Wisdom Teeth

December 6th, 2007

I went to get my wisdom teeth removed earlier this week.

While not a very confortable procedure, and post-op sucks, it wasn’t/isn’t that bad. Everyone I asked was making it sound like it was so horrible. But I guess I got off easy because I was only there for about 45 minutes, and came home and was surfing the ‘net without any trouble.

I went in at 11′oclock in the morning. They first explained what was going to happen. Then they gassed me with some laughing gas. What a wonderful feeling that was ;-) I asked them what was the point in the laughing gas, and they said it was so putting in the IV didn’t hurt. I guess it worked, because it was painless. I asked why they called it laughing gas (because I wasn’t laughing). Shortly after that I remember fighting the urge to giggle :-D

Then they gave me some pain meds. And then finally they put me out.

I remember a little stinging sensation in my hand as the drug went through the IV. I remember thinking, “Well this is a little uncomfortable”. And then I was awake 45 minutes later. So strange, I don’t remember going to sleep or waking up. Apparently the first thing I said upon waking was “that was fast”.

My gums are a little sore, and I’m getting tired of the taste of blood, but it’s not that bad at all. I was prescribed some antibiotics to fight off infection and some pain meds. The pain meds are these little pills called Toradol and they seem to work. I only really needed them the first day, but they do tend to reduce the uncomfortableness of the whole thing so I keep taking them.

So far the worst part of it all is the taste of blood every second of every day and eating mushy food. There’s a kit-kat chocolate bar in my fridge, like some cruel joke. And stories on digg about the best home-made pizzas. I never thought I’d care that much!

For those of you who want to see them (in all the disgusting glory): http://files.chroder.com/img/wisdom-teeth.jpg

Anyway, thats enough about that. See ya later :-)

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My Evil Twin?

July 27th, 2007

I had to break blogio-silence for this. Today, out of boredom, I decided to Google my name. I think I’ve found my twin. He must be the evil one (Onimua is convinced I’m the evil one, but that just can’t be true). I present you with Chris Nadeau who enjoys talking about his family, sports, work… and of course web-based technologies. A quick scan through that blog reveals he also lives in Canada. Funny thing is, I found the blog through one of his posts on a service called Yugma. A service that I just started using, too (it’s great by the way, highly recommended). This impostor must be stopped at once!

All jokes aside, I can’t believe I have to compete in Google for my own name! I didn’t think anyone who happened to share my name would be as ‘googlable’ as I was. I guess I’ll have to SEO myself.

Zend Certified Engineer

June 6th, 2007

ZCEToday I passed the PHP5 certification exam, making me an official Zend Certified Engineer (ZCE). Cool.

Devlog

May 27th, 2007

So I started up a new developer blog this weekend over at Devlog.info. Check it out :)

FreeNAS, Outershift

March 9th, 2007

So, I set up FreeNAS today on my PC. I was going to use it as a CentOS dev server, but I’m too stupid to set the thing up properly so I formatted everything and installed FreeNAS on it. FreeNAS is a BSD operating system that is used as a NAS server. NAS is Network Attached Storage for those who don’t know; basically a file server that can be accessed from any computer in the network.

It was really easy to set up, hardly had to think at all ;) Just burn the tiny (I think it was about 40MB) ISO to a CD and install. After the initial install, everything is done from a web GUI similar to how you might manage your router. I’ve got (S)FTP, SSH, Windows sharing (CIFS) and Apple sharing (AFP) enabled which is super cool. You can create user accounts and groups so only autorized users can access the system, but there’s no GUI for specific permissions (yet). I’ve tested CHMOD’ing a directory to be readable only and that seemed to work, that’s enough for now. What I would really like to see is FTP ‘jailing’, so I could let my friends leech off of my without giving them access to everything on the system and without having to always CHMOD the things I don’t want globally readable.

Anyway, I’ve only got a 160GB drive in there now, but I’m going to buy a nice 500GB one soon. I moved 55GB’s of video from my Mac today as a test, and it works. I can even stream video over the network :) I was going to buy an actual NAS enclosure that would hook up to my router, but this is way cheaper. The only downside, as Floris pointed out, is that now the PC is on 24/7. Other then the obvious downside of the energy being wasted (though it shouldn’t use too much just idling, and the HDD’s automatically sleep after 10 mins of inactivity), it’s loud! I haven’t had my PC on for a while since I got the Mac. The Mac is quiet, but I put it to sleep at night anyway. I had forgotten how loud the fans were in my PC. But it’s a price I’ll pay for NAS ;)

Other then that, I’ve started to really work on Outershift. This weeks task was to get a logo done. I ordered one from Ypson the other day. I said I wanted something really simple but still recognizable, and am in communications with the designer about one. I’m not sure of the one he came up with. It’s simple like I wanted, but still not sure. I may order one from a different designer and then just choose the best of the two. I probably could have come up with a simple one myself, but honestly, it would have taken me ages and it would probably have been some messy rasterized PSD ;) The Ypson logo only cost $80, so the time saved and the vector-based files I get are worth that to me. Besides, I get to write this off as a business expense :)

The first product Outershift will be a newsletter script. There are a ton out there, yeah I know. But I decided that’s what I want to do first. Floris is always bitching about how the vBulletin mass mailer is pretty useless, so we got talking about what we’d want in a newsletter script. The ideas were pretty good and I think I have some pretty unique features that aren’t in any of the available scripts. I think people seem to think little of the actual script, it should just manage lists, compose, and send right? Well yeah, but there’s a bunch of features that I think will be extremely useful to people who have sites already and want to add a newsletter to it. I’m going to pull a Jelsoft and not say any of the features I’ve got in mind :p But it’ll be pretty cool.

Speaking of the biz, I’ve got to file my taxes soon. Here’s the moment of truth where I find out how much money I get back, or none if I made some mistake somewhere or learn I’ve been working illegally or some crazy thing like that. I’ve got a bunch of stuff I plan on writing off, so hopefully I’ll get a nice big sum. I’m going to go to H&R Block with all my receipts and paperwork and get them to do it. First, they’ll tell me exactly what I should include and what I can get away with etc. so I get the maximum payout. Second, they will pay me on the spot if I am owed :D Pretty good service for a good low price.

In other news, the sister’s coming back home soon. She’s dirt poor up there, so she has to come home and earn some money before going back to school. I’ve gotta help her go move back on the 23rd I think (*groan*). It shouldn’t too bad this time. Walking down three flights of stairs with stuff shouldn’t be as hard as walking up them. Right? Right?! And I will simply refuse to move the TV-from-hell (that is, the ancient TV that weighs about a ton)! Actually we’ve already decided we’d leave it there instead of risking the remaining vertebrae in our spines ;)

And that’s all for today :) I’ll post when I’ve got the Outershift logo to show you. Though don’t be too imaginative in your mind, I asked for simple as my main requirement. I said it should be color-scheme-independent, be able to go pure white/black or grayscale, and simple. So it’s not going to be uber-cool ;)

I’m Not Blond!

February 10th, 2007

Time is flying by these days. A week goes by and it feels like an hour (well, perhaps not quite that fast). But alas, time for another blog entry. I don’t think anyone ever reads this thing other then that weirdo Danny (I kid, Danny, I kid! You’re not that weird). But I still like to write down my thoughts sometimes. Besides, it’ll be cool in 20 years to read how dumb I am now.

First things first. I am not blond! I’ve got dark hair. I normally wouldn’t care, but damn Floris and his mindfucks. I’m convinced there’s a conspiracy going on. If you don’t chat with us (#vbfans on irc.vbulletin-chat.com) then you’ll be completely confused right about now. Call it an inside “joke” if you will. Just remember: never trust a Floris. Their mind games are usually crude, but their persistence guarantees that once in a while, you’ll get truly mindfucked. Moving on…

As you know, I got my iMac 24″ in November. I think I expressed my satisfaction with the purchase a couple blog posts ago, but I just need to reiterate. The iMac is the best tech investment I’ve ever made. I’ve been using it exclusively since I got it. I’m about 99% Windows free. My old PC is now serving as a CentOS home server (which I still need to bug Derek or adb as to how the hell to get it working properly!). The only time I use Windows now is through Parallels to test something in IE or cleaning viruses and spyware from my parents laptop. In fact, I’m so happy with my iMac I decided to take the plunge and buy a MacBook as well. It arrived a couple weeks ago, and once again, I am not disappointed. It’s very very cool. (Note: I know I sound like a total fanboy, and that’s probably true! But the thing that always prevented me from getting a Mac before was fear that I’d regret it. I know a Mac isn’t for everyone, but I know a lot of people who it would be great for but they still use PCs because they see it as their only option.)

I ordered both Apple products by phone since I needed to pay via wire transfer (no credit card, and couldn’t get parents to put it on theirs as it needs to be in my name for my business). The first time, for the iMac, was a breeze. The saleswoman was totally awesome. The second time, for the MacBook: not so awesome. I had a feeling something was up just talking to the guy. You know, like he didn’t really know what he was doing. I put my order through just fine, went to the bank, did the wire transfer — seemed okay. Then about 5 days later I get an email from Apple saying I still owe more money for taxes. I was enraged. I called up Apple and told the woman who answered about the situation; my main argument being that I have to pay to do wire transfers, and I wasn’t going to pay more because the dumbass on the phone didn’t include sales tax. At the end of the day, they agreed to pay for the wire transfer. Not exactly the outcome I had wished for, but better then nothing. The whole ordeal still made a 5-7 day shipment take about 3 times that. In retrospect, if I fought harder, I think I could have got more out of them. But she had such a nice voice, and she kept saying sorry. Damn Apple! I was fooled by the puppydog-eyes, but audio version!

Speaking of money, I got my first spend-more-then-you-have card. AKA a credit card. I only requested a $500 limit, and I vow I will never ever spend more then I have. Ever! My sister is in so much debt now it’s not even funny. A college loan plus a handful of credit cards, all maxed. I don’t ever want to be in that situation. But it’s so damn easy to spend money when you have a credit card! Visa is accepted everywhere. Before I was limited to purchases through PayPal, which is getting easy enough these days, but now I’m only limited to $500 at a time. In the first 4 days or so of having the card I slapped about $400 on it. Though I won’t do that again, most of the things are tools I need for work (SmartSVN for example). But still, is there such a thing as too easy?

Also, who watches Hereos? 24? Criminal Minds? Battlestar Galactica? Rome? CSI? Prison Break? House? The Unit? The Office? Bones? LOST?! Oh my, my TV schedule is packed. I never used to watch much TV, but my “TiVO” has changed my life. All these shows, at the tips of my fingers. Mmmmm.

Anyway, that’s all for now folks. Come back in a month or so for another edition of Chroder’s Useless Commentaries.

Got an X-Box 360

December 5th, 2006

I felt the need to post since I haven’t said anything for a while (I say that just about every time, don’t I?).

Last weekend I went out and got myself an X-Box 360. Anyone who knows me knows that I’m not much of a gamer, but I still like to sit down and blow some monsters to smithereens with a rocket launcher (or some variation of such). And keeping my PC up to date to play games when I hate using Windows seemed counter-intuitive. So, getting an xb360 seemed the logical choice. The Wii is interesting but not my cup o’ tea, and the PS3 looks pretty crappy so far and is too expensive for what you get — so that was out (perhaps a purchase for the future when the price goes down and the quality comes up).

I didn’t want to spend too much, so I haven’t got any games that weren’t default with the package. I got the ‘pro’ package that my local retailer was offering. So I got the hard drive, the Live headset, wireless controller etc. and it came with 4 games: some ridge racer game that I have yet to try, FarCry which is a very cool game, a DVD full of X-Box arcade games (the ones you would normally buy from the ‘Marketplace’) and Ghost Recon which is faulty. Just my luck that the one game I really liked out the bunch — Ghost Recon — was the one that had to be faulty. So I’ve gotta go back over there and tell them to give me a new one. Since the game came with the system (it was in the actual X-Box box), I’m worried they’re going to tell me I need to bring back the entire console for an exchange. If that is the case, it’ll be a real pain in the ass.

When I told my parents I was getting an X-Box 360, my dad jumped in and said that if I was getting an X-Box, then he was going to get a new HDTV. The look on my mom’s face when he said that was pretty funny. There was a look of aghast that was followed by a firm “you will do no such thing”. Quite interesting to see how persistence on my dad’s part paid off (at least in this case!). After a few days, the protests finally turned into a resigned acceptance. So on Saturday we went out and got a 37″ widescreen HDTV. It looks really good!

The HDTV also came with a free year of digital cable so we went out and got a set-top box from the cable company. After setting everything up it looked pretty good, but it didn’t take long for us to notice that normal cable looks like shit compared to other non-HD media. It’s a bit blurry. Apparently it has something to do with the box not properly upscaling the SD cable media or something like that. This HD stuff is totally confusing. But the cable guy is coming over tomorrow to unlock some channels we now get with the digital service, so I’ll ask him about it. I hope he’s just not a typical know-nothing technician…

Also my sister came down for a visit for the weekend. She almost died on the drive here. There was a big snowstorm sweeping over the city when they left so it was quite slippery. While going 120km/h on the highway, the driver lost control and they almost tipped right over and landed in a ditch, but she swerved and managed to stay upright. Instead of tipping, they sped into oncoming traffic where they amazingly managed to avoid a head on collision and just scraped the side of some guys car. Lucky or what!

So that’s about all that needs telling I think.

Re: Graduated Today

October 13th, 2006

diploma-up.jpg Well, he told me I’d need to wait to get it, but I got it today! What a pleasant surprise.

Graduated Today

October 11th, 2006

Well I’m happy today.

Months ago I blogged about my co-op arrangement for getting my last 4 highschool credits, and I was happy then too. But when when this school year started and I tried to get in contact with my principal, who I was doing the co-op through, things weren’t looking so bright. There was a big mixup and the school kept saying I was supposed to be in classes. Since I work during the day, obviously this was somewhat problematic. So after a month of trying to get things all sorted out, I finally managed to get an appointment with the principal to talk about this.

I printed off all of the work that I’ve done for my job and business since these were the things that were supposed to earn me my credits. I walked in with a thick folder full of notes and after he flipped through them, he agreed that I’ve done enough to earn my 4 credits through co-op and gave them to me right there. He tacked the co-op on to my Computer Science class, and gave me the same grade I earned in it (92%).

So after a depressing month of thinking that I might have to come back for two more semesters, totally wasting this one, it is a relief to know that I got them — and in less time then I thought it would take. And 4 credits graded at 92% isn’t bad either ;-) Pretty cool to be able to show off honors in English, Computer Science, Computer Engineering and this co-op on any applications I send out :-D

Now to think about the scary future :eek: I’m not quite sure what I’m going to do… I may just work for a year before enrolling into college (either way I’ll need to wait until next year). I’m lucky enough to have a great college right around the corner which has very good (and reputable!) computer science courses, but still not sure what I’ll do. Regardless, it is in the future so I have time to think it all over.

iMac Arrived

October 4th, 2006

Well, the iMac has arrived :cool:

It came a couple of days ago, but been a bit busy so didn’t blog about it until now :-p I really really love it! Awesome design, looks totally sexy, and Mac OSX is brilliant :-) There are a couple things I need to get used to. I’ve already got pretty much everything down, but on the PC I used to do a lot of programming and used such key combos like CTRL+[backspace/arrow keys] and SHIFT+[home/end] to navigate/select text. On the Mac the key bindings are a bit different.

One of the first apps I downloaded was TextMate, and it is everything I thought it’d be ;-) I was a big fan of EditPlus on the PC because I prefer simple editors when I don’t need an IDE. TextMate is like EditPlus in simplicity and efficiency, but like an IDE in features. After you get used to the keyword expansions, you can create a full HTML document in 30 seconds by just typing the first couple of characters of a tag and just tab expanding it etc. Very good app.

I’m already using the Mac more often then I’m using my PC except for work. I still have to get my prefered server environment (Apache, PHP and MySQL) set up and working on the Mac. So far I’ve encountered no program that I need or cannot get on the Mac. I do however have to say I do miss mIRC and FlashFXP. X-Chat for IRC is just alright, but I’m not liking the FTP clients available. That’s probably just because I’m so used to using FlashFXP… Floris says I’ll get used to using Transmit. We’ll see :)

Uhm, so yeah. Everything just works and is beautiful :-D I did take some pics, but they’re not very good. I was a tad more interested in getting the thing set up then taking pics to satisfy Floris’ and Disjunto’s geekiness :-P But if you wish to take a look, I’ve uploaded them: iMac Unveiling. The pics were taken in my living room, but it has since been moved up to my room/office. I’ll take a pic of my current setup sometime later when I’m not too lazy to go and find the digital camera.

Bought an iMac

September 26th, 2006

Well on Saturday I went ahead and ordered myself an iMac. I got the 24 inch model, all stock except for the video card upgrade. I got the confirmation email sent to me today.

It says 2-4 days for them to ship it, then I think it said up to 10 for it to actually arrive. Floris says that I’ll probably be waiting like a month. I hope the “2-4 days” is actually 2, and the “up to 10″ is actually 1 ;-) Floris asked me to take pictures of everything from the box it comes in to the iMac itself — and being the geek I am, I will oblige :-D I’ll post them up when I finally get it.

Also while I’m here I thought I should mention I plan to open up a dev blog on devlog.outershift.com (don’t check, nothing there yet). I will use that blog to post more technical articles and code snippets that I’ve been wanting to publish (for example, Tyler asked about passwords and salts the other day — something I wish to write about in a bit more detail then I did on WMT). So keep an eye out for that if you have any interest.

Snakes on a Plane

August 26th, 2006

When I first heard of this movie I thought it looked really really dumb. Wait, I still think it looks dumb ;) But I went to go see it anyway, knowing that the excellent marketing had totally brainwashed me and not caring.

It was actually an alright movie :P It’s not an excellent movie by any means, but surprisingly entertaining. Though I did wait the entire movie in anticipation for the famous line, “Mother****ing snakes on this mother****ing plane!” and when it finally came about I was not disappointed!

That is all. :D

Chroder Theme Song

August 22nd, 2006

Danny, being the crazy guy he is, decided to create a Chroder theme song (someone has too much time on their hands… ;) :p). Well calling it a song isn’t quite right, but it’s still funny nevertheless :p

If you’re wondering HOW this ever came to be, well, it’s just an inside joke. Kinda. Or something ;) I think Pyro started it by mixing me saying “Ouch!” with Jack Bauer saying “Tell me or I’ll break the other wrist!”… I’m kinda scared to ever Skype with anyone ever again! [< Lie. I'm currently on a conference call with Floris and Kerry-Anne and Steve :p]

Anyway, this post is more archival then anything else but I still thought it was funny ;) Only a geek like me can find joy in something so simple :p

DeskPro3 Beta - Help Test

August 8th, 2006

DeskPro is a comprehensive helpdesk system. Many large companies use this product to manage customer relations (support, files, knowledgebase, articles, troubleshooters etc). You even may have seen it yourself on sites like 2Checkout.

The first beta is finally available for testers. Just point your browser to beta.deskpro.com and download a copy for yourself (it’s free, you do not need to be a license owner). When you find bugs, submit them to bugs.deskpro.com. The people who help the most will win a free iPod Nano or Playstation Portable!

The rough draft of the install guide is available at manual.deskpro.com. That page will be updated soon with the full DP3 manual as time goes on.

Sister Moving

August 5th, 2006

So the sister is moving out for college. She’s going up north (about 4 hours away from here) to live all by herself, a big step ;)

In about 2 hours time, we’ll be on our way. I’ve gotta help her move which is most unfortunate… Heavy things + 3 flights of stairs = not fun. The worst thing is this 10 year old 24″ TV that weighs like 1 billion pounds… Just getting it up from out basement to the moving truck made me sweat, so I’m definately not looking forward to heaving it up 3 flights!

And lately I’ve been keeping to my own schedule — I like to call it the “coder’s schedule” — where I sleep in the mornings and wake after noon (usually I go from about 05:00 to 13:00). But we planned on all getting up at 06:00 (it’s about 05:30 now), so it seems like I’m not sleeping tonight/this morning/sleeping cycle. I actually tried to catch a few winks, but to no avail… And I’m still not tired, but I know the sleepiness will come around soon. I think by the time the move is finished tomorrow (er… tonight), I’m going to be absolutely deeeaaadddd.

I should be back around Sunday (and perhaps Saturday if the ‘net is hooked up in my sister’s place) to finish off things. I didn’t have time to finish some of the DeskPro hours I have to put in, so I’ll be doing some catch up. DeskPro3 beta should be released soon, so keep your eyes on this blog because I’ll link to the download. Anyone will be able to grab it and install it to help track down bugs. Chris says he’ll give away free licenses to those who help most!

So that’s it for today. I’m going to go take a shower and get ready since sleep is evading me. I think I’ll go get a large vanilla cappuccino from Tim Hortons, too.

Yeah, I’m pathetic

July 25th, 2006

Okay, so I loooooove the TV show “Big Brother”. What’s the big deal? Stop looking at me like that!

Yeah yeah, reality TV shows are so stupid… But I love them. Well, some — I only like Big Brother and Apprentice and there might be few others that I’ll tune into if I just happen to be watching TV at the time. But Big Brother is my all time favorite. I’ll tell you why: I love to see how the balance of power is shifted from week to week, how plans are hatched then broken, and how alliances are formed and smashed.

I also find this sort of thing interesting in books. The Wheel of Time story by Robert Jordan has many political plot lines interspersed throughout the (currently) 11-book series which I find very fascinating. And then there’s A Song of Ice and Fire by George R.R. Martin which is a story based primarily around war, and thusly, around politics.

Most people think this kind of thing is dry and boring, but when you can see the plots and plans unfold before your eyes I think you can begin to appreciate the coolness ;-)

So yeah, I’m a geek that loves BB. Sue me :-)

Post Overdue

July 23rd, 2006

Haven’t blogged in a while so I thought I would just give a shout out now.

So the last month has been great with the new DeskPro job. I can’t speak for Padfield of course, but from my end I think things are going pretty swell. The plan is to release the first public build of version 3 soon — so if you’re interesting then stay tuned, I’ll blog about it later :) It’ll be free to download (so not only for license holders) and Chris hinted that if people do really well helping us find bugs, he might give away a few free lics.

I’ve been up to a few different things other then DP. After finishing the work for the day I usually like to sit back and relax a bit (which all too often may include skyping with Floris, peterska2, Onimua and Pyro ;-)), but I do keep busy. For vbulletin-fans.com, I created a nifty little vBulletin 3.6 product that allows an admin to have a bunch of forums on a single install. Not so much a bridge between installs or a single userbase, but literally a single install. Using some various tricks and hacks and ideas form Floris, I managed to use the new infraction system to set some forum permissions depending on the domain the user is currently viewing. For example, if they are on domain1.com, then the script dynamically sets permissions so that all forums but the ones from domain1.com are denied — effectively making it seem like a different forum. We were quite pleased with our own ingenious ideas ;-)

Also finished up some work I needed to do for Howard (which, ironically, included extending a ticket system ;-)). My part is finished I believe, now it’s up to Patrik to do the rest.

Then of course there’s TNT and WMT. TNT is coming along nicely, though still slow. I knew opening a forum in such a competitive and overly saturated market would be hard, so it’s no big surprise. DaveMo~ is an admin on another successful computer forum, so he’s got some good experience and connections that will surely help us grow. But I’m still trying to think of some ideas to put a little twist on things and create a unique spice that only TNT would have, but not much is surfacing.

I bought vBSEO a couple weeks back and am really glad I did :) It has some very good features besides just the obvious URL rewriting (ie. the (track|ping)back feature). They are full of ideas over there and I’m excited to see what they include next. The price point is still a little steep, but definitely a very good product to have.

WMT is the same as ever, nothing overly new going on. I completed the upgrade to vB3.6RC2 yesterday without a hitch. Upgrading templates from 3.5 to 3.6 was a complete chore though. There are many little things that, if missed, will totally mess things up. This is because of all the new Javascript stuff. I don’t mind, but it would be nice if they made a list of all the essential Javascript lines and where they need to go, and what objects need to be id’ed etc. This would make life a lot easier… But I used Beyond Compare to track down most of the issues. Combined with some help from peterska2, things finished up quite nicely.

We should be unveiling a paid ‘premium members’ package on WMT soon. Our first priority will always be offering free content for everyone, but we thought this might be a cool thing to have. I like to think of it as a donation which gives you some cool stuff ;-) Amongst the cool stuff is a private premium members lounge — but I won’t say more, since we haven’t revealed what we’re going to do yet.

My sister is going to college up north somewhere (4-5 hours away), so that’s one less person who’ll be in the house and 98% less phone calls (longish story). I’m going to help her move next (or next next?) week which is going to be harrrd since I’ll have to wake up at 6am ;-) Going to be weird not having her around though! I hope everything works out well up there for her.

My parents just got a laptop for themselves and are letting her take their desktop PC, so I’ve got to clean that thing up before she takes it and install one of those remote administration things for when she screws something up (oh, it’ll happen). But I’m glad I can still have access to a computer when I’m up there — even though it will be for a day or two ;-) A geek without his computer is nothing to joke about!

I’m not sure if I should get a laptop too. I may once the new core 2 duo chips are mainstream. I plan on getting a totally new PC about the time Vista comes out (which may or may not be ‘never’ ;-)), but I’d really like a lappy now. So maybe in a few months…

I’ve been saying this for a while, but I am doing it soon ;-) I’m going to register my business soon, so I’ll finally actually be ‘Outershift’ and can go crazy making business cards or something :-D I’m technically working for DeskPro as a hired contractor (for tax reasons), so I can put down DP as work. The biggest perk of owning your own business is that I can write stuff off ;-) That laptop I want, or gas for the car, or that $699 for Adobe Photoshop etc etc I can write off and get a lot of it back at the end of the year when I file my taxes.

And I’ve also got to call the guy from my bank back so I can get a credit card finally. It’s so hard ordering online without a credit card! Though I’m worried I’m going to start going crazy buying things because it’ll be so easy… Like, I’ll check in a month and I’ll have 200 Amazon boxes or something ;-)

Anyway, that’s about it for today. See ya later :-)

Got a job

June 18th, 2006

Well, I’ve been doing some freelancing the last little while which wasn’t going bad. Me and my friend Tyler (and a plug: HostMaven) were about to start a large scale (and quite well paying ;)) job, but it fell through, which was depressing…

So anyawy, I’ve got a job programming DeskPro with Chris Padfield. I have my friend Floris to thank for it, because he recommended me to him (and ManagerJosh, I guess :rolleyes: ;P). The first month will be for Chris to see if he likes me, and for me to see if I like the job. If everything works out after a month then I should be working there until further notice. I hope everything goes according to plan, because I like the product, I like Chris, and I like the stability of ongoing work ;)

Other then that, I started once again to work on TNT. I let it slip for a few months whilst everything else was going on, but I’m back in full force now. I’m talking with Dave and Tim about what we should do next. When I’m not working on DeskPro, then TNT will be my focus :) So if you’re into computers / tech, then please join us on TNT. We have a ‘Security Team’ in the works that we want to grow into a full fledged advice-giving-machine one day ;) If you know anything about security, then maybe you’d like to join that team.

And that’s it! See ya later :D

An image representation of software development

May 18th, 2006

SoftwareDevelopment.jpg
Someone posted this on vBcom, and I thought it was hilarious!

Robert Jordan Diagnosed with Amyloidosis

April 28th, 2006

Old-ish news, but Robert Jordan was diagnosed with amyloidosis. For those who don’t know who he is, he’s the author of one of my favorite book series, The Wheel of Time. So far there are 11 books in the series and Jordan has said there will only be one more. I hope he finishes it! That sounds really insensitive… I do wish him the best and all, but I’ll flip out if the series goes unfinished ;-)