Assorted Useful Discoveries in No Particular Order

Here are a few helpful discoveries that took a lot of time to find but have saved me even more time in the end:

1. There is a PHP function that passes PHP arrays to javascript variable arrays: json_encode($array) It puts the PHP array elements in dble quotes, comma delimits them, surrounds the whole array with brackets, and puts sub-arrays into dot-delimited child elements. If only I had known a few weeks ago...

2. The current state of the art for printing web content wirelessly from an iTouch or iPhone is an app called "Print n Share" from EuroSmartz in New Zealand. I am testing it on an iTouch and it works extremely well.

3. The browser within Print n Share is a watered down Safari-Mini browser that Apple provides third party developers. As such, it lacks certain features, such as the ability to prompt users for their userid and password on secure sites. The workaround is: https://userid:password@www.website.com (I didn't know you could do that!! Actually, you can't do that with IE, for security reasons, unless you tweak your registry).

4. Apple does things in "obvious" ways that sometimes are so "obvious" they take me hours and hours to figure out. Some classic examples: How to eject a CD from a MAC. Where is the damn button?? Oh, there it is. There is an actual eject key on the keyboard !! Or here's another one: how to download an iTouch app? You generally don't do it on your computer!! That solves two hours of fruitless research. You use the "App Store" app right on your iTouch. Or, if you are installing an app that you bought yourself for another person's iTouch, how do you install it (there's the owner's password in the way)? You plug it into your USB port, go open iTunes, find the device, click on it, and then you are presented with an option to install/sync. And finally, my favorite: How to use the AC adaptor to charge it up? It wasn't obvious to me, but I guess it is intuitive to someone: you plug your USB cable directly into the AC adaptor, as if your wall socket was a USB port. Who knows? Isuppose there's data in there somewhere....