Entries from August 2005 ↓

If Microsoft made the vi editor.

Enough said!

Today I bought my first PHP book! Yup I am now going to learn PHP and see what the other side is up to. I’ve been doing .net development for so long that I’ve become bored to death with it. So I’ve taken upon myself to learn php. Part of the motivation is to learn more on how to modify more of the Word Press blogging software I am using these days. It’s very extenisble, but its written all in PHP.

It looks very much like all the other languages so its not going to be that hard to understand. This is one of the advantages of current programming languages. If they all follow the C syntax, its pretty easy to jump right in and figure out. However every language have their slight differences (or they would all just be C then!).

I plan on doing doing some write ups on the blog about my experience with PHP.

The one thing that has really started to bother me about the .net framework is that I am truly stuck to only developing on the Windows Platform. I know why the do it but one should not be tied to a specific OS. I guess using a Mac is really starting to change the way I am looking at things. I don’t expect we should work for free. Heck I would not have a problem paying for the interperter for the OS. (Which should be included in the cost of the OS when you buy it, or as an addon for under $200) I say under $200 because your selling to the masses. If 100,000 servers have it installed for $100 to $200 a pop, I think you would more than cover your development costs. But thats another post for another time!

I wish I had read Drunken’s blog before I had done the latest security update from Apple. I have yet to have a problem with Security updates from Apple. However this is the first time that I had to go back and fix a few things.

The one problem I had was that the CVS repository that I have running on my Mac. I could not longer access it remotely. I guess the patch, fixed an exploit that I was not aware of. After about 3 hours of reconfiguring it, I finally got CVS working remotely again. If I had known earlier I would have waited for the second security update that Apple released a couple of days later that fixed several of the issues that it had created from the first patch.

Apple jumped the gun a little too quickly to get this security update out. By doing so, they made the Microsoft mistake! I don’t know how many times a Microsoft update has completely screwed up my computer. I now have a general rule with my Windows Machines: wait until the next update from Microsoft before I run it. I’d hate to think that I need to do this with Apple now!

Well I had to start my Mac today so my Uptime is now at 13:08, 2 users, load averages: 0.14 0.19 0.15

The best I had it at was 75 days. I had to reset it because I moved to my new house.

If you’re running OS X or linux you can get your uptime by opening up Terminal and typing in uptime.

Looks like blogger created an Add-in to word where you can post to blogger. Well I stopped using Blogger and started using WordPress about a month ago and have not looked back. To me this seems like a bit much to use word as your blogging tool. But then again it seems everyone using Windows has Word open and you’ll look like your actually doing work at work!!!

My old pal Phil has whipped up a storm again! This time he is taking on Joel Spolsky.

Joel believes in using BDUF (Big Design Up Front) software development where Phil believes in using Agile Development. While for the most part I agree with Phil, but there are times where BDUF totally makes sense.

What we’ve done at our company with great success is take a bit from both and add our own jelly on top. Before any development is done, we create a throw away prototype that the user can get their hands on. Once they agree to the basic design, we’ll go ahead and spec it out and create the database. We rarely do UML unless the project is HUGE.

The one thing that we did when I worked at a company with Phil was UML the hell out of everything. I hated this and I swear we wasted more time on this then actually developing the application. That’s probably why I ended up leaving. (Besides a few other thing that I really don’t want to go into. And no, Phil has nothing to do with me leaving!!)

One of the features we are beginning to use while in development is to create up a wiki for the team to leave documentation, notes, connection strings and who knows what else. So far this has been a huge sucess. I want to take this to the next level with the project management aspect and put our weekly status notes in there or better yet create a blog for this. There is has to be some real value in using a blog!!!

The new MSN Messenger 5.0 for the Mac was released today! It still does not have all the features of MSN 7.0 of Windows but its much better that what I wa using

Here is a screenshot of the MSN Messenger:

The first thing you will notice is the brushed metal look and feel. Microsoft is pretty late to the game when it comes to this GUI design. Apple is probably going away from this look, (For Example Mail 2.) so this will look aged by the time (if ever) Microsoft releases 6.0 of MSN Messenger.

Another feature that was missing was the ability to show your own image while chatting with your friend.

What could be interesting is the ability to use OS X MSN with Microsoft Live Meeting. That allows people in an office to use secure messaging within their own network. I’m not sure if that is even in MSN 7 yet!

The only reason I still use MSN is the fact that my work is still done in a pro Microsoft environment and most are using MSN. Someday when I can finally convince everyone I know to move to Apple, I can start using iChat! Until that day comes, this update is long overdue and a welcomed change!

If you have OS X 10.4 Tiger, you by now have used Spotlight. However there are a few tricks that most may not know about.
I’ve compiled a list of my favorite tips that I have found by reading blogs online.

• 1. Use Command + Spacebar to open up Spotlight instead of clicking the spotlight icon.
• 2. Command + Spacebar opens and closes spotlight.
• 3. To open the top hit, type in your search string and then hit Command+Enter Key.
• 4. Command+ Up Arrow Key or Command + Down Arrow Key to move to the next/previous category
• 5. If you only want to find a type of document/application use the keyword kind: + type (Example kind:pdf)
      If you need to find a specfic pdf you kind:pdf + name of pdf (Example: kind:pdf Niels)

Now this is one very cool picture.

Check it out!

WARNING: THE PICTURE IS HUGE BUT YOU WILL NOT BE DISAPPOINTED!!!

Have you noticed the lack of hype for Windows Vista? It’s like no one really even cares! It feels like when they annouced the Beta of Windows ME. No one really made much of an effort at my old office then to get the beta. XP was different. It was the OS you wanted to use after using NT 4 Workstation for so long.

This time around I don’t even hear anyone talking about it, except for how bad the name is. What I am puzzled about is that this is the new OS that will take Windows to the next level that it’s been lacking for so long. However, I will have to get it and see for myself. If they did cut all the cool features that they were showing at PDC in 2003, then I would have to agree with most, that this OS will be nothing more than Windows XP 1.5.

Compare this to when Tiger was in Beta, it’s night and day. Even my non Mac friends knew about Tiger. I have read from some people (Microsoft employees) that is better looking that OS 10.4. Even if it is, Apple will probably have 10.5 out before they release Microsoft Vista.