Why Set Up a Q&A Site This post addresses a fair question: with Stack Overflow, Reddit, and countless other Q&A platforms already established, why create a dedicated Q&A space? There are three practical reasons. Short-form technical tips Some knowledge doesn’t warrant a full blog post. A 2000-word article dilutes what should be a focused tip….
Disabling All Swaps on Linux To disable all active swap spaces on Linux, run: swapoff -a The -a flag targets all currently enabled swap devices and files. This forces the kernel and applications to rely entirely on physical RAM. When You’d Do This Disabling swap is useful for: Performance testing: Eliminating swap I/O variance to…
Using hex() for basic conversion The hex() function converts an integer to a hexadecimal string with a 0x prefix: i = 255 print(hex(i)) # Output: 0xff This works for negative numbers too: print(hex(-42)) # Output: -0x2a String formatting for control For more control over the output, use f-strings or the format() method with format specifiers:…
Configure CMake with Debug Build Type To enable debugging, configure your CMake build with CMAKE_BUILD_TYPE set to Debug. This tells CMake to invoke the compiler with the -g flag, generating debug symbols that tools like gdb and lldb need. From your project’s root directory: cmake -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Debug -B build cd build make The -B build flag…
strcmp and strncmp Implementation in glibc The strcmp() and strncmp() functions are fundamental string comparison utilities in the C standard library. Understanding their implementations reveals important aspects of character comparison, null-termination handling, and performance optimization. strcmp Implementation The glibc implementation of strcmp() performs lexicographic comparison of two null-terminated strings, returning: A negative value if the…
x86-64 calling convention in GCC The x86-64 architecture on Linux follows the System V AMD64 ABI calling convention. Understanding this is essential when writing assembly, optimizing code, debugging, or interfacing with C libraries. Register usage for arguments Integer and pointer arguments use these registers in order: RDI — first argument RSI — second argument RDX…
Getting File Size in C There are several ways to determine a file’s size in C, each with different trade-offs. Choose based on whether you have a file descriptor, stream, or just the filename. Using stat() with a Filename If you know the filename, stat() is the most straightforward approach: #include <sys/stat.h> #include <stdio.h> int…
strtol, strtoll, and Related Functions Converting strings to long integers is fundamental in C. The standard library provides strtol(), strtoul(), strtoll(), and strtoull() for this purpose. These functions handle the conversion robustly and let you detect parsing errors through their return value and endptr argument. Function Signatures All four functions share a similar interface: long…
Why scanf Is Dangerous The claim that scanf is dangerous gets thrown around frequently, but the reasons aren’t always clear. Most people point to %s causing buffer overflows and recommend fgets as the solution. That’s part of it, but not the core problem. The real issues with scanf break down into two categories: string handling…
ANSI C Grammar and Yacc Implementation ANSI C is the standardized version of C defined in 1989, specifying the language’s syntax and semantics formally through a grammar. Understanding this grammar is essential for building tools that parse, analyze, or transform C code. Grammar Basics The ANSI C grammar is defined using Backus-Naur Form (BNF), a…
Disable WordPress Built-in Canonical URL Link Tag in HTML Head WordPress has included automatic canonical URL generation since version 2.9. While this is usually beneficial for SEO, certain scenarios require disabling it — for example, when forum plugins generate incorrect canonical URLs that point all threads to a single page. The Problem Canonical URLs tell…
Choosing a Web Hosting Provider: Shared Hosting vs. Modern Alternatives If you’re evaluating hosting providers in 2026, the landscape has shifted considerably from the shared hosting dominance of the early 2020s. Before committing to a provider, understand what you’re actually getting and what limitations matter. Shared Hosting Limitations to Watch Traditional shared hosting providers like…
Adding Custom Buttons to the WordPress HTML Editor WordPress’s Text/HTML editor can be extended with custom buttons for frequently used code snippets or shortcodes. This is useful for inserting boilerplate markup, custom shortcodes, or formatting helpers without manually typing them each time. Basic Implementation Add this code to your theme’s functions.php or a custom plugin:…
Downloading Videos from Chrome When you need to download a video playing in your browser, Chrome offers several solid options depending on your workflow and the video source. Browser Extensions Video Download Helper is a reliable choice for Chrome that works across most video hosting platforms. Install it from the Chrome Web Store and use…
Free CDN Options for Your Website If you’re running a site with limited resources, a free CDN can significantly improve performance and reduce bandwidth costs. Here are the current options worth considering. Cloudflare https://www.cloudflare.com Cloudflare remains the most popular free CDN choice for good reason. Their free tier includes: Global edge network with automatic content…
Author markup for Google search results Google no longer displays author information in search results the way it did when Google+ existed. However, you can still control how your content appears in search results by using schema markup—specifically the author property in JSON-LD structured data. Current best practice: schema.org markup The modern approach uses JSON-LD…
Handling Paste Mode in Vim Pasting external code into Vim often triggers unwanted autoindent behavior, adding extra indentation and breaking formatting. Vim’s paste mode disables all automatic indentation while inserting text, letting you paste code exactly as-is. Quick paste mode toggle Enable paste mode before pasting: :set paste Then paste your code. When done, disable…
Vim Search: Case Sensitivity Control By default, Vim performs case-sensitive searches. When you need case-insensitive matching, you have several approaches depending on your use case. Global Case-Insensitive Search To enable case-insensitive search globally: :set ignorecase You can also use the shorthand: :set ic To toggle it back: :set noignorecase Note: The ignorecase setting affects both…
Automatically Adding New SSH Hosts to Known Hosts When managing many systems, manually confirming host keys for each new connection gets tedious fast. You can configure SSH to automatically add unknown hosts to ~/.ssh/known_hosts without prompting. The Risk Trade-off Before implementing this, understand what you’re doing: disabling strict host key checking opens you to man-in-the-middle…
Setting Up Firefox Sync Firefox Sync lets you keep bookmarks, passwords, history, open tabs, and settings synchronized across all your devices. It’s built on Mozilla’s infrastructure and doesn’t require a separate account beyond your Firefox account. Prerequisites Firefox 22 or later (current versions are 2024+) A Mozilla Firefox Account Devices running Windows, macOS, Linux, iOS,…