September 2003 Archives



September 2, 2003

Cease & Desist

Last week I checked the web logs for bgnews.com and in the referrer log I find this site, from Capital Advantage. They are using our name and our site template all without our say so. I do not know how, but they are driving traffic to their site, and therefor to our site. They are in the top 5 referrer sites for us. In this case this is not cool because we did not ask for it. But they are not a partner of us, nor are a partner with Digital Partners. I sent a cease & desist email of which I did not get a response from. My next step was a snail mail letter. Well I am not the only person that looks at referrer logs because we got an email from Kent Strickland, BGSU's Information Security Officer. He noticed that Capital Advantage is using our name, not legally I might add. After emailing back and forth with Kent both Bruce Petryshak, the CIO, and Toby Singer, the Executive Director of ITS are now notified. And getting help from the university's lawyers will be no problem. This could not have worked out better, the university is going to help us with this matter before I even had the chance to ask for their help. I only wonder how many other college news sites are being taken advantage of from Capital Advantage. It isn't right they are ripping the code off our web site and placing their own content in the "body" of the page. I will update when anything new comes up.

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 2, 2003 2:36 AM | | Comments (2)

September 3, 2003

My Dead Palm m505

I called Palm tech support about my m505. It will cost me $25 to talk to them. Fine. If they don't resolve the issue they do not charge me. Great. They had me do a battery reset when the Palm was in the cradle (two soft resets while plugged in). Then I had to charge it for 4 hrs. That did not help. It is dead. They will service it for $125 though. I don't think so. The tech gave me 20% off a new Palm. Of course this does not include the Tungsten series. I can, however, get $20 off the Palm Zire. So I bought the Zire ($99 MSRP) and am selling it. Maybe to Brian's friend, maybe to someone else. That is a deal I could not pass up. Unfortunately my m505 goes in the trash with no hope of getting data off of it. The lost passwords are not worth a $125 and only a chance at that price. I only got some of my passwords moved to my FileMaker Mobile database, not all of them. So now I am rebuilding my passwords database. If this happens again, I will not loose my passwords file. I will have the FileMaker file on my hard drive. I have not got an email back from Stand Alone (makers of Password Store, and app I will never use again, unless they tell me where my passwords are) either. That I am not happy of. They do have a phone number on their Web site though, so next I will be calling them. I would think the passwords file, probably encrypted somehow, gets sync'd to the host desktop. When I sync the Palm it does say "Backing up Password Store." I can still hope.

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 3, 2003 1:42 AM | | Comments (2)

800 MB CD-R

Well this is total crap! Mac OS X 10.2.6 does not recognize a 800 MB CD-R. The Finder thinks it is 660 MB and Toast 6 (Review to come soon) thinks it is a 710 MB CD-R. So I have found ONE thing that my Mac cannot do that my PC can. That stinks. I am going to email both Roxio and Apple about the 800 MB CD-R report. I also know a couple Apple reps. on campus that I can bring this up with. BTW, if you want a great place to buy blank media, check out cdrdvdrmedia.com.

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 3, 2003 2:47 AM | | Comments (3)

September 5, 2003

Cease & Desist, Part 2

Now for the really big twist that no one saw coming: The Capwiz web site was developed as a test portal with the approval of Larry Weiss. The last time I checked the only one to approve the use of The BG News name was my boss, Bob Bortel. Thanks to Kent Strickland I found out that Larry Weiss, Associate Vice President for University Advancement and Director of Alumni and Governmental Affairs, is behind all this. Larry Weiss is responsible for University relations and governmental affairs, he is a lobbyist. Once I had his name I called him and let him know I was not happy to have our web site ripped off! Not to mention we as a newspaper do not support the crap they were placing in our template. Mr. Weiss started drawing a shady picture for me on the phone. This company, Capital Advantage, had put a demo together for the University, a private demo, and Larry did not know why they chose to rip off the code from bgnews.com. Larry told me that they thought bgnews.com was a news site about BG, as in Bowling Green, and NOT a news site. Now that is total bull shit. Does bgnews.com NOT look like a newspaper? Does a site about a city have a Sports, Opinion or Arts & Entertainment section? Come on! Total horse shit. He told me the site would be down that day. I gave him my number so he could call and let me know when it was taken down. A few hours later I got a call from Mr. Weiss's assistant. She had no idea that this site had moved so many eye balls to our site. She has no idea why they chose our site to rip off for this private demo. Private my ass. I have more then 1000 visits from that "demo site." This assistant, nore Mr. Weiss seem to have any idea what went wrong here. Hell even Kent Strickland was agreeing with me. Kent had put in an incident report with Exodus Cable & Wireless to have them take down the entire Capital Advantage site. I kind of wish their site had been taken down before we found out about Larry Weiss. Once Kent found out about Larry he had Exodus Cable close the incident. Do you think that Larry Weiss has any idea about this? Do you think that Capital Advantage has any idea about this? I gotta say this though, Larry Weiss did a great job at taking this site down in a very timely fashion once I talked to him. I did my best to be professional on the phone and I think I did a good job talking to both Larry and his assistant, but man I gotta say I was pissed off. I was hot. My boss was hot. From talking to Kent, he was hot about it too. And I guess this ruffled the feathers with Bruce Petryshak and Toby Singer as well. So I feel pretty good. I got this issue resolved. My boss is happy, I am happy. If someone steals copywrite material, wether it be content or design, I am going to pursue it the same way I went after this. They had no right to use our name, I don't care if it was only for a "demo."

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 5, 2003 1:38 AM | | Comments (1)

September 7, 2003

Panic Room

I watched Panic Room last night on cable. It was a pretty good movie, but was hampered by the story putting its characters in some really stupid situations. I am glad I did not see this in the theater because there were many times in the story I was yelling at the TV. There are many places in the story that were just plain dumb. Stupid things like when Meg Altman calls 911 and they say "Please hold." Many times I was saying "That would not happen." The 911 call was just the worst case in the movie. Or how about the daughter with the insulin shots. Plug one of those in one of the robbers and they would be out in a second or two. Other then the hard to believe situations, the movie was pretty good. I would have just been an ass in the theater yelling at the screen. The opening credits were really unique. Very nicely done.

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 7, 2003 6:14 PM | | Comments (3)

September 8, 2003

Software Purchases

Purchasing software hurts, all that money gone from my wallet. But since I make money off of the software, the hurt is a bit less. I pre-ordered an upgrade to Studio MX 2004. I cannot wait to get my hands on Dreamweaver MX 2004. The new features in DW really look nice, really nice. It is such a big step to base the entire layout engine on CSS-P. I imagine this will quell my problems with the current version of DW MX. I can't say I like the name, "Dreamweaver MX 2004" doesn't exactly flow. Why not just call it Dreamweaver 7? Ahh well. The Studio is such a great deal though, Dreamweaver, Fireworks, Flash and FreeHand. I also ordered the Adobe Design Collection. That is Photoshop 7, Illustrator 10, InDesign 2, and Acrobat 6 Pro. Now that I have finally bought Photoshop 7, they can release Photoshop 8. Isn't that how it always works? Buying the Design Collection is also such a great deal. Photoshop alone is $609. And for what platform did I buy this software for? Macintosh. I have given up on Windows and am selling my Alienware rig. No more Educational Discounts. This is the first time I have bought Macromedia or Adobe software without an educational discount. What a difference that makes.

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 8, 2003 10:13 PM | | Comments (5)

Must Have TechTV

Forget "I want my MTV" I want my TechTV. The main Time Warner package does not come with TechTV! What the hell? No Screen Savers! Oh the horror. I must have TechTV! After waiting on the phone about 10 minutes to talk to a human, I got through to one, and was about to get rid of the "movie package" for the "value package" which has TechTV. Phewww. I can sleep better at night now.

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 8, 2003 10:54 PM | | Comments (3)

September 9, 2003

Adobe Design Collection

In no less then two days I recieved my copy of the Adobe Design Collection. One nice thing about buying this software so late is I get Acrobat 6 instead of Acrobat 5 (when we bought 2 copies of the Design Collection for Unigraphics Acrobat 6 was not out). I also get updated installers, so I do not have to upgrade, I can just install Photoshop 7.0.1, Illustrator 10.0.3, and InDesign 2.0.2. It saves some time at least.

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 9, 2003 6:40 PM | | Comments (0)

September 11, 2003

Macromedia Studio MX 2004

What a name huh? Lets just call it Dreamweaver 7. Anyway. The Studio shipped today. This morning I got an email with my serial number and link to download a huge 191 MB stuffit file. I really feel bad for those on narrowband. One thing though, what happened to physical books, you know, the user manual? Oh well, no one reads those anyways right? Like a kid in a candy store I dove into Dreamweaver MX 2004 (DW 2004) right away. The changes are outstanding. Well worth the price tag. When I have time I will post my first impressions and some screen shots.

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 11, 2003 1:01 AM | | Comments (0)

'This is our Pearl Harbor'

us flag.jpgCheck out the package that 210 West has prepared for the two-years-after of September 11. Be sure and comment on the articles! I can remember September 11 pretty well myself. I was listening to the Bob & Tom show (the best morning talk show) and they got very quiet, very quiet. Now for those who do not know what the Bob & Tom show is, its a comedy show, and there are no moments of prolonged silence. In a very sobering voice Bob & Tom told me, and the rest of people listening at that time, that the Twin Towers were being destroyed by one, and then two airliners. When I got to work someone on the radio announced that a plain had crashed into the Pentagon. That was my morning September 11, 2001. May our friends rest in peace. I have not really taken much time other then the days directly following September 11 to think about what happened. Of course The Media (tm) did not let me forget about it, ot let it get too far out of our minds. But I never really took much time, say last year at this time, to think about all that has happened. Please take some time today to think about the events that transpired on September 11, 2001. Your eyes might well up with tears, your through might sink, but it is worth it to reflect on the one moment that has changed our lives forever. And for us "20 somethings," the "MTV Generations" or "Generations X'ers" nothing has ever in our past changed our lives like September 11, 2001. May our friends rest in peace.

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 11, 2003 2:01 AM | | Comments (0)

The BG News Layout & Design

Well we can add another proverbial hats to my job at Student Publications. Last week I was called upon to salvage the Pulse cover (which is color, i.e. more important) because the designer who designed the page did not do a good enough job. All they had was a boot on the front of the Pulse section (otherwise known as Arts & Entertainment). Even though the boot was of awful quality i left it there, and just added some photos, last minute with a digital no less, of the Portage Quarry (the subject of this feature). How could you design a color front to a section and only run a boot at the bottom? The only thing you could see above the fold was a headline, and a column of text. Anyways, I fixed it up. You can check out the PDF if you like. It is by no means great work, but its better then what was planned. Today that same designer quit. Great. So now we have a design for the Pulse section (Matt Ivey does the design) but no one who knows how to put a layout together (they can layout the news, it seems they all lack in layout of a feature). So this time the entire layout was done by me, there was no boot this time, there was nothing. In the process I showed our Pulse Editor, Angela Gorter, a few things about Photoshop and Quark. I will link Friday's PDF once it is created. I have never done layout for the paper. Mainly because it is not my job and I do not have time for it. Lately my job description has been a changing though. So a new hat is more hands on Quark and Photoshop support. Now I am doing one on one training, group training, and both in person and over the phone (for when I am at home and don't want to drive to the newsroom) tech support. To say we have a green staff this year is an understatement. There is one, maybe two people on staff that really understand how to layout a paper. We do not ask them to understand Photoshop and Quark, just enough to get the paper put together Sunday through Thursday. This lack of experience is just that, lack of experience. It is not their fault, they are just green. So we need to fix that, because it is starting to hinder the look of The BG News. The first group training session will be this coming Sunday, and I am hoping things start to click.

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 11, 2003 9:13 PM | | Comments (0)

SPAM in ICQ; Fire Problem

The only reason I still use ICQ is for a small number of people I know that will not use AIM. Unfortunatly this group of people are either work related, or people that I do not get to see in the physical form any more. So I continue to use ICQ. I use Fire (best IM client for OS X, btw) for all my IM stuff. Unless I wish to use my iSight for Audio or Video chat. The only problem I have with Fire is that if you get an IM from someone who is not on your list (and I always have security on in ICQ so I have to accept an IM from anyone not on my list) the sheet that asks if you want to accept the IM covers up the approval text that is sent. I should really email the developer about this. Oh hell I will just email him the link to this post :-P. ICQ is the only IM network that has SPAM on it. I am talking about those random IM's that solicit you for stuff you don't want. It seems very random but I am sure it very easy to do. Since ICQ names are based on numbers, all a programmer worth his salt would have to do is setup a relay system for the ICQ network, which is open source by now (that is how there are so many multi-IM clients) and just plug in a bunch of numbers and they are sure to hit some poor sap ICQ user. These are the type of "people" you do not want to authorize to accept an IM from. And I don't dare not authorize it because it might be someone I know or that needs some help, something work related. This is a software issue with Fire that should really be fixed, because it is an otherwise very fine application. Of course now M$ is making it mandatory to use the official updated MSN Messenger. I get messages every time I log in with Trillian or Fire from MSN telling me I need to upgrade. I don't think so. I will stop using your crap excuse for an IM network. The same sentiment goes for Yahoo! Because! they! are! now! sending! out! the! same! type! of! message! Well screw the users of Y! and MSN - If they want to get in touch with me they will use a real IM protocol. And who is to say that AIM and ICQ are not the same thing. They are now compatible, I am sure they will be one in the same sometime down the road. That is great. One. One IM protocol. One standard (plus Microsoft of course)

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 11, 2003 11:39 PM | | Comments (4)

September 12, 2003

A Letter to Ahead Regarding Nero 6

Letter by James Kimble a.k.a. Techisattva (Jim also reviewed the Tungsten T Scuba Sleeve Case)
Hello, I\'m writing in order to register a complaint with regard to your recently introduced Nero 6 Ultra Edition product. I am currently an owner of Nero 5 and use it regularly in my work for the creation of everything from simple file archives to hybrid cds to VCDs and DVD presentations, and was happy to see that you were releasing a new version of your software with even more features, tools, and hardware support. I downloaded your demo to test it out and, I must say, I was very disappointed. It seems that, much like Roxio, your company has moved away from developing a suite of professional tools, to building eye-candy laden toys for the digitally challenged. One of the reasons I preferred and recommended your software was the ability to choose either the simple wizard-driven creation mode or the full-featured development mode. After looking around, clicking on just about every part of the interface that looked to hold promise, I found that rather than being the next generation of your product, I was stuck with a Windows FP (Fisher-Price) interface with no way to turn it off. I\'ve spoken with several friends and contacts who use your product and, while some are less sure as to what they are going to be using in place of Nero, none are pleased with your latest product. For my part, I respectfully hope that you will give your customers the option to turn this sort of screen garbage off and return to a more professional-grade interface. If not, and I haven\'t simply missed an area of your new found facination with bevel, emboss, drop-shadow, and gaussian blur - but if this is the sort of product you are going to be putting out, I\'m afraid you\'ve lost a customer. Thank you for your time and consideration. Tathata, Techisattva
I really like the Nero 5 interface. I like Nero more then Toast. It is a very good application because it has a very good interface. It is all to often that new versions of software seem to have eye candy bells and whistles and not useful bells and whistles. The developer puts a pretty face on something to make it "more user friendly" and succeeds in not only alienating the current user base, but also makes it more difficult to get the job done, a job that was easier completed in the previous version of the software. Sometimes this manifests itself in only parts of software. But Nero 6 seems to be an exception. I was thinking of upgrading, the Toast 6 upgrade was well worth it after all (drafting a review right now). I had not yet downloaded the demo until I got this email from Jim. I just had to see if for myself. No thank you. Its almost enough to make the want to use EZ Coaster Creator (HA HA, just kidding). Just a boot note: There are no screen shots of Nero 6 on the Ahead site.

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 12, 2003 12:00 AM | | Comments (3)

'Man in Black' Johnny Cash dead at 71

What a great musician and great man. I own a lot of Johny Cash CD's including his most recent with the Nine Inch Nails remake of "Hurt." Source: CNN

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 12, 2003 1:14 PM | | Comments (0)

September 14, 2003

Microsoft warns of new Windows flaw

Microsoft Corp. warned computer users Wednesday about a new critical security hole in its Windows operating system that could allow an attacker to gain control over a computer, delete data and install unwanted programs. Source: CNN Money And you people wonder why I am fed up with Windows.

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 14, 2003 2:10 PM | | Comments (1)

Check Out Burn At Once

Thanks for the link SPeedY_B, I will take some time later to check out Burn At Once. I have become very busy lately so I will not get to this right away, after all Toast 6 on the Mac is a very nice application. SPeedY_B posted a comment to Jim Kimble's letter to Ahead about Nero 6, if you have not read it please check it out.

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 14, 2003 11:41 PM | | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (1)

September 15, 2003

Kensington Pocket Mouse Pro Wireless

This is a great mouse. It is the only portable wireless mouse I have found that stores the USB receiver inside the mouse. This mouse is also not as small as other portable mouse I have seen. This is a good thing. Check out this mouse. It is great!

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 15, 2003 3:25 AM | | Comments (2)

New Client: Grad Student

Thanks to another Art Grad Student, Walter, I have a new client. Isn't word of mouth wonderful! My new client has one of those nice 17" flat panel iMac's, they are so purdy. We got a lot accomplished in two days. Starting from scratch is usually the best bet when a Mac OS has things missing that shouldn't be. So I started by backing up her data to CD, then installed OS 9.2.2 and OS 10.2.6. Hopefully she can stay in OS X, it makes things less confusing, but just in case OS 9 is installed as well. I also got her Epson all-in-one installed and working, and Microsoft Office X installed. Next time I will start teaching how Mac OS X works and installing more of her software, and training her on how to use that as well. Funny thing about the MS Office X install. I will have to make that a separate post. I think I need to advertise in the two local papers about doing this kind of work. It is really easy as I have been training people how to use computers and peripherals for years now.

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 15, 2003 5:47 PM | | Comments (0)

Update MS Office X

I guess there is no such thing as a combined update for Microsoft Office X For Mac OS X. The current version is 10.1.5. I install Office 10.0.0 (from CD) and go to VersionTracker to download the latest version, 10.1.5. Well I cannot install 10.1.5, see the dialog box at left. I ended up having to install 10.1.2, 10.1.3, and 10.1.4 before the 10.1.5 update. I thought everyone made combo updates these days. It is just annoying. If you are going to make an update to a piece of software, for crying out loud make it easy for users to upgrade. It is a good thing I had a broadband connection available to download all these incremental updates.

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 15, 2003 8:08 PM | | Comments (1)

September 16, 2003

Buckeyes on ropes heading into Saturday

Check out Joel hammond's sports column in today's edition of The BG News. For those who do not follow college football, BGSU is playing No. 5 Ohio State this weekend. BGSU has been playing rather well, even beating Purdue, the first time they have beat a ranked opponent since the 1970's. Ohio State on the other hand have not been playing that well, They were lucky to win over N. C. State in triple overtime. OSU also squeaked out a win over San Diego State. This is going to be a great game. I am by no means a OSU fan. I am a 'Canes fan, I always have been. Now reguardless of the fact that OSU really didn't win the National Championship vs. the 'Canes last year (lets face it, the referees won the game for OSU) I am gonna be rooting for BGSU here. Not to mention I go to BGSU - you don't root against your team. This column by Joel has gotten 24 feedback posts on The BG News web site. That is the most we have ever got. This is wonderful because now more people on The News staff are getting exposure online and finding out more and more about our online edition. That is one of my goals is to get The News staff involved with the web site. Most of the feedback seems to be coming from outside of Bowling Green too, which is nice to see. GO FALCONS!

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 16, 2003 6:26 PM | | Comments (0)

New 15" PowerBooks, Bluetooth keyboard

The rumors have been around forever. It turned out to be true that Apple would introduce the aluminum 15" PowerBook in Paris at AppleExpo. Apple sure has been busy lately, they just introduced a 20 and 40 GB iPod. I am very happy with my 30 GB iPod. I am happy with only 5 GB of music on my iPod to be perfectly honest. It's not like the iPod has a search function! It takes long enough to scroll through 5 GB of artists names as it is. The announcement of the bluetooth wireless mouse and keyboard was another rumor that came true today. No recharging station for the mouse? Come on Kensington does that. No two button mouse? No scroll wheel? This is another really sleek looking piece of Apple Crap. Apple prides itself on innovation, "Our strategy at Apple is to innovate," they only go half way. Using Bluetooth is innovating, OK, how about getting away from the AA batteries. Just a thought. I am not paying $60 for a mouse that has one button when I can get something from Kensington or Logitech that has multiple buttons and a scroll wheel for about the same price. The thing I do not like about the new aluminum 15" PB is the ports on the right and left side. The ports on the right side bother me more. That is where my mouse goes. Its a trade off though. You get a new hinge system, but the ports cannot be on the back. That is one of the things I did not like about the 17" PB design, one of the main reasons I did not get it. I am really glad I got the Titanium 15" PB before they released the aluminum one. I just had to wait till they released it to post this stuff. FileMaker Pro is still not as nice to use in OS X then in OS 9. So being able to boot into OS 9 for FMP, and other things, is one of the reasons I decided not to wait till this new aluminum 15" PB came out. I also got a heck a good deal. It would cost me $1000 more to get a similarly equipped 15" Aluminum PB, even with the educational discount. Ill take my rear ports, my OS 9 boot-ability (I do not believe in Classic Mode thankyouverymuch) and my major summer price cut over built in Bluetooth (low cost addition through USB), 802.11g (easily added through a PCMCIA card if need be), and a somewhat faster processor (I am willing to bet its not a huge leap in speed).

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 16, 2003 7:15 PM |

TradeKeys no longer free

Tradekeys, as well as other PC Magazine software, is no longer free. I blogged about TradeKeys back in January. Jim Kimble is the one who actually pointed this gem out to me. It is a wonderful tool for changing keys around in Windows (something that can be done with an easy OS 9 or OS X hack). Since I am so used to using a Mac, I changed the Control and Alt keys on my PC with TradeKeys. My friend Maury wanted to do the same thing, switch the Control and Alt keys around. I told him to go to PC Mag's site and download TradeKeys. Now you have to be a subscriber for $15 if you get PC Mag, or $20 if you do not subscribe (to the printed magazine), or pay for a 30 day pass which entitles you to 3 downloads, that option costs $10. It might be worth that $10, but when I downloaded it, the software was free. If I ever have to reinstall Windows (which I am sure I will, from what others have told me) I am going to have to fork over the money to get this application. I understand the need to generate revenue, and everyone is going to a subscription model, Its just irritating to see small utilities like this with big price tags on them, when once they were free to download. You can get a lot more for $10 on the shareware market these days. I just want TradeKeys, not 3 downloads for $10. Does anyone know of other Windows utilities that will remap the keyboard?

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 16, 2003 7:36 PM | | Comments (3)

CSS Box Lessons

This site, which has CSS box lessons, is a great resource. Not only does it have a lot of CSS multi-column layout examples, but it also talked about problems and workarounds, and has a rather good rant to read. This site also has a "CSS Panic Guide", some info on text sizing, and even a blog. The blog lists other CSS resources, most of which I have seen, but one I have not. There is a bunch to check out on this site.

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 16, 2003 7:48 PM | | Comments (0)

September 19, 2003

VeriSign Sued; BIND Patched

An Internet search company on Thursday filed a $100 million antitrust lawsuit against VeriSign, accusing the Web address provider of hijacking misspelled and unassigned Web addresses with a service it launched this week.
Source: C|Net
he Internet Software Consortium (ISC), the nonprofit group that publishes BIND (Berkeley Internet Name Domain) software, which runs 80 percent of domain name servers, has released a patch that will block VeriSign Inc.'s new Site Finder service... "We're talking about mail servers and electronic mail and other types of protocol besides Web protocol," he said. "The lack of a reliable indication of nonexistence meant that a lot of people were carrying traffic that they shouldn't, or they were not able to detect spam based on forged sources because there's no longer any such thing as a nonexistent domain -- they all exist now. It rubbed a lot of people the wrong way."
Source: MacCentral It serves them right, the greedy bastards. The worst part of it is that with this Verisign "feature" in place there is no way to tell if email is SPAM or not. I am willing to bet that those morons never thought of that one. I have never really liked Verisign. And when they bought Network Solutions and with that the root .net and .com DNS servers, I really don't like them. This is just another good reason not to like Verisign. Luckily, I am not the only one who feels this way.

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 19, 2003 12:35 AM | | Comments (0)

Add a Tab button to Safari

It seems a bit odd that Apple could not come up with this on there own! I have been cursing Safari for not having a button to create a new tab. I mean that is sort of innovating isn't it (sorry, couldn't resist). Enter Ollie's Tab 2.0 which I found on a short excursion over at VersionTracker. Download it! Install it! What a difference a tab button makes to the user experience! Thanks Ollie.

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 19, 2003 12:50 AM | | Comments (1)

iSkin Screen Protector

This week, Monday I think, I finally got the screen protector for my iSkin. It sure took long enough but the wait was worth it. Especially after I have seen how my friend Kurt's iPod screen looks after only one months use. The great thing about the iSkin screen protector is that it does not obstruct the iPod screen at all. The screen is just as readable with the protector on as it was without it. Hopefully people who order these things today will get their case with the screen protector and not have to wait a few weeks extra like I did,

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 19, 2003 5:26 PM | | Comments (0)

iPod Web Sites

Since I have finally decided to become a pod person and buy an iPod, (although I could not justify a new Beetle as well) I now have a good reason to check out all those cool iPod web sites that meant nothing to me before. The two iPod Web sites I check out most often is iPodlounge.com and iPodHacks.com. I know there are other iPod sites out there, but these are all I need for news and reviews of everything iPod and iTunes related. iPodLounge.com is where I first read about the eXo iSkin and the PocketDock. I have an iSkin and I love it. I see that this case just received a Tom's Best Editors Choice Award (that would be Tom's Hardware Guide for the uninitiated). Rightfully so I would say. It is a wonderful case. I also pre-ordered (just paypal'd it today actually) the PocketDock from SendStation. I cannot wait to get that little gizmo. I got both of these great accessories because of the exposure on iPodLounge.com, so check them out. iPodLounge also keeps up on the latest software and accessories that are available or soon to be available, and they list great deals too! iPodHacks.com is actually quite the same but It has some off the wall hacks, as well as some usefull hacks, that iPodLounge does not have. Both sites have great message boards too. Since I am an iPod nOOb these two sites are a lot of help.

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 19, 2003 5:55 PM | | Comments (1)

One Supafine Woman

I have got to say congratulations to a college friend of mine, Mary Beth Eastman. She has won the Best of Baltimore 2003's contest Best Local Online Addiction for her blog, Supafine. You might of noticed her blog in my blogroll, be sure to check out her site, as well as her Geek Log. Great job MB!

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 19, 2003 6:38 PM | | Comments (0)

September 22, 2003

Belkin Mini Firewire Hub

I finally decided to get a firewire hub. Unplugging firewire devices had just got irritating enough to spend the money. Now I can have my iSight hooked up all the time, my iPod Dock hooked up all the time, and my FireWire hard drives hooked up all the time. So just to clarify (this is for Jake) I am a lazy spoiled little bitch.

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 22, 2003 12:33 AM | | Comments (2)

Safari Wish List 09/22/03

Here are the features I would like to see in an update to Safari. (Disregarding any changes I would like to see in WebCore.) * Tab & Print buttons, not third-party, from Apple. * Print Preferences to let you print like every other web browser known to man. What I mean is date stamping the print, and also printing the URL in either the header or footer. Safari prints the background color of web pages. This is opposite of the norm. You usually have to turn that option on. I have also noticed some CSS heavy layouts do not print out nicely. Safari also seems to shrink the width a little too much when printing. Bottom Line: I cannot use Safari to print a page, which is a shame. * Multiple Password Storage: It would be great if Safari could manage multiple passwords for the same web page, a la Mozilla. If I sign in with a different login name and password, Safari can only save the most recently used login. I do not know if this is limited because of Keychain (as this is where the passwords are stored). It would be a great addition to be able to handle password storage like Mozilla. * Bookmark Tab Set: Since Safari has tabs, why not have a Bookmark Tab Set function? I know it is bad to use any browser in comparison, but I am going to have to use Mozilla again. In Safari you can Open in Tabs from a Bookmark Folder, so it is half way there. * Bookmarks/History Sidebar: As much as I like the iTunes like Bookmarks window, there needs to be a sidebar which integrates the bookmarks and the history. Every other browser known to man does this too. * Banner Blocking Preferences: Adding Pop Up/Pop Under Banner Ad blocking to Safari was a smart thing. This could be improved to allow regx style blocking a la OmniWeb. Another OmniWeb preference I like is to block images of the same size as standard banner ads. On this same note, I would like Safari to have the ability to block Flash content. We all know how I feel about Flash. Also posted on BlogCritics.

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 22, 2003 1:16 AM | | Comments (0)

Disassembled PowerBook G4

I would never do this, but you just knew others would. * PowerBook 12" * PowerBook 15" * PowerBook 17" Source: Slashdot

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 22, 2003 1:30 AM | | Comments (0)

ICANN asks VeriSign to pull redirect service

The agency that oversees Internet domain names has asked VeriSign to voluntarily suspend a new service that redirects Web surfers to its own site when they seek to access unassigned Web addresses, rather than return an error message.
I sure hope VeriSign gets their ass kicked for this. I do not care if you are a guru or a novice a File Not Found page; Server Not Found page is important. If I mistype a URL I want to be able to change my mistyping and get to the correct site. With this new "service" it is impossible to do this, no matter what browser you use. Source: C|Net

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 22, 2003 5:32 AM | | Comments (0)

New & Changed Sections

I changed a couple sections, and added a couple more. This was mainly because the Commentary section was getting to general, and things were not categorized well. There is now separate sections for Mac & Windows Software, and separate sections for Mac & Windows Commentary. The new section Geek Speak has been created for posts that have to do with both Mac & Windows, and general Technology. I created a section for the Friday Five. They are just five questions to write about on Fridays. I will start this Friday, hopefully :-D. The last new section was created to make fun of SPAM, called SPAM Watch. There may be a couple posts that are not in the correct section. I tried to re-categorize them all, but I am sure I missed some. I will create images for these section pages later, maybe later today :-P. Oh and I also decided to be more specific as to "whatever pops into my head." As you can now see it now reads "a fresh cocktail of technology, media & culture views." Wouldn't that drink get your head spinning!

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 22, 2003 6:35 AM | | Comments (0)

Eolas suit may spark HTML changes

I sure hope I never have to take out a license to use the <B> tag anytime in the future! According to this article, the W3C may be changing the OBJECT and EMBED usage.
Options the PAG could recommend include a technical workaround or new wording in HTML and related specifications warning that authors who implement the tags in question should contact the patent holders and take out a license, if necessary. (Source: C|Net)
That would be a big change. All plugins use these tags, QuickTime, Flash, Active X, etc, etc. This is all came to light because of a Eolas' $521 million patent victory over Microsoft and its Internet Explorer browser (Source: C|Net, One, Two, Three, Four) So is Eolas going to go after EVERY business who has used the OBJECT and EMBED framework in their own technology? He (Eolas is a one man operation) already has won a ruling, which we all know doesn't mean anything yet, M$ is going to appeal. Is he going to go after Apple, Macromedia, Sun, etc. as well and make them pay a licensing fee? I think this is all a bit harsh. How long have people used plugins in browsers? I seem to recal Netscape as being the pioneer of the plugin architecture to enhance the Web, but that is beside the point at this point. I am not sure if I agree with M$ or not here. There is a patent here (and how many years has it been with no word of patent infringement by Eolas?) But I get the feeling that Eolas is asking way too much for licensing, I mean, $521 million for the patent case? But, the federal court found that plug-ins and applets in Internet Explorer infringed on patents held by Eolas Technologies and the University of California. Say that again: plug-ins and applets in Internet Explorer. So why is this suit not directed toward other browser developers such as Netscape, Apple, Omni, etc, etc? This is not something M$ did, the use of plug-ins and applets in a web browser is a standard, and ALL web browsers use the standard. That is the part I am confused about. Whatever happens, small scale or large, this is going to change a lot of things for web designers and developers. I wonder how we will be embedding content such as Flash, Quicktime, and Java into web pages in the future. I will end this commentary with this from C|Net:
Microsoft also is said to have proposed other ways to launch applications in a way that could not be held to infringe on the patent, but would avoid the ungainly dialog box solution. One such option would move the data to the Web page itself, rather than pulling it from an external source. In Microsoft's view, attendees said, the patent only covers a situation in which the Web page called up data located elsewhere. The company is said to have told attendees that it believes so-called inline data falls outside the Eolas patent claims because it is described in the HTML protocol published in 1991--three years before the initial Eolas patent filing.... "This is not an issue just for IE," said Wallent. "This is a potential issue for Netscape Navigator, for Opera and for other browser vendors. This is an industry issue..." "The W3C has worked very hard to make the Web remain patent free and this might be the one thing that screws it all up. It's really very frustrating."
Like I said, I hope I do not have to pay for use of the <B> tag. Also posted on BlogCritics.

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 22, 2003 7:53 AM | | Comments (4)

September 23, 2003

Studio MX 2004 Reactivation

I encountered this screen only one day after I installed Studio MX 2004. I opened up Dreamweaver and got this screen. Kinda odd, I think. Studio MX 2004 required online registration when I installed it, and "if you've upgraded your hard disk or CPU." [scratches head] Well, the only thing I installed since Studio MX 2004 was the Java 1.4.1 Update 1. Great, all we need is more software acting like Windows XP :-P.

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 23, 2003 11:14 PM | | Comments (0)

September 24, 2003

Back in Toast 4

Way back in Toast 4 when you wanted to clear the contents of the toast window, wether it was a disc image or a data CD or whatever, you could use Command+Delete (being the same keyboard shortcut to trash something in the Finder, it makes sense). In Toast 5, and now in Toast 6, you have to use Clear from the Edit menu. And the Clear command does *not* have a keyboard shortcut! Why would you take a feature out of software? Especially something as useful as Clear. Hmmm. Panther (OS 10.3) is going to have a great solution for all these little "why is there no keyboard shortcut for this" gotchas. It will be part of the Keyboard preference. I could wait until then or I could get QuicKeys X2. I own QuicKeys 5 for OS 9, and do miss it. I might upgrade. QuicKeys X (the initial OS X release) and QuicKeys X.5 was not that exiting. This could go into another rant, once I need to dedicate to Mac OS X... QuicKeys X2 still does not have all the features QuicKeys 5 for OS 9 did. Do you see where this is headed? Mac OS X *still* does not have all the features that OS 9 did. Labels anyone?

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 24, 2003 1:54 AM | | Comments (0)

Feel The Love

See who is linking to you, or, in other words, feel the love! Technorati.

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 24, 2003 3:03 AM | | Comments (0)

Bayesian Spam Filtering

I am getting tired of people asking me what bayesian spam filtering is. Bayesian filtering is friggin cool, thats what it is! I guess OS X Mail does not have it, it has "adaptive latent semantic analysis" and it does not work. Well it works halfway well. Go to this very well written expiation of bayesian spam filtering on About.com. Now stop asking me what bayesian spam filtering is. Thank you.

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 24, 2003 3:26 AM | | Comments (3)

Oh the Horror

Oh the memories of just learning how to code. This site takes me back. HA HA.

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 24, 2003 4:08 AM | | Comments (1)

Fucked Weblog

LOL, Fucked Weblog, As in Fucked Company! I must say that is nice treatment to the Blogger logo.

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 24, 2003 4:19 AM | | Comments (0)

More Internet Preferences

More Internet is a System Preferences pane that uses Internet Config to allow you to choose which applications are set as helpers for internet protocols (i.e. which application will be chosen to handle which URL.) This is great because much like other parts of OS X, these things (Internet Config, for example) were easy to get to in OS 9 (Open the Internet Config application; Internet Control Panel, for example). This is a good, free, System Preference to download.

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 24, 2003 4:29 AM | | Comments (0)

File Association Lookup

I found this File Association Lookup site while trying to find a good way to change file associations in OS X, because if you don't know, no good way exists yet. In OS 9 you could change these easily. In OS X you have to get info on an app, change the file association, and click the "Change All" button. I want a UI akin to the File Types tab of the Folder Options dialog in Windows. That is a feature of Windows that I really like. Mac OS X has gone away from metadata, which is in some ways sad, and some ways good (See ArsTechnica for good insight on this). Since OS X has done away with the File Type & Creator codes, well lets be honest, the OS has done away with them, many, *many* applications still use them. But since the OS has gotten rid of them, and gone the more Windows-esk way of thinking, shouldn't OS X have a dialog like File Types in Windows? We now rely on the three letter extension in Mac OS X just as much as Windows users do. Wouldn't it make sense to have a centralized way to edit the file types, and the applications that launch?

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 24, 2003 5:09 AM | | Comments (0)

September 25, 2003

Not Selling My PC

Yea who saw this one coming :-P. I have decided to keep my PC, for a couple reasons, but the main one is because I need to PC to test my web work. I have moved my mail over to my Mac, I am using Mac OS X Mail. It does not do the best job at taming SPAM, even with the Junk Mail Filter system that was new in 10.2. I do not think I will find anything to compare to POPFile. I would say that OS X Mail is about 75% accurate where POPFile was 98% accurate. I no longer do any of my work on my PC either. I moved all my documents over to my Mac. I don't even back up the data on my PC anymore. Right now I have my TiBook sitting next to my 21" Monitor, I should have done this a long time ago. My Sony 21" Monitor has two inputs so I bought an extra VGA cable, and connected it to my TiBook. Having two monitors again is so nice. I have gotten very used to dual monitors at work. Its great that the TiBook ships with a VGA to DVI converter! Buying one of those from Dr. Bott would not be cheap! Since my keyboard and mouse is wireless, I just keep my PC mouse sitting next to the monitor, and switch to the PC (switch on the bezel of the monitor) to check my work. Its like having a KVM, but not. This setup really works well. And I would not think of selling my PC. Having both a Mac and a PC is nice, that was one of the original reasons I even entertained the notion of buying a PC. And I am still very glad I did. Besides, Knights of the Old Republic comes out for PC the middle of November. I am much more productive since switching back to using my Mac for all my work.

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 25, 2003 2:42 AM | | Comments (0)

September 26, 2003

New G5 at Work

Today was a wonderful day. ITS brought our Dual 2 Ghz G5 that we ordered, ordered way back when they were announced. I am so glad that Virginia Tech got theirs first :-P. This thing is fast! It better be for the price! It is also very quiet, especially compared to the Mirrored Door Drive (MDD) model, even quieter then the Quicksilver model. The model we ordered is like I said the dual 2 Ghz, with 2 GB RAM, and we decided it was not worth the money to get the ATI Radeon 9800 Pro, so it only has the ATI 9600. This is no slouch of a video card though. It can handle the highest resolution of the 21" CRT we bought, and it can even push the screen saver "Flurry" set as the Desktop Background. Not bad at all, I'd say. Since the news and production is not using OS X yet, this computer is mine to "test" until the switch over to OS X. I am shooting for that switch over to happen in January but only time will tell. So this is for the time being my desk, myself and my graduate assistant gets to use this. Oh how much fun I am going to have :-D. One small problem though... All of the University Keyed software does not seem to install on the G5. I do not know if this is the fault of the G5 or OS 10.2.7 which ships installed on the G5. All I know is that when I try and launch an installer for any University packaged software (anything from Photoshop to Fetch) I get an error message that states "This installer requires 4092 K of Memory." Hmmm, last I checked 2 GB was more than 5 MB. Information Technology Services (ITS) uses Stuffit InstallMaker to repackaged the Keyed versions of all University owned software. I have some experience with InstallMaker myself, and I think this is the real reason behind this. I talked to ITS today about this and tomorrow I get to go over to Hayes Hall and try and help them fix this problem. Since Student Publications is the first to get a G5 on campus, I get to be the guinea pig for the rest of campus, how fun! When I learn more about this I will be sure to post it. Next up is a short first impressions post about my first day with the G5.

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 26, 2003 12:08 AM | | Comments (1)

First Impressions of the G5

My first impressions of using the G5 are based in Macromedia Dreamweaver MX 2004 (DW MX 2004), and generally using Mac OS X. Dreamweaver As I stated, I could not install University software, so I downloaded and installed the demo of DW MX 2004. This is a great application to test the new G5 on since DW in general is one of the slowest applications on Mac OS X. I would really like to have tested DW MX, but as I said I could not get University owned software to install. You see DW is made up of mostly HTML, JavaScript, and XML files, there is little to it that is written in C. Web pages render slower on a Mac then they do in Windows, that is a fact. This is why DW has always been slower on a Mac. I have been using DW MX on my PC at home for 8 months now, and I am really happy to say that DW MX 2004 seems as snappy on this G5 as it does on my 3.06 Ghz P4 at home. The thing that takes the longest to load, both on Mac and PC is the DW Extensions. When you click the triangle in the panel to list all the available extensions, this menu takes a while to load. Nope, not at all, very fast. When you open the Reference Panel it also takes a while for it to load the reference., also very fast on the G5. Overall DW on the G5 feels like using it on my PC at home. It is snappy and can keep up with me. This is more than can be said about DW MX 2004 on my 1 Ghz TiBook, or any other G4 I have used DW on. Mac OS X Using Mac OS X on the G5 is the way Mac OS X was meant to be used. Everything is more responsive then using a G4. As it should be! What I was most impressed with was the speed in which the G5 navigated remote volumes, either being OS 9 based AppleShare volumes, OS X volumes, or SMB volumes. This is one headache I have on a G4, navigating remote volumes. I realize that part of the time it takes has to do with the network and traffic, but it is noticeably snappier on the G5. Everything is faster, When you change preferences in System Preferences, when you launch and quit applications. It is all so much more enjoyable. Apple and IBM really did a great job with the G5, I only wish this had come to market about 6 to 8 months ago. I doubt I would have bought a PC if it had. I cannot wait to see Mac OS 10.3 running on the G5! After seeing how much faster 10.3 runs on a G4, I am sure it will be leaps and bounds faster on the G5. More Testing I have a great opportunity here. I have been wanting to do this since I heard the announcement this summer of the G5. I want to comparison test my Alienware P4 against this G5. My initial thoughts are to test Photoshop 7, Dreamweaver MX 2004, Acrobat 6, InDesign 2 and Quark 6. This is a mix of applications I use for my business, and applications used at Student Publications. I would like to get some test results that are more then just numbers though. I want to get some numbers, so I am going to have to figure a way to accurately record those. But I am more concerned with just using the G5 and the P4 to get a specific process or set of processes accomplished. To me that is worth more then just plain numbers. If you have any ideas on doing testing like this, recording accurate numbers and such, I am all ears. Please let me know. I am also going to need some test documents. LARGE Photoshop files, complex InDesign and Quark documents. I should have little problem finding these from here within Student Publications, but if you would like to contribute some yourself that would be wonderful. I only wish I had a fresh clean install of Windows XP. I know that when I got my PC in January it was a lot snappier then it was now. Maybe I should format it and install all the software. HA HA had you going for a second there. There is no way I would want to do that! If you have any info on conducting these kinds of comparison tests (URLs or otherwise) please let me know, and if you would like to contribute a file to be tested head to head, P4 vs. G5, let me know as well. Thanks!

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 26, 2003 1:44 AM | | Comments (0)

COMSTOR Site Template

comstor.gifThe Template for the COMSTOR template is all but complete. The last thing I need to do is add the DW specific tags. Take a look at how the template looks. I am using the Menu Magic II extension from Project Seven, partly to cut down on development time, and partly to help keep my sanity. I once taught at CTLT how to make a full blown menu system like this with nested submenus and all, its a lot of work to do by hand, and for the most part DW is not much help for layers based work. With the Menu Magic II extension you can select which menu is in the down state (the black "Self Storage" section when the page loads) and which link is in the down state (the Past Clients link in the Commercial Property section) and both are handled in JS parameters in the BODY OnLoad property. That is a very efficient way of handling it, and makes it look even better. Those are JS functions I would rather not code myself that is for sure!

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 26, 2003 2:05 AM | | Comments (0)

Kill Bill Soundtrack

This Monday the BG News got a press kit for Kill Bill, the new Quentin Tarantino flick coming out this fall. The kit has three trailers for the movie, and the movie soundtrack. I only got to listen to the soundtrack once, it has some interesting stuff on it. It does have tunes from Nancy Sinatra, Isaac Hayes and Quincy Jones. The rest are from people I have never heard of. In all there are 20 music tracks, 2 dialog tracks, and 2 sound effects tracks. Gotta love "reviewing" music. The entertainment editor did ask if i would write a review of it, but I am not going to. I would have no idea on where to begin. Its good to listen to, but nothing I would spend money on. The movie looks killer though, I cannot wait till it is out, October 10th.

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 26, 2003 2:57 AM | | Comments (0)

Rivalries set aside in defense of Internet Explorer

Here is some more, very in-depth, information about the patent infringement brought on by Eolas against Microsoft. I recently wrote about this issue. Source: C|Net

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 26, 2003 3:02 AM | | Comments (0)

iChat Log Viewing Software

There are three pieces of software out to view iChat log files. Only one shines. The rest have problems. Logorrhea (great name, huh), iChatViewer, and iChatAnalyzer are the three apps looked at this comparison. iChatAnalyzer 0.2.1b VersionTracker still lists this app as beta. This app makes a line chart of your chats! Wow. What is this for? It relies on iChat to actually view the log files. The search function is slow, and when I double-click on an entry in the search results window it will NOT open the chat. This app might be better to look at once it has matured a bit. In the Read Me it does state that this is the developers first OS X app. I hope the future releases have more to offer. The two reports that can be generated are not useful, not formatted in a friendly manner, and IMO contain way to much information then I want to know. iChatViewer 0.5.1 This app is a little better. It tells the begin and end time, With this data there should be no problem adding the total chat time on the UI, because that info is not there yet. I really like the simple UI of this application. That is its best feature. It too also needs to use iChat to view the log files though. I don't really like that. Show in Finder is also a nice feature. The search also uses the same UI, opening the results in a new iChatViewer window. The only thing I would like to see in this app is inline log file viewing. That and the elapse time of the chat, in big, bold, numbers. Logorrhea 1.2.1 Now this is a polished application. The main reason I like this app over the rest is it shows the chats inline, not having to use iChat to view them. The search also highlights the search term in yellow, which is a very nice feature. Great Job! Logorrhea also can reveal a chat in the Finder. You can export chats out of Logorrhea but it seems that it exports all of them, not just the one that is selected, this a bummer. Concatenating all the chat data into one large text file does not make any sense to me. I wish it showed the begin, end, and elapsed times of the chat like iChatViewer. That would be my only suggestion for this wonderful application. Maybe in a future release. Also posted at BlogCritics. UPDATED 09/30/03 iChatBrowser 0.2 just came out, It is a work in progress as I encountered some strange behavior when trying to use the Export Chats feature. It handles inline viewing of chats as well though which I like. It does not have a find feature, but the read me indicates that that is a planned feature. This is another one to keep a lookout for in the future.

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 26, 2003 8:20 PM | | Comments (0)

September 27, 2003

First Web Site

There is no Friday Five posted today, so I went back and answered the August 15, 2003 questions. 1. How much time do you spend online each day? Oh lord! This is scary. This changes daily depending on how much web work I do at work, this could be 2 to 8 hrs. at work, then when I get home I could be doing web work for my business, or be online to chat, check email, etc. I would say I spend at least 10 hrs. a day online, and no more then 24 :-P. I guess when your work in web design/development its OK to be online that much. Well at least I tell myself that. 2. What is your browser homepage set to? Nothing at all. I have a google search built into Safari. I hate when a browser opens up and loads a page. It is always something I don't want. 3. Do you use any instant messaging programs? If so, which one(s)? I use Trillian on my PC and Fire and iChat on my Mac. I can't stand having multiple IM apps open at once. If only all my contacts would use AIM, there would be no need for things such as Fire and Trillian. But that never happens. There is always that person you need to talk to for work who only using Yahoo IM, etc, etc. I am using iChat more and more because of voice and video chat. The voice chat is really nice. The video chat is only great if your upload speeds are pretty good. But I have done video chat with my iSight and as long as it stays on this side of the continent (East Coast) it seems to be OK. Part of the reason I spend so much time online is because of IM. I utilize IM for my work all the time, it really helps. 4. Where was your first webpage located? My first web page was located on my Dad's web server, that was a long time ago. My Dad is the Network Administrator for Plain Local Schools. The entire reason I started to learn HTML and how to run web servers was because of Plain Local Schools. Plain Local got a grant as I believe from the OhioNET program to be one of the first districts in Ohio to get internet access. I know Plain Local had internet before the school district I went to, Ravenna City Schools, had any. I was always jealous of that, and I loved going down to my Dad's house on the weekends to learn what I could about the Internet. There were other reasons of course, but now that I look back at it, I learned a heck of a lot about the Internet because of dad's toys. My first real Web site was at kenneth.edwards.net at what is now Net Identity. Then I got meancode.com (way before I started my own business). 5. How long have you had your current website? I have had BreakingWindows.com since January 2003, when I bought my first PC. I have had Meancode.com for 4 or 5 years now. Before that I had kenneth.edwards.net for about 2 yrs. and before that I had pages on my Dad's web server. I am so glad I never had to deal with the likes of geocities or tripod, etc, etc. Well that is not true, I had to deal with friends who had accounts with those services :-P.

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 27, 2003 12:52 AM | | Comments (0)

September 28, 2003

Suit filed over VeriSign domain redirect

Class action, its about time. Bastards!
"VeriSign's redirection of .com and .net traffic not only is earning, or is intended to earn, profits for VeriSign, but it subverts the basic infrastructure of the Internet, to the detriment of numerous entities," the suit says. "VeriSign's actions have exceeded and continue to exceed the scope of its authorized monopoly status--its establishment of SiteFinder redirection service was not acting in compliance with any clearly articulated government program, and it was not acting at the direction or with the consent of any federal agency." Other suits have been filed against the domain name company on behalf of private companies or individuals, but Friday's was the first to seek class-action status.
Source: C|Net

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 28, 2003 6:03 PM | | Comments (0)

S.W.A.T. (2003 )

What a great summer movie! I can't complain about anything. Thats no fun :-D. I found this on the IMDb Trivia page:
The tune that the team sings at the table in the film's trailer, is the theme from the original TV series.
I figured that is what they were singing. This movie was great from start to finish with great action sequences and not a lot of sub plots, which is by no means a bad thing.

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 28, 2003 8:36 PM | | Comments (0)

Menu Magic II and Templates

More specifically Menu Magic II (MM2) and Dreamweaver MX Templates. In DW MX, Macromedia changed how templates work, they got smarter. If you use the Menu Magic II extention kit from Project Seven (PVII), be sure to read this PDF they have written. On a related note, I emailed them about this problem (using MM2 in MX templates) and they got back to me right away with the answer, this technote in their infoBase. Very fast tech support from PVII.

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 28, 2003 8:48 PM | | Comments (0)

September 29, 2003

One year later; A look back

I have been at Student Publications (as a Staff member) for a year now! I cannot believe it has been a year. I just signed another 1 yr. contract too. Yay :-D. (a non student letter of appointment is a 1 yr. appointment.) I say as a staff member because I have been involved with Student Publications since 1998 when I was a freshman in college. A lot of things have changed. For one, in 1998 there was no web site for The BG News. For a while we hosted it in West Hall, hosted on a Mac. Wow that was a while ago. I used AppleShare IP for a while, and then when Mac OS X Server (the first one, not the current version, the one known as Rhapsody). The process for posting the site took 2 hrs. even with the use of Transporter. My staff was 6 to 8 people and handled posting the news and also posting original content. We used to use NetObject Fusion (NOF) (no longer a Mac product). When Macromedia released Dreamweaver 1.2 we made to switch to it. Dreamweaver 1.0 was still a little on the "not all there" stage. The switch to Dreamweaver was more because NetObjects was discontinuing its WYSIWYG editor for the Mac. Its a shame they did because NOF is a wonderful product, even today.
Side Note: At that time I was involved with Apollon Components, a set of components for NOF. NOF Components are like DW Extensions or GoLive Actions. I provided the Mac Installers, using Stuffit InstallMaker to make them. After Mac support went south I had no reason to be involved with Apollon Project, or with NetObject Fusion.
After about 2 yrs. of producing The BG News site ourselves we partnered with a company that published college newspaper sites. The company was called Campus Engine, and their solution was written in Cold Fusion. At the time I did not know CF but I knew it was cool. It is, indeed a nice language. Campus Engine got bought out by Digital Partners, and we have been with them ever since. Digital Partners uses a PHP template engine called SMARTY, which I love. When partnered, and was given a CMS to use for our site, my web staff went down to two, which was such a nice change (think about managing hours for 6 to 8 college students). But you know what? This semester, Fall 2003 is the first semester that the print staff is publishing the web site. It has taken me 5 years to get the print staff to publish the paper online. It is so nice to not have to put the web site online every day (well ok its nice that I don't have to have my staff to put it online :-P). Now all I have to do is train the print staff how to fill out forms on a web page. That is so much nicer then teaching people HTML! It now takes an hour or less to put the paper online. A lot better then 2 or more hours!

Posted by Ken Edwards on September 29, 2003 3:38 AM | | Comments (1)



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Breaking Windows is © 2003
by Ken Edwards and Matt Paprocki. Some Rights Reserved.
Contact Ken: ken [at] meancode [dot] com
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