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Apple World Adapter Thinkpad Hack
2008-05-09 14:20:00
So I brought my Thinkpad X41 tablet to Hong Kong to use. I had spent most of the battery watching movies on the plane and when the plane arrived, it was already fairly late at night. The first thing I wanted to do was to charge my laptop but I didn’t have an ...
More About: Personal , Apple , World , Hack , How-To

5 Ways to Spend 18 Hours on a Plane
2008-05-06 19:51:00
A direct flight from Toronto to Hong Kong is a full 18 hours in a cramped airline seat 35,000 feet in the air.  For a lot of people, this could very well be the most unpleasant part of traveling.  Unless you can afford first-class, here are a few things you can do to keep yourself ...
More About: How-To , Plane , Hours

Leaving on a Jet Plane
2008-05-01 04:52:00
I’m leaving for a month long vacation to Hong Kong tomorrow! My first stop will be in Vancouver where we will stay for a few days.  I was hoping to join John Chow and Ed Lau for Dot Com Pho but we’re driving down to Seattle this Saturday to visit the Boeing manufacturing plant as well ...
More About: Plane , Leaving

HP Upline Debacle and Mozy Coupons
2008-04-26 15:10:00
HP Upline is an online data backup solution run by the big boys, HP. They offer monthly subscriptions for different online backup plans which don’t cost much, but frankly, is probably more than you should pay for their subpar service. Just last week, HP Upline’s web interface went down for a few days. A ...
More About: Coupons

Couldn?t Have Said it Better Myself - Design Coding Rap
2008-04-22 05:45:00
Follow everything the SEO Rapper mentions and you too can be a OCG (original coding gangster). Highlights: Have a nice navigation Use appealing graphics (but use animations sparingly) Highlight your contact info Use correct color combinations Use divs, not tables! Use XML and CSS (on a separate sheet) Include doctype in your HTML Check compatibility with all browsers Add titles to anchor and image tags Don’t ...
More About: Design , Entertainment , Coding

Review: Omnistar Mailer
2008-04-18 18:03:00
When I was asked by Omnistar to write a review about their software, Omnistar Mailer , I felt it would be a good opportunity to stress the importance of email marketing. Email marketing has been an vital part of many successful business over the last decade. I find that people new to the industry ...
More About: Reviews , Review , Efficiency

Review: Ethernet Related Articles
2008-04-13 19:05:00
When someone ordered a Review Me for their site, I was surprised since I had forgotten I was still listed on ReviewMe. This is my first ReviewMe request (all reviews requests were directly sent to me). Upon looking at the site that I was paid to review, I was rather confused. The site (or page rather) is a collection of ethernet related articles. What does this have to do with web development? Is this just a ploy to get linkbacks? Well, regardless, here is my review of the site. Overview The page I was asked to review is a single page on the site web-articles.info. Web-Articles is a place where anyone can submit an article they have written themselves and have them publish it on the Internet for free. I suppose this is useful for people that want to share their knowledge with the world but do not have the time and/or knowledge to set up a blog or website. Content If there is one thing this site isn’t lacking, it’s content. Lots and lots of very specific content. I ...
More About: Ethernet , Related

Quick Vim Tip - ESC Alternative
2008-04-08 17:56:00
Here is a quick tip on my favorite text editor, Vim. Vim is very efficient at what it does once you get the hang of it. However, one of the bottlenecks for efficient Vim coders is the use of the Esc key to get out of Insert or Visual mode. After typing a chunk of code, you have to move your fingers out of position to hit the Esc key and in a single editing session, this happens many times. Keeping your fingers in position is highly efficient and is also why I prefer the IBM Trackpoint over trackpads. Recently, I experimented with using other keys as an alternative to Esc for moving out of insert and visual editing mode. Default Alternative Ctrl-[ (Control + left bracket) performs (essentially) the same function as Esc by default and doesn’t require any configuration so if you can get used to this combination, you can use it on any machine. Custom Alternatives You can also map your own key to perform the same function as Esc. For example, a popular choice is Alt-Spacebar. ...
More About: Quick

Infinite Firefox Loading Prank
2008-04-01 08:00:00
No idea what to do for April Fool’s Day? Here’s a simple (and nerdy) Apple Fools prank I whipped up. Simply tell your friends about the fastest and most accurate internet speed test out there: EZ Speed Test (http://www.ezspeedtest.com) They’ll go there and wait … and wait… and wait for the page to load until they realize that the page has already loaded and they’ve been (mildly) punk’d. Note: this only works with Mozilla Firefox for two reasons: Internet Explorer does not currently support animated favicons. I was too lazy to create the loading favicon for other less commonly used browsers. If you visit the page with a browser other than Firefox, you’ll see that I did some (very basic) browser detection. I wish I had more time to make it more convincing but in all honesty, I purchased the domain yesterday and set up the page in 5 minutes — making the favicon took a bit longer though. Help spread the word!  Stumble it, Dig...
More About: Prank , Infinite , Loading

Wallet Alternatives for the Minimalist
2008-03-31 20:21:00
Long time readers of my blog will know that I’m all about being minimalistic and efficient — from getting things done with my Hipster PDA (mini version) to doing all my web development on a portable usb drive. Another step in minimalism and efficiency can come in slimming down something you carry with you every single day: your wallet. There are many types of wallets but the one most people would be familiar the one that is bursting at the seams, barely fits in your back pocket, and makes you sit lopsided. It has been affectionately known as a George Costanza wallet since being featured on an episode of Seinfeld where it literally exploded. The danger of explosion aside, large wallets in the back pocket have been shown to be a contributor to back pain and poor posture. What do you REALLY need to carry? Credit card (maybe 2) Bank card Drivers license One or two other cards (transit pass, membership cards etc.) A little bit of cash Wallet s for the Minimalist All of the...
More About: Alternatives

Do Your Part for Earth Hour - Turn off your Lights!
2008-03-29 16:01:00
This is what the world looks like in terms of light pollution. Incandescent light bulbs are one of the largest drainers of electricity and today, the world wants to raise awareness by having everyone turn off all their lights for an hour from 8pm to 9pm (in their local time). This means we won’t see ...
More About: Earth , Part , Offtopic , Lights , Turn

Dining in the Heavens
2008-03-26 03:27:00
Dinner in the Sky is a company takes a simple concept and flies with it, literally. Although not directly related to web development, it really is a great example of clever marketing and how to really target a niche. You can enjoy dinner suspended 50 meters (164 feet) in the air. At well over ...
More About: Entertainment , Dining

100k Spam Milestone
2008-03-21 01:58:00
Today, I have surpassed 100,000 blocked spam comments on my blog. This is quite the milestone. Big shout out goes to Defensio who makes one of the best spam filters out there. Akismet works fine for a lot of people but managing and moderating spam comments doesn’t get any easier than Defensio. A ...
More About: Spam , Milestone

Things on Facebook are Not as they Appear
2008-03-13 22:05:00
This is partly a rant but also partly a plea for Facebook to improve their FBML test console. This past weekend when my friend and I were developing a Facebook application for Gary Lee’s new golf site, we had coded up the FBML (Facebook’s HTML equivalent) in the handy dandy FBML Test Console. Everything ...
More About: Personal , Things

Top 5 Movie Battle Speeches
2008-03-07 16:04:00
A great speech can make any movie memorable. A great speech can also give you goosebumps or make you tear up. Here are my top 5 favorite battle speeches (speeches given before a battle). 5. Lord of the Rings: Return of the King Lord of the Rings had quite a few battle speeches but this ...
More About: Movie , Entertainment , Battle , Speeches

How-to: Build an Affordable Quad Core Desktop for $500
2008-03-04 04:35:00
Great news! I won the grand prize in the Business-Directory.com contest I entered a few days ago! This means $500 cash in my pocket to spend as I wish. As I had mentioned in the previous post, I am in the process of building a system and $500 can go a long ...
More About: Desktop , How-To , Core , Build , Quad-core

Free Reviews and Contest from Business Directory
2008-02-28 17:52:00
Until tomorrow, the newly launched Business +Directory is offering free reviews for anyone that is looking to get a few additional linkbacks and a little traffic boost for their site.  I personally know how hard it is to get start-ups up and running. To kick start the site, the guy behind Business+Directory, Chris Walker, is also running ...
More About: Personal , Contest , Reviews , Free

Realistic 3D VR Gaming using Head Tracking
2008-02-23 17:15:00
Carnegie Mellon University PhD student Johnny Lee has managed to turn a regular monitor into a 3D virtual reality display for around $50 using a Nintendo Wiimote. I can see this totally revolutionizing the gaming industry taking it to a whole other level. Can’t wait until we see some full fledged games that ...
More About: Gaming , Entertainment , Head , Tracking , Realistic

Bill Gates at University of Waterloo
2008-02-22 05:30:00
As I had mentioned on Monday, I was selected to attend Bill Gates talk at the University of Waterloo this morning. This is a recap of the presentation. 9:00 - Doors open and I found a seat on the lower level in the 7th row — not too bad. University of Waterloo emblem on ...

Meeting Bill Gates
2008-02-18 21:53:00
Exciting news! I was chosen as one of the lucky few to attend a talk given by Microsoft’s Founder and Chairman, Bill Gates . This coming Thursday, he will be at the University of Waterloo (Waterloo, Canada) to address students at the school and surrounding areas. Officially, he will be addressing two topics: Magic of software ...
More About: Meeting

Hacking Vim - The Ultimate Vimrc
2008-02-10 06:04:00
Maybe ultimate is the wrong word, but since my last post about a 256-color Vim colorscheme, I’ve gotten a few e-mails asking for a copy of my Vim configuration file (my .vimrc). I figure I might as well share it with everyone. I’ve added comments here and there so you’ll know what ...
More About: Linux , Ultimate , Efficiency

Search for a 256 Color Vim Colorscheme
2008-02-01 05:47:00
Vim is the editor I use most often in my day to day tasks from web development to coding to simple text editing. If you’re not familiar with Vim, you can take a look at this post featuring a video of its creator. On my Windows machine, I can use GVim which offers a GUI-based ...
More About: Linux , Color , Search

Review: Nokia N800 Internet Tablet - Part 3
2008-01-22 07:13:00
The last part of this three part review will cover the task of web development on this little device. Make sure you’ve read the first and second part of the review beforehand. One of the more popular posts on this blog is one talking about how to setup a portable web development platform on a ...
More About: Linux , Internet , Nokia , Review , Part

Review: Nokia N800 Internet Tablet - Part 2
2008-01-15 03:30:00
In the first part of the review, I discussed the general functionality of the Internet Tablet. Where the N800 really shines is its large and dedicated community that contributes third party software. Nokia is often praised for making their device completely open source (often contrasted with the Apple iPhone). Since the Maemo operating system ...
More About: Linux , Books , Review

Review: Nokia N800 Internet Tablet - Part 1
2008-01-11 00:21:00
A little while ago, I made a post promising a review of my latest gadget, the Nokia N800 Internet Tablet. After a month of use, I feel that I am ready enough to make a detailed and informative review about the device. I have split the review into three parts, the first is ...
More About: Linux , Review , Part

How-to: Maintain Web Server Uptime
2008-01-06 06:37:00
Last Sunday at around 9am, all of my sites hosted on mediatemple’s dedicated server were unresponsive. Because I was out for most of the day, I was not aware of this until I had returned home later in the evening. As a result, all of my sites were down for nearly 6 hours. The ...
More About: Linux , Web Development , Apache , Web Server , How-To

JonLee.ca Best of 2007
2008-01-02 23:33:00
JonLee.ca is now officially 1 year old. In this past year, I feel like the blog has accomplished a lot: gaining readership from all around the world and making a name for itself in the blogging community. I’m sure most readers were not reading this blog right from the very first post so I’ve compiled ...
More About: Personal

Cheap and Reliable Web Host Comparison
2007-12-27 22:43:00
Time and time again I get e-mails and comments asking me for recommendations on a cheap and reliable web host. mediatemple is a wonderful host but their packages are not exactly the most affordable if you are just looking for a cheap web host. To answer this question comprehensively, I’ve put up a page of web ...
More About: Host , Comparison , Cheap

Happy Holidays from my n800!
2007-12-25 07:10:00
This post is just to wish everyone a Happy Holidays and also to test the maemo Wordpress blogging integration with my Nokia n800 Internet Tablet! On the road, on the plane or even on the toilet, I can now write blog posts offline completely formatted with excerpts, titles, links, uploaded images, tags, trackbacks, and categories. So ...
More About: Happy Holidays , N800

Test Your Programming Skills - Project Euler
2007-12-21 18:06:00
This was something that was mentioned in the xkcd talk at Google. If you’ve ever wanted to put your programming skills to the test but don’t like the pressure and competition of joining a programming contest, then Project Euler is for you. Project Euler is a series of challenging mathematical/computer programming problems that will require ...
More About: Personal , Programming , Test , Skills