Personal
QuickTime – Error 47: Invalid URL. ()
My hard drive crashed on my workstation at the office about two weeks ago, so I took the opportunity to upgrade to Windows 7. Most everything seems to be working well but QuickTime has some networking issues — it appears that it cannot make any HTTP connections. For example it cannot load the “Content Guide” when you launch the standalone player — it just says “Loading…” at the bottom.
Oh, the irony
A while back I was driving to work and passed the University of Arkansas at Little Rock campus. Outside was a large electronic billboard flashing different notices for students and faculty. As I approached the board, I saw a large image of a cigarette with a circle/slash appearing over it, followed by these words:
UALR campus is smoke free as of Aug. 16!
Then, a few seconds later, the very next message appeared:
Art of the Peyote Religion and the Native American Church
Hmm … cigarettes = bad but peyote = good?
iTunes Music Store customer service ROCKS!
Some may complain about the way Apple does things, but I recently had an experience with iTunes Music Store (iTMS) customer support that was incredible. I have to say that I’m even more of a fan boy of the iTMS than I was before.
Surely the best of moms
I’m gonna miss you, mom.
HOWTO: Upgrade Ubuntu LTS 8.04 server to PHP 5.2.8
I recently had to upgrade an Ubuntu server to the latest version of PHP (at the time, 5.2.8) … the problem was the server was running Ubuntu 8.04 and the latest version of PHP available through the normal update channels is 5.2.4. The server is running 8.04 because that is the “long term support” version of Ubuntu.
Thanks to Tom Liu and launchpad.net, there is a binary build of PHP 5.2.8 for this version of Ubuntu. I know that real Linux studs would just compile their own, but I didn’t want to go through the build and fail, build and fail process and needed a quick fix. Here are the steps I followed to update my Hardy Heron to PHP 5.2.8.
Breathtaking promo video
A promotional video was just released by thisisnext.org for their upcoming conference and it is beautiful. Go watch it and be moved.
Kids say (or e-mail) the funniest things
Penny has a niece that has started writing her e-mail. Her niece is seven or eight years old and is very precocious. She is kind of quiet but once she gets to know you, she is a real hoot and says the funniest things. Her latest e-mail went something like this:
I e-mail you. You e-mail me. It all works together.
–Emma
Oh, so THAT’s how it works! Maybe you just have to know her, but this just cracks me up.
Matt Mullenweg in Generation Kill?
I’ve been watching an HBO mini-series called Generation Kill. It’s a grim and gritty look at Marine forces that were involved in the second Iraq war. It is extremely well written and the actors seem to be authentic. But did anyone else realize that one Matt Mullenweg (the mastermind behind WordPress) is apparently moonlighting as Lt. Nate Fick? Inquiring minds want to know …
(It is actually Stark Sands that plays Lt. Nate Fick, but c’mon, you can see the resemblance, right?)
