The goal here is to watermark all images in a certain directory, except for thumbnails or other selection. You can either do this on each file prior to placing on your webserver - which is probably wise for CPU load issues - but let’s just say you want to do this for all files served in a single directory dynamically, a gallery for example.

The first step is to create a .png file with transparency which holds your watermark image. For this exercise, I’ve created this image:

(I’ve added the border to stand the image out from the background of the page).

Here is the original image we are going to test with:

After we have our watermark and sample image, we need to write a php file to use PHP’s GD function to apply this image to our original image. The particular function we use is imagecopy(). Here is the code I am using, I name it w.php:

<?php

?>

This file is placed in the images directory.

Also in the images, create an .htaccess file with the following code:

RewriteEngine on
RewriteRule ^([^thumb].*\.[jJ].*)$ /com/gallery/w.php?i=$1

This tells the web server that instead of serving jpg files out of this directory, that we should instead process the filename with w.php and then serve to the browser. It also adds in a clause that if it starts with thumb_, that it will not run on this file. This is so it does not run on thumbnails.

Here is the resulting image, with watermark! This is served right out of an image directory with no watermark on the original picture:

If you need to compile ffmpeg for PHP (for example, to allow PHP to process video similar to how YouTube does) - then follow this Howto from Nazly. For a CentOS machine with custom PHP, it works great.

Ffmpeg PHP Extension Compile Instructions

Found an encyclopedic list of “stupid” .htaccess tricks. Includes many useful ones such as being able to stop hotlinking of images and replacing with your own, increasing speed and security and general good-to-know htaccess information.

Joomla! 1.0.12 appears to have a pathway bug. If you use a component other than com_frontpage for the “Home page” of Joomla - meaning the first link in mainmenu and the page that appears when you load the root of the Joomla! site - then when you click on an article you get a “Double pathway”, for example the pathway will state “Home > Home > Title of article”. The Home, or whatever you named this link, part will be duplicated. It isn’t a big problem but it does look unprofessional on your site!

I looked for ages for a fix to this problem, and eventually found it but the site I can not find the site I originally downloaded this fix from. It is courtesy of Reinhard Hiebl - www.hieblmedia.de (whos site is in German, one reason why I’m saving it here). I thought I would throw it online here for your download. The fix is in two parts of code in /includes/pathway.php.

At line 54 in includes/pathway.php:

// Fix for dublicate home if home have childs //
// by Reinhard Hiebl -- www.hieblmedia.de //////
// get first published item
$query = "SELECT id"
. "\n FROM #__menu"
. "\n WHERE published = 1"
. "\n AND parent = 0"
. "\n AND menutype = 'mainmenu'"
. "\n AND access <= " . (int) $my->gid
. "\n ORDER BY ordering"
. "\n LIMIT 1"
;
$database->setQuery( $query );
$first_mitem = $database->loadResult( 'id' );
////////////////////////////////////////////////

And at line 284 in includes/pathway.php immediately after “$item =& $mitems[$mid];”:

// Fix for dublicate home if home have childs //
// by Reinhard Hiebl -- www.hieblmedia.de //////
if ( $item->id == $first_mitem && !$item->parent ) {
break;
}
////////////////////////////////////////////////

I also have the file zipped up so you can just replace includes/pathway.php with this file. Note that this is for version 1.0.12 only, so it might not work with previous or newer versions.

pathway.zip

This one is neat - you can control those APC PDU Power Poles over the network via SNMP. This works for the APC Switched Rack Unit PDU, but it may work for others.

I use this on a PDU with Network Management Card AOS version v2.6.4 and Rack PDU APP v2.6.5, so of course this is not guaranteed for any other versions.

First, set up the PDU on the network. Then, you need to configure the SNMP write string. You do this by navigating the menu (default username password is apc/apc):
Control Console->Network->SNMP

Change one of the strings to Write+ and preferable change it from public/private to your own string. You can also limit access from certain hosts for extra security. I always keep the APC PDUs on a private network since the APC telnet/web interface is so insecure.

Once you have that set up, your PDU is read to accept SNMP commands from your script of choice. I use PHP, so my examples use PHP code.

The APC MIB which controls the status of the power ports is: .1.3.6.1.4.1.318.1.1.12.3.3.1.1.4., where is the power port you wish to control.

I created a function that controls the port, it is as follows:

In config.php:
// translates APC IDs into their IP addresses
$apcids = array(
"APC01" => "10.0.1.2",
"APC02" => "10.0.1.6",
"APC03" => "10.0.1.10",
"APC04" => "10.0.1.14",
"APC05" => "10.0.1.18",
"APC06" => "10.0.1.22",
);

// This is your SNMP Write+ String
$apcsnmp = "rwstring";

In functions.php:
//
// string function displayPowerStatus
// $apcid = ID of the APC unit as defined in config.php
// $apcport = Port of the outlet on the APC Switch
// returns STRING On, Off, Rebooting, or Error
function displayPowerStatus($apcid, $apcport) {
include('config.php');
$ip = $apcids[$apcid];
$mib = $apcportcontrolmib.$apcport;
$a = trim(snmpget($ip, $apcsnmp, $mib, 20000), "INTEGER: ");
switch ($a) {
case 1:
return "On";
case 2:
return "Off";
case 3:
return "Rebooting";
default:
return "Error";
}
}

// bool function manageAPCPort
// $apcid = ID of the APC unit as defined in config.php
// $apcport = Port of the outlet on the APC Switch
// $apcpass = APC Pass (SNMP Community String)
// $action {
// immediateOn (1),
// immediateOff (2),
// immediateReboot (3),
// delayedOn (4),
// delayedOff (5),
// delayedReboot (6),
// cancelPendingCommand (7)
// }
// returns TRUE or FALSE
function manageAPCPort($apcid, $apcport, $apcpass, $action) {
include('config.php');
$ip = $apcids[$apcid];
$mib = $apcportcontrolmib.$apcport;
$VERIFY = snmpset($ip, $apcpass, $mib, i, $action);
return $VERIFY;
}

Note that this code required the php snmpset function, which is not compiled into php by default. If you receive some error about snmpset or snmpget function not found, this is why.