Firefox 3 - So Far So Good

Posted by rob on June 20, 2008

I have installed Firefox 3 on one PC so far and the browser has been working fine so far. I definitely see an improvement in speed and the interface is also more polished. I don’t run with a lot of plugins, but if you do, you might want to first make sure the ones important to you have updates available for the new Firefox. I have seen a few blog posts say that the Firebug plugin isn’t available for Firefox 3. That is not true, as Firebug 1.2 will work with Firefox 3 (although I haven’t put it through the rigors yet).

Dell & Windows - No Longer The Easy Choice

Posted by rob on June 20, 2008

Most technical people end up being the IT support staff for their immediate and extended families. I am no exception. For years I felt like the best choice to recommend to family members was to go to Dell’s web site with a budget in mind and build a Windows PC that fits that budget. I would help out with the accessories and let them know about the service contracts that were available. For the most part it worked out pretty well. The process didn’t take up too much of my time, my family member got a pretty decent and technically up to date PC at a good price. And the support wasn’t too bad either.

Today that has all changed. Dell and Windows is no longer my default choice. In the past year I recommended Dell with Windows Vista to two family members and they have each had problems. The problems aren’t all Vista’s either as some were related to software that came pre-installed by Dell. Regardless of what the problems were and whose fault they were, the problems happened and they cost me valuable personal time as I assisted my family members in getting the problems resolved.

If asked today what system to buy, I think I would still list Dell and Windows as an option. However, I would be asking more questions like, “Do you have a copy of Windows XP that you can run on your new computer?” or “Have you thought about paying more and getting a really cool Mac Book?”. I might even ask, “Have you ever heard of Linux or Ubuntu?”. And I would definitely mention that using a quality, local PC builder, like J & B Technologies in St. Louis, has all sorts of benefits over using a national company like Dell or HP.

Its OK to code that Web 2.0 app in Java

Posted by rob on June 06, 2008

Maybe its not as cool to do so, but go ahead and code that new Web 2.0 app you’ve been thinking about in Java. Once of the most succesful Web 2.0 apps, LinkedIn, is written in Java. It serves up 40 million page views a day. And from my use of the site, its performance has been very good.

From a technical standpoint I am really impressed by LinkedIn’s pragmatic and striaghtforward technology choices for building their application. Tomcat/Jetty, straight JDBC, Spring and Oracle/MySQL.

For more information on LinkedIn’s implementation, see this excellent article.

Lazy Friday Afternoon Music List

Posted by rob on June 06, 2008

Today’s theme is lesser known, but great alternative music.

  • Primitive by Ambulance LTD from album LP   iTunes
  • The Sound of Fear by Eels from album Daisies of the Galaxy   iTunes
  • Country Sad Ballad Man by Blur from album Blur   iTunes
  • Happiness/The Gondola Man by Elliott Smith from album Figure 8   iTunes
  • Good to Be On the Road Back Home by Cornershop from When I Was Born For the 7th Time   iTunes

Update: When I do a list like this, I thought it would be nice to provide a link for each song.

What are you?

Posted by rob on June 04, 2008

Are you a…

And how much experience is required to put the word “senior” before your title?

Its fun to check out the variety of titles and descriptions everyone has given themselves on LinkedIn.