We were recently working on a project at work that required we submit some data by appending a dynamic image tag with JavaScript. The data was transmitted in a GET request through a query string defined in the src attribute. We wanted to return a 1×1 image that could be tiled as a background image to indicate the status of the request. With such a simple image requirement, I wanted to find a more elegant solution than streaming an existing image from a file. My experience dealing with images in Java is extremely limited, and a quick Google search didn’t turn up a concise example, so this is mostly just here for reference (mine and others’).

BufferedImage buffer = new BufferedImage(IMG_SIZE, IMG_SIZE, BufferedImage.TYPE_INT_RGB);
Graphics g = buffer.createGraphics();
g.setColor(new Color(Integer.parseInt(success ? SUCCESS_COLOR : FAILURE_COLOR, 16)));
g.fillRect(0,0,IMG_SIZE,IMG_SIZE);

resp.setContentType("image/png");

OutputStream os = resp.getOutputStream();
ImageIO.write(buffer, "png", os);
os.close();

IMG_SIZE in this case is 1 and assumes a square image. You’ll notice the parseInt method call specifies a radix of 16, so that allows SUCCESS_COLOR and FAILURE_COLOR to be defined as hex strings, which to a web developer are second nature.

After having recently audited a web application for proper character encoding support, I have one piece of advice for web developers in this area and that is: you should always support UTF-8 encoding across the board right from the start.

If you just take a few steps at the beginning of a project to enable Unicode encoding, you won’t ever have to worry about international character support, your application is “future-proofed.” When the time comes for your application to go global, it’s ready to go.

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For almost 2 years, I’ve been working on a product called Email Center Pro – anyone who reads this blog probably already knows that. It’s an email management solution for small to medium sized businesses that makes it super easy for a group of people to manage hundreds, even thousands of emails a day.

This is a big week, because we just launched version 2.0 of the software to our user base. The new version has a completely rewritten JavaScript client and makes use of an entirely new RESTful web services API. It’s got a lot of powerful new search features and introduces the dashboard which will soon allow users to customize their home page with analytics tools. 2.0 is a big step forward but it also lays the groundwork for the exciting things Email Center Pro will do in the very near future.

For anyone who has a web site, manages more than one email address, or has at least one other person involved with their business, I would whole-heartedly recommend this product. Sure, I may be biased, but I have seen first-hand the real gains in efficiency that it provides for an organization.

I was thinking the other day about the amount of form spam that most web sites get (and again just now as I moderated a ton of blog comments), and I was reminded of a proof of concept I saw a while back. It required the user to utilize drag and drop functionality to submit a form, thus verifying human interaction. Then I thought of the iPhone’s unlock function and how it would make a cool CAPTCHA.

I’ve written a handy JavaScript class for including these types of sliders into a web site- stick around after the break for more details and cool configuration options.

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