megacolorboy

Abdush Shakoor's Weblog

Writings, experiments & ideas.

📅 2026

Things I Learned as a Senior Engineer
Enable password asterisks for sudo on Fedora
Clean removal of Linux from a Windows dual-boot machine
Rewriting my SSG again — The right way
How JetBrains IDEs Improved My Productivity Across .NET, Laravel, and Python
Why Hangfire recurring jobs should always have stable IDs?
Running Laravel queues with Supervisor on Ubuntu
DateTimeKind.Unspecified can quietly break your dates
Resize images from a file list using ImageMagick

📅 2025

Can AI really replace software engineers?
Block browser features with permissions policy in Nginx
Ubuntu Bootloader Recovery
Eliminate Laravel .env leakage between multiple sites on Apache (Windows)
Removing Commits from a Branch Using Git Interactive Rebase
Recovering MySQL After an Accidental Binlog Deletion
9 Software Books I'm Reading This Year to Become a Better Engineer
How to Revert a Git Commit on the Server?
How to Delete Multiple Git Branches from the Command Line?
Laravel Scopes vs. Builder Queries: Which Should You Use?
A Starter Guide to Software Version Control
Mastering PHPStorm: Essential Shortcuts and Tips for Faster Coding
Installing and Configuring Elasticsearch and Kibana on Ubuntu
How to Send Test Emails via PowerShell?
How to Find Users with Duplicate Email Addresses in SQL?
How to Filter Records Based on a String Column Containing Numbers with Commas and Dots?
How to Cherry-Pick Commits from One Git Branch to Another?
How to Check if SMTP is Reachable from My Machine Using Telnet?
How to Change the Modification Date of a Folder Using PowerShell?
Fixing a CoreCLR Load Error in IIS with Self-Contained Deployment
Centralizing Storage for Multiple Websites by Mounting a Shared Windows Network Drive on CentOS Using CIFS
Adding Timezones to DateTime Strings in C#
A Faster Way to Apply Linux Permissions for Large Laravel Projects Using xargs and find

📅 2024

Using records for DTOs
Using Property Pattern Matching in C#
Remove Control Flags
Error loading V8 startup snapshot file in Visual Studio Code
Cicada 3301
Generating custom snippets using Visual Studio Code
Using the null-coaleascing operator in C#
Check if a string is a UNIQUEIDENTIFIER in SQL Server
Filtering results by weekdays in SQL Server
Don't forget what sparked your passion

📅 2023

Configure XDebug in Visual Studio Code
Generate CSR with multiple subdomains using OpenSSL
Clean Controllers in Laravel: Best practices for handling form submissions
Thoughts about ChatGPT and the impact on software developers
List tables that don't have primary keys in a MySQL database
5th February 2023 — Blogmarks
Playing around with ImageMagick
Install Cisco Anyconnect Client on Fedora Linux
Setup a virtual environment for Python development
Install TeamViewer on Fedora Linux 36/37
Connect to a Remote Windows machine from a Linux machine

📅 2022

Exploring Europe
Learning C# 10 and .NET Core 6
Trying out the Redragon K552 Kumara RGB Mechanical Keyboard
View list of services in Linux
Temporarily disable IPV6 protocol on Ubuntu
Containerize your Laravel application for Development
Install Docker on Fedora 35/36
Resolve permission error while SSH-ing to AWS EC2 instance from a Linux machine
Install PFX certificate on a Linux server
Install Microsoft SQL Server Driver for PHP on Amazon Linux 2
My thoughts on using Visual Studio Code
Logging client IP addresses on Apache server
Using IIFE in JavaScript
9th August 2022 — Blogmarks
7th August 2022 — Blogmarks
25th July 2022 — Blogmarks
Built a new generative art pattern generator
Download a webpage along with it's assets using wget
16th July 2022 — Blogmarks
A new makeover for 2022
Extract private key and certificate from .pfx file
Install NGINX and PHP on Windows
I switched to Fedora 35
Count the number of matches of a pattern in VIM
Count the number of word occurences in a text file using grep
Install MariaDB 10.3 on Void Linux

📅 2021

Is SELinux complicated?
On learning new technologies
How to create an ISO image from CDs/DVDs?
Truncate a file using redirection in Linux
How to identify which Linux distribution is running in your system?
Display list of files with their extension and file sizes
Dark/Light mode with CSS and JavaScript
View your wget progress even after closing your SSH session
How to update values of a column from one table to another?
How to use GitHub Personal Access Token to authenticate your git commits?
How to fetch a JSON object from an array of JSON objects by property value?
How to switch between integrated terminal and editor in Visual Studio Code?
Redirect from HTTP to HTTPS in Apache VirtualHosts
Quick Search for file in your workspace in Visual Studio Code
How to install Composer manually?
Prevent VIM from creating swapfiles
How to setup rsync with passwordless SSH on UNIX/Linux?
Render a simple RGB colored image in C++
One year of writing TIL articles
Understanding SPF, DKIM and DMARC protocols
How to resolve the "fatal: refusing to merge unrelated histories" Git error?
Exclude directories while searching for a pattern in files
Zip all files that are modified on a specific date
Find directories older than a specific date and sorted by size
Get a list of directories with their sizes in the current directory
Perform Git operations using path directory
How to update your Git remote origin URL?
How to change the character encoding of a file via Terminal?
Find directories created within a date range
How to perform mysqldump without a password prompt?
Fetch selected files from your remote repository
How to recover from an errorneous forced git commit?
Use MySQL 8.0 with Native Password Authentication
Clearing cache on a Shared Hosting Server
Convert numbers from English to Arabic in PHP
Convert string to variable in PHP
How to resolve the "Failed to clear cache. Make sure you have the appropriate permissions." error
How to exclude certain slugs in Laravel
Convert to date from timestamp using Carbon
Convert string to date using MySQL
Show Git branch in your Bash prompt (with colors)
How to resolve the "file_get_contents(): SSL operation failed" error
Check if trait is being used in your class
Create migrations and seeds from an existing database
How to resolve the issue of not receiving emails on the same domain?
Convert string from snake case to camel case
Make your own generative pixel art in less than 100 lines of code
A little bit about myself
Built a new static site generator using Python 3.7

📅 2020

Find and remove duplicate lines using Regular Expressions
Create aliased class constants in Laravel
Resolve the "General error: 1835 Malformed communication packet" error
Use node-sass to minify your CSS
Import and Export MySQL database via Terminal
Concatenate multiple rows into one field
Rename a Git Branch
Find your Public IP address using the Terminal
Fix screen tearing in XFCE desktop environment
How to move a running process to the background?
Clear a file directory using Filesystem in Laravel
Get pagination data by page number
Resolve cURL error 60: SSL certificate problem on localhost
How to resolve the "No application encryption key has been specified" error
How to filter requests with errors on Chrome's DevTools
Accessing WAMP Server from other computers on LAN
Enable HTTPS/SSL on WAMP Server
Prevent loading a webpage from Back-Forward cache
Refresh browser window without query parameters
Input sanitization with PHP
Increase memory limit in PHP
Increase execution time in PHP
Extract unique characters from a string
Do we really need to use pointers?
Hello, Go!
How to delete files inside a zip file?
Find the difference between two arrays
How to duplicate tables in MySQL?
Create a unique multidimensional array using a key index
Replace all occurrences found on a string using Regular Expressions
Find the number of uppercase and lowercase letters in a string
Extract YouTube Channel ID from URL
Using zipcloak to encrypt files within an archive
How to cache your queries on your Laravel application?
Looping infinitely around an array
Enable HTTP Strict Transport Security (HSTS)
Forcing HTTP to HTTPS redirect after enabling SSL
Configuring audio drivers in Arch Linux
Enable copy-paste clipboard in URxvt Terminal Emulator
Troubleshoot time-related SSL errors on secure websites
Transfer files remotely using SCP
How to manually configure your WiFi on Arch Linux?
Add search functionality to your static site
Read and Write JSON to a file in Python
Build a menu tree using recursion
Using default function parameters in Internet Explorer
How to identify the current target of an event?
Allow inline elements in CKEditor
Check if the current route exists before fetching it's parameters
Queues & Stacks
Launched a microblog site
Extract a specific folder from a zipped archive
Select all elements except the current element
Remove patterns from multiple files
Rename extensions of multiple files
Checkout branch
View the filesize in human-readable format
Check RAM and disk space
Check branch status
Check Ubuntu version
Clear all lines
Enable spellcheck
Integrate Excel into your Laravel project
Find files containing specific text
Find a file by extension
Including and excluding files in zip
Insert mode
Quit VIM
Save a file
Set up reCaptcha in Laravel
Set up a new repository
Using SSH with a private key
Create a symbolic storage link
Symbolic storage link in shared hosting
View battery status
View hardware info
Zip a file
Writing a book on how to build ReactJS applications
Using Laravel events and listeners in your application

📅 2019

The Circle Packing Algorithm
Deploy your Laravel app on Heroku
Getting started with Laravel Homestead
Build your own Static Site Generator using Python
Migrating to Netlify
Minesweeper Clone
Optimize your website performance
Build your own toy spellchecker
The 15 Puzzle Game
Keep a programming journal using VIM and Bash
Stripe's Scrolling Bubble Header
Poker Hand Analyser in Python
Project Euler solutions
The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho
Tools of the Trade
Say Hello, New Blog

📅 2018

Goodbye, Windows 10!
Artificial Intelligence: A Modern Approach - Chapter 1
Built a 2048 clone in 15 minutes
Can we eliminate traffic congestion with the help of Computer Vision?
Meet Blog Engine 2.0
Build and Design software with Empathy
Lexicographic Permutations
Finding the 1000 digit Fibonacci number using the Golden Ratio
The Game of Life
UI Design Pattern: Edit-in-Place
Convert IIS web.config to Apache .htaccess using Javascript
Convert SVG from Image to Code using Javascript
I decided to learn Python

📅 2017

The Cryptopals Crypto Challenges: Set 1 - Detect AES in ECB Mode
The Cryptopals Crypto Challenges: Set 1 - AES in ECB Mode
Hamming Distance Algorithm in C++
The Cryptopals Crypto Challenges: Set 1 - Break Repeating-Key XOR
The Cryptopals Crypto Challenges: Set 1 - Implement Repeating-Key XOR
The Cryptopals Crypto Challenges: Set 1 - Single-Byte XOR Cipher
The Cryptopals Crypto Challenges: Set 1 - Detect Single-Character XOR
The Cryptopals Crypto Challenges: Set 1 - Fixed XOR
Base64 Encoding / Decoding using Bitwise Manipulation in C++
The Cryptopals Crypto Challenges: Set 1 - Convert Hex to Base64
The Cryptopals Crypto Challenges
New feature: Share your reaction
Leave me alone, I just want to write code!
Building something out of nothing
Arcade Challenge 4: Tetris
Arcade Challenge 3: Pong
Arcade Challenge 2: Breakout
Arcade Challenge 1: Snake Game
I challenged myself to build 4 arcade games!
Programming Productivity
Let's Cipher This: Monoalphabetic Substitution Cipher
Let's Cipher This: A series about Cryptography
I built a Sudoku Solver!
Hello World

Archive

Here's a collection of articles that I've written over the years.