Andrew Pollack's Blog

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  1. 01/16/2008Even if you're not going to LS, don't miss seeing the Opening General SessionThis year you're going to see the payoff for all that work and all the overhead associated with running Notes 8 in Eclipse. Usually, either live or shortly after, there is a way to view the Lotusphere Opening General Session. Do not miss this year's OGS. The Notes 8.0 client has a huge potential for new stuff, but you're not seeing too much use of it just yet. I liken it to having a brand new high end sports car that came with a governor set to 55 miles per hour. This year you'll get to see the payoff ......
  2. 01/15/2008The Y2K+38 Problem - It could be your opportunity this weekendFor those who don't know, Y2k38 is "short" for 1/19/2038, when many currently used computers and devices will again have a problem with digits. This time, it is because most Unix based system store dates as the number of seconds since January 1, 1970. Many of those numbers are still stored in 4 byte (32 bit) integers. Since dates can of course exist before 1/1/1970, the 32 bits must be used for both positive and negative numbers -- meaning the most significant bit is reserved as a +/- indicator. So, ......
  3. 01/15/2008The Shirts Have Arrived in Orlando!According to UPS, the shirts are at the shipping depot in Orlando, waiting for me. There are 36 boxes, at 40 pounds each. Yes, over 1400 pounds of ......
  4. 01/15/2008If you are reading this, and will be at Lotusphere 2008 .....Please make sure to at least wave and say hi. There is only one real reason why most people blog. Ego. If someone says otherwise, they're full of crap. To blog regularly, you have to either truly believe that what you have to say carries some kind of importance or you have to not care a bit. Either way, blogging is a clear indication of someone with an ego. NOTHING makes a blogger happier than to hear from people who read their mindless, poorly written drivel. If you read mine, let me know. Finding me at ......
  5. 01/15/2008Weekend Update: Finished, thankfully, with my drywall project; 14 inches of new snow; Countdown to LS08New Snow Fourteen inches of new powdery snow fell Monday. That was enough to cancel school, giving us a three day weekend. More snow is expected on Friday but I should be fine getting out on Thursday afternoon in time to pick the shirts up in Orlando on Friday. I've scheduled the flight early enough that in a worst-case situation (like last February where Jet-Blue abandoned Portland, Maine for over a week due to the storm in New York) I can drive. It's about 21 hours straight driving, so I'd sure like to ......
  6. 01/11/2008Are "CAPTCHA" losing their value for security? New bypass method completely avoids the problem of reading them.You might be a hacker. If you've ever been asked to read an image of distorted letters and numbers, then type them into a field on a web form, you're using a Captcha.The thing is, even though the programs that make the images are keeping ahead of the programs that read them, it is quickly loosing its effectiveness. Hackers are now using YOU to do the work. Suppose a comment spammer wants to automate adding stuff to your blog, but you've got captcha codes set up. These spammers are resourceful people. ......
  7. 01/11/2008Slingbox -- It isn't about T.V. over the internet. It's about my OWN T.V. over the internetI mentioned a few days ago that I got a Slinboxwith the gift certificate Barb gave me for Christmas. I'm really enjoying it, with all the time I spend waiting for the kids at one practice or another. What's interesting, is that lots of services are offering video over the internet, and most of what I'm watching I could get in other ways. Most of the networks offer their stuff a few days later for on-line viewing, iTunes sells the stuff, etc. The thing is, its a pain the backside to use those things. When ......
  8. 01/11/2008Want to learn to do surface mount soldering and repairs? Hands down, this is the best 8 minutes you could ever spend to learn how to solder properly. http://www.curiousinventor.com/guides/Surface_Mount_Soldering/101 The video is zoomed in super tight, the speaker is very clear, the demo is relevant, and the advice is both practical and accurate. He shows soldering and de-soldering of small, surface mount resistors, larger chips, and chips with very small ......
  9. 01/11/2008How to kill your own network.I woke up this morning to no network connectivity here in my home/office. Given that I have both a cable and dsl connection, with failover managed through my sonicwall firewall this is an extremely rare event. How did it break? I broke it. I recently moved from two servers at Serverbeach to a single more powerful server at The Planet. Having put the order in to cancel the two at the beach, I'd forgotten about it. My firewall, however, did not. It is configured to monitor the two connection paths by ......
  10. 01/10/2008Someone is picking on Gab. Not fair! Gab Davis, who is one of the most gifted Domino admins within our light cone has made a resolution to blog more. Only a few days in, some "Friend" (as if) has told her she should "tighten up" her style. Apparently this person thinks she should write less and edit more. Go check out Gab's blog and help us give feedback to whoever this person is, that they need to go get their own blog, and leave Gab free to say what's on her mind. I think if this person would give less advice, and spend more time reading ......
  11. 01/09/2008CULT Shirts 2008 Preview + Many Changes to the Lotusphere Wiki!Don't miss going to the Lotusphere Wikifor lots of stuff related to the conference. I've just added preview images of the 2008 CULT shirts, and a full 1280x1024 transparent background image of the "Don't Hate Me" logo suitable for desktop and presentation use. Have at it people. ......
  12. 01/08/2008Slingbox Rocks!Here's a tease for you. I'm in my car, parked outside the indoor arena where Ari is practicing her soccer. I've got the EV-DO card turned on, and am connected to my brand newSlingbox. I'm watching Jon Stewart and the clarity is perfect. I did adjust the buffer to a full 15 seconds, because this is a kind of bursty connection. In the first minute or so of the stream, it can be a little jittery, but slow the buffer fills up and the picture gets better and better as the "slingstream" uses the available ......
  13. 01/07/2008My most hated home repair jobs - wallpaper removal and drywall patchingWhen I was very little, I would not finger paint. The reason for this, discovered later, is that I have an aversion to any kind of dust, fine powder, or things that feel like they're coated with dust. This includes newsprint, chalk, and even dry soil. The idea of purposely spreading talc on ones body makes my skin crawl just to think of it. The idea of working with and even sanding down dry wall joint compound is enough to send me into full procrastinate mode for very long periods of time. Interestingly, ......
  14. 01/04/2008Microsoft Patents Frustration Detection System - so I've created a User Interface for it.According tothis article, Microsoft has patented a software and biofeedback based "Frustration Detection System". From TFA:I can't imagine anything more annoying then my PC waiting for me to get frustrated, then at just the point where I'm ready to toss it against the wall it interrupts me with a modal dialog ......
  15. 01/02/2008Video - Come for a Drive in the Snow! Bonus: Pics of my kids an Barb playing the snow!img {margin:3px; border:solid 1px blue;Today we got about 10 inches of perfect snowman snow, on top of 8 fresh inches of dry powdery snow just two days ago. All that went on top of a base of maybe 6 inches of older, icy stuff. The little boy in the picture is our neighbor.Just in case you've forgotten what it's like to drive in this stuff, take a look at this video, or just click any of the thumbnail pictures to see it larger. The driving was done just as the second storm was getting going, so all the snow ......
  16. 12/31/2007New Year's ResolutionsNew Year's Eve is here, and its as good a time as any to reflect on the stuff you know you should be doing but haven't been. Resolutions aren't so much about sticking to them like an iron clad contract. If we could do that, we would already have done those things. They're about thinking through some of what's going on with you and what you can do to make things better. In that light, here are some of mine: #1. Refocus on some of my core business products. Resisting the temptation to endlessly tinker with ......
  17. 12/28/2007Finally picked a replacement phone. Its almost a smart phone - and it wirelessly synchs my DOMINO mail, calendar, and contacts ......
  18. 12/24/2007According to the BBC, The UK is set to release beavers back into the Scottish Highlands.Barb had a funny reaction to this article. According to the article "Plans are in the pipeline for beavers to be released into the Scottish wild for the first time in 500 years." Reading further, it seems the beavers they'll be using will come from Norway. Barb got a very concerned look on her face when she heard this. From Europe, to Scotland, about 500 years..... she asked "they're not going to name the first one 'William' are ......
  19. 12/24/2007Christmas Eve Day here at TheNorth.comMerry Christmas to all of you. Even those of you who don't celebrate Christmas. No harm in wishing you a merry one. Here at thenorth, Barb and the Kids are already up at her parents place. My tradition is to put a good movie on, sit and wrap gifts, and wait for the FedEX and UPS trucks to bring the last of the last minute fun. Most years that works out. One year it didn't. At 9am on the 24th one year a fire call came in that kept us busy until late into the evening. Here's hoping that doesn't happen this ......
  20. 12/22/2007I'm thinking of unifying at least two of my three web sites, what do you think?I have three sites I try to maintain. This blog site, the main NCT site, and my Second Signal web site. I don't think I'm quite ready to fold in Second Signal yet -- it probably needs its own identity. Do I really need to be all that distinct between NCT and my blog? Many of my peers spend a great deal of time making web sites that look like they're big consulting agencies. I know one guy who's web site almost makes you think he's one of the big analyst firms. I can't imagine that the charade holds up for ......
  21. 12/22/2007The state of the cell phone market. What happened when I went shopping.I need a new phone, as I've stated before. I use a Motorola e815 and generally like it, but if I have to buy another phone (I have to replace one for my daughter) I thought I'd check out Blackberry, Windows Mobile, Motorola, and so on. I spent hours on this yesterday and came away disgusted. I tried the Blackberry 8130, and I liked its size and form factor. The typing for text messages was pretty great even with two keys per button -- I did have trouble finding the period when doing a web address, but I ......
  22. 12/21/2007Shit Happens - A old favoriteThis is an old favorite of mine, I thought I would look up and re-share. As we reach this time of such religious fervor in the U.S. and around the world, it will be of value to understand each other's viewpoints a little better. This is the shortest comparative religion course you can ever take. Taoism: If you understand shit, it isn't shitHinduism: This shit happened beforeConfucianism: Confucious say 'shit happens'Buddhism: Shit will happen to you againZen: What is the sound of shit happening?Islam: If ......
  23. 12/21/2007Sounds like they need a really really big VACUUM cleaner!10,000 Earths' Worth Of Fresh Dust Found Near Star Explosion ScienceDaily (Dec. 21, 2007) — Astronomers have at last found definitive evidence that the universe's first dust – the celestial stuff that seeded future generations of stars and planets – was forged in the explosions of massive stars. Check out this ......
  24. 12/20/2007A December for the books, surely.I just went out and took these pictures to show you that yes, we got another 6-8 inches of snow today. It is getting hard to find places to put all the snow, allowing the UPS guy to get to the door. img { margin:10px; border:solid 1px blue ......
  25. 12/20/2007Certified Unofficial Lotusphere Text!A new wiki has been set up to help people plan and have fun around Lotusphere. It won't work if you don't go play. Everyone gets to be an editor! http://ls2008cult.pbwiki.com/?full_access=sBKGMIyPKI&l=S Go make good things happen, ......
  26. 12/20/2007Northern Collaborative Technologies Recognized by IBM for Second SignalSecond Signal has been named as a Finalist for "Best Industry Solution" in the 2008 Beacon Awards!Second Signalis helping save lives and property by improving response to emergencies by fire departments.Find out more"This is the third time I've been recognized by IBM as a finalist or winner in these prestigious annual awards. This kind of consistent industry recognition is a huge achievement for any sized consulting organization, and an even bigger one for a small one like ours."Andrew Pollack, President ......
  27. 12/19/2007Oh Joy - More snow tonight, tomorrow, and then again this weekend...I like snow, but enough is enough - its only December! We're set up for another 6-10 inches of fresh snow tonight. That will make something like 25-30 inches in the last two weeks. Our winter doesn't usually get started this way. December in Maine is not normally a heavy snow month. Its a few cold days and some warm ones, with January getting really cold and February being our big snow month. No so this year! I'm off to get my stuff together, we're staffing the station again tonight -- the third time this ......
  28. 12/18/2007Quick, call for the Dread Pirate Roberts!Scientists have discovered that there really are ROUS (Rodents Of Unusual Size) living in the jungles of New Guinea. According to this BBS article, "A giant rodent five times the size of a common rat has been ......
  29. 12/17/2007Another Storm, Another Fire, & Driving a Bus in the SnowSome of you who've worked with me have commented that I tend to be very quick to change direction if things aren't going the way I'd planned. I don't marry an idea. I try hard to know when its time to go in another direction. Last night's events are a case in point as to why that's not a bad way to work. This has been a heck of a December for snowfall. I don't think we've seen the front yard uncovered since the beginning. We got another 8 inches of very cold, very dry snow yesterday which was then covered ......
  30. 12/15/2007O.K. I've relented and got rid of the ugly CSS. At least I hope so. You'll have to tell me if this is better. What this has really been all about is an update to the site. Aside from generally cleaning it up, standardizing the fonts, and other such junk, I've built in a bit of a color scheme management feature. I can now create and save color schemes using a form (as in the picture below). Then, in a configuration record for this blog site, I can switch between them using a simple radio button to pick between the defined color schemes. The CSS for this ......
  31. 12/13/2007Ho Ho Ho --- Holiday CSS colors on this site now.[Updated 12/14/2007 at 23:55] - I couldn't take it any more. I've decided to roll out some new design a little early. I recommend squinting a bit, and maybe shielding your eyes. Nathan in particular may be off his lunch for a while after viewing. The whole point of CSS was that you could over lay different looks without rebuilding the site. I thought I'd give it a try tonight. Maybe I'll give up on it and go back really ......
  32. 12/12/2007Ok, time for a new cell phone, so I'm going to solicit some e-pinions here...I know there are a ton of you people using crack-berries. I also know some prefer the Windows CE devices. The CE has an advantage to me in that writing apps for it will be a trivial change for me given that I'm already pretty comfortable in vs.NET. Still, crackberries are all the rage. Let me tell you what I currently have and what my goals are -- then you tell me what to look at. Right now, I have a Motorola e815. Its your basic clamshell phone, but a good one. It has the "Get it Now" from Verizon and ......
  33. 12/08/2007WWRD?WWRD? What Would Raj Do? Mary Beth Raven is talking about the latest "persona" they've created as part of their user-experience work. Raj is a Notes Developer. He's not real. He's what's called a "straw man" -- a stand in for the Domino Developers and Notes Developers out there. He's how the user-experience folks will be thinking about the day to day work process from the standpoint of someone doing that kind of work. When I'm writing code, I frequently have a real person in mind for the user. I try to ......
  34. 12/08/2007Existential Server AdministrationI've arranged for a new server, and while getting it set up have noticed something interesting. You start out by getting a login name and password, which you can then use to open a secure command shell session on your new server. We're talking about remotely hosted machines here, where access is primarily through a command line shell, or maybe a browser utility you like. Even though the operating system is what you asked for, the configuration is somewhat different than what you're used to. Your favorite ......
  35. 12/04/2007Some snow pictures after the stormIt wasn't exactly the "Storm of the Century" as the various T.V. panic people were talking about, but we did get a fair amount of snow. About 9 inches total over the course of around 20 hours. Take a look. a.picture { border:none ; margin:5px }Click any of these to see the picture ......
  36. 12/03/2007Headed for Philly tomorrow. Anyone feel like getting together?I'm flying in for a client site visit Wednesday and Thursday, and staying up in the Malvern / Valley Forge area. Anyone feels like getting together drop me a ......
  37. 12/03/2007Snow Day!Its a Snow Day here at Northern Collaborative and at Second Signal, our wholly owned subsidiary (yeah, they're both just me). We're expecting between 10 and 16 inches of fresh snow by tomorrow morning. So far we have around 4 or 5. Yesterday, I took the spouse-mobile (a 2004 Honda mini van) down to the fire station, pulled Engine 1 out on the ramp, backed the spouse-mobile in, closed the bay door, and swapped the regular wheels and tires for snows (on the van, not the fire engine). It was nice to be able ......
  38. 11/23/2007Posted some ideas to IdeaJamIf you haven't checked out IdeaJam yet, you should. I've posted three Ideas to get started. Bruce has done a great idea with the concept and it looks very workable. Use RSS feeds to keep up with new ideas, then vote them up or down. inwidth = 500;inheight = 150;id = "3C0AB5C09EADFDA08625739C007FF0C2";//-->inwidth = 500;inheight = 150;id = "935851559D016E708625739C00807A4B";//-->inwidth = 500;inheight = 150;id = ......
  39. 11/22/2007It looks like the session schedules are already starting to get filled in for LS 2008If you haven't already gone to the Lotusphere Sessions site and picked your preferences, you should really do so soon. The schedule is built based in large part on which ones you say you're planning to attend. Gab and I are doing our Jumpstart on Domino Security again this year, and that one is already scheduled with a big room and a repeat. I'm sure the Jumpstarts are easier to schedule as they have specific slots to deal with, so that why its in there so soon. The preliminary schedule looks like Gab and ......
  40. 11/20/2007Domino 8 on Linux - CentOS 5Well, my test platform ( allSpark ) had to undergo a reinstall. The Domino version 8 install won't run properly on CENTOS 4, which is what I had on there. CENTOS 5 works fine though. I'm sure with enough digging I could have found what was missing and added the right packages. I think it was java related. In any case, neither is a "supported" platform so it may be a bit of a moot point. For those who follow such things, I can confirm that CENTOS 5 does provide all the goodies the Domino 8 server needs. ......
  41. 11/20/2007My Lotusphere Sessions with their official links & descriptionsFor those of you looking forward to Lotusphere 2008, here's the official summary of my sessions. For those of you not looking forward to this event, or not planning to go -- if you're doing work with Notes and Domino, you're very foolish not to be there this year.Understanding Security in IBM Lotus Notes and Domino- Gabriella Davis & Andrew PollackSecure your environment. The Lotus Notes and Domino product suite offers an extensive array of features which work together to provide a strong, flexible, and ......
  42. 11/19/2007Interesting Day - I finally got around to starting my testing with a new version of Asterisk Domino administrators are spoiled. A new version comes out, we upgrade and it works. Its gotten so you barely have to test even a major revision. Backward compatibility is part of the QA process. The rest of the world is not that friendly to upgrades. A few months back I put a new linux based test server together. Its been sitting and waiting for me to start testing ever since. You may recall that I named my new server "AllSpark" after the device of the same name from the Transformers movie. Its a 64bit ......
  43. 11/18/2007Question for any Prius or other Hybrid car owners.I want to know. How many of you have driven with the headlights off a bit longer than you would otherwise do? How many have turned off the radio - or just turned it down? What else have you done while driving, secretly hoping to extend the time on the batteries and make it just a little further without that engine starting ......
  44. 11/18/2007Found a new RSS feed reader I really like. Its called AlestiI used to use Sharpreader, but that doesn't share well. Foxmarks is good in theory, but it seems to loose track of updates. The RSS reader in Notes 8 doesn't make me happy, and paying for a better one isn't my style. I'd sooner write one myself. In looking around, I came across "Alesti" http://www.alesti.org/ , and I'm back to keeping up with RSS feeds again. Its web based, but doesn't feel like a web application. It uses a three pane interface, with bookmarks on the left, titles in the upper right, and ......
  45. 11/15/2007Reviewing the Charleston, South Caroline fireA tough evening last night. As part of our monthly officers meeting at the fire department, we listened to a good portion of the radio traffic from the tragic fire in Charleston, South Carolina last August. We also had some photographs and location markers to see where things happened. In that fire, nine good men died. Before I talk much about what seems to have gone so terribly wrong, I want to point out a few things. 1. It is much easier to criticize the incident after the fact, than to manage it as it ......
  46. 11/13/2007The template for presentations at Lotusphere 2008 isn't ready yet. So I took a guess today.Ok, this is fake. I made it as a joke, based on templates from the past. This one hits all my "Favorite" things about Lotusphere slide templates. Anyone else want to take stab at ......
  47. 11/13/2007Product Recommendation - Philips SHE9500 Ultra Sound In Ear Headphones ......
  48. 11/08/2007A shout out to Tom DuffTom Duff sent me a book he wrote abouton his blog. The content is right up my alley.Its a solid technical look at how hardware interfaces are used. It is a strange thing, because there are some topics in there that are really old hat -- the software side of the interfaces and communication protocols in particular. Some of the hardware I'm fairly comfortable with as well. I'm not exactly new to the use of a soldering iron. Then there are places where the content is totally new. I've never built a digital ......
  49. 11/03/2007We are a soccer household... ......
  50. 11/03/2007Come see me at Lotusphere 2008 - Here are the 3 sessions I'm doingI'm going to be giving three sessions this year, and I'm really excited by all of them. I really hope you'll come see them.Linux for the IBM Lotus Domino Administrator-- Zombies & daemons aren't just for killing! This session is updated from last year and its my new favorite. So many people are using Domino on Windows servers more because they aren't comfortable with Linux than because they've made a choice that they like Windows better.This session is designed to give the Linux newbie everything they need ......
  51. 11/02/2007The most insanely sick picture of lightening I've ever seen.This pic is copyrighted and being shown on a site that probably paid for it, so I'm linking to it by not displaying it in line. Link to Lightening PicWe're expecting some heavy weather here in the next 24 hours. It should be a fun day on the fire ......
  52. 10/31/2007Finally figured out an oddness in Notes 8 that I've had for a good whileI've used the keyboard shortcuts for "Create Mail Message" and "Create Mail Reply" for years, but since upgrading to the Notes 8.0 BETA I didn't have them. They simply were gone from the menus.I knew these were a function of a check box on the property settings of the forms in the mail file, so I assumed when I checked that design that they'd been accidentally left off by development during the beta. When I upgraded to the Notes 8.0 client, however, they didn't come back.I checked the properties box on the ......
  53. 10/30/2007Designing your web site for YOUR target browsers - Not just "global" standardsSecond Signal's web site has been the focus of a great deal of my time recently. I'd love to use all that screen real estate on the right side that my laptop's wide screen shows, but before even attempting that I needed to understand what other people would see. There are lots of sites out there declaring that most people are using 1280x1024 screens now that LCD panels have been standardizing on that at 17" for so long. Other sites say the majority are 1024x768 still. Pretty much nobody is running at ......
  54. 10/27/2007Laptop Performance Quest - An affordable way to use SSD (Solid State Disks) in my current laptop.Solid State Disk -- essentially big flash drives in the shape of and with interface level compatibility with internal laptop drives -- is here. They don't compete for size with traditional spinning drives, and won't soon for anything close to the same cost. But they can be used effectively. What got me started this time was realizing that I had this modular drive bay in my Dell D820 that is currently filled with a CD/DVD that almost never is needed. I found a $50 unit that goes in the same bay, and is ......
  55. 10/25/2007Domino 7.0.3 in ProductionJust a quick heads up on the newly released Domino 7.0.3. I've had it up in production for several days. All is well. Performance may be improved. Of most value to me is the ability to reduce the time a users credentials are kept in cache. Since new users to Second Signal get added to groups as they join departments, updating the cache sooner has a distinct impact on their experience. This should also help with password changes and password refreshes (user forgets password so a new one is sent) being ......
  56. 10/22/2007Web access and logs are, in the end, about people.After the press release last week, and today's announcement of a referral program, I've been keeping a pretty close eye on the log files for Second Signal's public web pages. To do that, I've built a view that really limits what is shown. It only shows specific documents that are on the web site. It shows no image requests, and filters out nearly all web crawler robots. It also filters out my own addresses. What I'm left with is a very clear view of what pages people are actually reading, how long they're ......
  57. 10/22/2007iRobot Roomba 560 vs. 3 Kids, 2 working parents, 1 cat, lots of mess.The short verdict - its a keeper. For a nice change, the product actually does pretty much what it says it does. It isn't perfect, but the carpets and floors are cleaner with it than without it. It isn't entirely effortless, but the combination of cool factor and function do result in the job getting done better and more often than before. I've been very skeptical of these things. They're small - more akin to a little rechargeable dust buster than a full sized vacuum. They're self-roaming -- I had little ......
  58. 10/19/2007What old favorites live on your hard disk? How old is your oldest? Can you still remember what they do?Some of these may be older than some of you reading this blog. I was going through the file system on my laptop as part of generally cleaning it up. I do that once in a while -- removing old junk, uninstalling software I tried once and didn't like, generally putting things to rights. Anyway, as I was looking at the file system, I came across a directory I've copied from machine to machine for quite a while now. In fact, I've copied this little directory full of utilities through more upgrades than I can ......
  59. 10/18/2007Second Signal - Today's press release starts up the big pushThis press release went out today. It marks an end to the tinkering and the first real push to get this thing out in as many places as I can. I don't usually do "sales stuff" on this blog, but it seems pointless not to put up my own press releases. Second Signal Helps Small Town Firefighters Save Lives and PropertyUsing cutting edge technology, Second Signal is helping fire departments across the country better respond to daytime emergencies.Thursday October 18, 8:43 am ETCUMBERLAND, Maine, Oct. 18 2007-- ......
  60. 10/17/2007Attention IBM Partners - Domino 7.03 is now out for distribution -- or so I'm told -- but don't wait. Partnerworld is going down AGAIN at Noon Eastern US time on Friday the 19th.Apparently, it is our responsibility to "Please Plan Accordingly" IBM Partners who want access to IBM software, must pay IBM $795 a year. For this, they get access to the worst download interface I have ever come across and a web site that just shuts down for a few days at a time whenever they decide to perform "Maintenance" on it. IBM Partners have been screaming about this kind of garbage for years, but mostly in forums with limited access. There has been little response from the Partnerworld program ......
  61. 10/16/2007My Mother-In-Law the ComputerPeople have histories that you never really consider deeply enough. I had a really interesting conversation with my wife's mother over the weekend. She had asked about the route I'd planned to take, as I needed to go from her place on the coast up to Bangor where Coryn had a soccer game. I answered that I didn't know; I'd just plugged in the field's address on the GPS, and it told me I'd need about two hours to get there. I would do what it said and get there within a few minutes of that estimate. Instead ......
  62. 10/08/2007The results of the Falmouth Fall Classic (Soccer)Cumberland's U14G division 2 team (Coryn's team) beat Saco again, dominating most of the game and winning the finals! Cumberland's U14G division 1 team (Ari's team) beat the other Saco team then faced Gorham in the finals. Gorham beat PAYSA 6-2 in their semifinal and was considered by all to be the heavy favorite for the win -- and the overall win at the State Cup level when all is said and done. The final went 1-1 through over time and into sudden death where at the last minute Gorham scored, ending the ......
  63. 10/07/2007Tommorrow is Andrew Day. It is a national holiday. Banks will be closed. Schools will be closed. The Government will be closed (but who can tell). Many people will be home from work. Why? Columbus day you say? Nope. Tomorrow is Andrew's Birthday. Here's a hint, it's a big one, and the least significant digit is a zero. ......
  64. 10/07/2007Soccer Update -- Coryn's U14G Division 2 team won their game today, leaving them #2 in their grouping.Oddly, finishing second in their group puts them in the finals against the the very team they beat today. The game was close and it could be anyone's game tomorrow. That's what happens when they're only one group in your division I guess. Ari's team plays in the Semi-Finals at 8:30am tomorrow. If they win that game -- and they should, as they've beaten that team twice before -- they play in the finals against their arch rivals from Gorham who have an extremely strong team and beat them 2-0 last time they ......
  65. 10/07/2007Another holiday weekend, another soccer tournament - Ari plays with an injurySoccer, soccer, and more soccer. Caitlin has been playing at the AYSO level. AYSO -- the "American Youth Soccer Organization" is an "everyone plays" recreation level league. I've actually done coaching in this league. They teach parent-coaches the basics and it really isn't hard to do since you're really just teaching the basics of the game and keeping the kids happy, safe, and excited. AYSO's principals are great for getting kids into the game. The league tracks kids and coaches carefully. No favorites, ......
  66. 10/04/2007Is Transparent Aluminium Here?"New Material is extremely strong — and TransparentThe stuff is really strong, really stiff, and lasts a long time. It isn't porn though, it is a polymer. From TFA: "Science Daily — By mimicking a brick-and-mortar molecular structure found in seashells, University of Michigan researchers created a composite plastic that's as strong as steel but lighter and transparent."TFA: ......
  67. 09/30/2007Congratulations to the German Women's World Cup Team!My daughters and I have been watching the Women's World Cup by tape delay over the last couple of weeks. Although we were disappointed by the loss of the USA team to Brazil last week in the semi-finals, it was still great fun to watch the games. Brazil plays with all the passion and heat you'd expect from Brazilians. They have some amazing talent, including a 21 year old who is possibly the best woman playing the game at present. Marta as so amazing to watch that you can't help but appreciate the way she ......
  68. 09/28/2007If your union runs your benefits, who do you strike against?Health Care costs in the U.S. are driving the costs and decisions of nearly everything else now. Companies like GM which have obligations negotiated over past decades in this area are finding these costs strangling as they have to compete with newer manufacturers that build plants in non-union states or have contracts negotiated more recently that manage health care differently. GM cites a $10 per hour per employee cost difference as a result. Enter the most recent negotiations with the UAW. GM has managed ......
  69. 09/25/2007Common cold, or geek let down?Since getting back from IBM in Westford on Friday night, I've been pretty under the weather with a low grade fever and stuffed up head. It could be just a common cold (when will they finally cure this?) but it could be geek let down after two days of some really good future tech. I don't do fever well at all, so I'm mostly sleeping it off. I'll write more on the weekend once this thing is ......
  70. 09/23/2007The Domino Server and Lotus Notes client have an exciting futureI (and some others) had a recent opportunity to participate in some long term future discussions with the IBM development teams. I can't talk directly about anything specific that I've been shown, but I cannot help but report that the future has more cool stuff in it than I'd thought possible in a much shorter time frame. The IBM teams are focused on making the product more robust, much easier (and less expensive) to support, and much more easily integrated with -- well, pretty much everything. The ......
  71. 09/15/2007Government is not formed from the top down.Nation Building is a 20th Century idea and it’s time to move on. I’m speaking of course about what we’re trying to do in Iraq, but the discussion is much larger than that. The whole of the 20th century with all its fantastic advances in health, wealth, and happiness for the world’s wealthier nations has been a disaster defined by nothing so much as the – sometimes unintended -- consequences of our misguided attempts to bring our brand of success and values to the less successful and less powerful. The more ......
  72. 09/12/2007Certified Unofficial Lotusphere Tee-shirt -- Sponsors Requested!Certified Unofficial Lotusphere Tee-shirt Once again it is time to sign up sponsors for the annual C.U.L.T. As always, we’re running late. Rocky will be posting this year’s top-10 poll soon, meanwhile I need to start setting aside sponsorships and planning for the number of shirts. One of this year’s goals is to create a fun shirt that people will want to wear – The design will be something a little bit less gaudy but still fun. This year’s theme isn’t a secret (though of course the final top ten list will ......
  73. 09/02/2007All I want for Lotusphere 2008 is a.....Its months away, but the planning is in gear so I thought I'd jump in here with the top item on my wish list. I've given feedback like this privately to a few people; but its time to ask for in a more public way. ( EDIT NOTE: I am specifically referring to using the Eclipse Based Lotus Notes client to access data stored on a Domino Server) I want to go at least one, maybe as many as three serious sessions about creating new style applications for Domino in the Eclipse Framework. Here's the rub though -- I ......
  74. 08/31/2007Some countries can no longer access my servers.I've been going through my logs. Not just web server logs, but also SMTP logs, firewall logs, etc. I did some quick analysis of IP addresses by country, and created a simple ratio of friendly hits to unfriendly ones. By unfriendly I mean password hack attempts, spam attack attempts, exploit attempts, probes, and all the other ugly shit. Based on that, I've blocked all IP addresses in some countries. All of them. Entire countries. In most of them, there was not a single "Friendly" hit compared to thousands ......
  75. 08/30/2007School Has Started!7:30 and already there is peace and quiet. Having a home office is great. You can be there for your kids when needed, work after hours, take care of home stuff during working hours, and general make whatever use of time you need. Its also terrible. It mixes home and work time in the worst possible ways. The balance can be hard to manage. If you ask Barb, I don't manage it terribly well. Today is the first day of school here in Cumberland so for the next two days I have several hours of peace and quiet. Of ......
  76. 08/29/2007Things I didn't know about most current laptop batteriesBattery technology changes fast right now. Most current laptop models use Lithium Ion batteries. These are really odd things. They store an insane amount of energy for their mass. Any time you have that kind of energy density its dangerous. These batteries have complex electronics inside their packaging that's designed with a number of fail safe circuits so they don't just burst into flame. As we've seen recently, they haven't always been successful. I'd forgotten how long this laptop could run without a ......
  77. 08/28/2007On a lighter, and more important note -- Help me pick some SF classic films to show a friend.I have a dear friend who's in many respects as geeky as the rest of us, but who has a horrible sad lacking when it comes to classic science fiction films. We're doing some work at the same client and its within driving range of me, so I thought I'd bring some films, a projector screen, the lcd projector, some descent speakers, and a dvd player and play catch up in evening. With some help from a couple of others, I've put some top picks in a list here, but as long as I've gone to that much trouble now is ......
  78. 08/27/2007If someone made these statements to you, in the order shown, would you find them deceptive?Yes, I'm still going on about this. These people deliberately told me something would ship overnight, but only when pressed would admit that they couldn't commit to when it would actually ship. Sure, they'd ship it overnight once they shipped it, but it could be 8 days before that actually happened. Keep in mind, I'd already been promised the item overnight 3 times and been shipped a package without it. "The replacement order will be sent to you overnight." -- but then when pressed to find out WHEN it ......
  79. 08/25/2007Dell no longer wishes to do business. They're a mail order company that has forgotten how to mail things. Now off my recommend list for good.It’s a good thing Dell is starting to sell via Wal-Mart. That’s where they are headed anyway. They’ve just lost my business, and I can no longer recommend them to anyone. It is now finally completely clear to me that Dell simply doesn’t want to do business. I have posted here about my issues dealing with Dell’s extremely bad customer service before. I’ve had shipping problems, I have had sales people refuse to give me part numbers so I could order them directly, and I’ve had their corporate sales people ......
  80. 08/24/2007Software Complexity Peaking AgainLotus Notes 8 is a huge step forward in what developers will be able to do. I’m already seeing the first posts in partner forums and on blogs showing simple side bar applications that make use of some of the extensibility. These remind me of the first wiz-bang buttons and actions in Notes 4 that used Lotuscript. In those days, that kind of work was considered very high end development for Notes. Today of course, most Notes developers think in LS and forget how easy formula language is to work with. In a ......
  81. 08/21/2007RIM should be embarrassed by their failure to support customers. RIM may be the darling of the wireless communications world, but from where I sit they’re not treating customers very well at all. They’ve created a situation where customers can easily find themselves locked out of the system for hours or even days though what would otherwise be acceptable business practices. I’m involved in a project right now that includes a goal of building a redundant Blackberry configuration for disaster recovery. People rely on these things now for doing important work, and an ......
  82. 08/16/2007Facebook -- the fastest I've ever dropped a social contact website.Someone please tell me what possible value is to be gained from this other than a nightmare of constant message pings telling me this one has added me to a "friend list" or that one has left his bedroom and moved to the kitchen or no longer likes the color blue. Who cares? Are they trying to re-create the seventh ......
  83. 08/15/2007Its new stupid meme time! Which Transformer are you?According to this site, I'm 73% Optimus Prime I AM 73% OPTIMUS PRIMETake the Transformers QuizOptimus Prime is the heroic leader of the Autobots. He is the personification of courage, strength, and integrity. His personal motto is that “Freedom is the right of all sentient beings.” Like Optimus Prime, you are good by nature. But beware because mischievous thoughts sometimes tempt you. You are inspiring, confident, and a natural leader. The Autobots have chosen well. In addition, you use technology when you ......
  84. 08/15/2007What's the most boring show on cable you get sucked into for reasons you'll never understand?Cable TV brings us new heights of insanely boring TV we can't stop watching I'm sitting here completely fascinated by one of the most insanely boring programs I've ever watched. I realize that doesn't make sense, but that's the way it is. Its worse than watching golf and yet somehow I can't turn it off. If you're really, really board, check out Ice Road Truckerson the history channel. What's the most boring show on cable you get sucked into for reasons you'll never ......
  85. 08/15/2007So which campaign is Karl Rove going to?Karl Rove is leaving the White House. If you hadn't heard that by now you aren't someone who cares. I can think of three reasons why he'd do that other than the ubiquitous "to spend time with my family" answer they all give. Some say its because some new scandal or a resurgence of ugliness related to an existing one could put him in in the same place as his buddy Scooter. I don't buy that. If that was going to happen it would have already. The Libby pardon was held back as long as it could be to allow the ......
  86. 08/13/2007Ear Bud Pads -- by the bagfullEar buds, those little headphone things that come with iPods and similar products have these cheap foam pads on them. They come off. Now the ear bud isn't useful or isn't comfortable. You can buy more expensive ear buds, cheap replacement ones, or a Belkin 5 pack of pads for $10 (ouch). I win. I found a place that had a bag of 100 of them for under 20 bucks. HA. Now I can use all the old ear buds again whenever I ......
  87. 08/10/2007More really bad travel thanks to US Airways and their horrible serviceThe flight to Philly was terrible, but at least there was a flight. On that one, though having booked in advance and having selected a seat in the isle near the front, I found when I checked in at Boston that my seat had been taken away and I was forced to take a last minute back row non-reclining one. Then, this airline actually took the time -- mid flight -- to get on the PA System and give a minute long scripted pitch for their credit card, including walking down the isle with the brochures. This is ......
  88. 08/09/2007CNN -- Back off Bob Murray a bit Bob Murray is the part owner of a mine where rescue operations are underway right now. The men trapped 1500 feet below the earth may be alive, may be injured, or may be dead. These kinds of stories are always a huge draw for news programs like CNN, and in my memory the owners of the mine are usually faceless companies represented by expensive PR machines. CNN is operating in full "gotcha" journalism style when they interview this guy. We, out here in opinion land, can't possibly know what caused the ......
  89. 08/08/2007Late to the JSON bus - In a nutshell, its a simplified hack that is easy to work with even in its ugliness[] Many people in the blogging community around Lotus Domino have been pushing JSON for a while now. These are mostly user interface oriented people who do a lot more front end web site development than I do. I'm late to the table with this technology, but on investigation it looks like the best workaround to a bad situation I've seen yet. I want to talk more about JSON in the context of some suggestions for the Domino server rendering useful data. I'll do that in another post, but for now, here's a very ......
  90. 08/06/2007I promised pictures yesterday -- well, here they are. All taken on Saturday late afternoon.These were all taken in or off the coast of Friendship, Maine. Friendship is a very small fishing village far enough off the tourist track of Route 1 as to be largely filled with people who either live there year round or returning summer after summer in established communities. Barb's parents have a really nice place up there on Davis Point looking onto the bay. They're terrific people, and her brothers as well are great to be with. This summer Barb has been taking the kids up there most weekends while I ......
  91. 08/05/2007Where, exactly, is Cumberland Maine anyway?I get asked all the time from people, "Where is Cumberland?" so I decided to post a couple of pictures from Google Earth. Its pretty far Northeast -- about as far as you can go and still be in the US (though people here call it "Southern Maine". I've marked on the map both Cumberland, and further up the coast Friendship, Maine. The next posting has a bunch of pictures taken in Friendship from my In-Laws' place there. This post should add some perspective. ......
  92. 08/01/2007Is a 'System Engineer' really an Engineer?Do you call yourself a "Software Engineer" or maybe a "System Engineer"? What happens when the stuff you "Design" doesn't work? A network goes down? Maybe a few users don't get their email? Today we see a reminder of what happens when an ACTUAL engineer gets things wrong. Maybe you really want to rethink using that word unless you're up to doing the math that would have prevented this. ......
  93. 08/01/2007Have you ever wished you could replicate non database files on your servers?I've been using a tool called "unison" to keep the files on a pair of linux servers in synchronization. Its available for Windows as well though. This is a command line utility that works very much like Domino replication. A hash database is used and compared rather than a simple look at file dates and names, so renames, deletes, changes, and new files are all replicated effectively. I'm using it at the file system level to keep not just the files in the domino/html directory in sync, but also several ......
  94. 07/31/2007Geek of the week at ServerBeach Look who got to be the marketing chimp for last week's "Geek of the Week" at SeverBeach! ......
  95. 07/26/2007What Are Chrysler's engineers thinking?From the "WHAT THE HELL ARE THEY THINKING?" category.... In a classic ADD moment, I left my car keys at the hotel in Tampa this morning, and didn't discover the loss until I was at my car in Boston. Given that the spare key is at home home in Maine about two hours away, I thought that I'd try out that AAA membership that I've had for years and have used for nothing other than a discount on hotel bills. The call to AAA was quick, and they called a locksmith who assured them and me that it would be no ......
  96. 07/25/2007Second Signal welcomes its first out of state department on-lineYou know how much time I've spent bringing the Second Signal venture to life. Today is a big milestone, because they're a department with no affiliation to me other than this, and thousands of miles away. They received their equipment today, and once plugged in it immediately started relaying audio and tone notifications as it should. The remote support tools also worked right away and the periodic "ping" updates to my servers happen like clockwork so I can see if there is any problem. So....Welcome to the ......
  97. 07/24/2007What should you be doing now, to get ready for that big upgrade later this year or next?Notes 8 is due out soon. Some of you will perform your own "Zero Day Upgrade®" while others will wait six months or more. This isn't an upgrade like any in recent history. This one is big on user-focused change. That means the upgrade planning is more important no matter how smoothly the "Wizards of Westford®" make the technical process. There are things you should be doing right now, to make sure you have the tools in place to do the job right when it comes around for you. You're going to want to manage ......
  98. 07/24/2007Hello from Florida! I'm at a client site for a change, and having a great time there.Some clients are a pleasure to work with. Today was one of those days you get to enjoy working with people to get something done. As a matter of policy I don't disclose most client names here, but since I know that at least one person there reads my blog, let me say in a most public way "Thank You". The client purchased NCT Simple Sign On, and asked me to come down to help them quickly get it integrated with their project. Though they'd already gotten the demo version up and running quickly, time pressures ......
  99. 07/22/2007The best detail all year longEach year, Engine 1 gets assigned to help out neighboring Yarmouth on the Saturday evening of the annual "Clam Festival" for the fireworks. We stand by in case things get out of hand or the fallout lands on something dry. Not much chance of that tonight with all the rain we've had unless they're using napalm. Chief Fairbanks over there always takes good care of us and this year was no exception. He tends to give us a spot right up close but just slightly ......
  100. 07/20/2007"Is it fear or courage that compels you, fleshling?" - Megatron Ok, I admit it. I liked the movie. Yes, from an artistic, intellectual, scientific, and aesthetic perspective it did truly suck. At least it wasn't a chick flick though. It was an hour too long, but it was fun anyway. Oh, and aside from the best line in the movie, courtesy of Megatron, I also got the name for my new linux server. It will be called ......
  101. 07/15/2007Valuation of productivity measurments as cumulative minutes saved by employees -- do you buy this?Someone I know was recently talking about a paper that could potentially explain a pretty huge annual savings by saving each of thousands of employees a moment or two each day. I personally don't put much credence in these kinds of savings unless we're talking about people who are essentially a fully utilized resource pool like a call center or production line worker and then only if the time savings happens during their core productive time and not on breaks or as they're getting started. In that case, ......
  102. 07/14/2007Andrew J SimpsonCreate your own at ......
  103. 07/13/2007What is your Minimum TTL for productive work?When I'm programming -- not tossing off a quick bit of script but really working hard on something new -- there is a minimum amount of time that I have to be able to devote to the process or it isn't worth bothering to sit down at all. For me, it is probably something around two hours minimum but three is really better. If I can't put at least that much time without being interrupted into the work than its as if I am starting over after each break. How about you? Do you build a model in your mind of the ......
  104. 07/08/2007Techo-Karma, and I'm on the payback side for a change!A few months back I had a week go by where everything I touched broke. That's unusual for me. Nonetheless, it happened. Software didn't work, I went to clean up a PC and killed the motherboard, it was endless. It cost me a few hundred dollars to put things right, and then a few weeks later I picked up a new system board -- and went to a lot of trouble to find one that would support the same P4 and ram from the one I broke. Of course, this strange negative karma was still with me. When I put the old ......
  105. 07/04/2007Great product if you support remote machinesPart of the magic of Second Signal involves remote data collecting workstations. I'm using low power "thin client" machines with no moving parts, but they still need support once in a while for software upgrades and settings changes. Since these machines will be sitting behind almost any kind of consumer grade firewall and NAT router you can think of, I needed a way to remotely manage them that would -- most of the time -- not require me to spend time with clients reconfiguring their network settings. ......
  106. 07/03/2007Upgrading from Visual Studio.NET 2003 to 2005 ......
  107. 07/02/2007Web Services - Great everywhere but the web. At what point will we finally put an end the entire load of cap that spun out of the late 1990's and into the software we're stuck using every day. If ever there was an over-engineered, under usable specification, it was SOAP -- the stuff that makes what we call "Web Services" happen. SOAP is an XML based specification that allows the exchange of complex data types between systems connected only in the most loose manner over the internet. A great testament to the senior programmers at IBM, Microsoft, ......
  108. 06/29/2007What about the children?Of course, it's not just me that's been busy the last two months. Caitlin has finished 2nd grade has both parents to herself for three weeks while Ari and Coryn are at an overnight camp. Its one of those classic New England summer camps that I thought only existed in movies. Barb and Caitlin are going up on Saturday to see them and to wish Coryn a happy birthday -- she's 12. I can't go as it is my turn to be the "weekend duty officer" for Cumberland and there is a good chance it will be active around here. ......
  109. 06/29/20072007 New England Regional Fire/EMS Show -- The big Second Signal DebutSecond Signal made its trade show debut in Springfield, MA last weekend. It was a lot of work, but a great time. I drove down on Wednesday with my car fully loaded with all the stuff I needed. Thursday was move in day, and by getting there by 8am I was able to drive right up to the location of my booth and save a lot of hauling. I spent Thursday setting up and getting ready, only to discover I'd left one of my signs at home. I called and had Ari fill out a fed-ex slip and the sign was to my booth by 8am ......
  110. 06/29/20072 months overdue for a bunch of blogging. Man I have been out straight...Figure this for a 'heads-up' blog. I've had a lot on my plate and it's time to catch up. Over the next few hours and days I hope to make up for that with a ton of ......
  111. 05/10/2007Andrew vs. The Mosquito Magnet Part 1 -- An attempt to solve a problem with actual scienceI live in Maine. Mosquitos also live in Maine. Many, many of them. Mosquitos also really like me. I must use up plenty of oxygen and exhale a great deal of carbon dioxide because that's what attracts mosquitos. Strangely, their bites don't irritate my skin much -- rather, the buzzing around my ears and eyes drives me insane. The device to combat these tiny terrorists is the "Mosquito Magnet", The device uses a bare trickle of LP (Liquified Petroleum) gas from a 20 pound cylinder -- your basic grill propane ......
  112. 05/06/2007Wow, what a weekend. Second Signal made it's trade-show debutI spent this weekend with Second Signal at a very small vendor show that was part of "Cumberland County Fire Attack School" (CCFAS). CCFAS is an annual event where something like 400+ firefighters take hands on classes in everything from advanced vehicle extrication to fire command. My personal favorite ever was "Get Out Alive" where I got to dive out second story windows in all my gear. A table at this show is incredibly inexpensive. There were like 15 vendors total -- most selling gloves, tools, safety ......
  113. 05/03/2007A very strange cache difference between LotusScript running in a WQO and Formula Language on a form.I have this form, and on the form is a field. The field is populated by doing an @DbColumn() call to a view in another database. The documents in that view are protected with reader-names fields, which are themselves group names. By adding a user to one of the groups, they see more documents. Makes sense, yes? Now, suppose a user is on page with this kind of field on it, and does a submit or something which cases his name to be added to a group that should let him see more documents from that view. How ......
  114. 05/03/2007Where's Andrew? Why is this blog so slow lately? Ok, I admit it, I've been really slow with new stuff up here lately. Let me give you a run down of the last few months, then we can agree that I'm caught up and move on. First, Soccer season is in full swing here now. Ari's team is out on the grass (well, what will soon be grass) and playing hard. Last weekend, for example, the team was in Glastonbury, CT for their spring warm-up tournament. Ari's team is considered top notch here in Maine, but going south to the soccer capitol of the US they had a rough ......
  115. 05/03/2007I think we've finally crossed the threshold in the attention span of most Americans regarding our policies in Iraq and anti-terror legislationI'm a serious time waster when it comes to television. In the evenings, after my brain turns to mush, I like to sit down and become a vegetable in front of the boob tube (yes, my TV still has a tube). I've noticed in the course of the last couple of weeks that virtually every show you watch now has an underlying message built into it about our policies in Iraq and our acceptance of such overreaching legislature as the so called "Patriot" act (the one that frees the U.S. Government from having to follow ......
  116. 05/03/2007A shout out to Baskin-Robbins, with their 31 cent scoop night to benefit the National Fallen Firefighters Foundation Thanks to LotusGeek for sending this my way...... The National Fallen Firefighters Foundation works to help the families and departments of firefighters injured or killed as a result of their work, and also works to prevent future incidents through training, research, and education. Take a look at their ......
  117. 04/27/2007Notes 8 Beta Reception in Second Life!This comes from an IBM person I met in my early explorations of Second Life. Anyway, I'm passing this along. ......
  118. 04/26/2007Have you considered what the basis for your decision process really is?Since being promoted to Lieutenant in my local fire department, I've had the added joy of being part of a monthly officer's meeting in which policies, procedures, ideas, and plans are discussed. We don't so much make policy -- that ultimately sits at the Chief's desk -- as we have a good deal of input to it and a healthy debate of the issues involved. As a result of this, some very clear ideas come forward as the basis for decisions. Three of these tenets have really come home to me lately, and I wanted to ......
  119. 04/24/2007Firebug -- the best browser add-in ever? If you're a web page developer, it could be.Cmdr Taco, famous of Slashdot (/. -- news for nerds) wrote of this tool in an article I read recently in either CPU or Wired magazine. It's a terrific all in one debugging and page analysis tool that sits in Firefox. It has features I've come to completely rely on. http://www.getfirebug.com/ The most important thing it does, is nothing. That is to say, it sits quietly unless called upon to act. A very small icon in the lower right corner of my browser allows me to open the working tool on any page, or ......
  120. 04/17/2007Storm Stories -- and better formatted pictures from the flooding and rain of power lines...This particular line is the one preventing power getting to my place. Believe it or not, this is a "minor" issue in terms of the priority list right now. Some of you may know that I've spent the better part of the last two days on the fire truck due to the severe storm. If you hadn't heard that Maine was hit badly, it's not a shock. Even though at one point three quarters of the residents statewide had no power, we don't make the news much. Part of the issue seems to be that the weather maps used by CNN ......
  121. 04/16/2007Cumberland flood 2007 - Heavy rains and 50 mile per hour winds mixed with occasional snow does a number on us.Here's some pretty raw snapshots taken from the front seat of my car as I ran around dealing with fire department stuff this morning. Featured are flooded out roads, down power lines, and general ugliness. More rain and wind is expected for the next two days. We're taking shifts manning the station and trucks, with Engine 1 positioned at a construction company garage on the east end of town while flood waters make response to that area from central very slow. [] [] [] [] [] [] [] [] [] [] [] ......
  122. 04/13/2007A Rocky Oliver health report!After a brief chat with Kelsey, I am happy to pass along the good news that the Dawg is up and around, home, and walking some with the assistance of a walker. I'm sure within a few weeks he'll be in better shape than we've seen him in a long time. I know many have been ......
  123. 04/10/2007It is unethical and unacceptable to use your security update process to play games against your competitors.For the 99 millionth time, I went through the Microsoft Windows update process, did their required reboot (Linux never seems to need to do that) and when I launch Notes what do I get but the old prompt "Lotus Notes is not your default email program...." dialog box. Yes, Microsoft has apparently decided it is acceptable to set Outlook as your default mail program frequently as part of their "Security" update process. As far as I am concerned, this is unethical behavior. The repeated abuse of this important ......
  124. 04/05/200717 calls in 24 hours as we get 15" of April Snow -- and I go to the city of Portland on Cumberland's Ladder 7Well, we got 15 inches of snow yesterday into this morning. Surprise! The forecast was for 5-9 inches and that was itself unusual for this time of year. This was heavy, wet, "heart-attack" snow that brought down power lines and left cars off the road. There were 17 call outs in the last 24 hours in Cumberland due to the storm, then this afternoon another very unusual event. About three times a year when the nearby city of Portland has a 3rd Alarm fire (which is an escalation from "Still Box", "Desk Box", ......
  125. 04/04/2007READ THIS -- It may save you a big headache with MS Update patch KB925902 !I'm still super busy, but wanted to post this heads up-- I started having major problems after installing patch KB925902 this morning. It is listed as a critical patch -- and for good reason. Unfortunately, it may have escaped early. I've other reports of issues but none as severe as mine as of yet. This may be a specific issue with some add-in I'm running, but since this is a new machine (built 1 month ago) and I'm not running too many weird things, I thought I'd warn you. My advice is wait until you have ......
  126. 03/25/2007Catching up -- Notes 8 and beyond, A trip to Microsoft, AJAX & Domino, Second Signal, Great People, fire trucks & paint ball guns, and hating how I workI have a lot to talk about. So much to talk about that I decided to title this blog entry the way I've seen chapters in old books titled with a list of all the things that happen without enough to ruin the story. I'm not as good at it though, so stick with me. First up, Notes 8 and Beyond. I've completely switched over from Notes 7.x to the beta of Notes 8 on both laptop and workstation. My mail template has been updated and I'm living the beta. I installed and tried the full version in the Eclipse ......
  127. 03/06/2007What ever happened to the concept of “Mine”?To me, it started getting bad with software licensing. You used to buy a software package and you owned it. If you wanted another one, you bought another one. Sometimes vendors would offer discounts for users who had bought their previous ones. If you moved to another computer, you had to re-install your software but you had the right to do so. That’s not all true any more. You’re often not buying software, you’re buying a limited term license to use software on one machine and not transfer it. In some ......
  128. 02/22/2007What a week!Aside from having both my wife's trip and my own mangled by Jet Blue, a fire to help with last week, the big storm, and a bunch of work -- I destroyed my desktop PC the other day. I've been living off the laptop until tonight. It will take most of the day tomorrow to get all my software reinstalled, but no data has been lost. This new machine is sweet enough to be fair consolation though. It's a Core 2 Duo with 2GB of matched dual channel 800mhz ram. The two processors are running at 2.2ghz (on Core 2 Duo ......
  129. 02/12/2007Great way to determine if a user has editor access to a document using AJAXWarning, this post is extremely buzzword and acronym heavy! I'm writing an application for the web right now that is entirely AJAX based, and uses back end Lotus Domino documents for data storage. Each back end document uses "READER" and "AUTHOR" names, but the code itself is all handled through agent calls made from the browser using AJAX. In some cases, I want to display edit controls if the user has editor access to the document where the data is stored, but otherwise not. I tried doing this in the ......
  130. 02/09/2007Well, so much for Dell. I had to tell someone today not to buy a new Dell PC.Like most of the geeks who read this, I'm someone people ask advice on what PC to buy. Often. I'd recommended a Dell machine to someone this week but got an email back saying they could only get the machine with Vista. Incredulous, I checked this out and it is true. Dell will not sell their new PC's to consumers without Vista. When I asked if they seriously would rather me go away than buy my fourth Dell machine, all I got back was "Why do you feel you do not want Vista?" Hey, Dell, how about because I'm ......
  131. 02/02/2007Product Review - HP C6180 All-in-One Printer, Fax, Scanner, CopierAfter finding my Epson printers to be complete garbage and essentially throw away items due to their very poor ink management (leaving clogged heads, wasted cartridges, and a bunch of money by the wayside) I decided to try an HP model this time around. After all, a good friend works there now. http://h20195.www2.hp.com/V2/pdf/4AA0-4465EEE.pdf The C6180 uses HP's newest ink technology with six individual color units which cost about $10 each at staples. They're not really large, but seem big enough to be ......
  132. 02/02/2007Addressing Changes to Daylight Saving Time (DST) in 2007 for Lotus Notes and Domino* Special thanks to Robert Ingraham at IBM for posting this information for distribution: New and Updated Information for Addressing Changes to Daylight Saving Time (DST) in 2007 for Lotus Notes and Domino is Available! Changes to Daylight Saving Time (DST) in 2007 in the US, Canada and Bermuda will affect the display and calculation of dates and times for Lotus Notes and Domino. To assist you with implementing changes to your systems, communicating the changes throughout your organization, and ......
  133. 01/29/2007VONGO SPAM! I tried the VONGO service as noted here.... and didn't care for it a bit. Since then, I'm still getting 1-2 email spams per week from them. I call them spam because I've clicked their option to unsubscribe on several occasions and still get the mailings. Their mail even disguises the "unsubscribe" with words designed to fool spam filters. Both characteristics tell me that this is unwelcome spam email. VONGO -- you've lost me for good now. There is no chance I'll do business with you for the foreseeable ......
  134. 01/28/2007So you've seen Second Life now. Do you still really want C.U.L.T. shirts there?About a dozen people have asked me for CULT shirts in Second Life. I actually stopped someone doing it themselves as it would have been a copyright violation for them to do it without permission. It is important that I protect that IP and make sure it isn't done unless it is done right. As part of exploring Second Life, I've learned to create a t-shirt for myself that is fairly convincing. It looks just like one I wear all the time around here. That was the point. It is, in fact, more like the actual shirt ......
  135. 01/26/2007The worst thing about Notes 8The question was asked in a panel q&a at Lotusphere ... "What are your favorite and what are the worst things about Notes 8". I've already blogged about my favorites. I'll tell you my least favorite right now. That I don't have it work with right now. That's it. Oh, I'm no fan of the Portal stuff sure, and I'm sure there will be some issues, but mostly I just want it as soon as possible. I didn't realize when I was watching the sessions showing the new user interface features and the new capabilities that ......
  136. 01/26/2007Corporate Presence in Virtual WorldsIf I were to arrive for a meeting at IBM’s Palisades headquarters, it seems unlikely that I’d be accosted and harassed by a pale skinned woman in a black leather bikini with wings and carrying a bull whip. IBM’s security presence would not tolerate behavior like that for long on their campus. Nonetheless, when I connected to Second Life to see IBM’s growing investment in that space I found exactly that going on at their “Theater B” – a gathering spot patterned after an amphitheater. The character in ......
  137. 01/24/2007Some favorite new things in Notes 8I'm in a repeat session of "What's new in Notes 8" and seeing things that are great. Some are long over due, some are new and brilliant ideas, and many are important incremental improvements. Here's some favorites: In views, the ability to select multiple documents using shift-click and ctrl-click on ranges and documents respectively. In rich text (like mail) inline spell check, multiple level undo, and better sections. Recent Collaborations -- I really like this. Just right click on anyone's name and see ......
  138. 01/24/2007Lotusphere 2007 so far -- followup to the first post, plus up to date with how it's gone. Updated (1)First a few more notes from the opening general session: The Band -- They rocked. They so completely rocked that I just had a great time. Lotus, IBM, stop looking. Make these guys a tradition. Make them part of the Lotusphere family. Bring them in for the opening session, as the band for the Wednesday night parties, and maybe even for the closing session. Let us get to know them, and them us. They're so much fun that they could very quickly become just one more thing to look forward to each year. I can't ......
  139. 01/22/2007Lotusphere 2007 - First Take, Opening Session, Overall Impressions so far -- IN BRIEFI have almost no time right now, and will post my usual "The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly" article at length later. The good news is, there really is no ugly. There's plenty of very good stuff, a few things I still put in the bad category -- but not that bad. Just not interesting and not yet dead. The new stuff is fantastic -- Quickr is going to be interesting, and clearly they have confidence in it. More details on it when I write the longer post. General First Impressions: More People -- there are a LOT ......
  140. 01/16/2007My sessions at Lotusphere listed here.RefreshSunday, 1-21-200708:00AM10:00AMJMP104 IBM Lotus Domino Security Features - A to ZSW 1004:00PM06:00PMJMP104R IBM Lotus Domino Security Features - A to ZSW 3-4Monday, ......
  141. 01/13/2007It's not David Beckham's move to LA that's shockingAny of you who read this site from anywhere other than the U.S. already know that David Becham has signed a 250 million dollar deal to play for a team based in LA. That's not shocking, really. They clearly hope he can fill seats, bring excitement, upclass the sport in the U.S. and maybe improve the players around him. That sounds like a great idea, really. At 31 the man is not, as some would say, hopelessly over the hill. No, what's shocking is this quote from the story in the BBS news.. ......
  142. 01/09/2007Ok, I've been tagged a bunch of times, so here's the 5 things you wish didn't know about meThis is one of those pyramidal memes that runs around blogs now and then. You're supposed to tell everyone in this twisted little community five things they don't know about you already and then pick five people who also should be telling their five things. I don't like to play by the rules (but you already knew that) so I'm tagging first. I'm tagging Vowe, Mother Vowe, Volker Weber, vowe, and vowe. I realize that's cheating but so what? He's avoided taking part so far so we already know he prefers to hold ......
  143. 01/05/2007Code Tidbit -- JavaScript to make all your button and text input elements easily CSS accessible.Ever want to do something in CSS that impacts only the buttons on your page? I came across a nifty bit of JavaScript that solves the problem of CSS applied to buttons rather than all input tags. A button is an input tag, and there is no CSS (current supported versions) selector for buttons specifically. This code, called in the onload() event of the document, will add a class name of "button" to all the button elements on the form, and a class name of "text" to all the text input device. Dustin Diaz had ......
  144. 01/02/2007Some technology is so cool you wish you could make other people use it.Remember that "Jawbone" I blogged about? It really works! YOU NEED one of these for Lotusphere. [] [] Some technology is so cool you wish you could make other people use it. After playing with the new Jawbone bluetooth headset, I really wish I could make anyone calling me at Lotusphere use one. After looking at [this demo] I went and bought one and put it through my own test. In a quick and dirty trial, I called myself and left voicemail using the headset. I was driving on the highway and the stereo was ......
  145. 12/22/2006Here's a helpful little addition to your Domino Development kit....Have you ever been frustrated going to look for which icon from the vast Domino 'icons' directory has which file name so you can use them in your own applications? Printing them on many sheets of paper works, but it's hard to find what you want. I've created this PDF which prints as a single page and lists all the icons in that directory with their file names. To get it to fit, I've excluded the ".gif" extension from the file names. ......
  146. 12/22/2006More great press - Second Signal in the local paperDecember 21st 2006 -- Falmouth Forecaster Software signals shift for firefighters; Volunteer develops automated notification system By Peter Smith (published: December 21, 2006) CUMBERLAND – Fire Chief Dan Small was at the Maine Mall with his wife doing Christmas shopping when he got a fire call – or rather, a fire text message. He rounded up his kids, went out to his truck and called the station. Then he listened to the previous 10 minutes of radio traffic compressed into less than a minute. In short, ......
  147. 12/21/2006This is a must have for Lotusphere. I will find one today if I can. I've never seen a consumer device higher on my "gotta get me one of these" list. [] [] The new "Jawbone" earpiece bluetooth headset for cellular phones is amazing. Take a look at [this ......
  148. 12/18/2006Yes, Christmas trees really do catch fire -- and you will not believe how fast they destroy a homeAnother firefighter send me this 60 second video showing a typical Christmas tree in a living room setting. It is worth watching, because within 60 seconds you would not be able to survive in this room. * At Ben's request, here is a link to information on making your tree more safe. ......
  149. 12/14/2006Dell Brilliance! Not!Part of the solution with Second Signal is a PC running at the local department. Rather than having departments go out and find their own, I thought it would be a nice idea to have an OEM machine built. I've had good luck with my Dell equipment in the past, and I know that Dell has a great deal of experience putting custom part numbers together like this. Thinking it would be a no brainier, I went to Dell's website and found an OEM page. I filled out the form to request contact and hit submit. It failed. ......
  150. 12/12/2006What a week! Another good fire, lots of attention for Second Signal, ..man, I'm tired already.This is a picture from the fire on Tuesday (last). This is the earliest I can find, and even here it shows the structure already collapsed. It was a 3 story wood frame structure with a wood shop, a garage, and an apartment in it. Although we lost the building itself (obviously it was fully involved before we got there) we did protect the house it was a few feet away from. The family never lost a night in their own home. On Monday (yesterday) Falmouth had a garage fire that went up in a similar way -- ......
  151. 12/09/2006Second Signal gets local TV coverage!Today I was interviewed for the 6:00 news on a local station. They showed film of the fire on Tuesday night, and introduced "Second Signal" to our little part of the world. The interview includes a great endorsement by Chief Daniel Small -- a shame they got his name wrong in the broadcast. You can see the video at this ......
  152. 12/08/2006A structure fire, a rolled over tractor trailer, and Second Signal begins to take offSorry for the silence - it has been really busy with the fire stuff this week. On Tuesday evening, just as I was getting ready to take Ari and Coryn to their soccer practice a call came in for a reported structure fire here in Cumberland. The call was on the west side which means Engine 1 (my crew) isn't on the initial response, but when they come in as a structure fire they usually escalate pretty quickly. I looked at Barb who decided that she could miss the Girl Scout meeting she'd planned to go to and ......
  153. 12/02/2006Can Windows Vista finally give me real screen size virtualization so we can stop using "large fonts" as a setting that doesn't really work?There are some things Vista could have that would really draw me in. Sadly, I can’t seem to find out if any of these are part of the product or not. In posting this, I’m hoping someone can either answer or point me to an answer for some of the questions. Number one on my Windows Vista wish list is that they virtualize the screen more. What I want is actually very simple. I want to tell Windows – in one place – that my screen resolution is not 72dpi, but is in fact 125dpi. Once that is accomplished, all ......
  154. 11/27/2006I AM.......excited to be telling you more about this year's C.U.L.T. shirt!As Rocky has announced on his blog, for this year's shirt we're bringing back the "I AM" theme from the R5 launch. We all had fun with that theme back in that day, and it really just radiated the excitement around the new product. Unfortunately, the campaign was short lived and many people just didn't see enough of it for the message get through. Still, it's one of those themes you can have a great time with. We're now collecting ideas for the Top Ten Alternate Responses to the "I AM ......" statement over ......
  155. 11/25/2006Black Friday? WTF? Are you that damn stupid?Every year I am stunned to see the idiocy of this whole nation. "Black Friday" -- so everyone has to line up at ridiculous hours to get into these stores to do what, spend money? With the rare exception caused by some idiot failing to meet project goals, just about anything you could buy today will still be available for most of the next three weeks. It won't be more expensive and they won't run out. If you let yourself get manipulated into this idiotic shopping rapture just so you'll get caught up and ......
  156. 11/24/2006New car toy has been orderedI'm not a huge music collector, and don't have a big portable music player. I do listen to audio books on long drives though. I've been using a Belkin FM transmitter to hook my cheap little MP3 player to the car stereo. The problem is, the airwaves are crowded as hell. You find a blank spot, dial the FM transmitter in and listen but less than half an hour later you're having to go through the process again -- and that's in rural Maine. I can't imagine how it's acceptable in a city. Of course, for me any ......
  157. 11/22/2006When is it too much security information?Between working on our Lotusphere Security Jump-Start with Gabriella Davis and doing a recent "Penetration Test" at a client site, I have been reminded of some really important steps that all Notes users should be taking to ensure their private stuff remains private. The thing is, if I start blogging the steps I take to poke into things I shouldn't, I risk providing the mental munitions that could fuel our own form of "script-kiddies" in the Notes world. I have no desire to do that. Nothing I'm talking ......
  158. 11/22/2006Car maintenance has changed a bit In the last week or so, a couple of things have really hit home how much different maintaining a car is from what it used to be. We still change the oil, but there are changes in virtually every other aspect of the car. While driving the other day, my car informed me through the dashboard console that one of the four tires on my car was low. Yes, it actually said "1 of 4 tires is low." I suppose simply indicating 1 tire would have left the total number in some doubt. It politely but insistently requested ......
  159. 11/17/2006Flakes on a Plane -- The next time I buy tickets on a US Air flight, someone slap meI hate this airline. I hate it more every single time I have the miserable misfortune of flying on it. Sure, all airlines have trouble from weather. The way you handle it, however, makes you a good or bad airline. As always, US Air handled it badly. I should have driven. All I wanted to do was fly home from Philadelphia yesterday. I was earlier than I'd planned, so the night before I'd forked over their $100 extortion fee for changing tickets -- itself more than a ticket on some airlines would have cost -- ......
  160. 11/17/2006Do people routinely send you mail prefaced with "Urgent:" or "Important:" on the subject? Here's something to try....Do people routinely send you mail prefaced with "Urgent:" or "Important:" on the subject? Do you know how often? Does it work? I have to tell you it makes very little difference to me on how soon I read the mail unless it isn't something I've ever seen that particular sender do. My immediate reaction -- one I've learned to control most of the time -- is to purposely ignore it and make an effort not to respond any faster. There must still be something left of my teen years deep in there somewhere. I did a ......
  161. 11/14/2006HOLY NOT LOOKING, BATMAN! Readers - you have an assignment, QUICK!* Updated: I was shown to be completely wrong here -- but in the interest of honesty in blogging I'm going to leave the post as it was. If you care to see, just view the comments. I'm staying at the Marriott West Philadelphia tonight and tomorrow night. I just was down at the front desk paying for some Doritos (I hadn't met all the parts of my food pyramid yet). The staff were all looking at the clock hanging behind the main lobby counter. Though it had been hanging there for years, it took a 5 year old to ......
  162. 11/14/2006And now, a new entry into the top 10 things you do not want to get for Christmas...This may not be the shower radio / shaving mirror you want to get for a present. There's a message in getting a gift like this, but I'm not sure I want to know what it is. Click here to find out ......
  163. 11/14/2006Dodge Charger for a Rental -- and the verdict is......So I rented this Dodge Charger from Avis in Philadelphia today. I'm here to do some security work for a big Notes shop (yes, I said Notes, not Domino). The verdict? It's a Charger -- in both the good and the bad sense of that. My rental is an under powered version, but frankly so were most of the Chargers ever sold -- and almost every one I ever drove. Like the three Chrysler products I've owned (which I mostly like) this is very hard to see out of when backing up. Charger improves on that, and is hard to ......
  164. 11/13/2006Web Site Design - softer topics are important tooAs someone who reads this site you know how much help I need when it comes to designing attractive, usable web sites. Technically I can make a site do whatever I want. The problem is making it do all the wrong things. I picked up Steve Krug's book "Don't Make Me Think" to get some perspective on this issue. It's pretty good, and about 90% of what I wanted it to be. The only thing really missing from my perspective is any discussion of color schemes and font choices. I've got that information from other ......
  165. 11/12/2006So wait a minute. Who is this 'Batman' guy, and just exactly who is copying who here?In the past few posts I've been working on Second Signal's new logo, and with your help I'm pretty happy with what I have now. The final straw as was that I now have a name for the logo itself. I'm calling it the "Hat Signal". A bit tongue in cheek maybe, and it isn't something I'll make formally part of anything, but it does bring to mind a question that has been bugging me. Who is copying who? In may of 1939 some guys named Bob Kane and Bill Finger started writing and drawing this "Batman" guy. So, as I ......
  166. 11/12/2006Internet Explorer v7 - First ImpressionsAfter allowing Microsoft to install this "Priority Update" which moved me from IE6 to IE7, I've played a little bit on both my laptop and my workstation. Overall, it's a step up but feels very unfinished. It's also extremely annoying in a few regards. Some problems I have with it.... 1. I f#cking hate "cleartype" which on my nice NEC 19" monitor makes text look vague and fuzzy even after using their free "tuning" tool. My Dell Laptop as well, looks like shit if cleartype is enabled. It may work better for ......
  167. 11/12/2006Still working on this -- you guys are great. Here's another stab at it.Update: A final logo was chosen. Click here to see it. Going back a step or two here. I'm trying to resist the temptation to add more and more complexity to the image. It's easy to fall into the trap of trying too hard to make it say too many things. ......
  168. 11/11/2006Yet another logo evolution, and yes, I'm still begging for feedback.Update: A final logo was chosen. Click here to see it. Great feedback so far. Since I love to push my luck, here's the next evolution in the logo design. The changes aren't based as much on specific suggestions as on what parts of the previous attempts were clear to everyone and what parts had people really confused (meaning my imagery didn't work). ......
  169. 11/10/2006Looking for opinions on this logoUpdate: A final logo was chosen. Click here to see it. Tell me what you guys think of this possible logo for "Second Signal". I'm too close to it. I've spent way too much time working on this to have an objective ......
  170. 11/10/2006C.U.L.T. 2007 Sponsorship is now briefly open -- more than 50% of sponsorships are now spoken forIt's once again that time of year to sign up sponsors for the Certified Unofficial Lotusphere T shirt! Last year's sponsors got first short at this year, and we already have several of the slots filled. This year we're going to have even more fun with the shirt and that gives us a few more options. If you're interested in sponsoring, you should read this and get back to me ASAP. I will update this page with the number of available sponsor slots periodically. Currently, there are 7 sponsorship slots left ......
  171. 11/09/2006Microsoft is sending out presents. Should you open them?I'm not sure if I dare, but ......
  172. 11/09/2006I've been accepted to speak once again this year at Lotusphere 2007, and on all new topicsThis year, I'm doing a session with Gab callled "IBM Lotus Domino Security Features - A to Z" as a jumpstart. It should be a good session, and Gab is brilliant to work with. I'm also doing one called "Moving IBM Lotus Domino to Linux" which is designed to give you the things you need to know in order to migrate a server successfully and then manage it remotely under Linux. I'm also doing something new for me. A hands on lab. Check this out and tell me what you think. Would you go? Mail Routing Mastery - A ......
  173. 11/09/2006Is the Iraq war really so different from the Vietnam war? In an argument on Volker's site, someone made the claim that they're nothing alike, and I should "look at the differences in our losses!". Well, I looked. Take a look what I found. In terms of non-mortal casualties per year, there are more in Iraq than in Vietnam. True, there are less deaths. We've gotten much better at patching up kids before they die. I'm all for that, but let's not kid ourselves that Iraq is mostly going well and it's just the media overstating the violence. The only thing I've seen ......
  174. 11/08/2006IMO, here's the real reason for Rumsfeld's resignation announcement todayWhat I don't hear much comment on is something I've seen this administration do over and over and over. They've succeeded in changing the conversation from their huge loss yesterday. They haven't been completely successful, but they have drastically reduced the volume of that loss and replaced it with something they have the control and focus on. It's a brilliant move, really. It steps on the press the Democrats are getting really really hard. If he was going anyway, what a great way to handle it for the ......
  175. 11/07/2006Notes 8 -- aka Hannover -- Install options. This is a GOOD thing.Over on Volker’s site, the discussion of Notes 8 installed as a standalone client versus the full installation with the Eclipse package and its features is leading to the same old trap of suspicion and critique before the product has even launched. Is it any wonder that these decisions are kept so quiet for so long? I like Volker and generally respect his opinion so please don’t assume I’m slamming him here. In this case though, I think pointing criticism at something that doesn’t exist yet and isn’t ......
  176. 11/07/2006New blog feature....I've made the "reply" box draggable. You can move it around if you like, so that you can see what is underneath. Try it, you may like ......
  177. 11/07/2006Mary Beth Raven thinks it's time to get rid of double-right click to close a Notes client window!I almost never link to someone's blog site and ask you to post there -- but in this case, friends of mine, I must beg for your help. Mary Beth Raven thinks it's time to get rid of double-right click to close a Notes client window! Please, for me, go to her site and pile on with the others of us all pleading for the feature to remain. It has been there for as long as I've been using Notes, and would be greatly missed. http://www-03.ibm.com/developerworks/blogs/page/marybeth?entry=right_double_click_to_close ......
  178. 11/06/2006If you're reading this and a citizen of the USA If you don't vote, don't bitch. The image below represents the approach taken by those who don't vote, preferring to simply hope things get better on their own.... ......
  179. 11/06/2006Pseudo fairness - a true mark of unthinking bureaucracy.It should be no shock to anyone that school systems annoy me almost as much now as they did when I was in school. Today it's all this talk about responsibility without actually giving the kids any and this idea that kids are born with a set amount of "self esteem" and anything you say to them could rob them of this precious commodity. Of course, that's bullshit. Kids are not necessary born with either enough or not enough of this mysterious "esteem" stuff. Kid's can build CONFIDENCE which is really what ......
  180. 11/06/2006Two hour jobs that take two daysDon't you hate those fairly straightforward jobs when everything that can go wrong does? Between games -- and mostly on Saturday -- I took on the job of replacing an old, noisy bathroom light and fan fixture. At the same time I put two coats of "Killz" on the ceiling and then a coat of nearly white semi-gloss paint. Over the years, some mildew had gotten into the old paint on the ceiling. The new high volume (low noise) fan and the fresh primer and paint (both with newer anti-mildew additives) should help. ......
  181. 11/06/2006Soccer Tournament Results!Cumberland (Ari's team) met Bangor first, and we were surprised by how well Bangor played. Ari started and played a defender of some kind (some kind of "double sweeper defense"?) The game went 0-0 through double overtime and Cumberland ended up winning by 1 on penalty shots. Ari played really well, making a goal saving hard run to shut down a play by taking the ball out at the last second at the goal line -- but was tripped (a real, no-bull, on-purpose, back foot kick kind of trip) for her trouble and came ......
  182. 11/05/2006Happy Birthday Ari!Ari turns 13 today -- and plays in her semifinal game against Bangor, then (we hope) the finals for the fall season. They're the #1 seeded team. I haven't posted pictures of any of us in a while, so here you go. As usual, just click one of the smaller images to see it full ......
  183. 11/04/2006Just let Domino do it! Sometimes we work too hard.Following up from my earlier post about xml and utf-8 encoding, I found "a better way". The earlier post talked about how embedded characters were messing up my xml feed. I spent a lot of time writing a complex formula to handle this. There is a better way. The feed for this site is generated on a "Page" design element with embedded computed text fields to pull in the data to populate the feed itself. I had done all that work to clean up the embedded data, but I didn't need to. The easier way to handle ......
  184. 11/03/2006The new blog design is now up, your comments are welcomeI spent more time than I'd expected, but the new blog site is now 90% in place. What isn't done is the new search form - which will be ajax powered. Some things to note: * No more new window for comment entry. That's done as a layer with an ajax style submit -- I opted to refresh anyway so your comment shows up. Let me know if you agree or dissagree with that. * There is a click to show comments, but no screen refresh. If you turn them on, they stay on -- saved in a cookie -- as your preference when using ......
  185. 11/01/2006SNTT (seriously geeky) - Some helpful @Formulas - clean up your XML, and convert from hex value strings to decimal numbersIn working to improve this blogsite, I found some challenges in creating good XML when the source data can be variable. The problem is that in formula language lacks easy tools for doing this. There is no simple XML transformation process that works the way @URLENCODE works. It sure would have been easier. First off, as you put together your XML string, you want to make sure to replace the "reserved" characters that are valid ascii values but still can't be in your content. By these I mean the greater than ......
  186. 11/01/2006Notes from the HAZMAT Refresher -- how much Benzene did you breathe today?This month’s HAZMAT refresher course, taught by Al Nygren of Training Technologies International, gave us a valuable new perspective on how our metering equipment works and the mechanisms behind some of the dangers we face. The course was a change of pace from the usual HAZMAT classes which focus on the decontamination process and identification of specific hazards. It had a heavy emphasis on the chemistry behind many of the fuels and oxidizers we may run into at any time. ......
  187. 10/31/2006Verizon Wireless - Broadband access for the Portland, Maine area is now active!You heard it here first -- Notice the last line... Cell phone reception at my house is terrible, but the rest of town is covered well. For several days I've been seeing the "EV" symbol start appearing in my cell phone display but haven't been able to actually connect to the EVDO broadband network until tonight. If I am able to get on with it from here with 1 bar and get 350kbps, that means almost everywhere else around here will give me close to 800kbps as an average useable speed. For those unfamiliar ......
  188. 10/30/2006Blog changes - finally. I've allowed the first mods to get out. Threading is still there, but you won't need to click and open new documents to see all the comments. Give it a try. There is a known bug (known to me) that I'll try to fix tonight. Obviously, there are no replies here so you can't see what I've done unless you click this link to see an old ......
  189. 10/27/2006Finally, we are getting very close to EVDO here in MaineI've been talking about how much I like Verizon's EVDO service for internet connectivity via the cell phone system. With a card in my PC, or with a bluetooth connection to my cell phone as a modem, I can connect and get DSL speed connectivity in most major service areas around the country now. In the rest of the places, I get 1xRTT service which is in theory up to 250kbps, but in reality works out to be about like using a dialup modem. The thing is, here in Maine I've had no EVDO service. It's well over a ......
  190. 10/25/2006Upgraded to Firefox 2.0The best news so far about this upgrade, is that there is no news. The upgrade was smooth, the product is slick and user friendly, and the new features work as expected. I am very pleased so far. From a performance perspective, it "feels" snappier though I've done no ......
  191. 10/24/2006Should I quit pretending that I'm going to have time to update this blog site and switch to Domino Blog?Ok, you tell me. I know some of you really don't like the UI on this blog design. I'm tired of it too -- but the idea of using some canned software doesn't thrill me. I've put off doing it because I have some big ideas for the site. So far, as anyone can predict, I've had no time to do anything about them. Tell me the truth -- does this design suck so bad I should dump it as soon as possible? One advantage to this one though -- no ......
  192. 10/24/2006Annoying as hell dialog boxesDon't you hate dialog boxes that offer no option? Here's a new one that really pissed me off yesterday.... Notice that there is no option here. You cannot close the dialog box without using the "Finish" button. You cannot deselect the option to restart the computer. The dialog is "Modal" so it will not go away without you doing what it wants. And it wasn't necessary, since I wasn't using the driver I'd updated. A simple warning telling me to reboot before I use the device would have been sufficient. ......
  193. 10/17/2006Cut the bullshit - the REAL real cost of leaving Notes is........the fact that you don't have it any more. That's right. If you win, you lose. You lose a secure, scalable, stable, redundant, standards compliant, and extensible platform in favor of.....what? Richard comes close to saying this in his blog. So what the hell. Discussions on several other blogs and sites recently about this topic focus on the costs of moving functionality out of Notes and onto some other platform. Some call this vendor lock in. That's wrong. It's a functionality lock in. The reason it is ......
  194. 10/16/2006Second Signal begins to become more publicAs of last friday, visitors to http://www.SecondSignal.com are seeing some early information about the service. Not all the details are there yet, but as there is press on the way it was time to put a bit of a teaser in place. ......
  195. 10/15/2006Small Town - Big Circus, great timeThe circus is in town, and just for a couple of days. Portland isn't a big place. Here in Maine, it's been years since the big top came to town so at the last minute I decided to take Coryn and Caitlin. Ari had other plans already. This is the same big circus that does the three rings in big stadiums -- but here in small town USA it's just the one ring. What a treat to see this show in so small a venue! Before the start, all the kids & parents gathered around the ring for a pre-show right there on the ......
  196. 10/13/2006Excellent History Channel Documentary on Fire Fighting 8-9:30pm tonight.According to several people, this is an excellent and realistic look at firefighting. History Channel Documentary on Fire Fighting 8-9:30 Pm tonight. http://www.history.com/minisite.do?mini_id=51524 About 'Into the Fire'Academy Award®-winning documentary filmmaker Bill Couturié goes beyond the firefighter hero image and into the hearts and minds of the self-proclaimed "ordinary" men and women who perform extraordinary acts to keep us safe. Through intimate interviews with firefighters from big-city engine ......
  197. 10/11/2006Latest conversation with my 7 year oldTalking with my youngest daughter has always fascinated me. She's a geek in all the good sense of that word. She may be the most natural engineer I have ever met. Here's a conversation from this morning, word for word: Caitlin: Can you open the garage door? Use the special button. I am pretending it only works for you and nobody else. Me: Actually, there are things that work that way. It's called 'biometric security'. It means things that only work when they can identify something unique about your body. ......
  198. 10/10/2006Piece of crap inkjet printers - The last Epson I will ever buyI own an Epson Stylus C86. Correct that, I own two. I also own another Epson all in one unit. The all in one sits by my desk, while the two stylus units sit with my kids in their rooms. By buying three which use the same ink cartridges, can keep a pair of each color on hand without having to have a distinct stockpile for three different printers. All three have had ink flow problems. Mine required a simple cleaning process -- it wastes about $10 worth of ink to do it, but it worked. One of the stylus ......
  199. 10/08/2006Have you checked your backup power supply lately?Today I was going through the fall chores, and one of those is testing the backup power and redundancy plan I have for my office and servers here. After changing the oil, filters, and spark plugs on the 12kw LP Gas generator outside, I ran a full power down test. That means walking over to the breaker panel in the basement and shutting off grid power to the house. Within 60 seconds, the house was automatically up and running on power from the generator. That's as it should be. The test confirmed the ......
  200. 10/06/2006Got my vmware server running on linux -- a very sweet setupIt took me a bit of work because first I had to make CentOS 4.3 recognize my AC'97 sound card and the drivers from RealTek wouldn't compile. I wanted sound in my VM's so that had to be resolved first. Once done, I downloaded the vmware server in "rpm" format and installed it. After spending a few minutes looking for what happened to it, I found the vmware executable and the configuration script and was up and running. The vmware configuration script isn't very smart. By default it wants to place your vm's ......
  201. 09/29/2006Tip: Log a user into a Domino website without a page refresh with this simple javascriptThese two functions are all you really need. The trick is in the ultra-simple first function listed below. The function uses the xmlHttpRequest made so famous as the core of the "Ajax" programming style. By doing an Ajax style 'Post' of the credentials to the Domino server, the results you get back which normally redirect you somewhere else, are caught by the request object. You can discard them (or display them if you really want). In this function, I've used the ultra-small icon file "onepixel.gif" as ......
  202. 09/28/2006Rocky needs your help.Yep, the Dawg is buried with work and other stuff -- so much that he hasn't blogged since September 11th. I've talked to him and he's fine -- he's not sick (some of you asked) he's just got so much going on in his world that nothing has made it to the blog. So here's the plan... I want everyone who reads this to write a blog article for his site, and send it to him -- by Friday at noon. Get to ......
  203. 09/25/2006Wow, do I hate web browser programming.I spent the better part of two days now, building a framework in which the next generation of a key website will run. It doesn't actually DO anything yet. The framework provides all the underlying functionality to provide a tabbed interface, and "ajax" based interaction between the multiple form objects and back end data. So when I say it doesn't do anything yet, I mean the tabs work and they change the displayed things as you'd expect -- but there's nothing on them. The ajax backend code works, and can ......
  204. 09/22/2006Help me understand what problem we really have with Hugo ChavezHugo Chavez, current President of Venezuela, seems to be going to great lengths to express his distaste for the current US Government. There doesn't seem to be any love lost on the part of our government for him either. But what has he actually done that's so terrible? From before his election, he's been criticized pretty strongly by US politicians. There were gloom and doom predictions made pending his election, and it almost seems as though he was written off as a lunatic in this country from the outset. ......
  205. 09/21/2006The Republican Party Belief SystemThis was sent to me the other day, it's funny. If someone has one crafted as well to make fun of the Democrats, send it and I'll post that too. WHAT YOU NEED TO BELIEVE TO VOTE REPUBLICAN Jesus loves you, and shares your hated of homosexuals and Hillary Clinton. Saddam was a good guy when Reagan armed him, a bad guy when Bush's daddy made war on him, a good guy when Cheney did business with him, and a bad guy when Bush needed a we cant find Bin Laden diversion. Trade with Cuba is wrong because the country ......
  206. 09/21/2006Some good ideas, from what we're hearing about Microsoft's iPod competitor "Zune"I've had half an eye out on this new thing from Microsoft called the "Zune". They are looking for it to be an "iPod Killer" which sounds a little ambitious to me. Something like 3/4 of new cars next year will have built in iPod support available. That, plus the huge add-on products market for the iPod make it a very strong competitor. Microsoft have done some innovative things, from what I hear. Of interest to me is their take on licensing. Apparently you'll be able to use an easy link method (maybe IR or ......
  207. 09/13/2006Had to perform and ugly hack today - to allow Domino web usernames with @ symbols.I have a client who has a web based solution in which the users are passed from an outside system. The NCT SSO works great, but the usernames from the other site are actually EMAIL addresses. Domino will allow them to be logged in since the NCT SSO creates the token for them -- but putting email addresses in groups does not work for ACL's. To get around this, I broke one of my cardinal rules. I modified the Domino Directory. Worse, I modified the most important view in the databases (or one of the two most ......
  208. 09/12/2006Have you tried Google Calendar?It's not new, but for the first time I've tried out Google's calendar application. I like it a lot, and not just for work. Barb and I both work full time. On top of that, I have the fire department work that keeps me busy with meetings and training; between my three kids we have school, tennis club, 3 soccer teams, karate, and Brownies. I travel about once a month, and Barb travels about twice a year. To keep up with just our family activities -- coordinating transportation for the kids mostly, requires a ......
  209. 09/11/2006What should the US do about it's relationship with Iran?What is the US supposed to do about an Iran that is developing seriously dangerous weapons? First, let us assume for this discussion that Iran really is developing the capability to produce nukes, or to supply that technology to others. We have, after all, set the stage in such a way that it makes sense for them to do so. In international politics, having nukes lets you sit at the special table. We've made it clear that if we could do so without fear of repercussion we'd already have invaded. If you don't ......
  210. 09/11/2006Remembering fallen brothers todayOn September 11th, 2001 I was not yet a firefighter. It was something Barb and I had talked about, and on the 14th I got in touch with someone she knew in the department to discuss joining. The first meeting I attended was less than a month later. Five years ago, I didn't really understand yet what a close brotherhood the fire service is. I didn't know that I'd feel personally connected to every firefighter in the country in a very real sense. Thousands of people survived the attack on September 11th ......
  211. 09/10/2006I am furious at hearing of this MYTH that those who are not US Citizens are "Not Entitled" to the rights under our ConstitutionWhat part of the following statement in the Declaration of Independence is unclear?     We hold these truths to be self-evident: That all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness;...   If you haven't read this brief document recently, go read it again. It won't take long. I've been watching "KOPPEL on Discovery" -- a fantastic program focused on the balance of security ......
  212. 09/05/2006Remembering Steve IrwinSteve Irwin, aka "Croc Hunter" died in a freak accident while filming a "soft" segment for a kids show. Listening to an interview with his friend and partner on CNN, it seems that the segment was just a bit of light film to be used for the kids show -- not even a part of what they were working on for the documentary they were filming. Apparently, Irwin had been cooped up inside the boat during bad weather for two days. According to the friend, Irwin "didn't do well" being cooped up indoors. Stingrays are ......
  213. 09/04/2006A New Product Launch ParadigmSoftware products are released as complete and supported, or as beta with the expectation of bugs and little support. For now, there is very little between these two paradigms. The idea of “Release Candidates” is getting more common as are “Gold” releases but something is still missing. IBM launched Domino 7.0 with the DB2NSF functionality marked as “Limited Availability” at the last minute. The name is wrong, really. It’s not the availability that’s limited; it’s more accurate to say that there isn’t ......
  214. 08/28/2006The C.U.L.T. 2007 shirt theme has been picked!Ok, it's still a secret at this point but I can tell you that this will be one of the most fun years for the Certified Unofficial Lotusphere T-shirt. In an exhaustive series of intense meetings and complex negotiations -- we talked about it around the pool at the Marriott Desert Ridge Resort -- NotesDawg and I along with help from good friends Gab & Tim have hashed out the theme for this year earlier than ever. People -- we're stepping it up just a notch. Look for announcements here and on Lotus Geek's ......
  215. 08/25/2006Weather for the Advisor Summit looks great!Weather in Scottsdale at 101 degrees is going to be excellent. Not the 120 that you sometimes see in Arizona, but overall warm and sunny. It's going to be hard to stay away from the pool to attend ......
  216. 08/24/2006IBM have some explaining to do about the cost of Lotusphere 2007As a pricing plan and strategy, this shows an amazing lack of market sense. I'm not saying a price increase is out of the question. The value of the conference is definitely higher than the $1295 many CLP's have paid in the past. The increase in cost to a minimum of $1695 is an increase year over year of $400 -- roughly 30%. To make matters worse, if you fail to sign up before October 14th it goes to $1895 and by December 9th its $2095. Given the number of attendees tends to be somewhere near 7,000 each ......
  217. 08/23/2006All my demos are done for Advisor, loaded on the laptop, and backed up to the spare drive. This may be the earliest I've ever finished. I'm usually working on demos right up to the session. The new laptop helps. It has 2GB of ram in it, so my DB2NSF demo has lots of elbow room. I've set up a windows 2000 virtual machine inside the laptop with 1gb of ram. Its running Domino 7.0.1 and DB2 8.2.x along with the full set of connectivity parts. I'm planning to do a live demo showing two databases with different documents, and a third that has no documents of its own, yet displays a view of mixed data ......
  218. 08/20/2006Advisor Conference at the end of August looks like a mini-Lotusphere!Advisor's conference in Arizona is looking like a MUST SEE. The speaker's like is like a Lotusphere All Stars team with very deep IBM participation on top of my favorite 3rd party types. Advisor's fall conference in Scottsdale, Arizona is almost here. I hear there is still some room open for this and it's going to be a great conference. As a speaker, the thing I like most about the Advisor conferences is the one on one nature of a smaller venue. I get to talk in great depth to people about the issue ......
  219. 08/18/2006Technote update -- Undocumented function @LocationGetInfoAn a post a few weeks back I went into detail about the function "@LocationGetInfo" which I used to help Rocky solve a programming puzzle. He needed to get the current location document's name so that he could do things with that location document. After doing a dxl export of common system files I found some parameters and using those we came up with formula language to get what we needed. Just this morning a response by Jens Winkelmann added a new parameter to that function. [FullName] . I've tested it, ......
  220. 08/17/2006Flew home yesterday from Heathrow to Boston -- its good to be backI had a good time in London, but it's good to be home. The travel day was a bit long but better than expected. First off, I had no trouble at Heathrow. I arrived 3 hours before my flight, having stayed at the Hilton attached by a long tunnel to Terminal 4. On arrival, I was directed to a short check in line for bag drop and within 20 minutes or so was through that. I had checked my large "Swiss Gear" computer backpack inside my luggage and borrowed a 2004 Lotusphere laptop case from Gab. It was a very ......
  221. 08/15/2006BA cancels all flights!Take a look at this image, sent by a client of Gab's who is in the travel industry. ......
  222. 08/14/2006Now not flying today, but will be trying again on the 16th.Arrival at the airport today was interesting. There are people milling about like cattle in the car parking structure as they cannot get into the terminal. The terminal is simply full. BA -- who has staffed the parking area with their own employees as BAA (the company who runs the airport) can't be bothered -- advised that in all liklihood they could simply not get me onto the plane today and have rebooked the next available which turns out to be Wednesday the 16th at 11am. The good news, is the "Home ......
  223. 08/13/2006Cowards, Alarmists, Manipulative Power Seekers, and Terrorists -- the whole lot of them on both sides can go screw themselves.As I will be traveling back from London to Boston tomorrow on British Airways and because some cowardly, manipulative, power hungry men (along with some terrorists) have forced an untenable and ultimately futile set of security measures into place I will be entirely and completely out of touch for pretty much the entire day on Monday. Beginning 4-5 hours before my flight when I check my luggage until the flight actually leaves (probably late, if at all) and through the completion of the flight and my ......
  224. 08/11/2006Hello from London. Yes, I managed to pick August 10th as the date for a planned trip to the UK.I'm here in Gab Davis's offices in London. While we're waiting for a download, I thought I'd talk about the trip. I'd left the house at 0400 on Thursday without catching the news and listened to an audio book for the drive. My first indication of any problem was walking through the pedestrian walkway from central parking to the international terminal in Boston and seeing a bunch of video remote vans in the parking area. I assumed some politician was on the way into town and would cause me a delay. A few ......
  225. 08/08/2006A weird java problem in Domino leads me to this challenging call for help. Anyone?I have a client application out there that kicks off a number of threads. The agent is failing to open some databases -- in a consistent and predictable but otherwise nonsensical pattern. When we spotted the pattern, it looked like we had it figured out. Lets assume the databases are db01, db02, db03, ...... db50. The agent would consistently fail to open db03, db06, and so on -- but not in an every 3rd database pattern. Here is the pattern of skipped databases: 3,6,9, 14, 17, 20, 23, 25, 28, 31, 34, 36, ......
  226. 08/08/2006Great lightening storm! I'm downstairs waiting for the pager to go off...Its 23:56 and I'm waiting for the pager to go off (oh, just went once, but for the west side of town...) The large red blob in the yellow "Watch Box" is a fantastic electrical storm which is going to pass right through town. Gotta love the new "Weather.Gov" radar ......
  227. 08/07/2006Be honest. Have you ever avoided doing a perfectly legitimate search because the keywords might attract negative attention?The use of search engines is now ubiquitous. Whatever you want, start with Google or Yahoo or Ask. I wonder though, as we live in an increasingly paranoid and monitored culture how many people have now started rethinking their use of these tools for legitimate purposes because the terms they're interested in might look suspicious to someone. If you read about the training I did for the Explorers last week, you may recall that we ran into a problem caused (we think) by the residue from tear gas or pepper ......
  228. 08/07/2006What would explain Landis's odd doping tests from the Tour de France?I've been wondering about this a bit. What kinds of things could make a test like that come up with results which we interpret incorrectly? Set aside the obvious nonstarters, that either he cheated or that the test was flawed or tampered with. They're all more probable than anything else, but make for boring discussion. One thought I had goes back to some articles I read a few years back about the role of testosterone in decision reinforcement. If I recall correctly, when you make a good decision -- or are ......
  229. 08/06/2006(UPDATED - SOLUTION) I hate applications that don't obey the Windows Large Font settings. Anyone know a good utility to rectify this situation?The one thing my laptop doesn't do well, is display text large enough for me to actually read. The "native" screen resolution is 1920x1200 -- on a 17" display. I use Window's "Large Fonts" and that works in most apps at least somewhat. Sometimes buttons are skewed or dialog boxes don't fit -- but mostly it's great. The high res with larger text makes works look like they're printed on paper. Products like Skype, Trillian, and that ilk suck though. I haven't found a skin for trillian that fixes the problem ......
  230. 08/04/2006Well, I tried VONGO -- the subscription video on demand thing. I think this picture says it all.Notice the time stamps on the 3 messages from ......
  231. 08/04/2006100 degrees, 80% humidity, turnout gear, and tear gas -- Training Wednesday was TOUGHOn Wednesday of this week I took the day off work to organize the “Roll-Up Scenarios” class for the Cumberland Fire Department “Explorer” Academy 2006. The academy is 5 days where kids participating in the “Explorer Scouts” program from six nearby towns live at the station and learn all aspects of firefighting as a career. Wednesday was the fourth day, and time to put all the skills they’ve gotten so far into practice. “Roll-Up Scenarios” is an all day class where the kids go through six “evolutions” which ......
  232. 08/02/2006Cumberland Fire Academy Week - Today I'm out teaching all day.Some of you may remember me talking about Last year's academy, where we take a group of kids involved in the "Explorers" program through a 5 day live-in program at the fire stations. This year I'm doing a little more to help, and I've signed up to run the "Drive Up Scenarios" day. This is the day we run them through everything they've learned. There are five groups of kids, so we run five scenarios (called evolutions) so that each group tries a hand at each job. Today is also the hottest day of the year ......
  233. 07/25/2006Busy, busy, busy.... Real engineering data from a tech helps me fix the pool heater -- oh, and the new Engine 1's first few calls.I can't believe its been 10 days since my last blog entry. I've been running around like a crazy person since then. I'll try to post more often now that things with the new truck have settled down. I fixed the pool heater today. After having the burner cleaned, it wouldn't run. The guy who takes care of the gas appliances for me from the energy company (I draw the line on DIY when it comes to playing with LP Gas) saw that my previous wiring work was up to snuff and figured I could save a ton of money by ......
  234. 07/14/2006I got to call the Engine 1 into service today. How cool is that?Bringing a new fire truck into service is way more complicated than it should be. Every truck is a custom work of art, unique from the word go. That leads, of course, to a debugging phase on delivery that any software developer would recognize. I've spent a good part of the two days working to herd the new truck through this process. I've spent hours loading equipment and writing up status and location reports on the equipment. Today was the payoff. With both the Chief and Captain unavailable today, I got ......
  235. 07/12/2006List of things to go wrong in the last two weeksIs it just me, or is anyone else having a strangely long list of things 'break' in the last few weeks? Here's my list: Pool Heater -- Still not right, I have a second appointment to have it looked at on Friday. As near as I can tell, the burner needs to be cleaned. Fire Truck -- Engine 1 finally died just a few days before we were ready for the new one to go in serviceWashing Machine 1 -- Died two weeks ago. It took until Monday to get a service guy out to pronounce it DRT. Washing Machine 2 -- Delivered ......
  236. 07/08/2006So the secret is out - I have been in Phoenix for a couple of days. Surprise! Well, it was to me.A family member in Phoenix was admitted to the hospital early Wednesday morning. I didn't hear about it until that afternoon, but decided to try to get out here if I could. There were some complications to this however. First, I can't travel without being ready to do some work if a client has an emergency. If you've been following this blog, you know that Wednesday morning my new Dell Laptop was delivered (which rocks, by the way). That means I was about a quarter of the way through loading software on it ......
  237. 07/06/2006Got my new laptop -- its fantastic. I am very impressed with Dell's work on this D820. Some humor though -- I tried asking a question on their chat tool. Transcript here.The new laptop I ordered finally arrived on Wednesday. I was actually not sure I'd like the screen -- At some point, resolution beyond a certain depth is too fine for me to use for long periods. In this case, the crispness of each character on the screen is amazing, and the aspect ratio being as wide as it is means I have some huge amount of screen real estate while opening easier on airplanes because it isn't as tall. The machine is fast, not too heavy, fast, elegant, and the magnesium case is rigid and ......
  238. 07/03/2006The joy of finding a new book that is wonderfully written!As I was needing to take long drive, I tried to quickly pull a book from Audible to keep me awake. It turned out at the last second the drive was cancelled, but I'd already chosen a book. I chose it almost at random. A familiar author had a book out and the reviews (by listeners) were terrible. In one, a comment was made about the terrible narration but the admission that he could be biased since he'd just finished listening to this other book. It was the frankness of that last statement -- as if anyone ......
  239. 07/03/2006First Beijing train reaches Lhasa -- Why Oxygen on it? That makes no sense to me. The problem at elevation isn't the oxygen.So this train goes from Beijing to Lhasa -- covering permafrost and mountains. It peaks over 16,000 feet. I've been as high as 12,000 feet and hiked around a bit without getting too tired, but I was younger and I'd imagine that extra altitude could really do a person in. So, the Chinese built the train with onboard oxygen. This makes no sense to me. The problem at altitude isn't lake of oxygen per se. Its lack of pressure. The amount of oxygen as a percentage is the same, but with reduced pressure, less is ......
  240. 07/03/2006Here's what FEDEX considers helpfulNote on these screenshots, that the overnight package sent on July 1st, was listed as being in Boston at 8am on the 3rd, and scheduled for delivery by 3pm that afternoon at my location -- 2.5 hours drive from that airport location in Boston. Now, after FedEx has "Helped" the package is shown STILL in Boston, and scheduled for deliver on the 6th - a full 3 days later. WTF? I'm fairly sure I could BICYCLE to Boston AND BACK in less time than they seem to plan to take to get this package to me. I am now ......
  241. 07/03/2006Vonage and FedEX Customer Service StupidityTime for a rant. Both Vonage and FedEx have surpassed themselves over the last couple of weeks in terms of shockingly bad support. Vonage, thankfully, I'm nearly through with as I'm in the process of transferring ownership of my numbers elsewhere (to connect.voicepulse.com) but FedEx I continue to have to deal with periodically. First FedEx. It seems that paying the extra 60 dollars for overnight shipping to Dell didn't actually get FedEx to ship overnight. Maybe. You see I can't tell. If I track the ......
  242. 07/02/2006The New Engine 1 was delivered today! Pics and details are here...It is a big event when a crew gets a new fire truck (an Engine in this case, as a "Truck" is for a Ladder crew). Our new Engine is a Ferrara Igniter chassis. Its a Class A Pumper, with 1000 gallons of water on board, class A and class B foam, a 1500 GPM pump, and all the bells and whistles you can imagine being helpful for a fire crew. Even air conditioning in the cab. The engine will stay parked up at our West station for the weekend, then go out for the "On-Spot" tire chains (which operate from a push ......
  243. 07/01/2006Domino Technote - Undocumented function plus cool code lets you get the current location name, thus any data from the current location in pure formula language.I don't post technotes like this often, but rest assured fans of mine, the old man still knows a few things. Someone we all know and love was bouncing a problem off me. He needed to lookup the currently active location document name. @Environment wouldn't work because you can't lookup non-user variables. The tricky part is that it had to be all formula language. He tipped me to an undocumented function "@LocationGetInfo". After dumping the mail6.ntf and pernames.ntf to dxl, I came up with only a few ......
  244. 06/28/2006I missed a fire while I was traveling last week -- but in my own way, I still did my part.On June 22nd at about 10:30am there was a fire at a home in Cumberland. This time of day on a weekday, manpower is at a severe shortage. The initial response was very shorthanded but was able to hold the fire until more personnel arrived to finish the job. The house is still standing and damage was kept to a minimum. I wasn't able to attend, as I was flying to DC at the time, but I do believe its fair to say I contributed. You've heard me talking about "Second Signal" over the last several months. Thanks ......
  245. 06/28/2006Finally ordered a new laptop. That's a big step -I've been considering it for a very long time but not found what I wanted.Based on its top notch performance and expandability, combined with fantastic price & durability -- and topped off by reasonable weight and size numbers -- I've chosen the Dell Latitude D820. The last new laptop I ordered was in November of 2002. That machine has held up well -- a Dell Inspiron 8200. It has been soaked with water, banged around, upgraded, and poorly treated for all that time. The water did force a hard disk replacement, but otherwise its been a rock. Its just not powerful enough any more ......
  246. 06/27/2006SUV Myths and Stupid PrejudicesI'm sick of hearing about evil SUV drivers. Let me post of a things to consider as you people make your snide comments. Note, by the way, that my present car is a Pacifica which is actually much more like a station wagon than an SUV -- though I do miss my Durango. I'm writing this after getting fed up with things like this stupid article. All SUV are too big for their owners and waste fuel? Not always true. While visiting my family a few years ago in Phoenix, I rented a massive Ford Expedition. This ......
  247. 06/26/2006Got stuck in DC last night in the longest thunderstorm I've ever seen12 hours straight of lightening storm. Anyway, I did get these AMAZING pictures at the Udvar-Hazy museum. I got to stand next to the Space Shuttle "Enterprise", an SR-71, Migs, a Concorde, a Corsair, missiles, and even a Kamakaze. Look closely at the Kamakaze -- its actually a bomb. Just a torpedo shape with a detonator visible on the front, a jet engine on the back, and a tiny cockpit. No eject, no landing gear, and very little steering control. Just fast and deadly. I heard there was a stealth bomber ......
  248. 06/14/2006Quit trying to turn your Notes Client apps into imitations of MDI or Dialog Box based applications. That's not where the value is.This is adapted from a response I wrote to someone in a private forum about the Notes client UI and its value. I realized when I re-read it that it would make a good blog topic, so here goes.... Notes 7 gives you power to do UI things in the Notes client. You will not, however, turn it into a Visual Studio dialog box driven MDI application. The further you go toward trying to do that, the bigger hole you're digging yourself from a scale, support, and stability perspective. Notes is Notes. It is not VS.net ......
  249. 06/11/2006Busy weekend for your favorite Lieutenant About once each quarter, every officer in our department has a turn at "Weekend Duty Officer". Basically, this means you're the go-to person for dispatch when there is a question about anything from burning permits to parade details (parade details are done for school teams that win state championships and other celebratory events). This weekend was my turn. This is also graduation weekend. Oh, and one other wrinkle -- Engine 1 has the graduation details each year which include doing the fire watch rounds ......
  250. 06/06/2006Time to repeat some of the best advice on programming I've ever read.A couple of years ago I read something Richard Schwartz wrote about "Second System Syndrome". I can't seem to find the original now, but here's a link to the topic on wikipedia. Since reading it, an understanding of this topic has been directly responsible for saving my backside about a dozen times. The general idea, is that you build something that by chance, luck, and a little skill turns out really useful. As a reward, you get the chance to do it again. You resolve that this time you're really going to ......
  251. 06/01/2006STTN - Store more than 32k of non-rich text on a document, and let it still be visible -- even in Notes 6.5.4 and 7.0.1I don't do "Show and Tell Thursday" all that often. I'm just too heads down right now. Today though, I thought I'd share a tip after having to resolve some customer issues related to a problem that can crop up in newer versions of the Notes client. Background - What is "Summary" data? When you save a Notes document, it cannot have more than 32k of "Summary" data on it. Summary data is all the values stored from all the fields on your forms that aren't rich text. It also includes any noteitems written to ......
  252. 05/27/2006When you REALLY love the game....Ari earns her team's "Man of the Match" award at her first out of state soccer tournament!You know you love the game when you love the game so much that after two of the toughest games you've ever played, playing hurt on the hottest, muggiest day so far this year, you come back to the hotel for a quick swim and then more soccer out in the parking lot with your team. Ari is playing center forward on a "Premier" level soccer team now, a position she'd never attempted prior to last fall. Her Maine Metro Football Club team entered a tournament this weekend. Tournaments break down into divisions. ......
  253. 05/25/2006New microsoft patch is here to [...help me option a licensed copy of windows..]How is this Microsoft "Update" designed to help me, to fix broken software, or to make my system more secure? Doesn't anyone else think its wrong for Microsoft to stick the newest and greatest license validation tool on my system in the form of an automatic system update? Have you checked your system? I'll be you got one of these ......
  254. 05/23/2006Advisor Conference in Scottsdale, August 2006 -- Discount of $100 Available via Bloggers and User GroupsIn what can only be described as the smartest marketing idea anyone in the history of the world has ever had, Advisor Magazine is offering a $100 discount to anyone who registers for the conference and mentions the name of certain speakers. I'm one of then, so when you register, just type in "Andrew Pollack discount" in the comment field and they'll "Take it from there." While it is true there are other people who can give you the same discount, and so far as I know there is no kickback to any of us -- it ......
  255. 05/22/2006Say what you may want to about Ray Nagin, as long as you call him the winner.The guy may have sounded pretty bad on the news. He may have said some things most of us find pretty ridiculous, but clearly he's a hell of a politician. It doesn't even matter if any of it was his fault. How else could the man right up front in charge of his city when it literally became uninhabitable, the man with the plan ....that left hundreds stranded on rooftops and thousands in a worn out stadium with inadequate food, water, power, and sanitation, the man who left hundreds at what was supposed to ......
  256. 05/22/2006Going bedouinReading in Wired Magazine for June 2006, the "Jargon Watch" column has an item titled "Going bedouin" (choice of capitalization is there's, not mine). This is essentially the idea of businesses made entirely of employees and their virtual connections via cell phone, email, VoIP, and so forth. There is no real estate asset. I suppose this differentiates from the solo consultant in that there is more than one person in the ......
  257. 05/18/2006If you live long enough, I guess you get to do just about everythingBruce and Julian interviewed me tonight for their "Taking Notes" podcast. It was fun to do, and yes it is true that this is the first podcast I've listened to as well as the first one I've participated in. I snuck in earlier this evening and previewed a couple of past episodes to get a feel for how it was done. If you're like me in that you don't do "Podcasts" don't sweat it. The audio is just an MP3 link you can click on to hear. It's telling that for a communication tool we didn't use the phone. We used ......
  258. 05/18/2006Podcasting -- how many of you listen them?I've been invited to take part in (or be interviewed on, or something somewhere in between) a podcast this week. I'm curious as to how many of you listen to them. Drop me and email or respond here and let me know. Its an odd medium that I have to admit doesn't hold a lot of interest (as a blogger) for me in its current format. I've never actualy listened to one until today when I reviewed a few of the site that I'll be talking ......
  259. 05/18/2006I always wondered what it would be like to have IBM's full support behind Lotus Notes and Domino. Now we're finding out.Support at IBM for Lotus Notes and Domino is as high now as I've ever seen it, and its fantastic. IBM's renewed commitment to Lotus Notes and Domino first became noticeable with the now famous whitepaper in 2003. For the first time in a few years, you could start talking about Domino inside IBM seriously again. Revisionists will tell you it wasn't that bad, but I'm not about to let them forget. Before Dr. Goyal was able to sift through the competing strategies and oversee the development of a plan to ......
  260. 05/18/2006I love living in MaineYou've no doubt seen the news about flooding in New England as a result of the rain over the last 10 days -- or as I like to call it, point-two-five on the Noah scale. I live about 45 minutes North of where the flooding is, and though we've had rain that's about it. An hour further North its been fairly dry. Well, its true, the National Guard did have to get called out. Not for looting or security, you understand. This is Maine. We don't do that. No, in fact the Guard had to be standing by for safety as ......
  261. 05/15/2006Infoworld Rates Domino 8.7 out of 10!The results are in, and Infoworld rates IBM Notes and Domino with amazing scores. Take a look at these numbers. What more can I say? Link: http://www.infoworld.com/article/06/05/11/78099_20TCnotes_1.html Overall Score: Excellent 8.7 Criteria FeaturesManagementPerformanceEase-of-useIntegrationValue Score 899899 Weight 20%20%20%15%15%10%   IBM Lotus Notes and Domino 7 Cost: Domino Server starts at $1,145 per CPU; Notes starts at $101 per client; Domino Web Access 7 starts at $70 per client Platforms: ......
  262. 05/15/2006Installation of Domino 7.0.1 on Linux - missing a few JVM libraries?When I started up my new Domino 7.0.1 linux server on Saturday, the HTTP task reported the following error: 05/13/2006 06:37:36 PM HTTP JVM: Exception 05/13/2006 06:37:36 PM HTTP JVM: in thread 05/13/2006 06:37:36 PM HTTP JVM: "main" 05/13/2006 06:37:36 PM HTTP JVM: 05/13/2006 06:37:36 PM HTTP JVM: java.lang.UnsatisfiedLinkError: /opt/ibm/lotus/notes/70010/linux/jvm/bin/libawt.so: libXp.so.6: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory 05/13/2006 06:37:36 PM HTTP JVM: at ......
  263. 05/15/2006I ran into an upgrade issue when I moved from Domino 7.0 to 7.01 this weekend.This lost me several hours over the weekend. It seems that 7.0.1 along with 6.5.4 there are some changes in the backend classes or in the LotusScript interface to those cases when storing data into fields. When moving from Domino 7.0 to 7.01 I ran into a problem which was oddly similar to the one I described last week. In this case, a web application just stopped working correctly. It took me several hours to track down, because it happened that I wasn't upgrading a server, I was installing a new one and ......
  264. 05/15/2006Talk about your ups and downs at work! The BBC follows an amazing day with a really bad one....Late last week, the BBC World News announced their listenership in English around the world was up by some massive number -- 47 million people if I can recall. No surprise, they've become one of the most trusted sources of information out there. Then today a friend referred me to this article: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2-2178097,00.html I especially liked the last ......
  265. 05/12/2006Finally, a great IBM ad on TV -- sponsoring Dr. Who no less!Imagine my surprise at finding IBM commercial on television that (a) was very good, (b) was very well placed, and (c) mentioned collaboration! Of all places, I was watching Dr. Who -- the new series just over from the UK -- on SF channel and a great deep voiced announcer tag came along and said, in 70's style "Dr. Who is brought to you by...IBM. What makes you special?". We then cut over to a pretty good abstract commercial centered around a water cooler in the desert. The quote "Lets tap into a million ......
  266. 05/11/2006Great pictures of my 12 year old kicking butt on the soccer field this weekendFor those who don't already know, my 12 year old daughter Ari has transformed herself over the last year from your basic pre-teen couch potato into a fairly serious athlete. She did this on her own. I never asked her take on more than a general two or three day a week active sport in a noncompetitive way. She opted for soccer and was asked last fall to join our town's "Travel" team. That was more competitive than she'd ever played before in the AYSO or "Rec league" games and it took real effort (and no ......
  267. 05/08/2006Busy, busy busy. Resolution to my earlier field size issue, fire calls, press release work, and half a dozen computer languages over the course of the last four days.Sorry I've been slow to post. Today's debacle was resolved when I stopped using a Lotus Notes text list field to hold a bunch of data and instead write it to a Rich Text field. To do that, I took the array and used "Join()" on it to turn it into one long string of comma delimited entries (there are no commas in the data of this so I was ok). I save the big string to that rich text field which is hidden. When the Java agent runs, it gets the string as one long value and parses it with a String.split() call ......
  268. 05/08/2006Ugly regression bug in Lotusscript - updated** UPDATE -- Thanks to Daniel Nashed... Looks like the regression bug is preventing code from running which may not have run properly before. I'm not sure that's really what happened, as it did seem to run properly before, but thank you Daniel. Meantime, I have updated the product that this "bug" crashed and am using a rich text field and saving the data out then re-importing it later. Ugly, but quick enough. I did some checks. For text items the limit is 64K from API point of view. If you read or write a ......
  269. 05/06/2006Stunningly perfect weather today in Cumberland, MaineToday was one of those days Mainers wait for all through February and March - often standing by the door of their trailers holding lawn chairs and staring out at the snow in anticipation. About 70 degrees, partly cloudy, low humidity and a nice breeze made for a perfect day to work on the yard and get ready for summer. I finished Barb's raised garden and brought in a cubic yard of compost to fill it. Of course, since I can't back the trailer (of course I have a trailer, I live in Maine) back there where ......
  270. 05/03/2006Oh joy, we've got a new I.T. crises to worry about. Lets just go ahead and call this one "BirdFlu2k", as that's how its evolving. The idea is that there's this looming deadline (sound familiar?) only this time its even better because we don't know when it actually is. Its probably at least a year or two away but nobody can be sure. When this deadline hits, it will hit suddenly, and we're all going to have to be prepared to work from home -- possibly without food or power. Yes, its up to our I.T. departments to get their plans in place now and roll out those ......
  271. 05/01/2006A lot of thought and planning, then 9 months waitingA lot of thought and planning, then 9 months waiting and finally I can show you these pictures!           Our oldest is already 22 years old. Its taken years to decide, and months waiting for it to get this far along. Delivery should be within 45 days, but I suspect it will go a bit ......
  272. 05/01/2006Its May Day! A day celebrated by state control freaks and by anachists alike -- who knows why?It is time for all the dyslexic workers of the world to untie, the misspellers of the word brake the bounds of oppression, and for the masses to seize control of industry in the name of mediocrity for all! That's right people, from those who can to those who need. As to the anarchists -- I have no idea at all why they would pick May Day as a day to celebrate. I find it incredibly funny that there is a "They" to even talk about with anarchists. How, exactly, can true anarchists organize? How did they end up ......
  273. 04/28/2006Cumberland Fire Department member Kevin Foster wins WCSH "Teens Who Care" award and scholarship!Take a minute to view this video. Most people will go their entire lives without learning how to be half as good a man as Kevin. I've known him for four or five years now and he just never ceases to amaze me. His work for the community is so tireless that this minutes long TV profile can't begin to cover more than just a few of the things he does. I've never met anyone who has raised more money for more projects, done more physical work on those projects, and been more ready to respond to absolutely any ......
  274. 04/26/2006Release name candidates for the product codenamed Windows VistaI saw this today on SlashDot, it was posted anonymously so the best I can do for attribution is a link. I like your comment on Vista becoming "XP warmed over". But there is a problem. "Vista" is non-compliant with traditional Microsoft OS names. Here are my suggested product names based on compatibility with MS standard naming convention: Windows 2007 Dull but it worked in 1995, 1998, 2000, and 2003Windows XP 2007 XP, new and improved for 2007Windows X[Q...Z] If XP is "extra pain", then XQ is ... Windows ......
  275. 04/25/2006Scott McNealy steps down from Sun Microsystems.Well, Scott McNealy has stepped down as CEO of Sun Microsystems. That's big news. I don't know much about his replacement yet, though I hear he's very P.R. focused and likes to troll the Linux world for attention. The more things change, the more they stay the same I guess. Jonathan Schwartzis the new President and Chief Executive Officer at Sun. Its no secret that I'm not a big fan of what Scott McNealy has done with Sun in the past 10 years. I hope Jonathan Schwartz has an agenda that makes more sense ......
  276. 04/24/2006In other stunning news, the Vatican may soon relax its rules about the use of condoms. According to BBC News, the Vatican is about to announce something as forward thinking as allowing the use of condoms by married people to prevent the spread of disease in cases where one has a terrible disease like AIDS. In this stunning step forward, it seems there may for the first time be recognition that sex may be considered for purposes other than procreation. Massive amounts of thought and prayer -- though of course no practical research -- must have gone into this decision. Overall, this is great ......
  277. 04/23/2006One last warm, dry day to build a new garden -- and now finally some rain to put an end to these woods fires.Yesterday was the last of a long series of warm, dry, early spring days here in Maine. Yes, I realize that you southern types are well on toward summer. Here in Maine we're still waiting for the trees and shrubs to come out of hibernation. I took advantage of the nice weather and finally got around to building Barb that new raised garden bed I'd promised last fall. The hard part is digging out the base and laying in the first layer of 4" by 6" pressure treated lumber so that it is square and level. Once in ......
  278. 04/20/2006Details about yesterdays big woods fires - it was a nice day for a walk in the woodsNearly every fire crew in the state was busy yesterday and today looks to be the same. With the onset of spring we've got warm, dry weather and brisk winds but the ground cover hasn't yet gone through the "green up" process so things are tinder box dry. At 16:45 yesterday I heard the call go out on the radio for two nearly simultaneous fires. One of our crews was requested to help Portland and Falmouth deal with a brush fire off the "Falmouth Spur" of the Maine Turnpike that sounded like quite an event, ......
  279. 04/19/200630 mile an hour winds and very dry conditions made for some good sized brush and woods fires today. I'm too tired to talk much about it tonight, suffice it to say when towns from as far as 15 and 20 miles away are all sending trucks, its a big woods fire. I ended up in charge of what started as a small group of four firefighters sent in around the back ......
  280. 04/15/2006Old stars gone, but new stars emerge - I'm impressed with what I'm seeing from IBM-LotusTalk about full cycle! In Kevin Cavinaugh's keynote he mentioned that the Notes Client is so strong in the combined Workplace Rich Client/Lotus Notes product that makes up Hannover that there is some serious discussion about not even using the "Workplace" ......
  281. 04/14/2006Back in Maine -- its good to be home.To misquote some really great music...-- you know the tune, sing along.... "I flew in from (Las Vegas) via (Southwest Air), didn't get to bed last night. All the way the paper bag was on my knee. Man, I had a dreadful flight....." Well, its only partly ......
  282. 04/14/2006My new favorite Linux Distribution -- yes, Domino runs well on it.Last week I came across CENTOS, which is a Linux distribution extremely similar to Red Hat Enterprise Linux in all respects other than a subscription cost. CENTOS is supported entirely by its community. It took me about 1/2 hour to download the DVD via ......
  283. 04/14/2006Notes on VMWARE Server (free) Beta - It ROCKS. You need this. -- and a free performance tip for the betaTIP: During the beta, turn off the debugging which slows things down by using debug = ......
  284. 04/09/2006Las Vegas - Perfect weather, a good flight, a car "upgrade".Yesterday I got up at 3am and drove to Portsmouth, New Hampshire for my 5 1/2 hour flight to Las Vegas on Southwest Airlines. I like southwest for short flights, but longer flights I really prefer the traditional carriers. Unfortunately, I don't prefer ......
  285. 04/07/2006Well friends, I'm leaving at 3am to make a flight to Vegas. If you're also going to the conference and end up being tricked into attending one of my sessions, please introduce ......
  286. 04/06/2006Serverbeach promotional event has a great deal on dedicated servers starting next week.As many of you know, I've moved from having my own datacenter to having my customer facing servers at ServerBeach. I've been generally very impressed, though the machine I'm using right now is not quite good enough for what I need to be doing. As part of ......
  287. 04/04/2006New architectures sometimes mean old planning toolsSince I've decided that the right way to build the new production website for SecondSignal is "SOA" (Service Oriented Architecture) which is the web equivalent of object oriented programming, I've been thinking about the best way to do the underlying ......
  288. 04/04/2006Its time for a party!From a reader: On Wednesday of this week, at two minutes and three seconds after 1:00 in the morning, the time and date will be 01:02:03 04/05/06 At least here in the U.S. which uses Month/Day/Year formatting. That won't happen again in your lifetime. You ......
  289. 04/02/2006Iraq issues spring directly out of our Iran & Korea policies -- We made this problem.Why is Iran so bent on having the ability to delivery fission weapons? Easy. They just look around and ask one question: "What is the difference between Iraq and North Korea?" The answer to that question is very simple. North Korea, despite not having the ......
  290. 04/01/2006Looking forward to Advisor in Las Vegas -- Just a week awayI plan to have a great, relaxing time out there. For me, its great that Advisors uses the Marriot way out on the edge of town away from the strip. Just regular stores, restaurants, and hotel rooms. The place is comfortable, quiet, and has a great pool. ......
  291. 04/01/2006Big news for meYou'll be finding the details out soon enough, but it may come as a bit of a surprise to you that I'll be doing a press release with Microsoft related to SecondSignal. I'm working with the same people who are behind the just finishing "Your Potential, Our ......
  292. 03/30/2006Safety recall on Nite-Lite products -- Please read this one.An electrical short circuit in the nite lite can cause it to overheat and smolder or melt which can burn consumers or result in a fire. U.S. Consumer Product Safety ......
  293. 03/30/2006About to get some really good press for my public safety notification tool -- need help now picking a namePretty much all of you know that I've been working toward commercializing the paging/phone system. Now that all the technical hurdles are met, its just a question of fine tuning and finish carpentry. Part of that though, is picking a name. You'd be amazed ......
  294. 03/29/2006What buttons does your phone need, but not have?I mentioned a minute ago that my Mute button didn't do what I want. I want to have one that mutes THE OTHER PERSON in the conference. I'd also like an "Assassinate" button. It would need to be specific to a single person on a conference call. What other ......
  295. 03/29/2006The mute button on my phone seems to be broken.I'm in a conference call and I keep pressing my mute button, but it isn't working. this idiot just keeps talking and talking. I need an assassinate ......
  296. 03/28/2006The first signs of spring are here in Maine...The first signs of spring have reached us here at TheNorth.... The dry, dead grass without rain had lead to a number of small brush fires, and tonight I've taken the snow tires and cheapo wheels off Barb's minivan and put the shiney alloy rims on along ......
  297. 03/27/2006Fire Department 2005 Year in Review - Town Council Meeting presentationFor anyone interested, this 15 minute video -- about 9 megs to download -- starts off with Chief Small commenting on the awards given out a week or so ago (of which mine is included) then goes into a short slideshow of pictures from training and incidents ......
  298. 03/27/2006Pork. The other white FISH.Speaking of transgenic food, some scientists are playing at intelligent design. They've spliced a gene for making oils of the kind fish make -- so called "Omega 3 fatty acids" -- into pigs. Two of the three pigs in the picture below have it. That could be ......
  299. 03/26/2006Microsoft employees at the front line are mad as hell about Vista, Ballmer, and MS quality control.If you have time, take a look at the rant going on by way of this anonymous Microsoft employee's blog. With comments like "Client appcompat % hovering at Fewer testers, less experienced, with little training, a much (ahem) 'slower' approach to testing. ......
  300. 03/24/2006A very revealing internal memo from Microsoft enumerates the changes in the division responsible for the Windows Platform.The memo from Kevin Johnson (presumably not the one who used to play for the Phoenix Suns) contains the list of new position holders along with this kind of standard issus execuspeak: "I know change is never easy but I truly appreciate the focus that ......
  301. 03/24/2006Do you now routinely ignore the top few search results?Search Engine farmers is a name I've decided to give these sociopaths who create automated tools that suck in content from as many places as they can, generate link farms, and work every other trick possible so as to be the top pick in as many searches on ......
  302. 03/24/2006Large Area Search training last night - details and picturesLast night we had a really great training event put on by some of the guys from nearby Portland, on a new technique for searching large open areas. Now you would not use this at a time when there's a rocking fire going on -- this would be used in the case ......
  303. 03/22/2006Its great when you can be reminded why you like Domino and Notes so muchHello everybody. I'm a bit south of my usual haunts. I'm doing a two day client visit as a subject matter expert on a site review project. I'm finding myself at what by all observations looks like a really successful classic Lotus Notes environment. More ......
  304. 03/19/2006The new Dr. Who on SciFi completely rocks.Watched the new Dr. Who on Sci Fi -- just now available here in the U.S. All I can say is "perfect!" -- its just captured the spirit of the old series in its essentials, added some special effects without making them so good as to lose the low-budget ......
  305. 03/19/2006An award, and some new uniform bling!You know something about all the work I've been doing on an emergency services paging & communication system,right? Tonight was Cumberland's annual banquet. Its one night a year when - out of uniform - we rent a local meeting place, put on nice clothes ......
  306. 03/15/2006I want my six hours back!I wasted about six hours today trying to figure out why despite everything appearing to work correctly, I could not make my phone client software make any noise. It would call out to the pbx, the pbx would play the congratulations demo messages, but no ......
  307. 03/14/2006Marshaling data in and out of managed vs.net code -- may have some value for Domino API work as wellPart of the work I've been doing requires that I make use of an external library in the form of a DLL. This article describes about 2/3 of the techniques needed for the process. If you like it, I'll write another one that deals with the other side of the ......
  308. 03/14/2006Got shell scripts? Get this book.Its not often I really endorse a computer technology book. In the past I can think of only two textbooks I've ever really felt were so good they exceeded my expectations. This one, "Linux Shell Scripting with Bash" by Ken O. Burtch is the third. Like ......
  309. 03/07/2006Amazing - a live capture of what was previously thought to be only a myth. I've been able to acquire a picture.A species of collateral knows as "Dominus Marketus Directum" has been captured live in the hands of a real world business decision maker. Its difficult to imagine, but true. While I waited in the safety of the Jeep, my assistant was able to capture this ......
  310. 03/02/2006Go the next step with VoIP - don't miss out. My S&TT Post for this weekForget Skype and Vonage for a minute. You may be just touching the surface if you’re using Vonage or one of its competitors, Skype, or any of a myriad other VoIP tools. There is so much more out there. My contribution to SNTT is to show you how to get ......
  311. 02/28/2006Proof that "Sender Pays" will not stop spam even one little bitFor those who don't know, the idea of "Sender Pays" is to make the cost of sending an email slightly higher than zero for bulk emails -- some say for everyone. Say a penny a message or less. AOL and YAHOO are talking about using this method for public ......
  312. 02/28/2006Where have I been?Well, aside from living in Linux, Asterisk, VoIP, Visual Studio.NET, Java, Eclipse, and fire trucks -- I was also on vacation in Florida with my family. ......
  313. 02/12/2006A shame President Bush doesn't get out more.Everyone gets tired sometimes, and clearly W needs a vacation. I'd like to suggest that he take some time and go bird hunting with his buddy Dick more ......
  314. 02/07/2006Domino & Notes version 7.0.1 now available -- contains what looks like a couple of REALLY key fixes...There are at least two fairly big deal updates in this release. If I read correctly, the very long standing issue some people have had where servers would seem to become unavailable unless you time-out and reconnect may have been resolved in this release. ......
  315. 02/03/2006Lotusphere 2006 Survey Results are in......Read 'em and weep, my friends! (Updated)I wasn't going to go to the trouble of adding these up from the website, but since all of you seem to being doing it on your blogs it only seemed fitting. Of course, now it's going to be hard to fit my head through the door after reading these. I don't ......
  316. 02/03/2006Creating a Rules Engine class in Lotusscript while cutting process time by more than 1000%Its time for a technical deep dive. I haven't done one of these in a long time and I know some of you couldn't care less about firefighting, shirts, or my daughter's soccer team (which is kicking butt). As anyone who reads this site regularly knows, I've ......
  317. 02/02/2006MS Tech Support?This is unconfirmed of course, but was forwaded to me and its good enough that I felt it could be passed along as ......
  318. 02/02/2006How often are you overwhelmed by things to do to the point of shutting down?Its 9am and I've been up and going in the office for more than an hour already. The list of tech and business items to address on my list is so consumingly huge that at present I'm unable to start any of them. I've learned that at this point there is no ......
  319. 01/31/2006Well, IBM really has set DB2 free. As Domino admins and developers, we are very well positioned to take advantage of this. So, how do we get started?First, I have to say that setting DB2 free was a fantastic move. PC based servers have never been the large part of the revenue stream for DB2 anyway, though it is for Microsoft's MSSQL. DB2 is very well regarded in the I.T. industry and compares very ......
  320. 01/26/2006Lotusphere 2006 Goes out on a high noteLotusphere 2006 came to a close with a flawless performance by Surjit Chana, IBM VP of Marketing and Partners. His fun, unscripted, and very energetic approach went over quite well. I’d heard from others they’d enjoyed his talk on Sunday. Core Lotus ......
  321. 01/25/2006C.U.L.T. 2006 Prize Awarded!Congratulations to C.U.L.T. member Christine Broome who was selected as the winner of this years prize. Christine, shown in pictures below along with our secret spotter Amy Blumenfield -- yes, we're sneaky enough to use our friend from Microsoft as the ......
  322. 01/24/2006More info on Craig Hayman -- he has quite a loyal fan baseI'm just back from the "Meet the Geeks" party (formerly known as the Iris Party) at that Atlantic, and what an earful of great news came from that! I'll sum up without breaking confidentiality by saying a few things in a general sense. Craig Hayman -- ......
  323. 01/24/2006A correction from yesterday's rant ---I should point out -- yesterday I said "almost no mention of Lotus Notes for 2 hours" -- in fact, it was mentioned right at the beginning, and there was talk about the present state of the product. I believe it was so poorly presented that it didn't have ......
  324. 01/23/2006Lotusphere 2006 Opening Session -- The Substance that Style KilledThere were good things in the opening general session at Lotusphere 2006 this year. The Sametime 7.5 announcement and features for example were well handled and well demonstrated. Jason Alexander, the guest speaker, was excellent as you would expect, and ......
  325. 01/21/2006Greetings from Lotusphere 2006! The shirts are here. I am here. Where are you? Here's more SHIRT info, including the Theme and Prize!Hi all --I've been really busy so haven't written much. On Thursday I drove two hours to the airport, waited two hours for the flight, then flew three hours to Orlando. That was the easy part. Once I got my baggage, I took a cab a few miles to the heavy ......
  326. 01/14/2006I LOVE this response on SlashDot to news of Sun and Oracle getting together for yet another potshot at MicrosoftFirst, here's the quote from "bcrowell" on /. "Y'know, I was just saying to myself, "Self," I said to myself, "you really need an enterprise datacenter architecture that leverages middleware based on robust frameworks." Wow, they must have been reading my ......
  327. 01/12/2006Only PARTIALLY hydrogenated. Damn. These people never do something all the way, do they?The image below is what happens if you leave a Cheese Puff on a piece of notebook paper overnight. This is because the cheap bastards are only PARTIALLY hydrogenating their vegetable oil. For those who never bothered to look this up, the big chemical ......
  328. 01/11/2006The economics of MMORPG's is fascinating stuffA friend forwarded a link to an article written on the impact of "Farming" in the "World of Warcraft" online game. "Farming" in this case refers to companies set up in low-wage countries where players are hired to run characters which generate in game ......
  329. 01/10/2006According to scientists, the Milkey Way galaxy is "Warped, and vibrating like a drum"....Those crazy Berkeley guys..... http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/01/060110094853.htm -- Isn't that funny......they say the same thing about me. Who else but those wacky guys at Berkeley could come up with THIS as a picture of the galaxy. I thought ......
  330. 01/10/2006Its funny the way yesterday's high end hardware is today's outdated toy.I'm refurbing a computer to put in my 10 year old's room this weekend. This one will replace the old Blueberry iMac that's in there now. That one will move to the six year old, now that she can read. Looking through the hardware closet to figure out what ......
  331. 01/09/2006Time for a new expression. Roommate Annoying.Ok, we all have heard of "Coyote Ugly" -- someone so ugly that if you were to wake up with them after going clubbing you'd gnaw off your own arm to avoid waking them as you got out of there. Its now time for a new expression. "Roommate Annoying" will now ......
  332. 01/08/2006Observation: High performance sportswear is really all about dressing up like a superhero.I've spent some money on a product called "Under Armor" for my daughter so she can wear these warm materials under her soccer uniform in the same way you might wear long johns or silk underwear skiing. The two big differences are that this is "High ......
  333. 01/07/2006Stop the presses! I actually took a day off today. As in, OFF. Like, REALLY.A Barb's suggestion, and with admitted reluctance (due to the huge volume of work I have to get done before Lotusphere) I took the day off and we took the three kids to Sunday Riverfor a day of skiing. The weather was perfect -- just below freezing at the ......
  334. 01/03/2006Unofficial patch for the big Windows security flaw (which does affect Notes clients) If you have a Windows 2000, XP, XP/Pro, or 2003 computer I encourage you to install this hot fix. It doesn't do anything you can see --just installs then says its done. According to SANS, it will protect you from this major exploit. I am already aware of ......
  335. 01/02/2006Its not like you weren't warned about it years before you first had to make the choiceConsider it, you were warned. Ok, the idea for this did come from /. -- I did make the graphic ......
  336. 12/30/2005My new favorite anti-spam & anti-website ads tool -- HostsManAds. I hate them. They've taken over every inch of available screen real estate on websites, roadsides, tv, radio, and even people. I went looking for a tool to help block them at their source. I found exactly what I wanted. There are others out there, ......
  337. 12/30/2005IMPORTANT - Easily Protect your PC and your Client's against this ZERO DAY exploitA flaw in a special kind of image viewer for viewing WMF files represents an unpatched security risk -- and that risk has been exploited in the wild already. All someone has to do is send you an email with an image of this kind containing the exploit to ......
  338. 12/29/2005Supersized iPod remote control for the visually impairedThe Supersized, Super-Easy iPod Remote Control The goal was to create an MP3 playing device which could be easily used by my father-in-law who is 87 on Sunday and is rapidly loosing his vision. He can now see almost no detail. Unfortunately, he has never been a technically oriented person and has had a very hard time using the adaptive technologies. Were I to give him a typical MP3 player, it would be lost in moments, and even while in his hand would be unusable. An iPod is ideal for him in other ways, ......
  339. 12/29/2005Spent all day fixing registry problems, and couldn't get iTunes to run without crashing. Finally got it.....If you ever run into a similar problem, or if you come across this blog entry through a google search on something like 'iTunes 6 keeps crashing in XP' then maybe this little note will help. Despite fixing the registry, removing old dead entries, clearing ......
  340. 12/26/2005Christmas purchase limits -- and a common misconceptionMost people take it for a given that if you and your wife agree on a limit for spending on each other, that you mean it to be the top end of the scale. I, on the other hand, choose to view it as a bottom end limit, and shop accordingly. As such, each year ......
  341. 12/23/2005Apple's On-Line store wins my appreciation -- big timeI've been trying to MONTHS to figure out how to make a solution for my 86 year old father-in-law that would allow me to give him audiobooks on tape. The problem is, he's lost most of his vision, and has never been good with technology. MP3 players and CD ......
  342. 12/22/2005A black eye for ChristmasI went to the eye doctor today and had the growth removed from my lower left eyelid before it could finish growing into my evil twin. When I planned the appointment for the 22nd of December, I hadn't considered that it would mean I shall probably have a ......
  343. 12/22/2005I MUST be special. I got "Mod Points" on SlashdotI've been fascinated by the way Cmdr Taco and his crowd have built a huge discussion site that seems to be able to keep a good conversation going even though it has a transient population of tens of thousands of people. The site is (almost) entirely self ......
  344. 12/21/2005Do you do Torrents?I'm looking for a jump start from someone who reads this blog. I've tried a few BT client side packages and like most newbies am left with a bit of an aftertaste. Aside from the fact that half the clients come with spyware (which I trap and kill instead ......
  345. 12/20/2005Professional Driver - Closed CourseEver seen those warnings? "Professional driver, closed course" or "Do not try this at home" --- It applies to I.T. work as well. This is for all of you who think you can just give your users Quickplace and leave them unsupervised. Folks, end users are the ......
  346. 12/20/2005The Life Aquatic - SuckedI just sat through "The Life Aquatic" for no reason I can determine. It started out sucking, and it sucked straight through. It wanted to be some kind of cross between "Buckaroo Banzai" and "Zoolander" and failed on all counts. What a shame, it was a good ......
  347. 12/19/2005The C.U.L.T. shirts are off to the production facility.....finally.....What a relief! This year's C.U.L.T. shirt has been quite a...treat....to work on. For the first time ever, we have 16 sponsors -- not counting Rocky & I. That means sixteen separate company logos which have be just right even though we are trying to keep ......
  348. 12/15/2005I don't know if this has made the rounds before, but its the first time I've seen it. "Who's on first?" -- applied to PC purchasesYou have to be old enough to remember Abbott and Costello and oldenough to not really understand computers to fully appreciate this. For those who sometimes get flustered by our computers, please readon. It is a reworking of the sketch Bud Abbott and Lou ......
  349. 12/14/2005Why is everyone so stunned about the narwhal's horn being a sensory organ?I would think that anything obviously long and hard sticking out of a mammal would be highly sensitive to something, now wouldn't you? ......
  350. 12/13/2005Can we execute a mass-joke at Lotusphere?This isn't something any one person could do effectively by themselves, and I'm not even sure it would be advisable at all. I also don't know exactly how the legal ramifications would play out. Maybe some of you could suggest answers. The general idea ......
  351. 12/13/2005The Law of Unintended Consequences, as a moral stance.The Law of Unintended Consequences is simply the idea that you cannot accurately predict all the ramifications of your actions. If you're someone who believes the end result can justify the means used to achieve that result, it is this law which is ......
  352. 12/09/2005Snow Day! Here's some pics of the day off here at NCT. We got DUMPED on today. The snow started about about 7am and by 4:30pm was all over. That's pretty quick for a snowstorm, but we got around 8 inches of powder in that time. Enjoy these pictures. ......
  353. 12/08/2005Andrew's FALL TV new shows reports. All opinion, no fact. Ha!With all the extra time I have, it should be no surprise that I like to end my day by using the television as a way to try shutting down my brain. It usually works. I can’t really stop analyzing and criticizing though, however, just because I’m exhausted ......
  354. 12/08/2005Surprise! For a few minutes on November 29th, I was a millionaire.It didn't last, but my Fidelity statement for November showed a bank wire transfer to my SEP IRA (Self Employed Tax Deferred Retirement fund for those of you outside the US) for exactly $1,000,000 US. I called of course, and asked the rep to whom I should ......
  355. 12/07/2005A hard fought loss -- ah well... -- and how ADD meds impact my Scrabble playing.Given the other news this morning, I thought I'd post some lighter stuff as well. I got beat last night in Scrabble by my wife. Again. We've had a long running series of games and over the years she's ahead by about 5% of games. Last night was painful. ......
  356. 12/07/2005I learned a new phrase this morning on CNNThe term "Extraordinary Rendition" -- a phrase created to describe the sort of amoral arrogant abuse of power that our government is involved in. I am sickened and disgusted (though sadly not really surprised any more) that we as a nation are doing things ......
  357. 12/05/2005Take back control of your PC -- A document I wrote to help end users deal with basic PC security issues.I wrote this document because so many of the people I know are absolutely frustrated with trying to keep their PC's running in the face of viruses, worms, scams, spyware, and other garbage. If this helps anyone, please feel free to distribute it or link ......
  358. 12/03/2005Santa is not happy. This was forwarded to me today, and may explain...A Christmas Story 'Twas the night before Christmas--Old Santa was pissed. He cussed out the elves and threw down his list. Miserable little brats, ungrateful little jerks. I have a good mind to scrap the whole works! I've busted my ass for damn near a ......
  359. 12/03/2005For the first time in years, I've got my mobile phone in sych with Notes Calendar & Contacts -- and its NOT a PDA phone.A couple of weeks ago I got a new Motorola e815 to replace my LG6100 cell phone. I hated the LG. The sound quality was terrible, the shape was odd, and the features were locked down so that anything useful cost more money to use. The Motorola e815, on the ......
  360. 12/01/2005C.U.L.T. primary sponsorships are now on "IF" list (if there's room). Secondary sponsorships still available -- here's a clarification on SIZE issues for those...Ok, so my previous post wasn't clear enough. When I said you couldn't pick your sizes, some people thought that meant a random set of shirts which could leave them will all smalls or something. Not so. There's a ratio of shirt sizes we've refined over the ......
  361. 11/30/2005Update! ** 13 ** of the 10 primary C.U.L.T. sponsorships are already committed!special update: 13 of the 10 primary C.U.L.T. sponsorships are already committed. Get them while they're hot ......
  362. 11/29/2005Insanely cool way to discover music you like -- its almost magic. Stunning.Its very rare that I repeat what someone else is already blogging. In this case, Volker Weber blogged this and its so incredible I wanted to re-blog it for both of you who read my site by not his. The site is Pandora and its just getting started. In less ......
  363. 11/29/2005Sponsors sought for the 2006 C.U.L.T. shirt! Info here --Yes, its that time again. Its past that time actually. Way, way, way past that time. Rocky and I have been banging our heads together trying to come up with a theme and an image worthy of burning in to the minds of all the attendees at Lotusphere this ......
  364. 11/26/2005Great video -- Ever wonder what firefighters do on a roof? Check this out...I'll warn you though, there's a soundtrack to this video and at the end there's a bit of harsh language. So...unless this kids are up .... turn the volume up on those fancy speakers and watch these truckies (ladder truck firefighters -- also known to some ......
  365. 11/20/2005Initial Results: Verizon Wireless "Broadband" rocks!I'm at the airport in Manchester, New Hampshire. Verizon's broadband map doesn't even show this area as launched yet. I'm connected with all the bars lit, and getting fantastic transfer speeds. Here's the result from DSL Reports... Keep in mind we're ......
  366. 11/18/2005Headed for Phoenix for the weekWell, I'll be blogging from the home of the heat next week. A thanksgiving with my side of the family should be.....interesting. Keep in mind, I am not the loudest member of my family. Not by a long shot. So, its pack Barb and the kids up then see if ......
  367. 11/18/2005King of the typos....Its not shock to anyone that I have fat fingers and frequently type a different version of what I'm saying than what is in my head. Today was a close call however, as I very nearly sent a note to a new NCT Search customer thanking him for his 'odor'. ......
  368. 11/17/2005Of COURSE MS Exchange .next will require 64 bit servers. That's the whole point of the upgrade!Its not about just selling Exchange upgrades -- its about selling Operating System upgrades. If you've been paying attention at all, you know that the real fear at Microsoft is that they're not selling as many licenses for newer and bigger Windows servers ......
  369. 11/16/2005The scoop on cellular broadbandI don't like being off the net. Its no shock to anyone who knows me. It means I can't just follow whatever crazy idea I have at the moment to create, adjust, fix, or check on something that's been simmering in the back of my mind. As such, I've been using ......
  370. 11/16/2005People -- wake up! Quit driving into trucks. They are much bigger than you!Its 01:41 on Wednesday and I'm just about to get back to sleep from yet another sleepyhead who decided to run into a tractor trailer on the interstate. He'll live, his car won't. The US Postal Service will have to do without the trailer load of delivery ......
  371. 11/10/2005Howto: Setup ASSP for anti-virus and anti-spam with IBM Lotus DominoThere's a PDF file at the end of the page if you'd rather use that. HOW-TO – Setup ASSP with IBM Lotus DominoThis HOW-TO is provided free (as in speech) and without warrantee. If you follow these directions, you are solely responsible for the results. I ......
  372. 11/09/2005Need anti-spam for Domino? Here's a good open source alternative -- and they even discuss Domino on the site!Take a look at ASSP. For geeks, its all you need. For the rest of the Domino world, put SpamJam in front of it and you've got a dynamite solution. Though nothing will replace SpamJam when it comes to end users interacting with their anti-spam tool in ......
  373. 11/08/2005Remember all those original Star Trek scenes where the earspliting noise attack would cripple the crew?Crippling high pitched noises forcing crew members to their knees on the bridge of the Enterprise as some kind of non-lethal submit-or-die noise came from the foe-du-jour was part for the course on the 60's TV series. Well, apparently the crew of that ......
  374. 11/07/2005Some thoughts on the violence in FranceAside from being a terrible thing, there is something that fascinates me about what's going on in France. By most accounts, France is a country with a decidedly strong socialist policy and economy compared with the US. The social safety net, healthcare, ......
  375. 11/07/2005Special of the day - Peking DuckBad taste? Of course. Just make sure you cook it well. Take a look at this article from CBS News.... ......
  376. 11/07/2005I don't want to do anything at all today.Do you have a long list of things you simply cannot be bothered to bring yourself to start? Mine's longer. My list, I mean. Its longer than yours. Its got lots of really cool projects on it. I don't feel at all like doing any of them today. This must be ......
  377. 11/07/2005AYSO Soccer in Maine -- late fall. Plus, a short clip for family.If you have kids over the age of 8 and live in the U.S., you probably know about AYSO. The American Youth Soccer Organization is one of the greatest things ever to happen for kids. The organization exists in regional chapters purely for the purpose of ......
  378. 11/06/2005The Soccer Finals!Well, sometimes you're the winner, sometimes you're not. Ari's team did well against a tough Kennebunk team but lost 1-Nill to end the season. They played really well, but you don't get to the state meet without being the best in your region, and none of ......
  379. 11/04/2005Yeah, I'm also speaking at LotusFear this year.I'll be doing an updated version of last year's "Admin Zero to Hero in 60 Minutes" -- I'm going to try to stuff more into it. You may want to bring a time lapse camera to get it ......
  380. 11/01/2005Just two and half turns to the left. Why can't all technology be that simple?Its pretty quickly moving toward the first real snowfall here in Maine. Sometimes that happens before Thanksgiving and other times not for many more weeks. Its time, however, while its still reasonable out to get things ready. As I do every year, I dragged out the old snowblower to give it the once over. Its nine years old now, and for small engines that means a little extra maintenance from time to time. I must have failed to properly drain the carb this spring because it was full of old fuel that had ......
  381. 10/31/2005Ari's soccer team advances to the state finals!My daughter Ari is on a competitive soccer team. She's worked hard to get up to the level of play with these kids. They play thirty minute periods with eleven girls on a side using a full high school varsity field -- and they play rough. Saturday morning ......
  382. 10/24/2005How to 'un-brick' a WRT-54G wireless router (and why) -- and other WRT-54G upgrade informationAfter some background, this post includes pictures and instructions for the de-bricking process. IMPORTANT NOTE: This blog entry was from 2005! While I'm glad people still find it useful and come across it in searches, keep in mind that most of the hardware discussed is out of date at this point and has been replaced with new versions. It's unlikely you'll still be buying this gear in the same revisions. Also, nobody is likely to answer a question you post, because it only gets read by occasional ......
  383. 10/23/2005Soccer Playoffs -- Ari the enforcer -- So far #1 and undefeatedAri (my 11 year old) plays on a competitive "travel" soccer team. The playoffs were this weekend Saturday and Sunday about 1.5 hours north of here. Sunday is rained out so only Saturday's games were played. Sunday's games are moved to next Saturday, with ......
  384. 10/21/2005If you could connect VoIP to Lotus Notes, what would you have it do?I'm playing a LOT these days with VoIP. I've got my own Asterisk PBX, and today's Penumbra meeting included a fairly large virtual attendee base (not giving away any state secrets here). It was successful for many, less so for others due to firewalling ......
  385. 10/16/2005Off to Westford for a two day meetingI'm off to visit my friends in Westford for a couple of days. Anyone have an special requests to pass along? Drop me an email or reply ......
  386. 10/16/2005Chimney fire season has started.Last night around 8:30 we got called out to assist the next town over with a chimney fire. Their ladder is our service so they called ours. Explorers can't go on out of town boxes, and the ladder 7 crew is pretty short right now so I went. A young ......
  387. 10/14/2005A remarkable personality charting toolI got turned on to this from a friend and tried it. It took about 10 minutes and was dead spot on accurate (in my opinion). I doubt any of the results are unflattering so no matter how you come out you'll find the answer is probably appealing. Still, I'm ......
  388. 10/12/2005My poor, troubled, laptop was once again put through hell -- this time by a software 'upgrade'One after another my favorite software vendors fall by the wayside as buy-outs and market pressure to feature enhance products result in bloat-ware, quality problems, extortionate licensing, and in the end my utter disgust and frustration. Merrily working ......
  389. 10/10/2005Microsoft is attempting to rationalize licensing in a world of multi-core, multi-processor, and virtual machine technologySuppose you have a product that sells for $1000 per machine on which it is run. Your revenue is based on the model of a single license handling about 1,000 users, so its a $1/user revenue stream. Now along comes Intel and AMD offering faster processing, ......
  390. 10/07/2005In other news, look what I got tonight...I got the promotion last week, but tonight at the meeting was the presentation of this new piece of hardware. By the way, proud as I am -- this is a really really hard thing to take a picture ......
  391. 10/06/2005Domino bug reported in 5.0.10 -- 2 years ago, still active in version 7I just lost the opportunity to give someone a trial version of my new software -- hopefully they'll try again tomorrow. Why? Because a two year (and three major revision) long bug hasn't been addressed in the Domino code. I can't print the technote from ......
  392. 10/05/2005Google's first big goofle.Google and Sun together. What exactly do they have in common? Nothing but a general dislike for Microsoft. Sun seems to go out of its way to back any play it can come up with that tosses mud toward Redmond, and Google's recent run-ins with the 'softies ......
  393. 10/03/2005The new server is in place, do you like it? Does it work? Is it faster?Well, it took most of the day to get all things carefully cut over, but the dns now points to the new server, and I've dropped http and smtp from the old one. That means if you're seeing this, you're using the new server. Please let me know if you see ......
  394. 09/30/2005I just got Domino 7 running properly on Fedora Core 3 with some minor tweakingIt took a little effort to get this done because Fedora Core 3 is not a supported version of Linux for Domino according to IBM. I suspect others may see similar problems in other Linux distributions so let me document what I did other than the normal ......
  395. 09/28/2005What is it that makes people think "Excel Format" is a standard for transferring data?What follows is the text of an actual response I sent to an associate of mine after reviewing a response to questions we had on an RFP. I had asked what kind of format we could expect to see for the regular updates of data to be sent to us. Only comment ......
  396. 09/28/2005I want one button publishing from the editor of my choice, to the web server of my choice.I want one button publishing from the editor of my choice, to the web server of my choice. All the talk of standards, of service based sites, and content driven applications hasn’t gotten me there at all. I’m not talking here, of using my Notes client to ......
  397. 09/27/2005The economics of hosting have changed, time to take advantage. You should try it.After nearly 20 years of hosting one or more servers of one kind or another in my home, I'm moving my servers to ServerBeach. Many of you know that I have a pretty extensive network setup here, with a professional grade firewall, standby power generation, ......
  398. 09/27/2005Site is moving -- should be faster, could be some minor interruptionI'm making some important infrastructure changes here this week. This server will be hosted on a high speed machine at a tier 1 provider. Within a week or two, I'll also have a hot standby in place. This is to accommodates a need for increased reliability ......
  399. 09/26/2005Ok -- my turn to post a questionnaire thing.This was forwarded to me by Lt. Gordon Murphy. He's on our fire department as well, serving on the Chebeague Island fire museum (yes, the NEW truck is 1980, before that they're a pair of 1973's). The idea here, is you're supposed to forward this to a ......
  400. 09/23/2005Engine 1 - Soon to be retired and replaced with a newer modelI'm not sure if I mentioned this before, but one of the exciting changes due in the spring of next year is the arrival of a replacement for our venerable Engine 1. The current truck is a 1984 Ford chassis customized for fire service by FMC. It still runs ......
  401. 09/22/2005Open Office is nice, but don't count it unseating Microsoft from the Desktop so soonDon’t count on Open Office with IBM Workplace killing Microsoft Office any time soon. I like both products, and I’d love to see Microsoft take it on the chin now and again; but the marketplace has done what it does best – and it has sent Microsoft ......
  402. 09/22/2005Its live! NCT Simple Signon -- Take control of your Authenticated AccessAnnouncing NCT Simple Signon -- Integration without Aggravation If you've ever wanted to accept a user onto your Lotus Domino based web site with credentials from another server, or with a cookie you assigned the last time they visited, our newest product ......
  403. 09/21/2005Sneak Preview -- NCT Simple Signon Documentation. Trial downloads to be released within 24-48 hours.NCT Simple Signon provides an easy to manage, secure and reliable way to accept credentials from nearly any other application, and to pass credentials for users authenticated by your server to other sites. Integration without Aggravation The whole idea of ......
  404. 09/21/2005So what does it mean to be an officer in an all volunteer fire department? My brother sent me an email asking what exactly this means. We're not paid much, its not the military, so what the difference? I thought I'd write up a partial explanation here for those who probably have the same question. Keep in mind that according to ......
  405. 09/20/2005I have a new nameTechnically speaking, its not a name but a call sign. Tomorrow morning an official email will go out indicating my change from the radio number 339 to the new call sign "Car 31" -- which indicates that I've been given the position of Lieutenant on ......
  406. 09/20/2005Convergence * Updated -- Even more convergence!Do things in your life seem to happen all at once? Convergence is a strange thing. Today I have two important meetings. They are unconnected. Both related to activities that I’ve been working toward for quite a while. I chose the date for neither. Yes ......
  407. 09/19/2005What's yer pirate name?I don't usually do this stuff, but this one looked fun. Mad Roger KiddGet your own pirate name from ......
  408. 09/19/2005Everyone go give big congrats to NotesDawg.....or he'll kick your ......
  409. 09/19/2005Shape the next version of Notes! Sign up to do usability studies early!Main TopicSubject: Help Us Find End-users for usability testing of the next version! [Comment] By Mary Beth Raven/Westford/IBM on Mon, Sep 19, 2005 at 11:40 AM. Categories: Applications, Calendar & Scheduling (Applications\Design), Community, Customer ......
  410. 09/19/2005So many ideas, so little time, and the radical personality shifts of 12 year olds.Do you have periods in your work life or home life were you have so many ideas you'd like to take forward and no time at all to finish them? My list right now is longer than its ever been, and it shows no sign of getting shorter. I think I've got at least ......
  411. 09/14/2005Some thoughts after looking at the new Office 12 -- and surprise, Outlook is the odd man out.Like so many of you, I took a look at Scobble's video of the new user interface on Office 12 -- beta supposedly due out this fall. My first thought, is Scobble -- for the love of God buy a tripod. Moving beyond that, here's my first impression.... Its ......
  412. 09/13/2005A strongly worded warning -- What do you think?As I get ready to release NCT Simple Signon into the wild, I have some concern over allowing a sample agent to come with it that will log on virtually anyone under virtually any name if they know the syntax of the command. ......
  413. 09/13/2005Making sense of eBay’s purchase of Skype, and its inherent dangerAside from the pressure for any large tech company to be in all the hot tech areas, there is a very important fit for Skype with eBay. At first glance, this looks like late 90’s internet boom craziness. eBay and Skype would seem to have little in common. ......
  414. 09/12/2005Two Bright Sparks in Software Development, means one great backup toolI've wanted a good backup software tool for a long time. Most of them are either too expensive, too complicated, or both. I've been really pleased with SyncBackSE from 2BrightSparks Pte Ltd. I read about it this month in CPU Magazine, and figured I'd give ......
  415. 09/08/2005I'll bet they didn't stop this one to search for illegal immigrationMexico sends first ever aid convoy to U.S. Food, supplies, doctors come north in gesture fraught with symbolism, irony http://msnbc.msn.com/id/9248064/ LAREDO, Texas - A Mexican army convoy crossed into the United States on Thursday to bring aid to ......
  416. 09/06/2005High fuel costs this winter mean extra challenges for firefightersHere in the northeast, home heating is a big challenge. The way some of you in the south struggle to keep the electricity bills down and still keep the house cool in the summer, we fight cold all winter with home heating oil or LP gas fired furnaces. Fuel ......
  417. 09/03/2005Visual Studio .NET -- a Thanks to Gary Devendorf -- and a RANT about "DotFuscator" from PreEmptive SolutionsWith some excellent help from Gary Devendorf, I've released the beta version of my first stand-alone (Non Notes) workstation application in something like 15 years. Its nothing most readers of this blog would be all that interested in, as it detects ......
  418. 08/31/2005...highlights and circles and items to do, these are a few of my favorite things....A few new features in D7 mail that I like. Follow-ups that are as simple as right-click to manage, automatic highlighting of mail you need to look at based on recipient (in this case, from my wife), and the little blue circle that indicates if you're the ......
  419. 08/28/2005NCT Scanner Monitor is almost in beta -- I have a feeling this is going to go over well.Yes, Domino is part of this solution, but just one part. Its my first time in probably 15 years building a commercial product that's not specifically targeted to Lotus Notes or Domino customers. This is the front end piece to be used on-site. I hope to ......
  420. 08/25/2005Help me understand how IBM, Microsoft, or anyone else will make money on Instant Messaging.Google is in the mix now with their own IM client -- including voice traffic. Why? Why not? Its easy now. All you need is plenty of bandwidth and some big servers. Pretty much all the connection protocols, encoders (CODECS), and so on are available now as ......
  421. 08/22/2005Some thoughts on Eclipse/Java vs VS.netI should start by saying that I know comparing VS.net with Java/Eclipse is ignoring the choice of which language I'm using in VS.net. IMO, it doesn't matter that much because the nature of .net is such that the object models you work with are largely the ......
  422. 08/19/2005Back from under my bomb shelter. Heavy coding this week; oh, and here are some phone behaviors really that annoy me.Well, I've spent the entire week getting deeper and deeper into Digital Signal Processing. What a complex arena this is. I've actually had to go and buy a book on Calculus to understand much of the documentation. It was either that or call Richard and ......
  423. 08/07/2005Lets get this straight -- HBO is a studio, and a broadcaster, but they are not a network.Look, I really enjoy HBO. The series work they do is everything they claim it to be -- groundbreaking, intelligent, well written, well acted, and fabulously shot. They sweep the awards every year. That said, its hardly in the same category as an actual ......
  424. 08/06/2005Sherman, to the wayback machine.....I've been cleaning out the basement all day today. Like archeology, as you dig deeper into piles of garbage you go back further in time. Some of its pretty scary stuff, though I haven't come across evidence of human sacrifice yet. Can you believe I used ......
  425. 08/05/2005I gotta get me one of these! ......
  426. 08/04/2005Cumberland Fire Acadamy - The ExplorersIf I've been a bit quiet this week, its because I've been helping out with this years Fire Academy. Each year, our "Explorer" post invites several other town posts over and we host a 5 day long "Fire Academy" for the kids. "Explorers" are kids between the ......
  427. 08/03/2005Busy night on the fire department last WednesdayAs promised (or threatened, depending on your point of view) here's the story from last Wednesday's big storm and fire. To set things up a bit, it had been hot here for several days -- temperatures in the 90's ( 32+ Celsius) and humid. The weather report ......
  428. 08/01/2005Odd googles for JulyWell, I get around 1000 google hits each month right now, which isn't much but it works well for me since clearly less than 1% are would I'd called "odd ball". The rest all have something to do with my site, my products, my company, or firefighting. For ......
  429. 07/31/2005Early Neal Stephenson re-released -- and its goodWhile I don't read at the rate of Duffbert (few do), I do read quite a bit of both fiction and I've finished the second of two books I picked up just before the trip to Las Vegas. The books, titled "Interface" and "The Cobweb" are re-released under the ......
  430. 07/31/2005Pluto isn't a planet; Domino Doesn't Scale; and other stupid things people have said.From reading this article about the confirmed discovery of another large mass orbiting our sun, further than Pluto and having more mass, I'm reminded of a really stupid presentation given at a Lotusphere BP day a few years back in which a prominent person ......
  431. 07/27/2005Big storm this afternoon.Six lightening strikes, 1 house fire, 1 down power lines -- 7 hours. I'm going to bed now. More details ......
  432. 07/27/2005Theory confirmed -- there is indeed a detectable, tangible link between Gab and Tim Davis which prevents them being separated.Its long been rumored that Gab and Tim cannot remain separated for any great length of time. The reason for that is now a bit closer as we have found a device which can clearly detect and be impacted by that very link. This is 100% true. While on our road ......
  433. 07/25/2005A shame, but it looks like Dr. Ambuj Goyal is moving from Lotus to Information Management (DB2)According to SearchDomino.com, Dr. Goyal is moving to become the General Manager of Information Management. Its no secret that I've been very impressed with Dr. Goyal's work at Lotus. I give him a lot of credit for bringing a bunch of different ideas on ......
  434. 07/24/2005Post Advisor Conference Road Trip (with pictures) with Rocky, Gab, Tim, and some childrenSorry for being so quiet this last week -- I've been speaking at Advisor then running off on a road trip. Here are pictures from the trip. Rocky brought two of his kids, and I brought one of mine. Gab and Tim were along as well, but no pictures here of ......
  435. 07/17/2005Harry Potter and the Dell Inspiron 8200 CD PlayerOn the way to advisor I picked up the new HP book on CD since the preordered books would not get to the house until after we'd left. Of course, this is for Coryn, my daughter who's traveling with me. Not for me, of course. No, surely not. Anyway.... I'm ......
  436. 07/14/2005Software Eval Key Question -- Am I being too strict this time?This time around, with NCT Compliance Search the license key problem is a little different. With a product like NCT Search I'm happy to give away full functionality for 30 days -- and extend that for people who ask. Its the kind of tool that really isn't ......
  437. 07/14/2005Help me set the price for a new NCT Product -- NCT Auto Login for Domino will debut later this monthYour parent company has a website with a secure area for your customers and distributors. Its run by the parent company I.T. center in B.F.E. You've put together a private site in Domino that is specific to the products made by your division in Cool City. ......
  438. 07/13/2005Results I can use! Add this search plug in to your Firefox and avoid pages of price comparison sites in the results!I mentioned that I'd like to be able to search Google and not have a full page of aggregation sites like nextag and pricegrabber show up. These are annoying. Well, I got exactly what I wanted. Thanks to a tip from Peter Leugner, I got what I wanted. ......
  439. 07/12/2005NCT Compliance Search v1.0 Release Date is Friday! Check out this quoteAt long last, with several copies in production `pre-release` use, I will be letting NCT Compliance Search 1.0 out into the public. The key difference between `Compliance Search` and nearly any other search product, is that normally a search tool isn't ......
  440. 07/12/2005My advisor schedule for next week is busier than I have ever been at one conferenceThis year, asside from more sessions than I've ever done at a conference (7 hours plus a lunch) I'm traveling with my 10 year old Daughter, Coryn. Rocky is bringing a couple of his Rock-etts with him, and we're all going to have some fun after the show ......
  441. 07/12/2005Firefox add-in extension that I'd really like to seeI want a "search" bar for firefox that calls google search, but automatically appends api commands to exclude a list of sites (particularly nextag, epinions, dealtime, pricegrabber, and that ilk that fills up the damn screen when you're searching for a ......
  442. 07/12/2005Will I see you at Advisor in VegasI'd like to meet as many of you who read this blog as I can. If you're going to be in Vegas at the Advisor show next week, give me a heads up by email or post here. I'll be leaving after lunch on Wednesday, so catch me before ......
  443. 07/07/2005The Great city of London -- triumphant even in tragedy -- is in our hearts today.Not 24 hours after gleefully and rightly winning the right to host the 2012 Olympics, London is beset once again by cowardly criminals who kill women and children in the name of a belief system twisted by callous, power crazed leaders. I have many good ......
  444. 07/07/2005Are you a wardriver? This guy may go to prison for it.The courts have repeatedly found that if you can pull a signal off the air without decrypting it, you can use it. If this guy had a wireless rig setup in his house and did not have a password requirement or anything preventing access, I wonder if that can ......
  445. 07/07/2005Digital Signal Processing, FFT, and CalculusFor that last two days I've been working out how to pull the 'current' dominant sound frequency (or tone) out of a digital audio stream. This is done using something called a "Fourier Transform". This is a complex algorithm based on some pretty heavy duty ......
  446. 07/04/2005Once more into the telephony breach, dear friends...In 1993 I used Phone Notes with a Natural Microsystems 4 port voice card to create a voice interactive sales tool for company here called "The Maine Idea". At the same time I set up my own office voicemail system with the same Remark product. Its been 12 ......
  447. 07/02/2005Speaking of movies -- help me understand.........zombie flicks. There's a key bit of logic I don't understand. Even with the best of the movies where attention has actually been paid to the cause (usually a virus from a lab) and thought has gone into the consequences, I don't get why the zombies ......
  448. 07/02/2005Who was in charge of packing the cooler?I took a couple of hours off today and saw "War of the Worlds" -- the new one. In the classic film, the premise was much simpler. The space badguys come down in spaceships protected by a lot of rock and land hard on the ground. The rock breaks open and ......
  449. 07/02/2005I would expect, given the wide range of topics I rant about, to get some really oddball Google hits....Would you believe that out of 1,300+ google hits in June, there are none I would consider really oddball or funny? 99% of them are directly related to the topics I favor most on this site -- that is to say IBM Lotus Domino and related technologies, or ......
  450. 06/21/2005Inserting pass through html onto a form with LotusScript, designed to used in the NOTES CLIENT.If you create a form for Notes 6, and put a field on the form where the field and surrounding text is marked "pass through html", and you use the form property to render pass through html in Notes..... It doesn't work. You see the html that you put in the ......
  451. 06/21/2005Some code I used to save time with creation of an ugly backward compatibility hackI had to create a form to be used by R5 clients and part of the form had to display a variable number of urls, with an image used for the bullet. The data had to be written from a COM call outside Notes, and the form stored with the mail send. Ugliness ......
  452. 06/21/2005Want to know what New England firefighting is like? Check out the Discovery Channel's new show ......
  453. 06/21/2005FX's RESCUE-ME starts up again tonightRescue-Me! Starts again tonight on the FX network. The show stars Dennis Leary as a New York truckie (firefighter assigned to a ladder company) dealing with the issues related to 911, a drinking problem, and an overdeveloped sense of sarcasm. It is one of ......
  454. 06/14/2005Insanely cool surreal nightmare of a film -- what a great surpriseI'm watching the end now, of "Eternal Sunshine of a Spotless Mind" and I'm so pleasantly surprised by it. It isn't at all what I thought it would be. The film jumps around, more focused on the idea than anything else. In some ways, I'm reminded of Pi (the ......
  455. 06/12/2005RIT gets real, Summer comes to Maine, Lightning strikes at a bad time, and prepping for Las VegasSorry for not writing sooner, its been a busy week. Aside from the regular client stuff, I've been working with Gab on our combined admin basics jump start for Vegas. I'm really looking forward to that. It should be a lot of fun. Had a good meeting in ......
  456. 06/03/2005THEM! Where did great, simple, fun movies like this go?Here's the description: "Scientists must defeat a horde of giant ants--before they conquer the world! With Edmund Gwenn and bit player Leonard Nimoy." People go missing in a small desert town in Nevada. After a bit, a print is identified by scientists (a ......
  457. 05/29/2005The great cable & adapter changeoverAs someone who still travels a good deal on business and used to travel a great deal my backpack/briefcase/computer bag is a wonder of modern packing. I carry such an array of cables, adapters, wires, and such as to be able to connect to, repair, display ......
  458. 05/28/2005Stupid article in Wired Magazine about supposedly new firefighting techniquesWired is carrying an article this month on a technique for using less water in a more deliberate way they call "3-D" firefighting. The method involves using thermal imaging cameras to see the heat patterns in the room, then using just enough water in ......
  459. 05/28/2005Am I getting older and yet more cynical or is the media getting more and more transparent?I'm an admitted information junkie. I read print versions of Wired, CPU, and Scientific American -- all cover to cover -- and can never resist a good article from Goggle News, which is my home page. I keep up with SlashDot (aka /.) and a dozen or so blogs ......
  460. 05/27/2005RESCUE ME -- season 2 starts June 21Rescue Me, the FX Network's firefighter show is due to start its second season on June 21st. If you haven't seen it, you should. This isn't typical overproduced garbage, instead its a riotous and irreverent comedy-drama that you'll think is over the top ......
  461. 05/26/2005The new chips are here! The new chips are here!Do you need to go faster? For only $1,150 at ZipZoomFly (one of my favorite haunts) they're now offering the newest Intel P4. If you remember what I wrote earlier about why Hyperthreading rocks, you'll understand why I love this new toy..... Intel Pentium ......
  462. 05/26/2005Running your Domino server on a consumer home network DSL or CABLE system? Bad news on the way...(updated)Information Week, and a bunch of others, are carrying an article that references a renewed FTC (Federal Trade Commission) effort to get consumer carriers worldwide to stop allowing SMTP traffic outbound to anything other than their own mail relay servers. ......
  463. 05/26/2005Selected pictures from Monday night's fireHere are a few selected pictures to go with the story from Monday night... Click on a thumbnail to see the picture in more detail. ......
  464. 05/24/2005What the hell is middleware, and why would anyone want to but something with that name?Of all the product categories and names out there, what the hell kind of name is “Middleware”? Would you ever buy something called “Middleware”? Is it attractive? What does a name like this promise? Will it make you stronger, wealthier, better looking, ......
  465. 05/24/2005A big night tonight on the fire department -- fortunately no serious injuriesIts 1:17 am and I'm just back from a long evening on Engine 1. I'm eating dinner and blogging to calm down a bit before going to sleep so forgive me if I ramble a bit. At 17:06 my fire pager went off, striking a "desk box" (a significant incident) for a ......
  466. 05/21/2005Throwing Clay, Java, and Developments at the Fire StationI have to finally admit that my new modeling clay is Java. I still don't buy into J2EE for building most applications, and I don't see the value in making standards an obsession for work being done within the application itself -- but having gotten ......
  467. 05/20/2005A stop in New York, a strange perspective on accents, and Revenge of the ReviewOn my way to Fort Lee, New Jersey for this weekend's Penumbra meeting, I stopped at the Palisades Center to wait out the traffic on the parkway. Its a huge shopping mall in the worst sense of all such things. This massive windowless, featureless, block ......
  468. 05/18/2005off to New Jersey -- as my friend Volker says, "See you on the other side"....Off for a fun filled weekend business meeting with my fellow Penumbra members in New Jersey. Yes, I know you'd think a bunch of bright people could pick a nice spot. Ah well. At least its driving distance. The new car should make it in one tank -- and I ......
  469. 05/17/2005Rabbits down holesSometimes you chase the rabbit too far down the hole. In my never ending quest for high performance, I built an in memory index that works very much like a sorted view column in that its very quick to find an entry, and even support partial matches -- in ......
  470. 05/14/2005High Performance Threadsafe Access to DataThis document started out a quick blog entry, about two and a half hours ago. Its become one of the most detailed performance explanations I’ve ever put down in writing. If you have the patience to sit and read it, I’d appreciate any feedback you have. ......
  471. 05/10/2005The de-buzzification of AJAXEveryone's talking about AJAX now. The level of attention this is getting is more indicative of the herd mentality of JavaScript UI programmers than it is of anything particularly amazing about the technology. Apparently, everyone has spent so much time ......
  472. 05/10/2005Its HAPPY DANCE TIME in Redmond, WA.....I'm sure you've heard this story already... "A pair of unpatched vulnerabilities in Mozilla's Firefox Web browser -- rated as "extremely critical" by one security firm -- could allow an attacker to take control of a PC simply by getting a user to visit a ......
  473. 05/09/2005Running with the "Lotus Domino/Workplace Consulting Business" theme under discussion on so many blogs right now.....Well, Carl, Ed, and a bunch of others are asking about the consulting business. This stems from seeing a few people leave private consulting and head for jobs in big firms of late. I suppose its a valuable question, but I think concerns are overblown. ......
  474. 05/04/2005Incremental progress on a big project - and learning to like JavaAt what point are you comfortable with a new programming language? Like all modern languages, Java needs to be approached in three distinct areas. The environment in which it runs, the lexical syntax and common practices associated with using it, and the ......
  475. 05/02/2005Bad ATM Software -- Someone should be VERY embarrassed at KEY Bank.Last week, the Key Bank in Yarmouth, Maine had their ATM upgraded. Same old hardware, but clearly new software -- and some kind of headphone jack -- for the blind maybe. Now, first I have to ask what the hell a blind person would be doing in the driver's ......
  476. 05/02/2005Intuit (Quickbooks) wasted 2 hours of my day today, by screwing up my software just to advertise to me!I hate these people. My poor accounting skills have left me little choice by to use their software or become hopeless tangled in my own finances. That said, I've never seen a product cause me to have to spend so much of my time looking at advertisements ......
  477. 04/29/2005More on the generic server -- and some code.....So I've finished two big pieces of the "current projects" list. Now I have a full blown DNS client that lets me pick a dns server and request any kind of data from it. That means I can do reverse lookups, pointer lookups, ownership checks, and real time ......
  478. 04/27/2005The Generic ServerSometimes a lot of the things you want to do start to all have some core things in common. Recently, several of my pet projects (those nobody is as yet paying for) have all but cried out for back end server functionality. I've been needing something that ......
  479. 04/22/2005Alan Lepofsky points out a few great hidden hints in his Tables blog entry...I learned at least three things that if I knew, I'd long since forgotten. In particular, check out his "Extra HintS" part at the end of the story. Nice job Alan. Its also nice to see Alan finding his own style and space on the web. This is the first time ......
  480. 04/22/2005The case for using on disk compression for your Notes Data directoryI did some very extensive testing & reviews back in the 90's when Stacker and its ilk were on the market. Microsoft bought out much of that technology and its now pat of the operating system. You can select a folder, a file, or a drive and elect to ......
  481. 04/21/2005IBM Travelstar drives are not waterproof. Aka: What not to do when starting a presentation...Well, I'm back from Munich and a great time was had, I must say. The H&T people outdid themselves with this show. It was their most well organized and run to date. I did have one problem. It was kind of a big one. 3 minutes into my first session, "Domino ......
  482. 04/17/2005Hello from H&T Verlags Conferenz in Munich!Hello all! I've been busy working on things like a hueristic anti-spam engine and a service provider application, but I wanted to say hello to you from Munich -- one of my favorite cities. Special thanks to B.G. who picked up Rocky and I, along with his ......
  483. 04/08/2005Does your company really think you're valuable?Business Week is running a big story about IBM's Sam Palmisano finding a new vision for IBM. The idea is that you won't just use IBM to get your I.T. project done. No, a company will be able to outsource everything but its "core business" to some kind of ......
  484. 04/06/2005Crack found in space shuttle tankI didn't have a lot of time to read this, but I came across a Google News headline titled "Crack Found in Shuttle Tank". Now, I'm sure I'll have more time to go back and read this, but in the mean time I must say that I'm very angry. The very last thing ......
  485. 04/05/2005The media in general is conspiring to scare the hell out of me.Lets get something really clear. The only calming factor I've had, which I've been able to count on, as a father with three girls -- one rapidly approaching teenhood, and another one not at all far enough behind -- is that regardless of what teenaged boys ......
  486. 03/30/2005(Another) Review of TeamStudio's new LotusScript class browserRather than a simple announcement, I've decided to give an early review of Team Studio's new object browser tool. It fills a big gap by providing a fairly good object browser to use with your LotusScript agents and classes. Its not perfect, but it is ......
  487. 03/28/2005So, why re-invent the wheel?One of you sent me an email asking how the code I wrote was different from simply using: import java.net.*; InetAddress addr = InetAddress.getByName("www.yahoo.com"); System.out.println("IP Address = " + addr.getHostAddress()); I have to admit, its not ......
  488. 03/25/2005DNS Lookup from LotusScript anyone?I've written some code and I'm thinking of making it available as a toolkit in a compiled script library. Using LotusScript with ls2j and a java object I created, you can easily pass in a name server and host name and get back the ip address of the host ......
  489. 03/24/2005Creating a single outbound SMTP server for your Domino DomainI get more questions about smtp routing than anything else. Here's some notes taken from a recent presentation I gave at LotusSphere 2005 that should help you resolve some of the problems. The idea here, is not to have all your Domino servers routing mail ......
  490. 03/23/2005Geekfest -- what does your home office look like?I originally posted this in response to Bill's question here Lots of people have a home office. Lots are geeks. Are you up to the challenge? What does your geekworld look like? My office is a few hunderd square feet of space off the kitchen area, with ......
  491. 03/23/2005Does Bank One really think sending me deceptively written marketing will make me a customer?Like all of you, I get credit card offers almost daily in the postal mail. I've noticed a trend though. I can almost guess the card vendor based on the type and level of deception they used to get you to open it. I've had one recently that was ......
  492. 03/23/2005Well -- Customer's data restored, my own server upgrade done, and I'm back to blogging. What a week. A customer managed to destroy about 50 gigs of data and found out their backups were 90 days out of date -- that took some real effort to clean up. Then I had my own server to upgrade. If you notice this site moving a bit faster, its gone ......
  493. 03/17/2005Did you know that using Java Agents is inherently multi-threaded? I nearly cooked my processor finding out....I discovered something interesting yesterday. I'd written some code for a project I'm working on dealing with spam management. The code examines native mime, parses and pulls out target URL's and does some things with them. This means a huge amount of ......
  494. 03/17/2005My darn desktop6.ndk crashed.....gr...If you, like me, have hundreds of database icons on your desktop and haven't got a good backup of your desktop6.ndk file -- make one. It is immensely frustrating to have to re-create that hierarchy. It brings me back to thinking about a solution that uses ......
  495. 03/12/2005Got Snow? Take a look at these pictures ......
  496. 03/10/2005Microsoft buying Groove - good for SOHO, good for Microsoft, irrelevant to IBM strategy.The truth is, Microsoft needs Groove, and Groove needs Microsoft. Microsoft needs inspiration and direction to make their play in the so-called “groupware” or “collaboration” space more complete. Groove needs backing, and a compelling suite of surrounding ......
  497. 03/04/2005How much investment do you make in your clients....when they'll never know?Its Friday night, and I'm waiting for Battlestar Galactica to start on SciFi (we already know I'm a geek) and trying to come up with something interesting that's not too contrived to put on this blog. After all, you people have been patiently reading ......
  498. 03/02/2005What a difference a week makes. Here's pictures of the latest additional foot of snowIts a good thing there was SOME sublimation between the last storm and this one or we'd be just burried.... ......
  499. 02/22/2005Verizon DSL -- 3 days of frustration for 4 days of connectionI ordered Verizon DSL for the condo we're staying at in Florida. Ordered in plenty of time with an activation date the 14th of February. Of course, when I arrived it didn't work. The DSL modem synced up fine with the CO (so it wasn't a line issue) but no ......
  500. 02/22/2005Ah, warm, calm, and relaxed at last. New car, and pics from the sand in FloridaIts sure been a stressful couple of weeks, but at long last I've got space to take a breath. First, I replaced the old car with the Pacifica (dealer pictures, not mine) shown at the end of this email. I went to a dealer I've known for years who's always ......
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