Easyrec – Integrate Recommender Engine in your website – open source

Easyrec is an open source recommender engine which can be trained and customized to provide personalized recommendations using REStful Web Service.

easyrec-engine
Easyrec exposes its functionality through REST API which provides several interaction types:

Actions

  1. view
  2. buy
  3. sendaction

Recommedations

  1. other users also viewed
  2. other users also bought
  3. items rated good by other users
  4. recommendations for user
  5. related items
  6. action history for user

Community Rankings

  1. most viewed items
  2. most bought items
  3. most rated items
  4. best rated items
  5. worst rated items

The list of recommendations is returned in XML and JSON notation to be further processed by your web application.

Easyrec API can be accessed from its main website http://easyrec.org/ or could be installed alongside with the web application on your own server. Easyrec require at least Java 1.5 and MySQL server for its functionality.

Download easyrect from: http://easyrec.org/recommendation-engine

Connecting blog with IFTTT !

I’ve managed to connect this blog with IFTTT! However due to certain security restriction that I’ve enforced on this blog to curb spammers and unauthorized access (aka crackers), I’ve decided against connecting my blog directly through XMLRPC endpoint. So I’ve use RSS/ATOM feeds instead.

IFTTT is a wonderful service which allows you to connect various services to perform automated task on another web service. Very convenient for busy people!

ifttt

*IFTTT stands for “If this, then that” which is a programming metaphor in basic automatic decision making or branching.

Securing Ajax and Web Services

It is undeniable that Web services and AJAX-ified interfaces are the trend now. Application that utilizes internet to retrieve data (such as mobile application or other thin client) uses web services alongside with its data format. AJAX-ified interface and website gives a modern and edgy look can make websites more attractive and can create great impression to the users.

However the issue of the web application security would still remain the same, if not more challenging, since there are so many ways to exploit the vulnerability of websites that utilizes Web Services and AJAX transfers on the background.

Therefore, it is imperative to use the right technique in order to evaluate the security of these services before deploying them out in the open.

For that matter, now I’m currently reading Ajax Security (Hoffman,B. & Sullivan, B.) and Securing Ajax applications (Wells, C.) which in my opinion is a pretty good start for somebody like me to understand common methods for securing web services and websites which uses AJAX heavily.

Hopefully the situation would improved as there are a lot of campaigns around to raise the state of awareness of web application security.

Example Code: How to Send SMS from PHP (via Clickatell)

Hi there, due to popular demand (requests sent to my personal email – mypapit -at- gmail.com).

I decided to share my old post regarding my simple SendSMS php class which can help php developers to send SMS from their web application

[php]
require(‘SendSMS.php’);

$sendsms = new SendSMS(“username”,”password”,”HTTP POST API key”);

/* if the login return 0, means that login failed, you cant send sms after this */
if ( ($sendsms->login()) == 0 ) {
die( “failed”);
}

/*other wise, you can send sms using the simple send() call*/
$sendsms->send(“0132073011″,”can you receive this message? Hello there….”);

[/php]

Requirements
To use SendSMS class, you need:

That’s it.. contact me if you’ve more questions

Download SendSMS PHP class (version 0.5)
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How to Use Launchpad account as OpenID URL

OpenID is a standard that allows you to log into many websites or services using a single identity as oppose to memorize several different username and password on different websites.

Websites that provide OpenID identity are called OpenID providers. There are many OpenID providers, and one of it is Launchpad. Launchpad users can use their Launchpad account URL as OpenID URL in order to access OpenID-supported websites or services.

For example :
https://launchpad.net/~mypapit

The general form of Launchpad OpenID URL is: https://launchpad.net/~your_user_name.

Where I can use OpenID for authentication?

You can use your Launchpad URL for authentication at websites or services that feature OpenID logo. Examples of such services is Blogger comment form, Sourceforge and Facebook.

OpenID Logo

How to use Launchpad account as OpenID provider?
On website that supports OpenID, enter your Launchpad account url : https://launchpad.net/~your_user_name, replace your_user_name to your own username. Then, you will be directed to your launchpad account, enter your password and you will be automatically authenticated for the current service.

Screenshot example :

Using Launchpad Account as OpenID

The favorable side-effect of using your Launchpad account as OpenID is that you can indirectly promote (and probably brag) about your contribution (aka karma) towards Ubuntu.