Valefor

Neck of State. Pretty awesome.

I was setting up my linode tonight and I was having lots of trouble installing the right postgresql gem, getting it unpacked and working in a clean rails app.

I finally managed to do it correctly. First of all the correct gem seems to be “pg”. It’s the most recently updated one in the gems listing and most blogs/articles/news posts confirm this. Once I installed the pg gem and unpacked it rails would shoot out an annoying message (This message did not appear after installing before unpacking):

Please install the postgresql adapter: `gem install activerecord-postgresql-adapter` (no such file to load -- pg)

Turns out that while I ran rake gems:unpack, I also needed to run rake gems:build in order to build the native parts of the gems that were unpacked. This makes a ton of sense now.

My database.yml file uses the string “postgresql” for the db adapter.

I used to be REALLY excited about the Open Moko phones. Once it finally got released (in this semi-user friendly setting, not JUST developer models) it became not only very overpriced for the hardware (compared to other offerings) but the software is severely lacking to begin with. I am keeping my eye on it, though.

Then out comes Google Android. This open source platform for phones sounds great cause it’s actually more fully features and has people writing lots of software for it (esp since, despite it’s faults, java does allow for developer adoption). I’m very excited… the google videos are awesome, I want to play on it, I want to write on it…. blah blah blah.

NONE of this matters if there is only ONE phone with Android. It’s locked to T-Mobile. The unlocked G1’s that are surfacing are 400 bucks. Figures.

Open Moko has said that they are working on putting android on their phone. I might just spend money on one if they get that working and all of the features of Android would work out of the box by me just putting my sim card in the phone once I get it (Already on AT&T which allows for unlocked phones).

I don’t understand how people put up with such crap in the cell phone market. People are paying through the roof for features that should be free and EVERYONE (including me, though it was the “free” one) has a locked phone. It makes no sense to me.

So recently my company bought some javascript code and we wanted to read through it and make sure nothing fishy was going on. Of course it was obfuscated using some code that starts out with:

eval(function(p,a,c,k,e,r){

Googling I found this that shows how just adding

eval = alert;

above the code makes your browser spit out the code. Some formatting may be needed but that’s easy enough to do with any of the online web javascript formatters!

For the first time in long time, I actually cared about a candidate and I can’t be happier that he’s elected. Let’s hope change can start that helps the United States get out of one of the worst periods of our history.

I can has votes? Yes I can. Showed up at 6:55 not knowing what to expect since I have not voted in Brookline before and was met with a line of people. At 7:45 I submitted my ballot to the big black box and left. Some were saying this was a very high turnout and the line behind me tripled while I was waiting in it, so hopefully those are good signs

These are all a part of my quickly growing collection of books on web design or relating to it. I always have more I’m interested in picking up, but they’re all so expensive!

Javascript

Simply Javascript

CSS

CSS: The Definitive Guide
Designing with Web Standards
CSS Cookbook
Bulletproof Web Design
The Art & Science of CSS
Transcending CSS

Design

Graphic Design Tricks & Techniques
The Non-designer’s Design Book
Designing a Digital Portfolio
The Principles of Beautiful Web Design
Web Design Workshop

Accessibility/Usability

Design Accessible Web Sites
Designing the Moment
Don’t Make Me Think!
Designing the Obvious

Photo

The Complete Guide to Digital Color Correction

Typography

The Non-designer’s Type Book

CMS/Other

Joomla! a user’s guide

Photoshop

The Photoshop Anthology

Lol this article is amazing

But don’t read it if you don’t want spoilers for Battlestar Galactica up to the very end of the third season.

Cylons for McCain

I’m getting disappointed reading the current news coming out of the OLPC camp. The reason I supported the project (and forked over my $400) was for two reasons. 1) I agree with education being the answer to most of the world’s problems and 2) I support open software. This project seemed to endorse both. I feel like both are deeply ingrained within each other. Not only does open software allow for creating awesome machines that are going to be usable for years without corporate lock in, but they also provide a learning experience for everyone regardless or age due to the nature of being able to play and pick apart the machine.

Hearing that the goal for the OLPC project is now to “get the technology in the hands of as many children as possible” I find myself disgusted. From the beginning it wasn’t a “laptop” project but a “education” project. That was stated so many times at talks over the past few years. Now all that has gone away. I’m totally fearful that this is just going to be another corporate sponsored “lock in another generation to our software” project. The world doesn’t need this. The world needs what OLPC was.

I hope the OLPC leaders listen to arguments like these. You aren’t helping anyone by spending money to help Microsoft get XP onto low power laptops. It’s wrong on so many levels. These kids need to be able to explore these systems and learn.

Even more important though is the apparent lack of my number one reason to be interested in the project. EDUCATION should be the primary concern, Not the spreading of technology. If the goal of the project is suddenly to only provide technology then I agree with all of the original naysayers: the money would better be spent on nutrition and poverty projects.

http://fadtastic.net/2008/04/01/awesome-hot-tips-for-your-website-in-2008/

The Universal IE Hack

Another hot tip? Go on then.

Last year saw the launch of IE7. IE6 is still a widely used browser and IE8 beta is out of the starting blocks. A lot of IE hacks? Nope. Simply use the Universal IE Hack. Place the following code in the Head of your document:

<!–[if IE]>
<style>
html, body, * {
  display: none;
}
</style>
<![endif]–>

This supersedes all documented IE hacks to date. Enjoy.