tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-243823832011-07-28T05:10:20.203-07:00My views on software, programming, Linux, the Internet, government, taxation, working, and life.supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.comBlogger831100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-50021560369308176672007-04-11T13:46:00.000-07:002007-04-11T14:20:24.836-07:00

In my post here, I explained how South Carolina is confusing on its language regarding LLCs, is a business repellent in more ways than one, and also has made all Delaware Corps or LLCs pretty much illegal as a way to skirt paying SC taxes. I also explained how many states, not just South Carolina, are a business repellent especially for the online global economy regarding tax and business law,

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-9156032807831257832007-04-10T12:57:00.000-07:002007-04-10T20:17:09.280-07:00

I had a cousin from South Carolina in the USA ask me to research for him whether it would be better to form a C corp or an LLC, and whether to do it in his home state of South Carolina or to do it in a tax-friendly state such as Nevada or Delaware. His business was the Free Software Model, where he gives away freely downloadable software as a lure but then sells customization consulting, manuals

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1169421054578727022007-01-21T16:10:00.000-07:002007-01-21T16:10:54.596-07:00

Super Cool Image Shifting CodeIf using Firefox, and you surf to images.google.com, type in a keyword to see your favorite set of images, and then go to the addressbar and paste into it this code and press Enter...javascript:R=0; x1=.1; y1=.05; x2=.25; y2=.24; x3=1.6; y3=.24; x4=300; y4=200; x5=300; y5=200; DI=document.images; DIL=DI.length; function A(){for(i=0; i-DIL; i++){DIS=DI[ i ].style;

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1168829962172582092007-01-14T19:59:00.000-07:002007-01-14T19:59:22.176-07:00

Can't Do This on Windows!My daughter came over to me and said she didn't save her Abiword document for her class, and it crashed. She thought she had lost everything. I asked if she saved it at least once because the program auto-saves every 5 mins. by default after that and she said she had not saved it at least once. She was in a panic. The first thing I did was tell her that in the future

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1168283292365341242007-01-08T12:08:00.000-07:002007-01-08T12:08:12.370-07:00

Planning The Polar Programming LanguageOver the years I like bits and pieces of certain programming languages and developed a preference. I wanted to build a programming language called Polar to collect it all in. I don't have the brainpower to build an interpreter for the language in C, so at best all I can do is dump out my feature list in great detail, copyright it in a book, and try to get

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1168242478920831832007-01-08T00:46:00.000-07:002007-01-08T00:47:58.936-07:00

This is the image that I have for the article:http://www.ubuntuforums.org/showpost.php?p=1983541&postcount=1

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1167503219366802032006-12-30T11:26:00.000-07:002006-12-30T11:26:59.406-07:00

My Wealth StrategyOf course, I need to follow my own strategy more religiously, but in general these are the steps I plan to take to increase my wealth or are already taking them. Perhaps they can work for you. 1. Start by saving up about $4,000 to always have on hand each year for an emergency. If you deplete it, then you need to slowly replenish it the next year over a 3 or 4 month timeframe. 2

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1167496045608707322006-12-30T09:27:00.000-07:002006-12-30T09:29:53.983-07:00

Taking YouTube Audio from Mono to StereoYou might not know this, but YouTube audio is mono. Of course, many of us never noticed because I guess we were so thrilled to see and hear our favorite bands again. So then I wondered how to pull the audio stream out of the video, and I found several other people wondered that too and built scripts, websites, programs, or browser plugins to handle

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com34tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1167285478671044332006-12-27T22:57:00.000-07:002006-12-27T22:59:44.373-07:00

Predictions About Microsoft's Next OS After VistaA recent insider told me that Vista is going to be the last OS of its kind once it is released. And that's if it's released, of course. It might, once again, have to go back to the drawing board to have more stuff ripped out that's unpopular, and more goodies added in, in order to lure people in. This process is going to be expensive for Microsoft.

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1166160034150983602006-12-14T22:20:00.000-07:002006-12-14T22:36:08.033-07:00

Surviving Freshman Managers in Tech JobsDo you have a crappy tech job? Is it because you're making wise decisions grounded in experience and logic, but your manager, who's far more the freshman than you, merely implements choices with no bearing on anything, moving, if not at random, on some buzzword he last saw on his cnet homepage, even if it's counter to the corporate direction? Is he always

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1165801403605918972006-12-10T18:43:00.000-07:002006-12-10T18:43:23.660-07:00

Being Held Hostage By Your ComputerYou know, it amazes me how capitalism works to benefit people at the same time it screws them over. So here we have the unethical capitalists, Microsoft, who wish to not out-innovate their competitors, but crush them, and they have made this really paranoid, stinky OS called Vista. Microsoft got so money hungry that they actually had to make their OS prey on its

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1165210581469150142006-12-03T22:36:00.000-07:002006-12-03T22:36:21.473-07:00

InsomniaOkay, I think I have issues now with my sleeping patterns. I'm like way out of whack. I can't get to bed until 4am, and I can't get up until 8:45am or 9am. I've tried different things, but nothing works. I keep wanting to think, think, think and accomplish, accomplish, accomplish. I keep asking myself, in the measure of my day, what have I accomplished that I can be proud about. If you

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1165125313099784602006-12-02T22:55:00.000-07:002006-12-02T22:55:13.133-07:00

I Wrote to Mark Shuttleworth -- My Ubuntu WishlistHere's my 2007 wish list I wrote to Mark.Command-line Yast-like Tool for Ubuntu Server. Beats having to memorize LDAP commands and other commands that have a lot of switches.GNOME integration of SSHFS for "secure mapped drives" to other Ubuntu workstations and servers. It's more secure than NFS and needs good integration with GNOME.Simultaneous

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1165123123354242972006-12-02T22:18:00.000-07:002006-12-02T22:18:44.226-07:00

Strange Ubuntu iPod ExperiencesFor chrissakes, I just want to get an iPod icon to appear on my desktop when I put it in, and when I double-click it I can assign that to an import/export/playback app that actually works. Sure, the icon appears, but it launches Nautilus instead of an app that I want to assign. They said Rhythmbox on GNOME was all the rage, but I couldn't figure out how to write

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1164944657679783782006-11-30T20:44:00.000-07:002006-11-30T20:44:17.686-07:00

Killing the Reddit AddictionReddit has to be the most addicting website on the planet. I can't stop myself from going there. It's an OC behavior, I swear. For one thing, it's fast. You can respond on a link in just a couple minutes and far faster than you can respond on Google Groups. For another, the pages load super fast and don't come with a lot of other junk, much like Google. And most of all

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1164702519190753712006-11-28T01:28:00.000-07:002006-11-28T01:28:39.196-07:00

A Well-Designed Disinformation CampaignFor just about a thousand dollars, you could interact in chat rooms and web and news-based forums to link back to phony but authentic news sites such as "Middle East Times" to promote your own agenda. (The thousand dollars handles the dozens of sites and the GB bandwidth utilization costs.)Think about the disinformation campaigns that started in 1999 and

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1161750793938575322006-10-24T21:33:00.000-07:002006-10-24T21:33:13.943-07:00

My Phone Rings and The Internet Drops Its ConnectionSYMPTOMDay 1: You hear slight high pitched sounds on the phone at first, along with some mild fuzz.Day 2: When you're talking, people ask you to speak up and you sort of get the feeling that your words are getting cut out.Day 3: When someone calls you, your Internet connection goes down 50% of the time. When they don't call you, even though you

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1161745878910993372006-10-24T20:11:00.000-07:002006-10-24T20:11:19.006-07:00

Making Imaging Apps in Linux PHPI found after some research that if you know a little PHP, it's super-easy to make your own imaging apps in PHP on Linux. But wait! Before you read "linux" and get turned off because your users use Windows, do not despair. You can use Ubuntu Linux or your favorite Linux as your scan station, but then the web app can serve up the docs for viewing and printing

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1161710704508529692006-10-24T10:25:00.000-07:002006-10-24T10:25:04.516-07:00

Quit Using DIV Tags AlreadyI don't mean quit using DIV tags altogether, but dang it, if you're going to use them in your HTML to replace where you might be using TABLE tags, test them in all kinds of font situations and on Macs, the top 4 versions of desktop Linux, and Windows, using Firefox, IE6 and 7, and Safari. Please!!!!You see, the problem is that I now go to many sites where the message is

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1161705348142010702006-10-24T08:55:00.000-07:002006-10-24T08:55:48.226-07:00

PHP Is My Web Language of ChoiceAs much as I like, I've come to realize that there are 6 forces that will always be in computer programming:THE SCIENTISTS. Computer "scientists" and professors who will espouse the productivity of Scheme and LISP and who end up making big-selling web products from it, oddly enough, such as the fact that most of Yahoo's ecommerce catalog is running on LISP. .....

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1161609847840450382006-10-23T06:24:00.000-07:002006-10-23T06:24:07.853-07:00

The USA Is BetterNo matter where you go, there are these main conditions, where any of these countries may have at least one of these, that make it far worse than living in the USA. You'll deseparately want to come back.Bad healthcare -- sure, it's free, but you wait in tremendous lines for it and the doctor advice is "pat you on the back, send you on your way" style.Welfare state -- the

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1161543490234532672006-10-22T11:58:00.000-07:002006-10-22T12:41:35.273-07:00

Drawing PNG Piecharts in Linux-based PHPAfter a lot of work and articles on the web, I figured out how to draw PNG piecharts in PHP without needing anything more than ImageMagick to be installed on the Linux web server. (You might also need to change file permissions or use a sticky bit here or there to get this going in your environment.) The following code uses the SVG XML standard to create a

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1161460613273538892006-10-21T12:56:00.000-07:002006-10-21T12:56:53.276-07:00

Internet Addiction vs. Web Development from HomeReddit, emails, and YouTube are the enemy of the web developer. They are highly addictive and you end up never getting anything done. Tell yourself you're going to avoid them for a whole two days. The fix for me has been old swing music because it has a steady beat to keep your mind moving and not sleeping like environmental/nature music would,

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1161410481962520962006-10-20T23:01:00.000-07:002006-10-20T23:01:22.030-07:00

Second StateRecently I came across an interesting fanatic post on Reddit about a USA citizen wanting to get a bunch of people to move to Kansas and succeed from the USA. He seemed to be reading too much Socrates. I decided it would be a fun exercise to figure something out, even though I don't agree it can work. And, of course, it would be illegal in the USA.His concerns were:High state and local

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1161333523875149582006-10-20T01:38:00.000-07:002006-10-20T01:41:43.580-07:00

Getting Wealthy Ain't So BadDon't you just hate arrogant wealthy people? Me too! *long pause*Wait a minute. I thought this article was about "wealthy not being bad". Yep, that's right. So when you hate arrogant wealthy people, it's because they were arrogant, wasn't it? It wasn't the wealth part. Or perhaps you called them tightwad wealthy people, and you were really upset that they were

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1161140977267822752006-10-17T20:09:00.000-07:002006-10-17T20:09:37.370-07:00

What Would Ghandi Do?With this whole no-way-to-win, Al-Queda or islamofascist anti-Western Civilization thing, what do we do now? Where do we go? Have the generations that brought us all this technology suddenly found no more ways to innovate and get us out of this rut? How come we have no more Solomon-like gurus like Ghandi suggesting ways out of this mess? How do you win an ideological war

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1161061327804899262006-10-16T22:02:00.000-07:002006-10-16T22:02:07.810-07:00

The Penguin PartyI recently came across this interesting image.Too bad we don't have this. The Penguin Platform adapts rapidly to changing market conditions, runs fast, lean, and cheaply yet supports so much for everyone, embraces capitalism with concepts like loss leaders and using Google AdSense to make money from almost nothing, yet does not support monopolistic practices, encourages community

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1161056366383021242006-10-16T20:39:00.000-07:002006-10-16T20:39:26.390-07:00

When Blogging Makes A DifferenceRecently, I got an almost realistic email that turned out to be an Internet phishing scam. I did a lot of research to prove how it was a scam by so many different factors. I blogged about it and to my delight I've had 5 people where it stopped them from getting caught in this scam, and one person was already a bit deep into it and caught it early enough to get out.

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1161054882723838732006-10-16T20:14:00.000-07:002006-10-16T20:41:00.790-07:00

Scaling Your PHP Internet WebsiteThere has been a lot of talk about people making money on Internet-facing websites that generate income solely from Google AdSense revenue and provide free content. Sounds nice, and if you're a budding web developer, or have done several web apps in an office, and know a little Linux and some web language, you might be the perfect fit to get something like this

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1161053759553131072006-10-16T19:55:00.000-07:002006-10-16T20:40:45.526-07:00

Why Would Anyone Try To Be An Asterisk PBX Reseller?For those of you don't know, Asterisk is an open source project by a company called Digium, and a large community of worldwide developers, that allows one to make a nearly free, super cool phone system for your office, or for your company over the Internet where you might have workers spread across the globe. It's nearly free because it still

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1159931614220666912006-10-03T20:13:00.000-07:002006-10-03T20:13:34.236-07:00

The Next Big Internet Site IdeaAfter being greatly inspired by this link...http://www.blogotechnic.com/the-internet%E2%80%99s-biggest-google-whores/...I just had to come up with a website idea that drives all its income from Google AdSense. So here it is.Mix a dating site with an online free gambling site (using fake money) with a version of secondlife.com, minus all the fancy artwork and minus

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1158465972246394352006-09-16T21:06:00.000-07:002006-09-16T21:06:12.370-07:00

Blueprints of an Internet Phishing AttackI'm going to show you how to find signs of an Internet scam that you could easily get caught up in, and then explain a real one going on right now.Take a look at the following two links for a so-called "job opening" at a place called AVT Designs, supposedly based out of Spain. I received this job opening request through the email because of a resume I

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1158030737560441492006-09-11T20:12:00.000-07:002006-09-17T12:34:09.046-07:00

Being a USA Republican and Sometimes Regretting ItSometimes I'm so sick of being Republican. Of course, to me, being Democrat is worse, nothing like being in a party that's only talking points are to be anti-Republican, but being Republican in the USA is such a problem for me. More often than not, Republicans are unsophisticated when it comes to technology. They are like the cartoon character of

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1158029712320555662006-09-11T19:55:00.000-07:002006-09-11T19:56:13.513-07:00

On Leaving for Iraq with HaliburtonA relative of mine found a deal where he could teach Iraqis to be prison guards. He stands to make $400,000 tax free, all expenses paid, for one year of abusive work with abusive, hectic management, strange food, crazy people, and a strange land. From that, he can come back and pay off his house, his farm, and still have some money left over. So then another

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1155014263101237912006-08-07T22:17:00.000-07:002006-08-07T22:17:43.113-07:00

Wealthy vs. GeekIsn't it true that the job of the wealthy class is to lock the geeks hopelessly in the middle class while reaping the benefits of the geeks' fantastic achievements? There is the old expression, a job is a good way to have a career, but not to make any money.

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1154967000991797952006-08-07T09:10:00.000-07:002006-08-07T09:10:01.676-07:00

The Internet Is OwnedHave you gotten the feeling lately that the Internet is owned? By that I mean that various mafia and gangs (according to recent reports) are on the Internet making a business out of extortion and phishing scams, and they're infecting and using zombie PCs to hide their tracks. And if it's not them, it's the North Korean and Chinese militaries -- these addresses appear on my

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1154495776581825892006-08-01T22:16:00.000-07:002006-08-01T22:16:16.593-07:00

Top Ten Reasons Why Wal*Mart Sucks10. The staff parks in all the good spots up front.9. The bathroom stalls have broken doors and are disgusting. Imagine the worst possible option and it's there.8. The floors are nasty throughout the store. They should get a clue from Target.7. The products are severely low quality and have usually been opened and returned, or are missing parts. I've gone through

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1154102846423556312006-07-28T09:07:00.000-07:002006-07-28T09:07:26.433-07:00

Project To Bring Yast to UbuntuA new project to try to bring a Yast-like tool to Ubuntu has begun. A menu demonstration has been completed for a project called Ubuntu System Tool (UST). If you have Ubuntu and dabble with programming, I encourage you to download the demo and try it out because you may find you can contribute to it quite rapidly.Here's a Screenshot.And here's the project

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1154102116900836962006-07-28T08:55:00.000-07:002006-07-28T08:57:00.210-07:00

How To Bring Down MicrosoftI read with great interest this article this morning...Zune Will Produce Massive Losses to Microsoft...stating that Microsoft will have to produce its new iPod-knockoff at a great loss in order to get you to pay for other products and services surrounding it. We Linux advocates have had fun with things like this ever since we figured out how to put a Linux OS on the

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1153793752301262562006-07-24T19:15:00.000-07:002006-07-24T19:15:52.380-07:00

Sinatra & Swing & Motivated To CodeI'm nearly 40 and I tell you, after all these years of programming software, I never really took to Swing and Sinatra like I do today. But you find that it's a great change that doesn't annoy people (most of the time). The steady secondhand beat of the sound, which I listen to dimly of course, keeps me moving with less pauses. It also encourages me to type about

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1153709581370262842006-07-23T19:53:00.000-07:002006-07-23T19:53:01.376-07:00

On Popup Ads and Flash UpgradesSo if popup ads are now well-known by most citizens as something that gives them the heeby-jeebies, and most ISPs and web browsers now block this, then why are web developers still so lazy to remove them from their websites? This does not compute.And why do most of us not have any problem seeing Flash advertising on websites without having to upgrade our browser

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1153658311110121932006-07-23T05:38:00.000-07:002006-07-23T05:41:00.183-07:00

Experiments with Ubuntu Linux AdoptionI have done an experiment with Ubuntu and my family. Here's the results.My wife understood the justification for the move because after severely trying to protect her PC from identity theft with Windows and Windows controls, she was still hacked. We have since switched her to Ubuntu. Now, however, she asks if online courseware from her school will work on it

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1153400326385835032006-07-20T05:58:00.000-07:002006-07-20T05:58:46.430-07:00

Imperfect Upgrade To Ubuntu Dapper From BreezyIf, after the upgrade to Dapper, your system boots up in Dapper and comes to a blinking underline cursor and then hard locks, where CTRL+ALT+F1 won't even get you a terminal window, welcome to the club. However, perhaps I have the fix for you. It's likely how the video drivers are set up in your /etc/X11/xorg.conf file. On my system, I had Xinerama

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1153015709923444932006-07-15T19:08:00.000-07:002006-07-15T19:08:29.930-07:00

Get Swiftfox on Ubuntu and Speed Up Your Web Browsing Tremendously!Man, I have great news.After reading about this in a forum, I installed Swiftfox on Ubuntu to replace Firefox (and still leave the old Firefox icon). I think you have to be on the 686 kernel, though, to run it -- not certain of that.Anyway, to get it, you go to:http://getswiftfox.com/releases.htm(Info is here: http://

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1152991208238002982006-07-15T12:20:00.000-07:002006-07-15T12:20:08.330-07:00

Ways To Improve Your PHPI've collected some ways to improve your PHP web application development over the years.MAGIC QUOTESTurn off magic quotes. These are very bad because it can mangle strings and make it hard to parse stuff. You can google for what I'm talking about.TEMPLATEUse a template page. Usually my template page, from the top down, consists of a graphical banner, a ridge, a section

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1152986012776536722006-07-15T10:53:00.000-07:002006-07-15T10:53:32.783-07:00

PHP6 or PHP7 Should Have Some ImprovementsI have used PHP4 and PHP5 awhile now, and I can tell you that I am still always grabbing the manual to understand the sequence of function parameters for String Library functions. In some cases, if you have a haystack, needle, and a source parameter, you may have to reorder these with one function, and another way with another function. Instead, I call

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1152980947253701332006-07-15T09:29:00.000-07:002006-07-15T09:38:01.740-07:00

Speed Up Your Next Software Project with the "Morale Project Plan"Working on software and falling behind on the project schedule? Is your customer frustrated already? Try my gameplan. It may improve the morale of your customers as well as your developers, and may unstick a stuck project.DEMO. You really need to think through all the nuances of the app. Sometimes projects are mired down because of

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1152921210115825432006-07-14T16:53:00.000-07:002006-07-14T16:56:21.500-07:00

Why Database Table Denormalization Is Just As Important As NormalizationWhen it comes to databases, everyone wants to make them run faster. They may crack open books and read advice from Computer Science guys with Master's Degrees or even PhDs on the subject. You might even think they are absolutely 100% correct and could never tell you a lie. Well I'm about to set you straight.Most often the

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1152767246152210872006-07-12T22:07:00.000-07:002006-07-12T22:07:26.156-07:00

Why I Hate JavaProgramming with Java is aggravating. You find an object method that solves the very problem you had, but no, you can't use it. Instead, you have to take your variables and dip them in other object methods like baths, changing the data into the right format so that therefore, perhaps one day, young man, you might be good enough to use that exciting object method that gets it all

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1152274955734730612006-07-07T05:22:00.000-07:002006-07-07T05:22:35.740-07:00

MySpace Not Good for Linux AdoptionBecause MySpace promotes proprietary formats on its website, it's not good for helping Linux adoption. My daughter said she can't watch videos on Ubuntu when she visits MySpace sites, or clicks on MySpace music. Yet, if you check, you find the netcraft stats show that MySpace is hosted on Linux servers. Go figure.

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1152270407657226492006-07-07T04:06:00.000-07:002006-07-07T04:06:47.663-07:00

American Programmers Dealing with Indian OutsourcingLose your programmer job to India? Here's your recipe for a comeback:Take a systems analyst, helpdesk, or server-room job. They're still out there and usually require a physical presence in local offices in the USA in order to be effective.Because you're not a programmer by doing such a move, you're creative energies will have to have a release.

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1152268548582336592006-07-07T03:35:00.000-07:002006-07-07T03:35:48.586-07:00

A Danger of What's New Type SitesI've been using over a couple of months now these What's New type sites like digg, reddit, and shoutwire, among many others. I've noticed symptoms that the sites have been hacked mildly by people who seem to know how to work the system and artificially inflate their news item to the top. It occurs to me now, however, that there is a risk with this sort of thing.

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1152265204375795312006-07-07T02:40:00.000-07:002006-07-07T04:07:07.426-07:00

Reviewing the Latest Web StatsThis is in regards to this:http://www.w3counter.com/globalstats/To my surprise, it says here that 55% of the Internet is now running at 1024x768 screen resolution. Only about 11% still use 800x600. I was surprised to see that low number! For most of the stuff I do, I was still trying to make it work in 800x600. Perhaps in about 2 years I can start designing only in

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1150699230079974692006-06-18T23:40:00.000-07:002006-06-18T23:40:30.096-07:00

Getting Family Members on LinuxSo I got my wife on Ubuntu Linux 5.10, got everything looking great and Win95-ish on her desktop (but cooler) so it's familiar to her, and now I want to replicate this desktop's GNOME theme settings, launchers, icons, and font settings on another desktop because it's so cool. How do I do that in the least amount of bytes and time?Anyway, I got her on Linux by first

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1148789614713139852006-05-27T21:13:00.000-07:002006-05-27T21:13:34.746-07:00

My Horrible DayThis is my horrible day. I got up, kissed the wife in bed, and looked over at her. It was our wedding anniversary. The night before, she said, "What are you going to do for me on Saturday?" and I had not answered it. I felt strongly compelled to do something for her. It was our eleventh. We showered up early and got the kids up, then waited on them to get ready. We were going to

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1148187327722287122006-05-20T21:55:00.000-07:002006-05-20T21:57:53.053-07:00

Prograph, Back from The DeadOh no, Prograph is back from the dead, now with shades of it appearing in Marten. Did someone put magic shrooms in my tea? Yep, and it's only going to run on the Mac. I used to be a Mac user years ago before I got sucked away into the make-money-on-Novell phenomenon and then was in a deep haze with Windows for a few years before finally landing in the wonderful world

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1148184380929317192006-05-20T21:06:00.000-07:002006-05-20T21:10:57.163-07:00

Why I Beat Up Your Cat ObjectFor a few months I was wondering what was going on -- why I couldn't get back to work, programming again on my huge web app project that I eventually plan to release on GPL and then form a business around it. (This will be my second startup.) I was more prone to watch a movie or play my guitar than to write software. Yet writing software is important to me because it

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1147566127877558392006-05-13T17:22:00.000-07:002006-05-13T17:49:32.580-07:00

The Problem with SEOMoz's Web Developer Interview QuestionsThis is driven from:a blog at Seomoz.orgI have a few problems with this kind of employer. He has to realize that not only is he picking people he wants, but the candidates are trying to decide whether they want to work for him as well. I'm a manager and a programmer, myself, so I get to hire and fire people. Therefore, I try to be fair

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1146022513813721012006-04-25T20:35:00.000-07:002006-04-25T20:35:13.816-07:00

Creating Rich Client Linux Apps with XPSLTonight I've coined the term XPSL to stand for making a rich client application on Linux using Mozilla XUL, PHP, SQLite, and Lighthttpd. The way it works is that the one XUL file is loaded as a chrome for Firefox. This in turn calls Lighthttpd which then calls PHP. The PHP then interacts with a SQLite database. The only catch is that I want to work on

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1146022228476467582006-04-25T20:30:00.000-07:002006-04-25T20:30:28.600-07:00

Cannot Take Ruby on Rails Seriously!Model View Controller architecture is enforced? Give me a break. Isn't that sooo Java? I can't think in MVC mode. My mind won't let me. It hurts. Then, when I looked at the source code for RoR, I just had to laugh. Looks like Fortran and Java mixed together with C#. No way I'm going to touch that stuff. Programmers need to program, not have their language get

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1145762369294983152006-04-22T20:19:00.000-07:002006-04-22T20:22:05.673-07:00

Grisbi - Business Accounting For LinuxNeed something as if it's a Quickbooks Pro™ for Linux? Go look at Grisbi. Of course, the most sound advice I can give you is to consider the Gnucash project because it is most used, or do all your books in OpenOffice spreadsheets. Still, however, if you want to see a sensational up-and-comer, Grisbi is something I have my bets on. The problem I have with

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1144870872677797342006-04-12T12:41:00.000-07:002006-04-12T12:41:13.516-07:00

What's New in GNU/Linux and FLOSSYawn. The recent LinuxWorld Expo was a yawner. There is like nothing going on right now. It's like everyone must be furiously coding something right now? And this AJAX stuff. Jeesh -- that's overhyped too much. Here, let me write a piece of code that will more than likely break in your browser. Or, let me give you thousands of lines of Javascript/ECMAScript so

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1144649895835327092006-04-09T23:18:00.000-07:002006-04-09T23:18:15.840-07:00

ParkourI have seen the future and it's something from France. It's called Parkour. People will simply not believe it. And imagine if these guys combined martial arts with this. I imagine the military in most countries will probably start teaching this stuff. There are also some great videos of people practicing this.

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1144632343537100512006-04-09T18:25:00.000-07:002006-04-09T18:25:44.826-07:00

Getting back to code...I've been getting back to my project, which is a ticketing system written in PHP and PostgreSQL on Linux -- the LAPP platform. So hard to focusI've been working on this project for several years now. It's getting a bit old and is a drain on my life and my family. I'd like to get a 1.0 release out, but unfortunately there's just so much more work to be done. The introduction

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1143954646179596162006-04-01T22:10:00.000-07:002006-04-09T18:33:34.293-07:00

Business Model To Rocket-Propel Free Software Startups{withdrawn by me}

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1143944033784401092006-04-01T19:13:00.000-07:002006-04-01T19:13:53.836-07:00

Linux Needs An AlphalanguageLinux needs an alphalanguage by which other scripted, OOP languages are hatched. What I mean is that Linux needs a simple-to-read Perl-like language that allows you to create new scripted programming languages. If you want to build the next Rubyesque or PHP-clone language, then fine. This thing can handle it.And, if you at least know a little Perl, then you'll be at

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1143938223805761842006-04-01T17:37:00.000-07:002006-04-01T17:37:03.810-07:00

Sticking it to the oil menThey say it costs too much to move to a hybrid car or SUV, and it does when you look at the whole picture -- at least now. However, my opinion is that we must do this. We must do it because it is our way of sticking it to the oil men, to show we really do have a choice, and if the more of us do it, the less the oil men will get. Besides, if we move in this direction on

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1143818580245078492006-03-31T08:23:00.000-07:002006-03-31T08:23:00.246-07:00

Blogs give you little tractionIf you want to get some reaction on your opinion, what I call "traction" where people "digg" your blog, you often find that you get very few hits with a straight blog. Instead, you find you are more productive if you find the appropriate forum on the web, such as something built with phpBB, and then submit that to digg.com. Still, however, sometimes there's just no

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1143818363119579872006-03-31T08:19:00.000-07:002006-03-31T08:19:23.130-07:00

A blog of a blog of a blogJust an observation. I've noticed that the way things are turning with tech news, we're seeing a blog of a blog of a blog. It's rather disorganized. It's like "Here's a case where..." and they describe something about the article, and then it says, "Click here for the full story...". You click there, and it's yet another blog with the same thing but different words or

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1143426859459043372006-03-26T19:34:00.000-07:002006-03-26T19:34:19.473-07:00

Low Cost Fluorescent Bulbs Could Cause FiresWatch out for low cost fluorescent bulbs that are pitched to replace incandescent bulbs. I've switched most of my house bulbs to these. Unfortunately now, however, I'm finding the downside. These bulbs could cause a fire when the base burns out and a paper or plastic shade is too close to the bulb. The bulb may be cool to the touch, but when the base

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1143392725825241862006-03-26T10:05:00.000-07:002006-03-26T10:05:25.826-07:00

Arm the Linux Battlestations!Steve Ballmer hints at litigation against Linux here. I guess since Microsoft isn't successful on several other fronts, they're going for the throats of Linux and Linux applications. Why can't Microsoft just focus on making better software instead of throwing all their toys at the other kids in the sandbox? In the Linux world, if you make a better mousetrap, most end

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1143349379780806652006-03-25T22:02:00.000-07:002006-03-25T22:02:59.783-07:00

Drop Linux GNOME Nautilus in Favor of ThunarDo you find GNOME Nautilus, the Linux file manager, to be slow? I just found out that XFCE is using the Thunar application to replace Nautilus. It's much zippier and is fairly stable. If you have Ubuntu (and who doesn't these days?), then here's the way to install. Note that you first have to allow universe, multiverse, and backports (I don't know which

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1143218487397739302006-03-24T09:41:00.000-07:002006-03-26T19:34:52.440-07:00

Roll Your Own Linux Firewall ScriptBRIEF INTRODUCTION TO FIREWALLSOver the years I have learned how to roll my own firewall script and call it from /etc directory. Of course, my firewall is only INPUT based, instead of INPUT and OUTPUT based, but I find that building an INPUT/OUTPUT based firewall is tremendously difficult and not really all that necessary if you use good download practices on

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1142972925856992212006-03-21T13:28:00.000-07:002006-03-21T13:28:45.860-07:00

Low Cost PCs for Underdeveloped CountriesIt seems odd to me that underdeveloped countries are trying to get low cost PCs when terminals like WYSE, or something custom with the cool new Acme Fox processor can be achieved far more easily. They also have lower power consumptions, no moving parts, and have many other advantages over regular PCs. If you connect WiMAX (or something comparable) wireless

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1142956194588239702006-03-21T08:49:00.000-07:002006-03-21T08:49:54.593-07:00

Even MS Used Open Licensing To Their FavorSo evidently this report shows that MS wants to slam the GPL license and the BSD license for software, but they themselves used it to create the TCP/IP stack on WinOS (starting with NT). Without that, MS probably wouldn't have had TCP/IP on WinOS as soon as they did and we'd probably still see too much NetBEUI traffic out there on our nets.http://

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1142955975782552992006-03-21T08:46:00.000-07:002006-03-21T08:46:15.786-07:00

Any Linux Hack Worth His SaltAny Linux hack worth his salt should surely have this cute Tux PC sitting on his desk, if not for anything but bragging rights!Someone took the Tux icon and molded a plastic case that can hold the new, tiny, FOX PC with embedded Linux on it.Tux case posted at linuxdevices.com

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1142955264256080172006-03-21T08:34:00.000-07:002006-03-21T08:34:24.266-07:00

PostgreSQL Emulating Oracle - Save CashIf anyone touts Oracle to you ever again, consider this: http://www.enterprisedb.com/It's built with PostgreSQL for Linux (and another for Windows) and both are 100% free. You only pay for tech support.So why is that exciting? Well, because you can load Oracle applications on it, that's why! Check this baby out:http://www.enterprisedb.com/solutions/

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1142954787991702792006-03-21T08:26:00.000-07:002006-03-21T08:26:27.993-07:00

Wallace Now Cowers Under A RockIt appears in the GPL case in the courts by a Mr. Wallace, he has lost and the GPL has not only won, but it has been reinforced by winning the case. Hurray once more for the GPL.http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20060320201540127

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1142896412394884642006-03-20T16:13:00.000-07:002006-03-20T16:13:36.030-07:00

Free Software Startups for Old-TimersAre you an old timer like me who's quickly approaching 40, still moonlighting, writing code, and wanting to get rich quick? If you're doing it with the LAMP or LAPP platform on Linux (Linux, Apache, PHP, and MySQL or PostgreSQL), you're probably being encouraged to release the software in typical FLOSS (Free Linux Open Source Software) style by giving away the

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1142879701267521472006-03-20T11:35:00.000-07:002006-03-20T11:35:01.933-07:00

You Send It -- way to send large filesRogue Brazilian sent me a cool link. It's http://yousendit.com . With this, you can send an email to send a large file. Then, other users can click on the link and start downloading it. Too bad they use Microsoft .NET to implement it instead of FLOSS technology, but it's a neat idea, anyway.

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1142879281374858062006-03-20T11:28:00.000-07:002006-03-20T11:28:44.810-07:00

PHP Frameworks Should Be EasierPHP frameworks are somewhat of a pain because they have a steep learning curve. Some programmers swear by them so that your code doesn't look like the old Microsoft Active Server Pages with html and code intertwined.http://www.phpit.net/article/ten-different-php-frameworks/I still think there's room here for an even better system. It should be minimalist and fast,

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1142838233127222302006-03-20T00:03:00.000-07:002006-03-20T00:47:30.366-07:00

New Social Darwinism: Being "Internet-Stupid"Check this link out that I saw tonight.http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/14133891.htmSome people still just don't understand the Internet. Notice in the link above about the comment from the lawyer for the Chicago housing group where he tries to compare publishing on the Internet to publishing in a newspaper, and says that USA's laws regarding equal

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24382383.post-1142836393059568402006-03-19T23:33:00.000-07:002006-03-19T23:33:13.063-07:00

This is my second test. This time, I'm using a Linux tool called Drivel to access blogger.com.

supermikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318755093033009059noreply@blogger.com0