VS Code Syntax Highlighting

How to Copy Visual Studio Code with Syntax Highlighting to Other Applications

In this article, we learn how to copy from Visual Studio Code with color syntax highlighting to various other applications including Word, PowerPoint, Outlook, OneNote, and Gmail to achieve beautiful, clear code samples for documentation, presentations, and general communication. This will prove useful whether you are using JavaScript, JSON, HTML, CSS, TypeScript, Markdown, C++, Java, PHP, Python, Go, T-SQL, XML, C# or a host of other languages and data formats that Visual Studio Code supports. How is this accomplished? It’s very simple! When you are in VS Code copy your selected code to the clipboard, VS Code brings the color syntax formatting along for the ride so the formatted text Read More

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Do I Need an Umbrella Today? Google Sheets and JavaScript to the Rescue!

OK, Google Sheets! Send me an email if I need an umbrella today. Send an email using Google Sheets? Yes, that’s right! Sheets can do a lot more than add numbers and calculate your mortgage payments. In our last article, we learned how to consume JSON web data using Google Sheets and we built templates to display and sort weather forecast data. Today, we’ll build on what we covered last time and learn how to send email using Google Sheets based on the JSON data we retrieve. Let’s get practical and build something useful while we’re at it. Have you ever found yourself outside somewhere and it starts to rain Read More

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Consuming JSON Web Data Using Google Sheets

Note: This article has been superseded with Fetching, Filtering, and Sorting JSON APIs in Google Sheets: The Missing Functions which provides a set of Google Sheets functions with additional capabilities. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again.  JSON has become the lingua franca for exchanging data on the web, and we (as developers) need to know how to process JSON data received from RESTful web services so we can be positioned for the present and for the future. My article on Consuming Node.js Microservices Created with stdlib provided a high-level tour covering several methods of parsing and processing JSON data. Last time, we focused on how to consume Read More

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Consuming Node.js Microservices Created with Stdlib

In our last article, we learned how to create Node.js microservices using Polybit’s stdlib platform. We created a fabulous (IMHO 🙂 ) GPS service that enabled us to retrieve the name of a city based on its GPS coordinates. Today, we’re going to learn how to consume data returned from this stdlib GPS microservice using several methods. While the information presented here is specific to consuming Polybit stdlib microservices, many aspects of this article will be generally applicable for consuming Web API JSON data from any http endpoint. Strap on your seatbelts as we embark on a whirlwind tour to learn about consuming JSON data from a variety of contexts…and I’m Read More

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Creating Node.js Microservices with Ease Using Stdlib

Microservices and serverless architectures are all the rage in the software industry. After working with Polybit’s amazing stdlib platform, I am clearly seeing the value of this promising technology! Today, I will introduce you to stdlib. I encourage you to work alongside me as we leverage stdlib to build a microservice that we can consume in a variety of contexts. Let’s get started with this fabulous technology!

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Upgrading to more recent versions of Node.js on the Raspberry Pi

I’ve received questions from readers of my Beginner’s Guide to Installing Node.js on a Raspberry Pi wanting to know how to upgrade to more recent versions of Node.js on the Raspberry Pi.  The steps are quite easy and can be adapted to other Debian variants as well including Ubuntu.  I’m assuming you followed the steps in my Beginners’ Guide, especially under the “Install Node.js” section where we update the Raspbian/Debian package repository to include the Node.js binaries provided by NodeSource.  Let’s get started!

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Node.js: Sending Email Notifications Using Nodemailer and Gmail

We all want to be in the loop and notified when certain events occur within our Node.js programs. For example, email notifications can be very important for creating situational awareness with IoT systems we develop that interact with our physical world. Email communication can be used to deliver messages to our inboxes as well as to deliver text messages in order to enable us to take more immediate action. In today’s tutorial, we’ll walk through the steps of using the amazing Nodemailer package which has become the de facto standard for sending email messages in the Node.js world. Let’s get started so we can start seeing our own custom messages Read More

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Getting Started with YAML in Node.js using js-yaml

In this tutorial, we harness the power of YAML for use within Node.js. As described on the official YAML site, YAML (YAML Ain’t Markup Language) is a “human friendly data serialization standard for all programming languages”. YAML and JSON are closely related. In fact, all JSON syntax is valid YAML as of the YAML 1.2 spec, but not all YAML syntax is valid JSON. YAML is a superset of JSON.

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Node.js IoT: Logging Data That Is Out of This World

The ability to log data is an important capability in IoT applications. In this tutorial, we learn how to use Node.js to log data by utilizing built-in Node modules. There are certainly excellent logging modules available including pino and Winston (see my Winston tutorial here); however, our goal today is to deepen our knowledge of Node by implementing some simple logging code ourselves in order to become better Node developers.

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Node Newbie Error – NPM Refusing to Install Package as a Dependency of Itself

I encountered an error and thought I’d post the solution here since it just might happen to you sometime!  Here’s the scenario: I was planning to take the winston npm module out for a spin to try out it’s awesome logging capabilities.  I created a directory called winston to create a project and conduct the test.  What would be more logical than that?  🙂 Next, I ran npm init to create a package.json file hitting my Enter key as fast as it could go to accept all the defaults for this throwaway test project:

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