Month: December 2011

Categories
Arduino Hardware Programming Tutorial

Accessing Virtual Hosts with Arduino Ethernet Shield

If you've worked with the Arduino Ethernet Shield, you've probably noticed a limitation: while you can connect to an IP address, you can only reach the default virtual host on that server. This becomes a problem when working with shared hosting or VPS servers that host multiple websites on a single IP address.

The Problem

Modern web servers commonly use virtual hosting to serve multiple websites from a single IP address. When you make a basic HTTP request to an IP, the server returns the default site—not necessarily the one you want. On commercial shared hosting, you typically can't make your site the default host.

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Categories
Customization Programming Ruby Tutorial

IRB Console with History and Logging

I spend most of my time working with IRB (Interactive Ruby) or Rails console. Over time, I've settled on a configuration that provides essential features like persistent command history, autocompletion, and Rails-specific logging. These improvements make the Ruby REPL much more productive for daily development work.

What is IRB?

IRB (Interactive Ruby) is Ruby's built-in REPL (Read-Eval-Print Loop) – an interactive shell for experimenting with Ruby code. It's invaluable for testing code snippets, debugging, and exploring APIs. When working with Rails, the Rails console is essentially IRB with your application's environment loaded.

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