Thursday, December 25, 2008

Its Christmas in Texas


Well, it's Christmas time again and I found the PERFECT song for the holidays. Here is a video of Christmas in Houston... enjoy and Happy HO HO HO!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fhei5sUY3I4



Respectfully,
twitter @dkirkland

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Friday, December 5, 2008

Budget


It has been about a month since I posted on my quest for financial freedom and about two months since I started my budget... I have to say it is going better then I expected.  I have been able to pay off 2 credit cards (low balances) and move those payments to the next highest one on the list.  I have also started treating the money I need to pay property taxes as a revolving monthly payment due and putting in my savings account.  I see no reason not to make a little interest off money I have to pay the government.  I am still working on my Emergency Fund... This seems to be the hardest to get started.  I think once I pay off a couple more cards it will be easier to contribute.  
With Holidays coming so soon after my  decision to become fiscally responsible, I am glad to report that with the help of my every loving and infinitely patient wife we have agreed to not over spend and adjusted our Christmas list accordingly.  This means only spending on the kid, niece and nephew this year (sorry Grandpa) and asking that the family not spend anything on me. By this time next year I expect that I will have a tidy little sum in place for gift giving.  Yes, it is marked as a revolving monthly payment (% of yearly take home divided by 12) in my budget to be activated after my Emergency Fund gets to a certain balance.  Wish me luck... I will need it.
By the way for whatever reason I did not include a link to a page that I found most helpful in starting my budget it is The Financial Page Created and maintained by Keith Rawlinson. Please, if you have a few minutes, stop by his site it will be well worth your time. It has saved me several hundred dollars already!

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Friday, November 21, 2008

Replacing Notepad.exe with Notepad2.exe


I do not like notepad.exe... It will not behave the way I think it should so I replaced it with something better: Notepad2.exe
Hare are some of the features:
  - Syntax highlighting: HTML, XML, PHP, ASP (JS, VBS), CSS,
JavaScript, VBScript, C/C++, C#, Resource Script, Makefiles, Java,
Visual Basic, Pascal, Assembly, SQL, Perl, Python, Configuration
Files, Apache Config Files, Batch Files, Diff Files
- Drag & drop text editing inside and outside Notepad2
- Basic regular expression search and replace
- Useful word, line and block editing shortcuts
- Rectangular selection (Alt+Mouse)
- Brace matching, auto indent, long line marker, zoom functions
- Support for Unicode, UTF-8, Unix and Mac text files
- Open shell links
- Mostly adjustable
Below is a batch file I found to help speed things up (Wish I could remember where I found it to give credit) in replacing notepad.  You will notice that notepad2 has been renamed and is in the folder c:\notepad.  Also you will need to un-hide all system files. 
To install just copy the batch file below into a txt file and name it whatever.bat and run it.  That's it. Have fun.

@echo off
echo ****You must have Notepad2.exe in c:\notepad and named notepad.exe****
pause
copy /y %WinDir%\System32\dllcache\notepad.exe %WinDir%\System32\dllcache\notepad.exe.orig
copy /y %WinDir%\ServicePackFiles\i386\notepad.exe %WinDir%\ServicePackFiles\i386\notepad.exe.orig
copy /y %WinDir%\System32\notepad.exe %WinDir%\System32\notepad.exe.orig
copy /y %WinDir%\notepad.exe %WinDir%\notepad.exe.orig
copy /y C:\notepad\notepad.exe %WinDir%\System32\dllcache
copy /y C:\notepad\notepad.exe %WinDir%\ServicePackFiles\i386
copy /y C:\notepad\notepad.exe %WinDir%\System32
copy /y C:\notepad\notepad.exe %WinDir%
echo.
echo.
echo Write down the locations after the REG_MULTI_SZ or REG_SZ in case the batch file does not work.  If it does not work, you will need to look in the locations from below to find other copies of notepad.exe that are possibly being used to restore the original notepad.exe
echo.
reg query HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Setup /v "Installation Sources"
reg query HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Setup /v ServicePackSourcePath
reg query HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Setup /v SourcePath

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Thursday, November 20, 2008

Ok, I have had it with IIS... Time to install Apache!


I was reluctant to install Apache because I always thought that it would be too hard.  Lot's of fiddly things to install, mucking about with a bunch of text files... the list went on and on, but as it turns out, I was wrong.  Just go to http://httpd.apache.org/  grab apache_2.2.10-win32-x86-openssl-0.9.8i.msi (at the time of this writing) and run the msi file.  The only change I made was to install everything and point the installer to something like x:\apache  (x being any drive you choose) for easy webroot access. 

This install will do everything! Unlike the PHP installer Apache will work as soon as the installer is finished.  Now the fiddly part that I was afraid of: Getting PHP and MySQL to play nice with it...
Add these three lines to your httpd.conf:
LoadModule php5_module "x:/php5/php5apache2_2.dll"
AddType application/x-httpd-php .php
AddType application/x-httpd-php-source .phps
Do a search for DirectoryIndex and make it look like this: DirectoryIndex index.php index.html
That's it! You are done.

Ohh almost forgot if you have set anything to the Inetpub\wwwroot folder in the php.ini file (like upload_tmp_dir or session.save_path), you will need to change it to reflect your new webroot folder:x:\Apache\htdocs

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Wednesday, November 19, 2008

PHP+MySQL+IIS Install


Here are the steps that I took to get PHP and MySQL on IIS:

Software Needed:

  • IIS: Installed on all Windows Servers and can be added to XP Pro via the Control Panel -> Add/Remove Programs -> Add Windows Components.
  • PHP: Can be downloaded from http://www.php.net/ (Be cure to get the Windows Binaries Zip Package NOT the installer package)
  • MySQL: Can be downloaded from http://www.mysql.com  Choose the Community Server download. Also grab the GUI-Tools Administrator while you are there.
  • IZArc: If you do not have an unzip tool this one is one of the best

 

PHP Install

Unzip the PHP binaries package (php-5.x.x-Win32.zip) to C:\PHP5 and do the following:

  • Copy php.ini-recommended to C:\windows\ and rename to php.ini.
  • Copy php5ts.dll to C:\windows\System32

 

Let IIS know you have PHP

 You have to tell IIS where PHP is and add the extensions:

  • Open IIS control panel and expand the computer name to reveal "Web Sites" right click to properties.
  • Click on the Home Directories tab and look for and click on the Configuration button
  • On the Mappings tab click Add button, browse to C:\php5 and select php5isapi.dll.  Then type .PHP in the extension field (Yes, type the period first)
  • Next go to the Documents tab and add index.php as a new document and move it up to the top of the list.
  • Add C:\PHP5 to your system Path
    • In a cmd windows type PATH C:\PHP5; %PATH%

 

Testing PHP
  • Go to your webroot folder (C:\Insetpub\wwwroot) and copy the following into a newly created text file phpinfo.php:

<?PHP phpinfo(); ?>

  • Open a web browser and point it to http://localhost/phpinfo.php You should see the PHP information page.  It contains all config variables that are loaded from the php.ini file.  If you see this page, PHP is installed and configured.

 

MySQL Install

Unzip the MySQL file that you downloaded earlier and runSetup.exe

  • Choose Compete Install and click NEXT till starts to copy files
  • Choose Configure the MySQL Server now
  • Pick Detailed Configuration
  • Select Server Machine
  • Choose Multifunctional Database
  • Leave the Default settings for InnoDB Tablespace
  • Pick Online Transaction Processing
  • Leave the networking options at the default settings
  • Choose Standard character set
  • Check Install as a service and include in to Path
  • Modify Security settings and choose a new root password
  • Click Execute to begin the configuration process
  • Press Finnish

 

Add a user to test with:

Open the SQL Administrator CommandLine and type the next commands (hit enter after each line)

CREATE USER 'test'@'localhost'IDENTIFIED BY 'test';

FLUSH PRIVILEGES;

This will create a user called testwith a password of test

 

Bringing It All Together

Now we have to let PHP know thatMySQL has been install:

 Open the php.ini file (Start ->Run -> php.ini) and either uncomment or add the following:

 extension=php_mbstring.dll

extension=php_mysql.dll

extension=php_mysqli.dll

 Save the php.ini file and restartIIS

 

 Testing PHP & MySQL Together

 Type the following in a text file and name it test.php

 <?php

// Let's connect and select adatabase

$link = mysql_connect('localhost','test', 'test')

 or die('Couldn't connect to the MySQL Server:' . mysql_error());

mysql_select_db('mysql') ordie('Couldn't Select the Database.<br><br>

The error returned by MySQL says:<br>' . mysql_error());

// See Ya!

mysql_close($link);

?>

 

This page will comeback with the errors:

 Couldn't Select the Database.
The error returned by MySQL says:
Access denied for user 'test'@'localhost' to database 'mysql'

 This was just to see if PHP could see the MySQL Server.  If you see this error it is install andworking. 

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Friday, November 14, 2008

New Test Site


I have a new test site up for students @ work...
http://students.mumford.k12.tx.us
As you can tell it is still very much a beta site so be gentle with it. :)  Off to start my Weekend!

More later...

Posted by email from Musings, Ramblings and Other Assorted Rubbish (posterous)

Thursday, November 13, 2008

Websites


I have been in a frenzy the past couple of weeks looking atdifferent web templates for a site that I am thinking about.  As aTechnology Director of a small school it is hard to find quality technologyresources that I can afford and when none exist, I have to coble somethingtogether.  There are several good sitetemplates out there, but I have focused on just two.. Joomla! andWordpress.  Below is what I have found...

 

Rating:

Joomla - for the shininess of it..NOT the install

Wordpress - because it just works.

Joomla!:  This is one of the newer finds that was mentioned to me by afellow Tech Director and was eager to try it out.  The installation was for the most partpainless, if you are accustomed to white-hot pokers being stabbed in your eye(or else where) repeatedly.  Yes, theyhave a web based install method that looks very good.  It will walk you through setting up your siteand associating it with a database.  Thatpart is easy.  Where you start to run into trouble is when you complete all the steps and hit the final Finishbutton.  There is a very small message atthe bottom of the page that tells you that setup could not write to theconfiguration.php file while at the very top in large red letter it is tellingyou to completely remove the installation folder.  

 

What appears to be happing is that the Anonymous InternetUser account does not have write access to the file.  Fine I can deal with that, give it writeaccess with IIS and every thing is happy right? Wrong…  You have to go to the web-root folder andgive it the permission from the security tab!.. Think about this.  Is it wise to leave a config file world writable?  IMHO - Nope. Then manually edit the file in atxt editor.  After you do this you canbring up the page.  However, when you login to the Admin interface and try to make more global changes you will not beable to unless you leave the config file world writable.   Ohh,and just incase you have tried to install Joomla and wanted to go to the forumsfor help – forget it.  They will tell youto check to make sure that the config file is in the correct directory and gothrough the set up again.  Or the willmove your post to another forum with out posting a link to where they movedit. 

 

Over all my impression was that the Joomla group is more interestedin eye-candy than making a quality product that works.

 


Wordpress: I have used word press for quite awhile and havebeen very impressed with the install, support forums and easy of use. There area lot of templates available to set your site up almost any way you want.  I know, Wordpress is a blogging suite, but itis not that hard to turn in to a stable and very usable web site.  I had one site that I wanted to work as amobile gateway.  I looked on Wordpressand found an add-on for it.  In 5 minutesI had a site that was accessible to mobile phones. Give it a try, it may surpriseyou.

 

My over all impression was that Wordpress just works.  There are a lot of tweaks that you can do anda lot of templates to use.  If you want ano-hassle web site this is a good way to go.

 

I will be digging out an old web site suite that have usedin the past to give another review soon. It is called Plone and runs on Python and Zope.  I need to configure my web server to make itwok so bear with me.  From what Iremember it is very customizable and fairly easy to use. 

 

More later…

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Tuesday, November 11, 2008

Edge Device


I found a great Open Sourceproduct the other day while looking for a way to monitor me network @ work.. Untangle (UT).  Here were myrequirements:

  • Had to be Open Source (schools have little enough funding)
  • Should have firewall and IDS/IPS components
  • Would be nice to have QOS
  • Must be transparent to my users
  • Must have good/active user forums
  • Must be Easy to maintain


I set UT up as a transparent bridge and stuffed it in between my last switchand router where it can see all traffic going into and out of my network. Itested it for a while in my office before deploying it on my network anddecided that I liked the interface.  It's been up for about a week now andno problems in production.  I will caution you, that is you are going torun it headless, you will need to enable SSH.   I know it may soundgoofy, but it didn't occur to me to do it during my testing because I hadaccess to the console but 10 min. after I put it on the network I needed wanted to access something that was not on the webinterface.   Also with SSH you can modify(with extensive help from the forum) the default install to add among otherthings nTop, a nifty little program to showbandwidth usage and network usage statistics. 

 

Considering I have nothing more than time invested in thismachine, I would say it serves my needs quite well.


More Later...
--
twitter @dkirkland

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Wednesday, August 27, 2008

Blog Has Moved

I have moved this blog to another domain. See ya there! Posts will continue to be updated here as well.

Monday, July 7, 2008

Web Site Additions

I found a couple web site additions I thought were worth telling you about. These are simple enough to use with little or no web design knowledge but are robust enough to satisfy most job demands.

The first is Webpad, read what their site has to say:

webpad is a web-based text editor which gives you access to files from any of the following locations;

  • Your own computer (via file upload)
  • The server that webpad is installed on (via direct file manipulation)
  • Any FTP server (via FTP file operations)
  • Any website (via remote file requests)
  • Popular blogging tools (Blogger.com, MovableType, TypePad, LiveJournal, blosxom, WordPress)
  • Other data sources via a flexible plugin system

It features a simple interface and includes a collection of powerful HTML tools for working with web pages.

webpad is written entirely in PHP (HTML, CSS and JS), and operates in your browser without any need for cumbersome plugins or extra downloads.

This is one of the easiest web editors that I have seen you should check them out if you need an online editor.



Next Podcast Generator, here is what their site has to say about it:
Podcast Generator is a free web based podcast publishing script written in PHP: upload media files (audio-video) via a web form along with episode information and automatically create podcast w3c-compliant feed including iTunes specific tags. It also features a comprehensive web administration.
This is an easy to use solution to distribute podcasts. I simply FTP my audio file to my site and then click one link on the PodGen admin page to updadte my XML page. Then modify the episode information and I'm done.

Monday, June 30, 2008

...I'm a page designer..Who Knew?

Recently I started going to a new church in town. They are just getting started and were already looking for a web designer. I offered my services to "help out" with who ever they found. UMMM... turns out they found me. I work with hardware not so much with the software side of things, so when I realized what they had in mind I started playing around with some ideas. Turns out that they liked it and I am having a ball. There is not much verbage there yet but we are working on it.

If I am going to do it, I figured this will be the perfect time to find some really good Open Source web tools that are also portable (no install). So far I have used nothing but free programs to create this site. Below is what I have been using:

  • KompoZer: A HTML editor that replaced NUV. So far the only thing I had trouble with was making the frames page (easy enough with a text editor though)
  • GIMP: A wonderfully powerful image editor.
  • FileZilla: A great FTP client.
  • Audacity: For my audio editing needs.
  • XAMPP: Local web server to test my pages.
  • NotePad2: One of the best text editor replacements I have found.
  • FireFox: The greatest browser on the planet! (ever notice it takes you 3Xs longer to a make page look as good in IE as it does in FF?)
Also, I would be a fool not to mention the wonderful folks at Dynamic Drive for all the cool scripts and stuff

I will try to keep you posted on the more interesting stuff.

Sunday, June 8, 2008

Too Much Stuff...

I have been overloaded with stuff to do. It seems that every time I turn a round I have forgotten to do something that I promised someone that I would do. I just couldn't keep up with every thing. That is until I found this little template. This is a 'pocketmod' -ish style print out that can be edited with Word and folded into an eight page book that will fit in almost any pocket. This thing is great for those of us that require a little low tech every now and then.

I couldn't see spending money on a day planner that I would be locked into for ever or worse stop using after a while - and I enjoy the idea of doing it myself. I took the basic layout of this template and designed my own to fit my needs. It was easy, cheap, and I learned a few things as well. Now I am ready to join the masses that have decided to "Get Things Done".

Here is a copy of what I came up with... ToDoTemplatenopic.doc

Wednesday, May 7, 2008

AAAAAAAAAHHHHHAAAAAAHHH!!!

So I get to the office this morning and we have NO INTERNET!! (First sign of a bad day) Between answering calls asking me if I knew we had lost our internet connection and actually working on the problem, I'm informed that Embarq is here and is ready to up grade our phones... AND that the phone system will be down for "a while." I have to take this as "We have the updated system installed but why is it not coming back up?"

OK, Current state of affairs:
Internet connection: up
Phones: MIA
Phone Techs: @ Lunch

Tuesday, March 18, 2008

Training Videos

If you are like me, you probably have a few hundred people trying to get your attention at the same time, and all of them are thinking that their problem is the one you need to work on first. Fortunately, some of these users have the same problem or it is a problem that you have seen before. In these cases you may be well server to create a training video distribution system. Training videos are very easy to create, convert and distribute if you have the right software.

Here is a list of the software that I use to make my video files. You may know of better ones, if so, let know! These are all OpenSource and FREE to use:

CamStudio
This the main video capture program that I use. It does a great job recording what is on your screen. It can do voice overs while recording, pop-up info clouds, and highlight your mouse for high visibility. If you would rather not have to deal with an AVI file, it can also record to Flash.

SUPER
Is a program that handles video conversion of the .avi files from CamStudio to .mov files so I can use them in iTunes. I am sure it can do more but that is all I need it to do at the moment. It has "drag and drop" file importing and will take an AVI created with the Microsoft1 Video codec that is 857MB and convert it to an 8.61MB MOV file encoded with DivX. (Real numbers!)

PodProducer
Is an audio mixing program that can handle multiple audio inputs such as MP3s, and WAVs and combine them with your voice via the microphone. It has queuing capabilities, audio level control, and instant play buttons that you can configure as well and the ability to
upload it strait from the program interface.


Basically, if you can see it on screen or have to tell someone howto do it, it can be captured with these programs and distributed to your users. I am getting rather long here, so I will save that for later missives...

Saturday, March 8, 2008

It's Been A While...

I know I haven't posted in a while, but I hope to rectify this in the coming weeks. I have a few new (To me!) topics that may be of interest to those that work at school districts:

Creating tutorial videos for employees and how to distribute them for FREE.

Creating a podcast entry in iTunes for a LOCALLY created and used podcast.

An interesting use for iPods in schools.

Other truly useful Freeware programs.

That's about it for now...

Monday, January 14, 2008

A peaceful Sunday...

Yesterday my family and I went to my father-in-law's house to hang out and ride horses/4-wheelers. Now you have to bear in mind what this entails ... Getting everyone ready. Hooking up the horse trailer. Loading the 4-wheeler and (The freshly groomed) horse into the trailer, loading our "house horses" (4 year old rotties) in to the back of the truck; THEN wrangling the goat (Who thinks the horse is mamma!) back in to the pasture while loading all the tack. But I digress...

We made it safe, happy and ready to ride. It was nice to see my father-in-law!

Friday, January 11, 2008

The UK and Microsoft

It looks like the UK education agency has an issue with Microsoft...
According to this page at least.

Thanks for the heads up Phil!

The Meeting is Set!

I am still working out the finner technical details, but the date and place of our meeting has been set. I hope to have about 20 people show up, but we shall see. Patrick tells me he is excited about this because it is a new take on an old process. It seems that he is liking the idea about avoiding the purchase of MS CALs by using an X-server to authenticate against. More details soon!

Thursday, January 10, 2008

Planning

I had a call today from Patrick, he wants to push back the meeting till the first of the month. It seems if we can accommodate this he can get a SE to come to the meeting that may be able to go into more detail about the server and setup in a bi-computer environment... We shall see.

Can't Please Everyone

I don't think that I have mentioned this before, but I work at a small school district in Central Texas. What this means is I am continually baffled by the goings on of the typical student mind. It is amazing to watch the thought process and see where those thoughts take them. For instance, I was working on a student computer station the other day when I came across the search history of the browser. It seems that there is a student here very upset with me because after trying to get to several blocked sites, and proxies this student decided to search for "gay fat computer teacher that blocks web sites." I can only assume this student meant me as I am a rather joyfully rotund individual and I do block websites, however, I am NOT a teacher. My wife and I got a good laugh out of it because it lets me know that my new web filter is working... apparently pretty well. Just remember if someone is mad at you at work, it may be because you are doing a good job!

Wednesday, January 9, 2008

Just a note before bed time

Here is a very informative article from the folks over at lifehacker's Geek To Live that deals with PC - Mac Compatibility.Check it out, you may learn something... I did

Thanks Life Hacker!

Tuesday, January 8, 2008

Phase One Almost There...

Ok, so when last we left I was rambling on about hoping to get Macs with good Vistas or at least a lot of eXPerience. Well I have been talking to Patrick at the Apple National Education Center and have been assured that there are ways to accomplish the primary goal! In fact there seems to be at least two ways to do this:

One is the use of of the third-party software, Parallels, to start a virtual Windows session to run your Windows applications. On the plus side if you have a problem with the windows portion you could just push a new Windows image file out to the computer.

The second is to use what the Mac people call BootCamp which is already apart of the Mac OS. This solution will require that the user restart the computer in question and choose which OS to use. As a foot note, David, an inside Systems Engineer at Apple, told me that there is even a FREE boot manager that could be loaded so that the computer will boot into a GUI and present the user with a Choice via two buttons on the desktop! While this seems the easy road he did caution me to consider the roll-out process. It seems that to get an image of this computer I will need to use third-party software (Casper... I think) because of the NTFS partition. This has all the hallmarks of a good decision and I will probably follow this path.

Next in line is the server options... Again Patrick and David were there to answer my initial questions. First and foremost is the burning Question about whether or not we can control/manage windows computers from the Xserve. The answer is a resounding yes. Through the use of OpenDirectory and other OpenSource software it is possible to talk to Active Directory.

My plan is ambitious, but I hope to be able to pull it off... I want to completely remove AD from my network and use the Mac servers to authenticate against for all computers and have the windows servers regulated to very specific job rolls in the hope of eliminating the need for CALs.

Next step..
"The Meeting" with the Mac people. I hope to have more information on this tale in 2 weeks or so. Until then, I will more than likely have something else to say about something.

Monday, January 7, 2008

A peaceful co-existence

When you think of Computer Labs what comes to mind? Row upon row of new Dells, or shiney new HPs, or are you adventurous and dream of a room full of Macs? Here I will try to chronicle the evolution of the birth of one computer lab as it forms into a homogeneous collection of Mac computers with a clear Vista or at least a lot of eXPerience. It may be a fruitless journey, but it will be interesting!
More to come...