Open Recall: git-annex, JavaScript tools and Audacity 2.0.1

Open Recall is a space on The H for those things that are too small to package as news but are worth the linkage. Open Recall collates the interesting stories that didn't quite make the cut. This edition is all about handy open source tools.

• git-annex Kickstarter campaign succeeds – Developer Joey Hess has successfully funded work on his git-annex project for a year by reaching $24,786 in donations. Git can have problems with bigger files so the git-annex tool was developed to store large files alongside Git while using Git to track the versions and metadata of those large files. With the funding secured, the plan is to turn git-annex into a fully cloud-synced and open source alternative to software such as Dropbox with an easy to use interface.

• Embed a Git repository in your web site – Repo.js is a lightweight jQuery plugin that makes it easy to embed a GitHub repository into any web site. Users can include whole repositories or just specific branches. Files can be opened right in the embedded widget. Code in these files is automatically highlighted and lines are numbered similarly to the styling of the actual GitHub pages.

• A JavaScript error steamroller – FuckItJS repeatedly compiles JavaScript code, getting rid of passages that throw errors and repeats the process until their are no errors left. The tool is based on jQuery and since it eliminates every single error in the code it gets run on, the result might not be very useful. As the author of the program puts it: "Whether or not the remaining code is even worth executing, we don't know. We also don't particularly care."

• Audacity 2.0.1 released – The latest version of the open source audio editor Audacity includes several bug fixes introduced since the last release in March. Audacity 2.0.1 fixes several problems with the user interface and exporting to WAV and AIFF has been made more stable. A new "Paulstretch" effect has been introduced which can slow down audio without changing the pitch; new translations for Serbian are also included. More information on the new version can be found in the release notes.

(fab)