Don't Back Down

In general, I consider myself to be a fairly easy-going person. Those of you who know me well may or may not agree, but it's typically the case that I don't get really worked up about very much. Where I do let things get under my skin is when something just doesn't go like it should. Unfortunately that seems to happen more and more these days.

Now I'm not - usually - talking about an individual. Sure, there are times when a single person can be irritating in their behavior, but generally that is something that comes up and goes just as quickly. I might even write on it if the mood strikes me, simply because it's something that might be fun to read about later. What really gets me going is when a company who is in the business of dealing with people has no clue whatsoever how to do it.

Read "Whatever Happened to Customer Service?" »

While perhaps they haven't exactly had a bad season, the Butler Bulldogs were certainly not doing as well as everyone had hoped. Sure, they have had some impressive wins, but they had also lost to East Mecklenburg just two weeks ago, and last week they beat South Mecklenburg, but not by much. This week they seem to have found their groove again, handing Weddington a monstrous loss - 58-7.

It's almost sad to say, but is that a good score for Butler or not? Just last week, Independence also destroyed Weddington - but by a score of 76-27. Does that mean that Butler is ready to play Independence this Friday? Or does it mean anything? I think it probably doesn't mean anything, and we'll just have to wait and see. It looks to me like the Patriots are in the groove and the Bulldogs are hit-and-miss. But you never know.

Read "Butler Back on Track with Thrashing of Weddington" »

Just over one month ago, I released MT-Notifier version four. There weren't too many changes in this version, as it was mostly done in order to bring the code base up-to-date with the new Movable Type interface, a change that had been a while in the making (much of which had to do with lacking documentation in this regard).

Most of the changes made in this release were cosmetic - seeing the interfaces updated to reflect the new lightbox-styled dialogs, add quickfilters used in the way that MT4 was using them, that sort of thing. But there were also some other changes that were made as well.

Read "Celebrating Four Years of MT-Notifier" »

With Halloween approaching, the most difficult of tasks was upon us - deciding what (and if) we would do in regards to a haunted house. The first problem is that admission fees have risen rather steeply in recent years, and the second is that our kids are at an age where they just might be ready to check some out. We've been to some local places where they might be able to deal with the goings-on, but we've also been to some where they most certainly couldn't. So it's a bit iffy.

Ultimately we decided that we'd try out the Nightmare on Independence. We did this for a few reasons. One, because it's close - just a few minutes away. Though there are other places that aren't too far, at least this one is close and we don't have to worry about driving a ways and paying a lot as well. Two, because there just aren't that many other options these days. Some open later and are a bit much, while others (the Jaycees house) seems to have closed entirely. Third, it seems that the Nightmare is on its last go-round, since a Wal-Mart will be opening in that space soon. So we went for it.

Read "Nightmare on Independence" »

Though the vast majority of installations I work with use LAMP (Linux, Apache, MySQL, Perl) to run Movable Type, there are also a few where my client would like to place Windows in that equation. While it's a possibility to run Apache on Windows, Internet Information Server (IIS) has shipped with Windows Servers just about forever, and it's quite possible to get Movable Type up and running without Apache. I guess you might like to call this a WIMP (Windows, IIS, MySQL, Perl) installation, which fits in nicely with the old Windows, Icon, Mice, Pointers joke from years back. But I digress.

First, of course, you need Windows and IIS. Unfortunately, configuring those two is going quite beyond the scope of this article. Luckily, doing so is not particularly difficult. You'll also need, at a minimum, MySQL and Perl. If you want to use dynamic publishing, you'll also need PHP - but I'm not going to cover that here. Maybe next time. Ready? Let's go!

Read "Install Movable Type Under Windows (IIS)" »

In the Cell Phones on Planes episodes of Mythbusters, it was shown both that cell phones could cause interference (in the homemade cockpit) and that cell phones probably would not cause interference (in a real cockpit that's probably more like real planes in use today). Of course, any one who travels today knows that whether there is any validity to the argument or not, you aren't supposed to have your phone on (on "phone" mode) while the plane is in the air.

Naturally, most of us also know that there are probably dozens of phones left on during any flight, either on purpose or out of forgetfulness, and generally there isn't any problem. So I for one would probably side with the Mythbusters in this regard. But that has to do with planes. What about in other locations? Do cell phones really cause interference to the point that it could be detrimental to our health, or even dangerous to the surroundings?

Read "Dial C for Cell Phone Interference" »

Just a bit over seven months ago, TiVo announced that they were making the Amazon Unbox service available to everyone. Well, perhaps not users of Series 3 boxes, but they are already out in the cold for so many reasons that it didn't really matter. What seemed interesting was that this meant that you could actually download content from Amazon straight into your living room. It's an interesting model, and one that bears looking at.

I have to say that even though I'm a fan of online purchases - I regularly buy things online - the online delivery of video isn't really something that I've been a fan of, and the problems that came along with the Unbox service (not being able to transfer content elsewhere, etc) made it seem all the worse. Perhaps being able to use it on the TiVo would make those issues go away. As it turns out, that's not really the case.

Read "Is Amazon Unbox on TiVo Worth the Effort?" »

With their bye week out of the way, the Carolina Panthers are going to have to make some decisions. The most obvious, of course, is whether they are going to start hot hand Vinny Testaverde, coming off his win in Arizona just over a week ago, or if they are going to go with David Carr. But that might just be the easy choice to make. They also have to be concerned about their linebacker decision - do they go with often-injured Dan Morgan, who may be back on the field or increasingly productive rookie Jon Beason?

To make matters even more interesting, that's still not it - the item I've been aching for - nay hoping for - for a long time just has to come due. Please, let it come due. DeShaun Foster appears to have returned to his fumbling ways, and I hate it for the guy. He has had some great runs. I wish him the best, and I'm sure he has some good work left in him. But at the end of the Cardinals game it became obvious that Foster isn't working - or at least, the way that he's being used isn't working. Before it's too late, they need to make the decision on whether to continue the exercise in futility with Foster or jump to the future with DeAngelo Williams.

Read "The Carolina Panthers Have Some Decisions to Make" »

The news outlets have been abuzz recently with word that racing magnate Bruton Smith wants to build a drag strip at the Lowes Motor Speedway complex in Concord. This alone should hardly be newsworthy - Smith generally does what he wants and gets away with it. After all, his mammoth track is certainly one of the generators of income in the region, and has been so for a while.

However, with Concord Mills right up the road being the number one tourist destination in the state (how about that?), he only has so much bargaining power. While the speedway used to be the only thing at that exit of the freeway, there are now hotels galore - including a full-service Embassy Suites and apparent plans to open a Great Wolf Lodge, restaurants and any number of things. The track just isn't what it one was. So when he makes a move, does it matter like it once did?

Read "Is Bruton Smith a Bully or a Genius?" »

The date with destiny is fast approaching as the early November classic comes closer with each week. In slightly less than two weeks, the game that everyone was anticipating will happen when the Independence Patriots and Butler Bulldogs meet to determine the city supremacy for the year. Of course, they will perhaps meet in the playoffs as well, so it probably doesn't mean much more than bragging rights - but when the season started, it seemed as if the game held all sorts of possibilities, with the Bulldogs having the chance to unseat the Patriots from their throne, and end the streak.

Naturally, now that the Patriots have lost that streak and started another, does The Game really mean anything? Unfortunately, with Butler having lost not only to West Charlotte but to East Mecklenburg as well, perhaps it won't be what most were predicting. How about the rest of the season? It seems like business as usual.

Read "Independence Cruises, Butler Slowing" »

By now, there's a reasonable chance that if you've wanted to upgrade to the latest release of Movable Type, you've done so. But you may still be waiting. Perhaps you're hoping that your favorite plugin will be updated (there are still a few that haven't been released for MT4). Or maybe you've run into a problem that you can't seem to overcome.

One of the issues that I run into fairly regularly is for people who use the MTCommentFields tag. This tag, originally released in version 3.0D - way back in 2004, for those of you keeping track - was designed so that you wouldn't have to keep up with your comment form. Unfortunately, people like to keep up with their comment form, to move it around, change some wording, add features or just tinker. So it rapidly fell out of favor, and in MT4, it's gone completely.

If you're still using it and you want to upgrade, you'll see a message that reads The MTCommentFields tag is no longer available; please include the Comment Form template module instead. You will be able to rebuild your templates, but you won't be able to accept any new ones.

And naturally, if you're upgrading, you won't have this module to make that happen. To make matters worse, if you're a user of certain versions, even if you try and get rid of the tag, you might still have problems. What do you do? Luckily, it's an easy fix.

Read "Upgrading to Movable Type 4 with MTCommentFields" »