This is my first post via the new PolarBlog POP3 email interface. If this is working as it should, this is the body portion of the post. This is largely just a test message, but also represents a significant achievement on the progress of the Homing Pigeon release. This posting should posted by "Kevin", be titled "Posting via Email" and be located under the "Software Development" topic. There should now be a read more link. …more
When I originally created PolarBlog, one of the features from Personal Weblog (PWL) that was dropped was PostgreSQL support. This was largely because I'd never worked with it and didn't have access to a PostgreSQL database. (Actually I still don't.)
Recently I was contacted by an individual who had some very nice things to say about PolarBlog and expressed an interest helping to port it to PostgreSQL. Very cool I thought. We've only had a couple of preliminary discussions about it, but this has definately become something I would like to do. Thus to support this fully I will need access to a server with a PostgreSQL database. Arrangements for that are already in the works and more details about how that is going to happen will be forthcoming. (November 21, 2005 - See this entry for more info.)
So why am I doing this? It's going to be a lot of work obviously, so why bother. In short, the challenge. I've never worked with PostgreSQL although I've heard very good things about it. This is also a very good opportunity for me to learn something of potential value for not just this project, but for my professional life.
I likely will not be concentrating on this until sometime early next year. There are a number of things I need to deal with before I can realistically take this on. First off I will be getting the PolarBlog "Homing Pigeon" out the door. This release is roughly 90-95% complete. The core functionality is nearly done, but then I have some CSS issues I need to clean up and then another security audit to possibly address some potential issues. And then there is the alway fun updating of the documentation. It's a drag, but it's what makes my projects friendly and easy to use in my opinion. My goal right now is to provide current users with a Christmas present by getting this out by the end of the year.
So what do you get when take an avid beer drinker, give him a camera phone and a blog? You get a pictorial log of marginal pictures of beers he has drank recently! Coming soon as they say.
December 16, 2005
So after much trial and tribulation, my DSL service FINALLY went on. They had told us December 9th, but it wasn't live when I tried it then. Mary Lou called them a couple of days ago and they told her sometime before December 27th…a date they referenced in an email from the DSL group even though the web and phone check system still said the 9th. Anyhow, I worked all night on Wednesday which allowed me to work from home on Thursday afternoon. Before dialing up a connection I popped the phone line into the DSL and was happily greeted with a blinking "DSL" light. I did what I call my "DSL Happy Dance" (it's not a pretty thing folks), ran the installation routine that sets up the account and I was good to go. Goodbye crappy dialup service from LocalNet and their bad DNS issue and constant disconnects!
—
I've suffered through a return to dial-up Internet access for the past several years. I've now gotten the ball rolling on switching back to a high speed connection -or have I…
Several years ago I had a high speed Internet via my cable operator. But due to one of my many unemployment incidents I got rid of it to save some money. Then a couple of years after that I cut my cable service to just the local broadcast channels for the same reason. As a sidebar, I have to say we really don't miss it that much and at $7.00 a month it's hard to not be happy with the decision.
Anyhow, my life has finally rebounded to the point that I'm gainfully employed and I started on convincing my wife of how nice it would be to have a high speed connection again. She reluctantly agreed. But because we've cut our cable service to the minimum we can no longer get a cable ISP connection without upgrading to the standard service again. I don't have the need or desire to return to a $80-$100 a month cable bill so the answer was easy: DSL.
Verizon offers DSL in my area and I know others around my neighborhood have it. Thus it was a viable option. I'm not currently a Verizon customer so in order to get DSL I had to also our switch phone service over. With the cost of my current phone service and dial-up access it's only going to be about $20 a month more. So the call was made, the switch was on…
For about 2-1/2 weeks that is! The cut-over date came and went and nothing happened. Calling Verizon revealed that our order had been cancelled. Why? Blah, blah, blah. In short they blamed my current provider for not releasing the line. This proved to not be true. (I guess I should also note that they lost our initial order right after it was entered because the rep didn't save it. He had to call back and reenter it again.) Thus the order was reentered (again) and I awaited my new cut-over date. The catch here was that they wouldn't send out the DSL package until we were ported over and they could verify DSL availability. So the second cut-over date came and went without anything happening (again).
Once again the order was cancelled! As it turns out they had been enter the wrong code on the order! I guess at this point I should also note the phone service is in my wife's name and she's the one that's been doing the leg work. Me? I've been doing the whining and complaining at home! ;) So being the shrewd businessperson that she is, she spoke to a supervisor and squeezed them for a free month's service and a waived "installation charge". This is on top of the initial discounts and what not she had gotten out of them the first time. So now we are (hopefully) entered into the system and should be switched within the next 10 days. Color me skeptical…
It just amazes me how hard companies will work to NOT take your money. Hello? If I had another option I would pursue it, but I don't. Thus I still hold out hope that this will come to pass and I shall be surfing the Internets with appropriate response times!