Microsoft stops selling Windows XP today.
Coincidentally I just got my work PC upgraded from Windows 2000 to Windows XP just last Friday.
On the cutting edge....
Monday, June 30, 2008
Tuesday, June 24, 2008
PHP
I have been working with PHP at home lately. Currently I generate my web site as static html pages using Smalltalk (the best programming language ever created).
One problem we have, though, is that we have a lot of products and we run out of inventory, causing back orders.
So, I have been prototyping having my page generator create PHP pages instead, which will create product rows by reading a MySql database each time the page is loaded. If the inventory level is below a threshold, the product row will show "Out of Stock".
The cool thing is that the shopping cart service I uses (mals-e.com) can do a silent post back of order information to a php script, so I plan to use that function to automatically decrement inventory.
One of the trickiest things is getting it to work on my local Apache server, while still reading the database that sits on my hosting account. I had to tweak the Apache config settings, and tweak the PHP config settings. The PHP database connection settings are different depending on which platform you are running on. Fortunately you can detect this pro grammatically, so I can run the same PHP code base on my windows XP machine running apache and on my Linux hosting account.
The design is not perfect; returns and exchanges have to be handled manually etc.
I have built the MySql product table and the table that links products to pages. I have also started prototyping a C# desktop application to allow table maintenance: adjusting prices, removing products from pages etc. The tough part was getting the connection to MySql and the datagrid to display and update rows. That took a couple hours to figure out. Still a lot left to do.
It is kind of ambitious, but it will give us some big benefits like being to run reports of products we are running low on, and drastically reducing the number of back orders we have to deal with.
One problem we have, though, is that we have a lot of products and we run out of inventory, causing back orders.
So, I have been prototyping having my page generator create PHP pages instead, which will create product rows by reading a MySql database each time the page is loaded. If the inventory level is below a threshold, the product row will show "Out of Stock".
The cool thing is that the shopping cart service I uses (mals-e.com) can do a silent post back of order information to a php script, so I plan to use that function to automatically decrement inventory.
One of the trickiest things is getting it to work on my local Apache server, while still reading the database that sits on my hosting account. I had to tweak the Apache config settings, and tweak the PHP config settings. The PHP database connection settings are different depending on which platform you are running on. Fortunately you can detect this pro grammatically, so I can run the same PHP code base on my windows XP machine running apache and on my Linux hosting account.
The design is not perfect; returns and exchanges have to be handled manually etc.
I have built the MySql product table and the table that links products to pages. I have also started prototyping a C# desktop application to allow table maintenance: adjusting prices, removing products from pages etc. The tough part was getting the connection to MySql and the datagrid to display and update rows. That took a couple hours to figure out. Still a lot left to do.
It is kind of ambitious, but it will give us some big benefits like being to run reports of products we are running low on, and drastically reducing the number of back orders we have to deal with.
Monday, June 23, 2008
"The Road"
Last month I read "The Road" by Cormack McCarthy (the guy who wrote "No Country For Old Men", recently made into a film).
"The Road" is a post-apocalyptic horror story, all the more horrifying because there are no monsters.
The story takes place about 5-6 years after the world has been destroyed by some unnamed cataclysm. At first I assumed it was a nuclear holocaust, but as time went on the descriptions of the devastation made it seem more like a catastrophic meteor strike: the skies are eternally gray, mountainsides are scorched, ashen dust covers everything, even clogging the oceans. Almost everything is dead, nothing will grow, and the few human survivors band together in groups of cannibals and scavengers.
A man and his young son are following a road south, desperate to find food and avoid cannibals. They witness horrifying scenes of destruction and cruelty, and the book is relentlessly despairing. It is really hard to see how any redemption can be pulled from the horror. Bleak doesn't even begin to describe this story. I really dreaded the end because it seemed to be leading only into deeper tragedy.
In tone the book reminded me of the darker works of Harlan Ellison, but without the fantastical elements. I read a lot of Ellison in the 1970's, and found the nihilism perfect for my teenage years. McCarthy is a more disciplined and controlled writer than Ellison, and thus his horrifying story is much more believable.
McCarthy has been described as one of the greatest writers in American literature. His story was so sparingly written and so evocative of an imagined place and time that I think I'd have to agree.
"The Road" is a post-apocalyptic horror story, all the more horrifying because there are no monsters.
The story takes place about 5-6 years after the world has been destroyed by some unnamed cataclysm. At first I assumed it was a nuclear holocaust, but as time went on the descriptions of the devastation made it seem more like a catastrophic meteor strike: the skies are eternally gray, mountainsides are scorched, ashen dust covers everything, even clogging the oceans. Almost everything is dead, nothing will grow, and the few human survivors band together in groups of cannibals and scavengers.
A man and his young son are following a road south, desperate to find food and avoid cannibals. They witness horrifying scenes of destruction and cruelty, and the book is relentlessly despairing. It is really hard to see how any redemption can be pulled from the horror. Bleak doesn't even begin to describe this story. I really dreaded the end because it seemed to be leading only into deeper tragedy.
In tone the book reminded me of the darker works of Harlan Ellison, but without the fantastical elements. I read a lot of Ellison in the 1970's, and found the nihilism perfect for my teenage years. McCarthy is a more disciplined and controlled writer than Ellison, and thus his horrifying story is much more believable.
McCarthy has been described as one of the greatest writers in American literature. His story was so sparingly written and so evocative of an imagined place and time that I think I'd have to agree.
George Carlin
I just read that George Carlin died last night of heart failure.
I had a lot of respect for Carlin, I watched a couple of his HBO specials and I remember watching him host the very first episode of Saturday Night Live. I was 17 that year I remember thinking that I was watching something completely new and revolutionary.
Carlin morphed himself from nightclub comedian to counter culture hero to senior curmudgeon. He managed to pass through the 70's without getting typecast in the Cheech and Chong mold. He was profoundly anti-religious and not afraid of power.
Surely he won't get the attention that Tim Russert got, but in his own way he was an important contributor to the modern culture.
I had a lot of respect for Carlin, I watched a couple of his HBO specials and I remember watching him host the very first episode of Saturday Night Live. I was 17 that year I remember thinking that I was watching something completely new and revolutionary.
Carlin morphed himself from nightclub comedian to counter culture hero to senior curmudgeon. He managed to pass through the 70's without getting typecast in the Cheech and Chong mold. He was profoundly anti-religious and not afraid of power.
Surely he won't get the attention that Tim Russert got, but in his own way he was an important contributor to the modern culture.
Tuesday, June 17, 2008
Slow news week
A few weeks back Tim Russert's death would have been a two day story, but now that the nomination races are over, there isn't a lot to talk about.
Larry King bumped Steve Carrell to talk about heart disease last night, he was happy for the diversion.
I didn't watch Russert; haven't been a fan of the Sunday morning gab shows since I was in college. I did read his book "Big Russ and Me" and I really thought that it was a great marketing approach for a book. For a famous guy to write a book about his dad makes him see like such a great guy, but I am convinced that a lot of people who lathered up tim Russert over this book never actually read it.
The first 25% of the book is about "Big Russ" and the whole rest of the book is about "Me". The book really is an autobiography of Tim Russert, marketed as an homage to his father. I am sure he sold thousands more copies because of the sentimental appeal of a son writing about his Dad.
Not that it was a bad book, I just think it was marketed rather deceptively...
Larry King bumped Steve Carrell to talk about heart disease last night, he was happy for the diversion.
I didn't watch Russert; haven't been a fan of the Sunday morning gab shows since I was in college. I did read his book "Big Russ and Me" and I really thought that it was a great marketing approach for a book. For a famous guy to write a book about his dad makes him see like such a great guy, but I am convinced that a lot of people who lathered up tim Russert over this book never actually read it.
The first 25% of the book is about "Big Russ" and the whole rest of the book is about "Me". The book really is an autobiography of Tim Russert, marketed as an homage to his father. I am sure he sold thousands more copies because of the sentimental appeal of a son writing about his Dad.
Not that it was a bad book, I just think it was marketed rather deceptively...
Friday, June 6, 2008
Death of the SUV
A recent article documented the collapse of SUV sales in the US (the only real market for them).
This is due to (surprise) soaring gasoline prices.
SUV plants are closing and thousands of auto workers are losing or leaving their jobs. I understand that the auto companies "give people what they want" but I don't understand how the Jpanese companies seem to be able to produce a mix of high quality, reasonably priced cars that people want to buy. Toyota and Honda and Subaru etc produce all kinds of cars from ultra-cheap to ultra-chic and seem to be structured in such a way that they can respond to changing consumer needs.
Could it be that US companies were greedy for the fat profits SUV's gave them and got caught with their pants down when gas prices went up so fast?
No, never. Must be the union's fault...
This is due to (surprise) soaring gasoline prices.
SUV plants are closing and thousands of auto workers are losing or leaving their jobs. I understand that the auto companies "give people what they want" but I don't understand how the Jpanese companies seem to be able to produce a mix of high quality, reasonably priced cars that people want to buy. Toyota and Honda and Subaru etc produce all kinds of cars from ultra-cheap to ultra-chic and seem to be structured in such a way that they can respond to changing consumer needs.
Could it be that US companies were greedy for the fat profits SUV's gave them and got caught with their pants down when gas prices went up so fast?
No, never. Must be the union's fault...
Monday, June 2, 2008
Yahoo Pipes
I just was reading about a neat little online gizmo called "Pipes" from Yahoo.
Basically a mashup tool that lets you wire different types of feeds into some canned library modules to sort/modify/display and re-aggregate data.
You can publish your Pipes with a unique URL.
You have to have a Yahoo account to use but it looks like it has a cool visual editor.
Seems kind of neat, I will have to play around with it when I get a chance...
Basically a mashup tool that lets you wire different types of feeds into some canned library modules to sort/modify/display and re-aggregate data.
You can publish your Pipes with a unique URL.
You have to have a Yahoo account to use but it looks like it has a cool visual editor.
Seems kind of neat, I will have to play around with it when I get a chance...
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