Late night ramblings...
Back to blogging... ahhhh.
I just ran across Ugo's list of Java Persistence Frameworks which will come in quite handy. He's also starting development on an RSS reader for his Cocoon based blogging software. Neato.
Did you know that if you're using Mozilla, you can just right click on images and choose "block images from this server"?!?! I didn't until just a day or so ago. Bye-bye ads! Now only if it had an option to turn off Flash like that, I'd be WAAY happy.
I almost forgot to thank everyone who included links and words about me on their blogs in my absense. Thanks! It's nice to know I was missed!
My brother - the wonderful man he is - sent me my SpeedStream ADSL modem that I had in my crap in the U.S. Awesome. The only problem now is the power. I blew a fuse the other day seeing if the converter that came with it would work here in Europe. Nope. It's a holiday here tomorrow, so I can't go looking for a replacement like I wanted to. It needs to covert to a 18v line in. I'm praying it's not something so ridiculously custom that I'll never be able to find it here.
JohnCompanies sent me a notice today that they're doing a 15 minute scheduled maintenance tonight or tomorrow. Ugh! I don't have all my startup scripts written yet!!! If this site goes down again for a while, this time it'll be my fault and will be down until I can ssh into the server and restart Orion. ;-)
I sorta mentioned my new server setup in passing before, but I'm using OrionServer again and I love it. I was thinking about slapping a hacked copy of Weblogic on the server so I can work and play in the same environment, but Orion is just so nice I decided to play nice.
There is definitely going to be a to-do list feature added to this blog ASAP. And calendaring if I can get 2 minutes. I really need both.
Looking at my server logs from the past week on the server to see what happened last week (a little autopsy). From my code I can see that I stupidly set the OSCache to Session based instead of Application based caching. This was dumb... but the reason I got nailed was that a bot started slamming my server on Thursday night archiving the site and obviously opening up a bunch of sessions in the process. The log says it was "User Agent: Genome Machine (Powered by Waypoint); info@thinktank23.com" apparently from ThinkTank23.com... anyone know anything about it? ("Nav4 is a 4th generation navigation and information-retrieval platform that delivers conceptual navigation to any environment." Hmmmm...)
I am really digging Wired's new XHTML designed site. I really need to take another look at my own site from design, technology and usability angles - I really like the idea of being XHTML. (By the way, having worked for TerraLycos, and not leaving with a great impression, it's nice to see that they are letting sites like Wired do their own thing still, even though they've slapped that branding bar across the top.)
That reminds me... gotta update my resume again. How many jobs have YOU had in the past 10 years? My new job makes my 17th or 18th employer since 1993. If you count the different projects I've worked on and offices I've been in, it's probably in the 40s. I'm so used to switching jobs, I have to remember that my coworkers probably won't be aclimate to me as quickly as I do to them. I'm still the new guy, but I feel like I'm at home. (desk, computer, coffee machine, toys (koosh + squeeze balls) Where am I again?)
Bob Wallace and Jim Seymore have died. Life is definitely short, and moreso it seems for geeks. You won't be on your deathbed thinking "Man I wish I had just done some more coding!"...
It's so nice to have all my server links work again.
-Russ