To Whom It May Concern...

It's been a crazy month. Starting a new job, Aux. Pioneering, lot's of activities. It's had it's ups and downs, but it was good. Today was a nice touch. On the way to work I saw a pretty nice rainbow. It wasn't the entire rainbow, but both ends. (The top was missing.) I also did some work on my system to fix a problem I was having with my RAM. I couldn't use both chips of my Dual Channel OCZ RAM. I also couldn't tweak the BIOS settings for RAM because the motherboard was very limited. I got a new ASUS board which booted right up with both sticks of RAM. Later though, I got the same Windows Stop errors. But I was able to go into the BIOS and tweak the settings for latency and such, getting it to work with no errors. However, I'm also trying to use my system less. I'm wrapping up my projects for my old boss. I'll eventually end up with this box as a media box, feeding a Hauppage set-top unit. So, getting closer to our Wyoming trip. What's new i...

Spiderman on Broadway!!! By U2!!!

Try this with just a numeric keypad. http://www.cnn.com/2007/TECH/ptech/04/22/top.texter.ap/index.html

Go to: http://maps.google.com Click on the directions tab. Enter 'New York' to 'London' and search Look at step 23.

We don't know everything, but everybody knows something. How can you glean the answers to your questions from the internet. Google.com is a great tool, but sometimes, instead of a back-hoe you only need a spade. So, to search for .Net stuff, try this: http://www.searchdotnet.com/ . This is a focused search for your .Net answers. I've also heard some things about Singletons at my new job. What is a Singleton? One of the links that popped up on searchDotNet.com was this link: http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms954629.aspx . Interesting...

We had 136 with 1 partaker on April 2nd. Our bible studies came, so that was nice. Okay, the new job. I like it. I have to get acclimated to the new type of work environment, but as for technical skill, I'm not as far behind as I was afraid I would be. I still have a lot to learn, and it's a big project, but it's VB .Net 1.1. So I don't have to get used to a new language right now. I'll try to find topics I can talk about but for now, just getting used to the routine and such. All else is well.

I'm on a roll with this PHP and mySQL stuff. Here's an updated book site: http://mark.phillk.net/sellBooksByAuth.php?ID=1 Notice that I'm passing an ID in. I have an authors table and a books table. Thus, in the future, I can have pages for other authors. I also created a PHP page to enter the data. I can drop in the Amazon ASIN number with the other info and automatically have a link to purchase the book. It's Amazoning what you can do...

Why would a Microsoft guy say that? Well, because they do!!! I created a demo database so that I could flex my muscles with PHP while searching for a job. (More on that to come.) You can check out my samples page here: http://www.greatwhitedata.com/samples.php I got to thinking, when I wanted to add a joke to my site, why create a page for every joke? So, I created a database for my site with tables for jokes. Take a look at the results here: http://mark.phillk.net/funnyKeys.php I even create a PHP form for adding jokes in. It uses Key words to sort. It's not as intuitive as .Net, but it works, and it's free. New Job Ok, now to my new job. Computer Aid . I decided that I needed to broaden my horizons, get out of my basement, and get something that paid enough so that I wouldn't have to work 2 jobs. (7 DAYS A WEEK! YEESH!) I can't give out details of my job assignment, but this is a consulting firm, so they have multiple projects for multiple clients. I will probably be ...

First you must watch this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=leEsz9ci5XE Then the slightly less funny: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W3KponfM52A&mode=related&search=

In a world where messages can travel at the speed of light in many different forms (e-mail, voice, even video) it's nice to see somebody wasting time using technology to advance the age-old methods... Pigeons! In other news, can anybody help with this Channel9 post ?

I have a page put together now that shows some of the work I've done: http://www.greatwhitedata.com/samples.php

Ok... what have I been up to lately? I've been working on DataMatch, adding an e-mail server to my linux box, and my very own PVR. Let's start with that. Joel Gott offered a while ago on his blog an article for a 'Poor Man's Tivo'. Well... I got to thinking, and looking... and found this: http://www.byopvr.com/Sections+index-req-viewarticle-artid-10-page-1.html This entails using your own computer at the desk, and networking/streaming the signal to a Hauppauge MediaMVP. I spent $45 on an Avermedia 150 Plus, which has coaxial input for cable and one for FM. Most important, it has an on-board MPEG2 encoder. This saves your PC horsepower. I can work while it records. (Not that there is much to record during the day when I work.) The only problem I've run into is the hard drive. I have 120Gb SATA, but failed to set it up as RAID. So, as it get's filled, it gets slow... very slow. (Plus, I run SQL server and Visual Studio on this box, and they hog RAM.) The mothe...

Why didn't I know about this sooner? Homemade Knight Rider K.I.T.T car... In other news... I'm ramping up development... doing both DataMatch, our Windows Forms app, and the site, which will be tied into DataMatch. Web Services, Data Access, it's getting messy. I'm up to my waste in code. My computer is still running at half power for RAM. I've had a few suggestions for tuning it up, but haven't had the time to work on it. I've started working Saturday nights, from 11PM to 7AM, cleaning. Boy do I come home tired. With service and sleeping all day Saturday, and Sleeping and Meeting on Sunday, the weekends are pretty much blown. Oh well.

Here are Tommy's videos from Indonesia. http://www.youtube.com/user/indonesiatom His 50 memories one is pretty cool. Edit: Speaking of videos, check this out. http://eepybird.com/exp214.html (Completely different matter.)

It's Official! My nephew has arrived! Just wanted to let you know, Isaac Harris Shrom (7 lbs. 15 oz.) Born 6PM (eastern time approx.) January 17, 2007 To Clint & Beth Shrom

You may have heard about the documentary, Knocking. Here is a trailer for it. It's about 8 minutes long. If you want to know more about the video, look here .

I won't go into all the details here. I will point out, using MsgBox() overloads do not come close to all the flexibility of MessageBox.Show() overloads. You can do some searching on your own, but hopefull this reminder will help others. I googled for a while down the wrong path, before I had to ask for help.

When I revamped my blog here, I forgot to include the counter for it! No wonder my numbers dropped to zero. I know I have many eager fans/listeners/readers. In programming news, work continues on the Canon SDK at the Canon Yahoo! group. http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/CanonSDK/ DataMatch is getting a major look overhaul, and some basic functionality enhancements. We're not throwing a lot of NEW features in just yet. Just getting a bunch of little glitches running better.

If you're a .Net developer, it would be good to review this article . Yes, it's been a while since I posted mainly programming info, but I am trying to get back into it. I've been reading a lot of tech stuff, and will be adding some of it here.

Ever get stranded in an unfamiliar location? We did!!! Let's see, where to start. 2 weekends ago, December 9 th and 10 th , I spent working on my work system, trying to re-install Windows XP Pro. Why? I get weird STOP errors when I go through my registry and other things. I tried to do it without wiping my drive, but couldn't until I removed one of my 512Mb chips of RAM. This past weekend, 16 th and 17 th , Steph and I drove to CT for my sister's graduation party. All went well (other than the fuse blowing at the hotel room) once we got there. We were going to head up Friday, but a surprise late bill canceled that. (Our water bill should come to us, not the landlord, then it won't surprise us!) It was on the way home we had trouble. We were doing fine, crossed the PA border and took the first exit to grab a bite to eat. Got back on the highway, accelerating to cruising speed, and we hear a big BANG! I pull over thinking a tire blew or something... nope, all looks we...