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Useful Concept

Useful Concept
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Buffalo Swarms
2007-08-31 19:39:00
Jen and I were asked to write a description of our Yellowstone trip for The Wire. The Wire is a local entertainment weekly and is staffed by some cool cats. Anyway, we happily complied and wrote a story about some buffalo we saw on the trip. It was published while we were away, so I didn't get a chance to blog about it until now. Since many of you don't live in the area I thought I would reprint it below as well. [More]
More About: Personal , Buffalo , Swarm

Back from Vacation
2007-08-30 15:51:00
Oh yea! I forgot to mention I am back from vacation. It was amazing. A cruise from Spain to Italy, then France then back to Spain. We docked each day to play and explore, then cruised at night to the next port. Here are some photos I took. Mostly from the excursions. Who knew Pompeii is so big? That Monaco was that small? The Tuscan countryside is really that beautiful!
More About: Personal , Photos , Vacation , Back

Time to Revisit My Sites Resolution
2007-08-30 15:36:00
For a long time now I have been using the 800x600 resolution on most of my sites. On some of my newer sites (such as this blog redesign) I have played a bit with wider designs. The recent blog post by Pro Blogger got me thinking about doing more proper research into what my readers actually use, and pinging the Cold Fusion community about their findings and preferences. Pro Blogger recommends checking the stats for the site in question to see what percentage of people use 800x600. This isn't perfect, as many people may have a higher resolution, but have their browser not fully maximized or people may have a favorites bar on the left side (like my parents always do). However this is at least a bit of a guide. [More]
More About: Time , Sites , Solution , Resolution

Vacation time again.
2007-08-17 18:57:00
Yes, again! This time I will be cruising the Mediterranean. Spending most of my time in Italy it seems. As always I will take lots of pictures and post them for those interested. In unrelated news I can't get the Peanutbutter Jelly song out of my head. What the heck man? Of all the damn songs...
More About: Personal , Time , Vacation

So you think you can dance final
2007-08-17 04:57:00
Spoiler Alert: I just want to say, I was skeptical of this season based on the first 5 episodes. They voted off people they shouldn't in my opinion. However, the final winner was the person I loved from the start. Sabra deserves it no doubt and I am quite pleased she won.
More About: Dance , Final , So You Think You Can Dance , Fina

how to pick a president
2007-08-07 04:28:00
This is a handy way to find out which presidential candidates are most in line with your values. This is based on their publicly stated positions on many issues. You simply fill out the form as best you can and find out which candidates match your interests. This is nice since it removes the whole 'I want to be his friend' vs 'he would be a good president' type decisions that people often make. The result may even surprise you. http://www.dehp.net/candidate/index.php
More About: Politics , President , Pick , Resident

Trying World of Warcraft Again
2007-08-06 18:35:00
I took a five month break from WOW. Just after Burning Crusade was released my wife and I just got tired playing. We had played since beta and though we had lots of fun, it really just became a grind. I couldn't care about getting to 70, etc. Five months later we decided to give it a try again. We have a nice setup with two computers next to each other, so we can easily play together. We also have some friends that are new players, so we can play along with them. It has been nice so far. [More]
More About: World , Warcraft , World of Warcraft

Yellowstone Pictures from Vacation
2007-08-03 00:31:00
Quick post to show you some photos from our vacation last week. These are random, and there are lots more to see on the main flickr site. #flickr_badge_source_txt {padding:0; font: 11px Arial, Helvetica, Sans serif; color:#666666;} #flickr_badge_icon {display:block !important; margin:0 !important; border: 1px solid rgb(0, 0, 0) !important;} #flickr_icon_td {padding:0 5px 0 0 !important;} .flickr_badge_image {text-align:center !important;} .flickr_badge_image img {border: 1px solid black !important;} #flickr_www {display:block; padding:0 10px 0 10px !important; font: 11px Arial, Helvetica, Sans serif !important; color:#3993ff !important;} #flickr_badge_uber_wrapper a:hover, #flickr_badge_uber_wrapper a:link, #flickr_badge_uber_wrapper a:active, #flickr_badge_uber_wrapper a:visited {text-decoration:none !important; background:inherit !important;color:#3993ff;} #flickr_badge_wrapper {} #flickr_badge_source {padding:0 !important; font: 11px Arial, Helvetica, Sans serif !importan...
More About: Personal , Pictures , Vacation , Yell , Tone

Using KTML with ColdFusion 8
2007-08-02 17:49:00
In testing our CMS with CF8 I have only found one small issue. With the editor we licensed of course. KTML works well with CF8 except for some image and file browsing. Turns out there is an easy code fix for this however. You will see an error saying something along the lines of Cannot open Class plugins.modules.image.service.ktml4_mspl_ image. The debugging errors are not accurate as it is a general error if anything goes wrong when calling a function in KTML. After a little poking around I see that there is an error calling one of the functions. getfileinfo Turns out CF8 also has a function named getfileinfo and thus the error on CF8 and not CF6 or 7. [More]
More About: Cold , Fusion , Coldfusion

Help Promote ColdFusion 8
2007-07-30 14:45:00
ColdFusion bloggers already know that CF 8 has been released. Here are a few ways you can help spread the word to the non-CF community. 1) Digg It. Ray Camden has already submitted to Digg. So just +1 it. [More]
More About: Promote , Cold , Coldfusion , Romo

On Vacation
2007-07-20 23:55:00
Blogging will be lighter than normal for the next week or so. No Cold Fusion at all! I am off to Idaho then Yellowstone for a nice vacation with family and friends. In the mean time I leave you with this funny video. American Beauty in 5 Seconds [More]
More About: Personal , Vacation

Text Link Ads ColdFusion Code
2007-07-18 21:55:00
I can't remember where I got this code from but I am pretty sure it was directly from TLA. You can't find coldfusion code on the text link ads site any more. I have gotten a couple private requests for it, so here ya go. You should wrap this up in some sort of error check, since sometimes the TLA web site goes down. Also, Brian Rinaldi wrote up a handly pod for blogCFC that does this all for you. Update: TJ also has a TLA project to check out: http://cftextlinkads.riaforge.org/index.c fm      <cfset local_file_name = 'local_67489.xml'> <cfset inventory_key = 'get this from TLA'> <cfset local_director...
More About: Link , Code , Coldfusion , Text

Advertising in your CF Blog
2007-07-13 20:37:00
There was an interesting discussion in a private group (check it out if you blog) regrarding blogging and CF and making money from it all. I posted this there, but felt that I wanted broader feedback from the community. The text below is slightly modified from its original form. I know some of you are not interested in advertising and some are. Some find the advertising a conflict of interest, and while I don't completely agree I find it reasonable to feel that way. This is mostly for those wanting to make some money on their blog though I welcome everyones input. [More]
More About: Advertising , Blog , Cold , Fusion , Vert

What is the Best Tequila
2007-07-08 17:42:00
Last night some friends of ours gathered around for a fun experiment. A blind tequila taste test. We gathered 6 different tequilas ordered below in price. Pepe Lopez Premium ($9.99) Jose Cuervo Especial ($15) Hornitos Sausa ($19) 1800 Silver ($19.99) Don Julio Blanco ($36.99) Patron Silver ($48.00) We bought a lot of little dixi cups of various prints, and served to seven people a small sample of each. Turns out those little cups leak after a short period. I don't recommend using them. We randomized the distribution so people were drinking a different tequila than their neighbor so as not to be influenced. This requires at least one person to be running the taste test and not partaking (me and friend Jess). Get a handful of people to sit down and focus. We then wrote each score down against each tequila, also noting the person. This way later we could see the persons favorite vs the group favorite. ...
More About: Tequila , Review

Explain rackbacks with BlogCFC to Me
2007-07-07 15:09:00
I have always had trackbacks disabled on my blog. just didn't seem worth the spam hassle, and honestly I didn't really understand how to do it so why bother? Well a friend is pushing me to enable them and so I thought I would give it a try, but now I want to actually trackback a post for someone else and I have no clue. I have tried many different things, but nothing seems to actually show my trackback on their blog. I think I am missing something fundamental. Can someone set me strait? If I want to do a trackback to someone else's blog how do I do that? I know people can do it to mine since I got those in the past when I had it turned on.
More About: Cold , Fusion

Simpsons Character and Transformers Thoughts
2007-07-06 15:35:00
Following many others I made a Simpson's character. I opted to build something that doesn't look like me in any way. I do wish I had the tshirt though. On another note, I saw Transformers last night. I liked the action, but the story was really really bad. So many holes, bad dialog and a pointless romance setup. The movie itself was long. There were numerous scenes that could have been removed to help. I enjoyed many parts though. We all laughed several times (not sure we were supposed to for a couple of them). The action scenes were great. Turns out if you decapitate a megabot he dies. Who knew. At any rate in thinking of earlier films by the same director I liked on the whole The Rock and even Independance Day better. Transformers had big battling robots, which is super cool, but the D - story still brings it down. So sad. That said, I will probably buy it on DVD when the price is inexpensive.&nb...
More About: Review , Thoughts , Cold , Fusion

CFUnited Update
2007-06-28 19:35:00
It is now day two of CFUnit ed. Just had lunch and feeling good. The conference has been great for us so far. Lots of interest in our Cold Fusion CMS. Made a few sales already. We are giving away mouse pads that are actually note paper. They are very popular, with people coming back asking for extras. Good thing too since we don't want to take any back with us. Yesterday I went to only a couple sessions. Matt Woodward and Hal Helms both put on good presentations regarding OO. Too short in my opinion, but not their fault. Just so much to say and not enough time. I am looking forward to Practical Design Demystified this afternoon. House of Fusion is next to us and they have a great deal on Fusion Authority. $50 gets you three back issues and three upcoming issues. I signed up on the spot. Currently the CF heads of the CF state are signing Fusion Authority books. Fun times!
More About: Update

Repeating Events Question
2007-06-25 16:51:00
Just started looking into setting up recurring events in a calendar for an application of mine. I haven't had to deal with this before and to be honest I don't want to invent something that must have a standard out there. I would rather use the established methodology. I searched around the Cold Fusion world a bit, but haven't found anything. I then started searching around for anything relating to it. I found lots of wiki's with info like "we need to do x" but not much that gave me a sense that there is a tried and true way to do store and search them. I can easily enough make a schema for storing recurring events (monthly, weekly, every x days, etc). The tough part comes in doing proper searches. Ideally there is only one query result. Do people make temp tables of actual records for events, populated by the recurring event record? It would work, but seems wasteful. How far out would you populate? [More]
More About: Events , Question , Vent

Getting Ready for CFUnited
2007-06-25 16:44:00
I fly out tomorrow with for CFUnit ed. Bill and I will be there as sponsors/exhibitors. Looking forward to the conference! I plan on attending a few of the sessions, and will be manning our CMS booth for a while too. I am also looking forward to hanging out with some of my Cold Fusion friends. Sure we all im/blog/email often enough but it is another thing to sit down and have a beer/soda/lunch with people you really respect in your industry. Throw around half baked ideas, see what sticks, etc. Seems like the unofficial meeting place has become the small bar at the hotel the night before the event, so probably see you there. [More]
More About: Ready

tagcloud
2007-06-22 00:21:00
Sometimes it is fun to submit your site to silly things like Tag A Cloud. This site is basically a way to tag your own site, and hope people click on that tag. There are ways to make your tag larger or different looking to garner more click throughs. Silly, fun and a good waste of a few minutes of my afternoon. For the record here is my tag score thus far. Click on it to try it yourself.

New Hampshire Smoking Ban
2007-06-19 20:42:00
New Hampshire officially joins the rest of New England today. A smoking ban for bars and restaurants has been signed into law. Thank freaking goodness! While I respect my smoking friends and their interest in being able to stink up everything around them I am very happy to have smoking banned. The law takes effect in 90 days so smokers will be able to enjoy the rest of the summer. It will be interesting to see if any restaurant changes early, or if they have a smoking party to mark the end. Interestingly of my favorite bars in Portsmouth, two of the top 4 are smoking bars. The Brewery went non smoking a couple years ago and had a short drop in traffic and then a boom in sales after that. Their clientèle changed, however. Some people just went elsewhere. What will happen to the final bars that held out to the end? I suspect those that held out will suffer the worst. But then again, where will those custome...
More About: New Hampshire , Smoking , Local

CF 8 Released before Max?
2007-06-18 18:49:00
Many people are predicting that Cold Fusion 8 will be released sooner rather than later (exactly mid of year). I say at CFUnited! I noticed today that the CFUnited blog has a small clue (maybe). In the blog entry about prizes and giveaways they state that CF 8 will be a prize given out on Friday and that it will be delivered in 1.5 months after the event. I take it to mean that you will get CF 8 by middle of August. Well before Max.
More About: Released , Lease , Ease

Book / Blog List - need advice
2007-06-15 16:36:00
I need to build a little library here thus in the market for some new books / resources. I would love your recommendations for the following: Flex 2 (or should I wait for 3 before buying book?) [More]
More About: Advice , Blog , Book , Cold , Fusion

Shift Happens
2007-06-06 19:28:00
This video is quite interesting (after the first 20 seconds or so). Basically a lot of stats about the world, techology and the future. I think some of its predictions are bunk, but overall it quite thought provoking. How do you teach technology to kids when it is outdated before they graduate? How do you prepare them for jobs that don't yet exist to solve problems that don't yet exist? In thinking of my own background I went to business school rather than pursue a computer science degree specifically because I didn't know what I wanted to do. I knew it would involve computers in some way, but I had NO clue other than that. It wasn't until near the end of my education (1995) that I was introduced to the web, and upon graduating (1996) when I started using Cold Fusion . The best thing I did was focus on logic and philosophy as a minor. Gave me everything I needed to learn down the road. Seems to me problem solving sh...
More About: Technology , Shift

Facebook ColdFusion Group
2007-06-01 20:30:00
Did you know there is a Cold Fusion facebook group? Looks like 155 members, though only a few familiar faces/names on the list that I know. I just joined facebook to see what all the talk is about. I find it odd that the networks available are work/school related or region, but not topic. They have groups like the CF group, but it isn't a formal network. Wierd. Anyway, if you sign up or are already signed up add me to your friends list. See you at CFUnited.
More About: Coldfusion , Facebook , Sion

Lumosity Review
2007-06-01 01:15:00
This is an early review for Lumosity. Lumosity is a site where one plays short games that are supposed to help with brain function. There are many different games that test your skills in various ways. Memory, Speed, etc. You can test your skills with their games without creating an account, to get a good flavor for how it works though the quick trial only includes 3 of the games. The games themselves are petty fun. You get a score and naturally you want to play again to try and beat that score. My wife and I found ourselves with very different strengths. She is much much better at the speed math games while I do well with the memory maze games. Birdwatching was only ok for both of us. We will play a bit every night for the next month. [More]
More About: Review

super mario brothers rocks
2007-05-30 18:46:00
I have very fond memories of Super Mario Brother s when I was a kid. I spent sooo much money on the game in the arcade and finally got a Nintendo so I could play it at home. Countless hours of entertainment for me and my friends. This widget helps bring that fun back. [More]
More About: Super Mario Brothers

color changing card trick
2007-05-28 23:56:00
I love these sorts of visual tricks. Watch this video closely and see if you can catch what is going on. The first half is about the trick the other half is the explanation. [More]
More About: Card , Color , Trick , Changing , Chang

applications without databases with dataMgr
2007-05-28 21:29:00
I have often thought that many smaller applications could be more useful if they didn't use a database. It isn't that I don't like databases, but all to often they become a barrier for adoption, testing, etc. Those apps could easily run without a DB. Easier to test and deploy in theory. Plus writting applications to support multiple DB platforms can be a pain. Wouldn't it be nice if those small applications that are read only for the most part didn't use a database at all? On the other hand, writing those apps using only xml (or another format) can be a bit more of a pain than it is worth. Using a database makes it so much easier really. None of it is rocket science, but hey we use Cold Fusion because it is easy right? Why make our lives more complicated when we don't need to. That is why DataMgr caught my eye last month. It looked like the perfect tool for quickly and easily using an xml doc as a datasou...
More About: Applications , Databases , Application

Google Supplemental Results for BlogCFC
2007-05-26 00:26:00
I was reviewing my blogs google stats recently when I found that 75 pages of my blog are listed in the supplemental results, not the main google index. My first thought was that maybe blogcfc didn't have propper settings for indexing and following links. A quick look at the code proved that wrong. Blogcfc works just fine (thanks Ray!). The typical reasons for being in the supplemental results don't seem to apply. Pages such as my vanguard review or database metadata for example are supplemental, though have good content (well, not junk content). I have unique titles and keywords. I have unique content. I don't see anywhere in my blog that my content is duplicated accidentally (category views, etc) that are indexed in any way. [More]
More About: Google , Results , Cold , Fusion , Menta

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