set of recent comments/activity for a given post, the script provides an inline link for each post that will expand/collapse the data related to the post. By only showing the post titles, a user can quickly and easily scan the set of posts on the page to determine the ones they want to read, and then expand only those posts to review the additional information.

Screenshots

Example of Normal Vox Recent Activity page, prior to introduction of script.

Example of Vox Recent Activity page, with script.

Example of expanded post thread, using script.

Download

The Greasemonkey script can be found for download here. Make sure Greasemonkey is installed prior to trying to install this user script.

Feedback

If you have questions, comments, or suggestions on how to improve this script, please leave a comment here or send me an email at ross…@gmail.com .

• Greasemonkey Scripts
• Perl Scripts
• PHP Scripts
• Hardware Projects

Greasemonkey Scripts

Greasemonkey is a Mozilla Firefox extension that allows users to install scripts that make on-the-fly changes to most HTML-based web pages. Although I’m new to the language, I’m finding it fun to write scripts for websites I use regularly, to enhance the functionality of their pages.

• Vox Recent Activity Collapser - A script for blogging site Vox.com that allows users to streamline the “Recent Activity” summary page.
• Vox Homepage Reorder Script - A script for blogging site Vox.com that reorders the modules on the homepage to provide the most popular modules “above the fold”.

Perl Scripts

Perl is a kind of programming language, known for its strengths in text processing. I learned it back when I thought I would be creating a dynamic website with .cgi scripts. I never ended up using a lot of .cgi, but I got some good use out of perl for other things.

• Textify - A script based on the “Textify” program by XXX. Allows the user to reformat text files found in the directory where the script is being run. The script turns text files with line breaks at the end of each line or (1 or 2) line breaks at the end of each paragraph into a simple .html file with 2 line breaks after each paragraph. This .html file is well-suited for loading onto a portable device book-reader, such as the Rocket eBook reader or a PDA.

• Photo Gallery Creator [No longer supported] - A set of scripts that takes a directory of image files and their thumbnails and creates a photo gallery page out of them. Allows the user to enter a page title, date, additional page comments, and then individual captions for each picture. Generates an index.html page for the thumbnails, as well as individual .html pages for each photo with links to the full-size images.

• Random Picture Generator (Perl side) - Generates the proper PHP code for the selection of a random picture from an array of pictures created from the image files in a directory. Code is executed on every page load, displaying a new randomly, selected picture on each page load.

PHP Scripts

• Random Picture Generator (PHP side) - In combination with the perl side of the code, this is the resulting output to display a new, randomly selected picture on each page load.

Hardware Projects

No current hardware projects