HTTPS for everyone!

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Jan 312016
 

Google and others have been pushing for HTTPS everywhere. If I recall, they put something out last year stating that having https will be factored into a site’s ranking. My web host has made it possible to have https on their hosted accounts as of this past week. For free! As in beer! So update your bookmarks to this super frequently updated site to use https because you can.

I had to fix a few things that caused mixed content warnings including finally updating the ancient widget that I was using to show my tweets over there on the right. It’s been broken ever since Twitter switched API versions from 1 to 1.1 and started requiring OAuth. It was going to take a bit more work to update that widget, so I opted for the one from Jetpack that uses the Twitter widget instead. I could configure that via the existing editors versus having to go grab a PHP OAuth library and having to figure out how to integrate that into WordPress.

 Posted by on January 31, 2016 at 10:04 am

Ch-ch-ch-changes

 Blog, Geek, Tech  1 Response »
May 312013
 

I’m somewhere between San Diego and Austin flying back from a business trip. It’s the last day of May. School is about to end for the kids. It’s a time or change and Spring cleaning. We’ve been doing a lot of purging and cleaning around the house. Now it’s time to purge the bits.

I just deactivated my Facebook account and deleted the app off of my phone. I’ve been meaning to do this for months and decided that it was just time to kick myself in the ass and do it. The last straw was the targeted Mother’s Day ad that I got with my mom’s picture embedded in it. I know that’s the sort of thing that they’ve been trending towards, but it wasn’t until it was staring me in the face that I really grasped how much that bothers me. They’re constantly altering the privacy settings in a way that also bugs me.

I’ve also been bothered by the ease of it. It keeps me from really interacting and writing longer posts. I’m checking it too often instead of actually doing something or interacting with family and friends. I’m hoping to see friends follow me to Path or Twitter or just stick with good old email or phone. I’ll miss out on some of the interaction, but the benefits definitely outweigh the drawbacks. So…hope to see you here or elsewhere.

Last Day of 2012

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Dec 312012
 

We sent out our holiday cards a bit late this year. Most people should’ve received them by now. I had to resend one already. It was a pretty good year all things considered. Looking to do a better job exercising in the new year (there’s an original resolution).

This is also a test post to see how things flow from the blog to FB and elsewhere as I reevaluate how much content I want to send out onto social networks never to be seen again.

20121231-123241.jpg

 Posted by on December 31, 2012 at 12:14 pm  Tagged with:

Sad News – And old is new again

 Blog  1 Response »
Apr 012011
 

Seven years after the Austin Metblog started, the Metroblogging network is shutting down. I was able to get the content that I created and import it into my own blog here so that it wouldn’t be lost. I haven’t been posting much here, so it’ll be a shot of content. If I remember correctly, it’s something like 500-600 posts.

If the site does go down completely, some of the images may be lost. I’m not sure that I’m motivated enough to go and fix that along with the internal links. I think I wrote some decent stuff over time, so I’m glad not to have lost it. Thanks to both Sean and Jason for starting it in the first place. I’ve met some pretty cool people through the site. I’m pretty sure that the original, Blogging LA, will continue on.

 Posted by on April 1, 2011 at 7:45 am

Scentless Apprentice

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Mar 252010
 

Decided I’d title this whatever song was playing on the iPhone when I started writing. Seems appropriate, I guess.

The last post was a little less than a month before M. was born. He’s nearly nine months old now. Needless to say, I think my blogging urge is being fulfilled by Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, Delicious, YouTube and whatever little posting I still do over at Metroblogging Austin.

Is a new baby a good enough excuse? Do I need an excuse? Should I keep updating WordPress versions to keep ahead of the script kiddies (probably)? Should I change the theme (probably)?

It’s also been nine months since I quit the main band. I’ve had a couple gigs with Victims of Leisure since then, but we haven’t played or practiced since before Thanksgiving. We’ve got one coming up this Saturday for the gig at the Parlor next week (April 3). I’m not sure I even know how to hold the drumsticks still (or remember the songs). It could be ugly. Better be sure I have plenty of beer so I’ll play better.

We finally tried out a Skype video call with my parents using the webcam that I got for Xmas this week. Ours has been working since the beginning of the year, but it took this long to get my parents going. Now my mother-in-law is running out to get a webcam as well. Yes, we’re just now joining 2004 and doing video calls with far flung relatives. If you’ve got a webcam and are on Skype, come find us. It’s the same damn username that I use for everything.

Renewal

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Jan 082009
 

I suppose I’m a bit late for the end of year/start of year post, but since I’ve neglecting blogging here so much over the past year, this doesn’t seem all that bad.

2008 was a real bitch in a lot of ways. I know I’m not the only one hoping that 2009 is better. Only 12 more days before we’re rid of G.W. Bush. Amazing. He’s been the president for nearly all of my childrens’ lives. The Boy was born under Clinton, but Bush was sworn in before his first birthday. It’s no secret that I’ll be glad to see him go. I’m clearly not alone in that sentiment.

We’ve got some new things to look forward to this year, the most monumental being the arrival of our third child in July. We’ve got six months to prepare and we’ve already got a long list of things that need to be done to the house and the crap that we’ve accumulated in 10 years here. We’re also going to get the kids to help out around the house a lot more to ease things on us once the baby arrives.

I’ve been terrible about budgets in the past, but it’s time to get serious about one this year. I’ve been checking out Mint for the past couple of weeks. It’s not perfect, but I like it better than Quicken.

I’m not sure about my drumming hobby in the context of a third kid. I’ll have to wrestle with that one over the next six months. We didn’t apply for SXSW this year. I think we’ll go for the alternate showcases this year and see how that goes.

We tried out a gym membership at Lifetime for most of last year and failed miserably. I need to come up with an achieveable workout plan. We got a Wii Fit at Christmas and I’ve been dabbling with that, but that’s only a part of the fitness picture.

Kind of a rambling post, but I wanted to get something going to get back into the groove. Let’s see if I can do at least two posts a month here and on the Austin Metblog.

iPhoning it in

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Jul 252008
 

I suppose having a template that only shows recent posts on the home page is one way of making sure you blog on a semi-regular basis. I’ve found that Twitter, Flickr and Delicious are commanding more of my attention these days than the blog. Well, and work and family…

The summer rolls on. It’s been a hot one so far without much relief from 90 and 100 degree heat. The electric bill is reflecting that. We hosted a last minute July 4th party at our place. Parties are always a good way to force you to clean up the joint.

We checked out WALL-E and Iron Man in the theater so far this summer. We rented/cabled/on-demanded Batman Begins, Apocalypto, Enchanted,  Hellboy and Mr. & Mrs. Smith. We went to the IMAX theater at Bob Bullock on Saturday. Austin Books & Comics and the museum were having bat-related activites, including the “bat lady” who had several live bats to show the kids. The lines for the movie were long.

I scored an iPhone a week ago. I had to wait 3 hours in line to get it. I’m liking it so far. The Bat Lady shot that I linked is actually my first uploaded iPhone shot. I’ve made a few iPhone related tweaks to this blog including setting the default viewport and adding a home screen image based on the favicon. I downloaded and installed the WordPress app for iPhone, but haven’t tried it out yet.

Ugh. WordPress hacked.

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May 022008
 

According to the Dreamhost people, my WordPress install got hacked. I tried upgrading from 2.5 to 2.5.1 today and even though their install bot claimed that I’d upgraded, everything in WordPress still said I was on 2.5. I’m not sure if the hack that was exploited was the one fixed in 2.5.1, but now everything’s borked and I’m back to the default theme. It’s going to take me some time to get everything customized again. Sigh.

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