Pauls Rants and Revelations

Since I created the ASP Tag Cloud function, a get a few emails a month asking questions about it. Most of the time its folks starting out wondering how to implement it, or some other developers wondering why I used this method instead of others available, and so on.

I usually help out those who ask  for help (hey, we are a community after all) and generally everything is rather nifty. However, one person, Scott, emailed me one day asking about limiting the results to only popular tags and as usual I replied with my ideas on how to do it.

He replied back thanking me and told me the sites he uses it on. I was rather taken aback when he told me that it was he podcasting sites for the US Geological Survey (http://usgs.gov/corecast and http://usgs.gov/corefacts) and that he was creating another image gallery site that also uses my tag cloud function.

And, to those who know me; yes, I patted myself on the back a bit at this news.

Now some people would say “Big deal, my shit’s seen by millions of people every day”. To those blokes, I say “Fecalphelia is a curable disease so seek help”.

For me, though, in my little corner of the internet, I’m quite please to know that someone else uses my code in a useful way on a popular site instead of just cataloging the various tags used on adult sites (yes, I get emailed about this and no, I will not post links to them). The sites its used on are pretty sweet since I visit them on a somewhat irregular basis (hey, I’m no geologist now) and it does make it far easier to find popular articles. Check them out when you get a sec.

Thanks to Scott for letting me know how he uses the function. If you use the function let me know. If you have questions about it it also let me know by comment or email.

-Cheers

P.S. - To all those that tell me that its wrong to steal the bubble sort function, I will email the person in the next cubicle and tell them to hold you head in the toilet until the bubbles stop. I gave credit to them. Please read the code instead of blindly copy/pasting. - Thanks, Paul

So its been like 6 weeks since I made  an entry and I must say I am disappointed in myself. Partly because I cant seem to get a sec to jot something down, but mostly because twitter is so much easier and I can do it from anywhere.

OK, technically, since I got my iPhone, I could blog from anywhere as well, but Twitter is just easier all aroung (hence why I added my Twitter feed to the site).

Anyways, things are starting to calm down somewhat. Its mostly been work and dealing with summer and since schools out that means I have both the kiddies with me all day. Its hard coming up with new things to do. Theres only so many times we can go to the zoo, the park, the fountain, strip clubs, etc. I mean, it gets dull sometimes. If anyone has suggestion please leave a comment.

In other news, my wife and I are going down to Eugene to see the Olympic trials for track and field. Since she works and Nike she got premo tickets and accomodations. The funny thing is that there is a very long list of rules that are going to be enforced; such as specific size of allowed fluid container (no more than 1.5 liters) and bags only so large and clothing requirements and a whole lot more. Its weird but I guess theres a valid reason for it. What it is I have no idea, but there has to be a reason, right?

Anyways, I’m trying to post more so hopefully I can make money again from this thing. That, and provide an outlet for me to rant about whatever I want. Or post sizzling pictures of my favorite female celebs. Or videos of kittens. Whatever.

-Cheers

OK. Its been a while (a month to be precise) but I have been busy with work and family stuff. So tough.

Its also, in about 15 hours, my birthday (hooray!). Since we have limited time we have to split up the fun into two days. Today we did presents (my son was extremely excited to give me a Lego fire truck) and we are doing cake tonight. Tomorrow my wife and I are going out for dinner (on my actual b-day) so a swanky place (sweet).

Other than that I am trying to finish some projects before my yearly review. It doesn’t help to have a bunch of late items when going for more money/benefits/company jet, so hopefully I can finish them in short order.

Also, paulsrants.com is going to be up soon. And soon as in actually soon, not soon as in the Urban Dictionary definition.

-Cheers

Today is my sons birthday. It seems only yesterday that he sloshed out of moms womb and now he is six years old. Where does the time go?

And since this is such a huge deal, I decided that it is time to get him a skateboard. I mean a real one; not the tiny play one like at Target. This is an official World Industries board with a nifty flame boy decal on it. He was totally excited about it and started riding around in the house. Now we just have to wait for a non-rainy day and off to the park we go.

We also got him a huge lego set that we spent the entire next day putting together (which his cousin destroyed the next day; bummer) and games galore. Board games, mind, not video games.

He was really stoked with everything including the black-light pirate themed mini-golf we did in Portland, which was a bit of a trip actually. We also had a pirate ship chocolate cake. It was just coincidence that it worked out that way since I ordered the cake and my wife  set up the mini-golf.

Everything considered, it was a really good birthday and my little dude was quite happy with everything.

-Cheers

So I am finally moving this wonderful little distraction onto its own domain now. In the next few days paulsrants.com will be the new home for this blog.  You can update if you feel like it.

-Cheers

If anyone has read The Mist by Stephen King, then they could see how interesting this could be as a movie.

The premise is that a scattered group of townsfolk are trapped in a super market when a mysterious mist (hence the name) rolls in and brings with it some, well, unfriendly things.

I wont spoil it for you (although the trailer does a good job of it for me) but it does remind me of time when a buddy of mine and I were heading through a somewhat dangerous part of L.A. when we got cornered by a group of gangsters. This ‘friend’, as I refer to him in type now, unceremoniously pushes me forward toward the group, vaults the wall we were against, and disappears into the alley. I was seriously standing their with a classic ‘what the fuck’ expression at the behavior of my friend; enough so that the gangsters were even saying “Man, thats fucked up.”

Turned out that they were only playing, and let me use a phone to call a real friend to come and get me. It was an hour before she showed up but my and my new gangster friends passes the time by playing Super Punch Out on the SNES (at which I sucked at).

OK. Enough reminising. If you are interested in it, I would suggest reading the book first as the book is always better then the movie. But if you just like movies (or cant read, which if you cant then why are you reading this post?) then by all means just see the flick. Either way you won’t regret it. Until, that is, you go to sleep that night, anyways

-Cheers

So it happened that I was in the Apple store in Bridgeport Village when they were rolling out the latest and greatest version of Apples new OS. I was there to help out a friend but I was quite taken with Leopard once I got to playing with it.

For instance, the Time Machine is nothing short of spectacular. You can save a file, make changes to it, and still recover an original version that is weeks old at the click of a button. Also, the nifty scrolling features in the Finder and the fact you can preview files without actually opening them is really impressive. Also, from what my boss said, it takes full advantage of the Intel chips power so everything is just plain faster.

I haven’t gotten my copy yet but am planning on obtaining it (leagally, mind you) soon. I almost had one of the Apple store blokes convinced to give me one off the shelf for free but it didn’t pan out (bummer).

Despite the fact that everyone is toting this is as the great OS to date, there are still some that are having problems. Reports of BSODs on the Apple support forums got me worried a bit, but the fix was as simpel as booting to DVD and selecting “Archive and Update”.

If you have any great stories (either good or bad) leave a comment. Once I get my copy Ill let you know how it goes.

-Cheers

Well, what can I say about this weekends festivities? Only that they were a lot of fun and am really sore from it all.

For those of you without dirty minds, I was at an archery festival in Vulcanfelt (Union Gap, WA) and was shooting archery all weekend. Aside from the fun and games I got burned in the day and smashed at night (I blame the fellow who brought the rum). As for the competitions go, I got second place in the Clout shoot which is shooting at a stick 180 yards away, sucked at the royal round, and did an abysmal job in the York. But at least I had a great time doing it.

And now, Monday has come again and it is back to the grind.  But at least now I get to use a pimped out new Macbook Pro.

-Cheers

Yes friends and enemies, I have myself a brand new top-o-the-line Mac Book Pro, courtesy of my super fabulous boss and super-rific boss’s boss.

Its a strange feeling though. It took about 5 minutes to set up everything and I was off and running soon after installing apps (Firefox is a must as well as Skype and Paralells) and the whole while I am thinking “this is so easy and it works”. I am even still amazed since I got it home and started copying over info (ok, its mostly music) as I can still do tasks like write posts and not have any problems. No slow downs or lag (sweet).

Im still getting used to all of the new functions and such but its becoming easier the more I use it. Ill post pictures of my new uber mac as soon as I find the USB cable to my camera (not the built in one, my camera camera).

Oh, and to those people who contributed funds to the “get Paul a Macbook Pro” fund, I will be issuing you a refund soon.

Sorry for the lack of any interesting posts lately but I have been super busy with work and preparing for an event in a few days. I promise that after the event I will post something interesting (possibly me getting shot with an arrow, but who knows).

In the mean time, here is some fun stories to keep you distracted.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/odds/bofh/

-Cheers