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New user? Sunday, July 23, 2000
Just in the nick of time
Ironically, the web server that hosts just the images for this site went down overnight due to another storm. The new home page template doesn't have images. But if you go to the other pages in the site, you'll notice a lot of broken images.
Update: I've updated the rest of the site to match the home page's template.
The first web browser was written in Objective-C
Yesterday, while playing an online game (WarBirds), a person wouldn't believe me when I said the first web browser and web server were developed on a NeXT computer. (we were debating the merits of closed vs. open protocols, I'm not sure why I brought up TBL's NeXT box). We were promptly flamed for "talking shop" in the game, and rightly so! :-)
W3C: The History of the World Wide Web. from 1945 to 1995.
Opera and MDI - again
cnews: Look out Microsoft, the fat lady's singing
Opera is offered in 10 languages, including Afrikaans.
"We feel the software should be adapted to the user and not the other way around," Tetzchner said.
Okay... then: Opera Software, please adapt Opera so that I don't have to use the awful MDI ("several windows within one browser frame") user interface. I promise to purchase a copy as soon as that is a released feature. In the mean time, my 30 day trial license of Opera 4.0 hasn't expired yet.
Saturday, July 22, 2000
Lance Morrow explained -- He's a secret weenie!
What a completely stupid article.
CNN: Al Gore explained -- He's a secret Canadian!
Lance Morrow refuses to explain HOW Gore is like a Canadian, just giving his readers a lot of "nudge-nudge wink-wink say-no-more say-no-more" bullshit.
The article ends with:
"How so? I'm not sure it would do much for American-Canadian friendship to go into more detail. Students wishing to pursue the subject, however, might explore fatal comparisons in the area of humor."
Lance, put up or shut up. We are not amused.
E-mail down until Sunday or Monday
I've just learned that a storm knocked out the mail server for my domain. The hard drive(s) and backup UPS are trashed. Apparently however, no mail is lost as it's cached on an external mail server. (I hope that's true!)
The server will be down until Sunday, or more likely Monday. Bugger. ;(
If you need to contact me, please use the address jim@oaai.com for now. Thanks.
Underwhelmed and Uninformed
Apple's Jobs fails to inspire - I must admit I was underwhelmed by Wednesday's announcements. There was nothing earthshaking, no big advances like we've seen in the past - iMac / Netbooting / AirPort.
Maybe Apple's done such a good job surprising and impressing us in the last 2 years that it's pretty much impossible to live up to that level of excitement.
Regardless, I'm bothered by how tight-lipped Apple has been about new products. I believe it's doing them more harm than good.
If they had told developers that MP macs were coming out so soon, more software could have been made MP-enabled by now. Then, these MP macs would have appealing to more markets in the short-term.
If they had told accessory makers about the new colours, they could have prepared for the transition.
If they had told WebObjects developers and sysadmins that the new G4s wouldn't be able to run OS X Server for a few months, they could have snagged the remaining supply for development and deployment needs while they waited for the update. People are complaining louder now than they would have had they had some warning.
Do you think it's important for Apple to be secretive about product rollouts? I'd love to hear a rebuttal.
Petreley on Enhydra
Arcane or not, Enhydra is a dream come true for the Java-loving servlet developer
Enhydra is pretty darn cool. If I wasn't already doing WebObjects development (which IMHO is still much better), I'd really like to be using Enhydra.
If you've deployed apps with Enhydra, I've love to hear your experiences...
Don't golf in a thunderstorm
1PM: I wanted to go golfing but there's a severe weather warning (thunderstorm watch) for the Greater Victoria area. :-(
8PM: This afternoon I traded in my first (starter) set of golf clubs for a full 11 piece set and new putter. The store I bought my first set from has a '1/2 back' program where you get 1/2 the cost of your clubs back if you upgrade in the first year.
After that I went to the driving range. I definitely shouldn't hit more than one bucket of balls -- by the time I'm at the end of the 1st bucket my swing is all over the place. The 2nd bucket was a total waste, and now my back is a wreck. :-(
When I bought my first clubs last year, I wrote about it on this site. It's kind of neat (for me anyway) to be able to go back and read that stuff... I wish I had kept a diary through my whole life.
.NET: "psychic hotlines and newspaper horoscopes"
Joel Spolsky totally understands .NET. Which is to say, he doesn't know what the hell it is either!
And that's his point. It's exactly what you imagine it to be, which is why you think you love it. Sneaky huh?
New Look
I know what you're saying. What the hell happened?
Well I'm trying out this new template I just finished. It's similar to the one I had been playing with for a few days, but I like this one better.
I don't know if the colours are good or not, but I tried it in 5 different browsers (IE/NN on Mac/Win and Opera/Win) and it looks nice to me. :-)
I'd really really appreciate your feedback on this new design.
Thanks in advance,
Jim
PS: The rest of the site still uses the 'normal' template. If I decide to keep this template I'll have the rest of the site use this template too. One of the many advantages to using Conversant is being able to have many templates stored and available all the time. I can revert this page to the old look in a few clicks.
Friday, July 21, 2000
Colour Theory - I think I like it!
James Spahr, the man behind the recent redesign of MacOSX.weblogs.com, among other fine sites, generously shares some of his extensive knowledge on colour theory with me as I'm trying to come up with a pleasing colour scheme for a new template for this site.
Thanks James!
I am Jack's fashion sense
Ed points Aaron's raison d'etre for The Cube.
At the bottom of Aaron's piece, he points to the crowd that the Cube is for.
That crowd's site reminded me of IKEA. Reminded me of Tyler Durden. Tyler Durden would just love to teach those folks a lesson. (If you don't know what I'm on about, see Fight Club, immediately. Really.)
Shudder.
Would you give it a rest please? I'm reading.
There are too many web sites. Stop it. Please, just stop making new ones until I've gotten through the ones you've made so far. STOP IT.
Here's an example. Rotten Tomatoes. I know for sure there are over 1000 sites that I haven't even heard of, like Rotten Tomatoes, that I'd thouroughly enjoy if only I knew they existed.
So just... take a vacation, okay?
If you know of other cool sites that most people don't know exist, please share them. It'll just help me get through them all faster. I'm sure everyone who is reading this page is in the same boat.
Thanks!
Keep that thing away from me :)
Chew Chew, the meat-eating robot, scares me.
Remember how the machines got their energy in The Matrix? Well, they weren't carnivorous, but they did use humans as their energy source. (their heat energy IIRC)
Lawn-powered lawn-movers sound interesting, but wouldn't solar-powered lawn-mowers work too?
Life imitates art.
E-mail still down
The mail server for my e-mail account jim@roepcke.com has been down for a full day now. If you're trying to send me e-mail, please send it to jim@oaai.com for now. Or, ICQ me @ 14287112. Or, AIM id JimRoepcke.
