Categories
everyday life

What is this bird?

同一記事の日本語版
Update information      Edit

Today's bird.
Today’s bird.
   The ume(梅) are blooming beautifully in my garden now. Of course, mejiro are coming almost everyday. This morning, I found another kind bird. What is this? I cannot remember. I think this is its song because the song came from the same direction of the bird.
   If your browser doesn’t support audio tags, download and listen!!
 
Edit:
   One of my Japanese Blog visitors told me the name of the bird. It is a Shijūkara(四十雀). I’ve already seen it, I think. Now, my head is cleared. (^^)

   Thanks a lot, りりさん.

Categories
WordPress

To create a WOFF file from my own handwriting-#1.

同一記事の日本語版
Update information      Edit(Jul.17)

Widgets Title on English blog   One of the reasons I chose the Theme “Sugar and Spice” was its Widget title design. Originally, it also provides the same design for blog titles though I don’t use this feature for the title. The name of the font for the designs is Niconne. It is available on Google Fonts and we can use it by this instructions.

Widgets Title on Japanese blog   After changing my Theme to “Sugar and Spice”, I suddenly found the Niconne includes only Latin font. On my Japanese blog the Widget titles are like the right image. Oops. Its Japanese font is dry and boring. Besides, what fonts are used depends on the visitors’ PC environment. Only “w” and “p” are displayed by the Niconne. I don’t like this.

   So I was looking for a Japanese WOFF instead of Niconne, but I couldn’t. At this point, when we use WOFFs of Japanese fonts, we have some specific difficulties. In Japanese texts we use various kind of characters than in Latin texts. A Japanese font file at least contains about 7000 characters. So the size of Japanese font files are much bigger and to create a Japanese font file needs harder work than to create a Latin one. Therefore, to find a free Japanese WOFF is difficult. To use a free Japanese WOFF is also inconvenient because the display of the blog slows down due to its size. Time that gives technology improvements will resolve this issues. But then, I was in trouble.

   Hence I decided to create a WOFF file from my own handwriting. Because I need only 31 characters for my Japanese blog Widget titles(最近の投稿広告コメントタグアーカイブテゴリ日本公式キャラクwp). So, I don’t need a full WOFF of Japanese. Besides, no license problem they have if I make them by myself d(^o^).

   Now, I’ll begin.

**Step by step**

  1. I wrote 31 funny letters by my hand like this ☞ . Ha ha ha.
  2. Scan my handwriting and save it as a png file. If your scanner doesn’t have a saving feature as png files, you need an images converter to make a png file. Of course you can use Inkscape as the converter.
  3. Modify each character to each ping file (1000 pixels x 1000 pixels). Only “p” and “w” are 500 pixels x 1000 pixels.
  4. All this ping files are bitmap image files, so I need to change them to vector image files. Download inkscape-0.48.4-1-win32.7z for my Windows8 x86.
  5. Extract inkscape-0.48.4-1-win32.7z to an appropriate place.
  6. Run inkscape.exe.
    1. Open one of the png files. Click on the image to focus.
    2. To trace a bitmap, call up the Trace Bitmap dialog (Path → Trace Bitmap). Click [OK]. Close the Trace Bitmap dialog.
    3. Simplify path (Path → Simplify). Save it as an Inkscape SVG file.
    4. Rotate rule.Repeat 1-3 about all png files.
      [Note] If you need to create a vector image by manual, keep this in your mind. When you draw outline of the glyph, you do always see the glyph body at the right side and the empty area at the left side. See the right image.
  7. Download setup-x86.exe (32-bit installation) See the edit. You can use FontForge for Windows.
  8. Install cygwin by following FontForge install procedures for cygwin under MS Windows. Actually, I installed and ran FontForgeSetup_2012-07-31_Windows.exe before this. But, unfortunately it didn’t work well on my Windows8 x86.
  9. Run setup-x86.exe.
    • At “Choose A Download Source”, Select “Install from Internet”.
    • At “Install For”, select “All Users”. Avoid the folder that name includes spaces, for example “Program Files”.
    • At “Internet Connection”, select “Direct Connection”.
    • At “Choose A Download Site”, chose a server you prefer.
    • At “Select Packages”, change X11 preference from “Defalt” to “INstall”.
    • Now, install.
  10. Download fontforge_cygwin-20090914.tar.bz2.
  11. Move fontforge_cygwin-20090914.tar.bz2 to cygwinhome<username>.
  12. Install FontForge.
    Open a cygwin window (by clicking on the cygwin icon).

    1. $ bunzip2 fontforge_cygwin-*.tar.bz2
    2. $ tar xf fontforge_cygwin-*.tar
    3. $ cd fontforge
    4. $ ./doinstall
    5. $ cat >> ~/.bashrc
      PATH=${PATH}:/usr/local/bin ; export PATH
      MANPATH=${MANPATH:-}:/usr/local/man ; export MANPATH
      export LANG=ja
    6. $ exit
  13. Download mplus_bitmap_fonts-2.2.4.tar.gz.
  14. Move mplus_bitmap_fonts-2.2.4.tar.gz to cygwinhome<username>.
  15. Open a cygwin window (by clicking on the cygwin icon).
    1. $ tar zxvf mplus_bitmap_fonts-2.2.4.tar.gz
    2. $ cd mplus
    3. $ ./install_mplus_fonts
    4. $ cd ..
    5. $ cat >> ~/.bashrc
      xset fp+ /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/mplus
    6. $ exit

   Now, I can use FontForge.

**Ref. URLs
   FontForge install procedures for cygwin under MS Windows (The original page does not exist anymore. This is Internet Archive’s. – 2014.11.7)
   FontForgeを使う (Japanese)

Edit(Jul.17):

   Hey guys, I have good news for you. Now, we can use FontForge for Windows with no pains. At this time, its version is 20-06-2014.

Categories
translation

The translation “Seijō no Ran (青条の蘭)”-#6.

   I’ve posted the last part of chapter 2, “Seijō no Ran (青条の蘭)”. Hyōchū (標仲) still continues his long and important journey.

   I have added some new explanations to the notes.

Categories
WordPress

WordPress Theme “Sugar and Spice”.

同一記事の日本語版
Update information      Edit    Edit2(Mar.9)    Edit3(Mar.9)

   I changed the theme of my sites to “Sugar and Spice“. I made three child themes for my site except my netradi.

   There are a lot of things which need work, but I already get bored. So, the rest I do at a later date. (^^;)

Edit:
   This was too shoddy article. I make some addition for my reminder.

   The reason for changing my Themes is I want to use the new features of Themes, about which I wrote on “Upgrading to WordPress 3.6.“. There is also the maintenance and the security of my sites. Besides, I want to support HTML5. Oh yes, about AdSense (He-he).

   The theme “Sugar and Spice” has ‘custom-menu’, ‘responsive-layout’, ‘theme-options’ as its major features. Nowadays, my sites has more accesses via smartphones, so the ‘responsive-layout’ is what I want to use.

   Though I considered revising my old themes before deciding to select a new theme, it seemed to take enormous time because each site had each theme and the themes made by myself. And, a lack of my knowledge about WordPress Theme (^^;). Besides, I’ve learned about “Child Theme” of WordPress Theme since I began WordPress blogs. So, at my new Theme I don’t make any changes on the parent Theme, I use the child Theme features for this purpose.

   WordPress has a huge number of Themes as you know. It is very difficult to choose a Theme from among them. So, I decided the range was only “Featured Themes“. I think the Theme among them maybe has new features and decent supports. I was tired and bored about this, finally, I settled for “Sugar and Spice“.

   I made a style.css for the child Theme. It includes the next customizations.
body {
color: #000;
}
/* Typography */
h1, h2, h3, h4, h5, h6 {
color: #000;
}
/* Calendar Widget */
table th,
table td{
color: #000;
border: none;
text-align: left;
}

   The most struggling thing is the change of the original color of the Color scheme in the Theme Options. This original script is not in the style.css but in sugar-and-spice/inc/extras.php. Various new techniques appear, but an amateur like me is not following them (Sigh!).

   With this revision, I stopped the use of “One Row Calendar” and “My Link Order”. I’ve use them for a long time. I thanked the authors of both plugins m(_”_)m.

Edit2(Mar.9):

  • **About style.css customization
    • ****For displaying table’s background image
      /* Calendar Widget */
      table th,
      table td{
      color: #000;
      background: transparent;
         <--- I added this line. border: none;
      text-align: left;
      }
    • ****For darker comment form font color
      /* #Forms */
      input[type="text"],
      input[type="search"],
      input[type="password"],
      input[type="email"],
      textarea,
      select {
      color: #000;
      }

      input[type="text"]:focus,
      input[type="search"]:focus,
      input[type="password"]:focus,
      input[type="email"]:focus,
      textarea:focus {
      color: #000;
      }

      label span,
      legend span {
      color: #000;
      }

Edit3(Mar.9):
   I created my own WOFF file for “Sugar and Spice” child Theme.
     To create a WOFF file from my own handwriting-#1.
     To create a WOFF file from my own handwriting-#2.
     To create a WOFF file from my own handwriting-#3.

Categories
Windows

Updating to PHP5.5.9.

同一記事の日本語版

   At Feb-06 00:36:12UTC, they released PHP5.5.9.

   According to ChangeLog, this release fixes several bugs against PHP 5.5.8, and some of bugs are related with OPCache. So I updated my PHP immediately.

   I downloaded a Thread Safe version php-5.5.9-Win32-VC11-x86.zip for my server (Windows7HP + SP1 (x86)). It requires VC11. If you don’t have VC11 on your Windows, you must install vcredist_x__.exe before the PHP configuration.

   The php.ini-production has nothing changed.

   As the official PHP binary includes php5apache2_4.dll, I extract the zip archive and replace all PHP5.5.8 files with all PHP5.5.9 files except my php.ini. Then, I restart my Apache. That’s it.

   If you need how to configure PHP5.5, please see the post. It is for a mbstrings user, but the information gives some help for you.

Categories
translation

The translation “Seijō no Ran (青条の蘭)”-#5.

   Today, I’ve posted the second part of chapter 2, “Seijō no Ran (青条の蘭)”. The second part is very short.

   I have removed the kanjis from the translation “Seijō no Ran (青条の蘭)”, and about the explanations of them I wrote on my notes.

Categories
Windows

Updating to AWStats7.3.

同一記事の日本語版

   I updated AWStats from 7.2 to 7.3. See ChangeLog and current features. Wow!

  1. Downloaded awstats-7.3.zip for my server (Windows7HP + SP1 (x86)).
  2. Extracted the Zip archive.
  3. Replaced the old folders below by new ones. (Location:Drive_DC:awstatswwwroot)
         classes
         css
         icon
         js
  4. Replaced the old folders below by new ones. (Location:Drive_DC:awstatswwwrootcgi-bin)
         lang
         lib
         plugins
  5. Customize new awdownloadcsv.pl, awredir.pl and awstats.pl. (Location:Drive_DC:awstatswwwrootcgi-bin).
         #!/usr/bin/perl  —>  #!Drive_SV:/perl/bin/perl
    Replaced the old files by new ones.
  6. Use old awstats.MyDomain.com.conf as the new conf.

   If you install AWStats at the first time, see AWStats Installation, Configuration and Reporting.

   I use this opportunity to do the software blow up-to-date. Actually, about PERL I did on Dec.26. I forgot to write it. Now, I updated AWStats, which is a PERL scripts package. So, the information about it needs the PERL version. Right? (^_^;)

  • ActivePerl-5.16.3.1603 —> ActivePerl-5.18.1.1800
  • phpMyAdmin-4.1.0 —> phpMyAdmin-4.1.6
  • mariadb-5.5.34 —> mariadb-5.5.35
Categories
translation

The translation of “Hyōhaku (漂舶)”, Third Edition.

   I released the translation of “Hyōhaku (漂舶)”, Third Edition. This time, Delonix helped me so much again. We worked together from December 1 to January 27 about the third edition.

   From January 27 to today, I added a lot of explanations to the notes and removed all kanji characters from the Third Edition of Hyōhaku translation. I am very glad if the explanations on the notes will help you.

   I really appreciate Delonix’s help. We completed our mission. If the result makes you happy, which will make us happy. (^^)

   In addition, Delonix has a site on Flickr, and you can see beautiful flowers on it.

Categories
WordPress

WordPress3.8.1 Background Updates.

同一記事の日本語版

   This morning I had a update message about WordPress3.8.1 on my Dashboard. I checked the ChangeLog out and found this was a minor maintenance release. So, I tried to wait the feature Background Updates which were introduced in WordPress 3.7.

   I tested my multisite by Background Update Tester created by WordPress.org. Then I had the result below.
————————————————————————————————————————————-
Automatic background updates require a number of conditions to be met.

  PASS: Your WordPress install can communicate with WordPress.org securely.
  PASS: No version control systems were detected.
  PASS: Your installation of WordPress doesn’t require FTP credentials to perform updates.
  PASS: All of your WordPress files are writable.

This site is able to apply these updates automatically. Cool!
————————————————————————————————————————————-
   I was waiting for Automatic Background Updates to finish. Finally, I had the email below.
————————————————————————————————————————————-
Subject : Your site has updated to WordPress 3.8.1 (2014.1.24 20:13)
Message :
  Howdy! Your site at http://MySite has been updated automatically to WordPress 3.8.1.

  No further action is needed on your part. For more on version 3.8.1, see the About WordPress screen:
  https://MySite/wp-admin/about.php

  If you experience any issues or need support, the volunteers in the WordPress.org support forums may be able to help.
  http://wordpress.org/support/

  The WordPress Team
————————————————————————————————————————————-
   Mission complete! Clap Clap.

   However, this feature remind me that we always need to watch out our PC environments. If the features like this are used by malevolent things, we might be given a lot of malwares.

Categories
everyday life

Yowamushi Pedal(弱虫ペダル)

弱虫ペダル   Yowamushi Pedal as an anime started at 2013 October in Japan. The 14th is already released this week. Basically I don’t like sports animes. But this is fun and I feel uplifted when I become depressed.

   The name of starring role is Onoda Sakamichi(小野田坂道). His given name is Sakamichi(坂道). 坂 is “slope” and 道 is “road/way”. When you watch the anime, you will think his name is toooo suitable for him (^o^).

   If you have an interest in the anime, you can watch it on crunchyroll.