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Jan 23
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One Hip Bullfrog

Posted on Tuesday, January 23, 2007 in Tech Bytes

My source for most that is intellectual and not computer-related is, of course, CBC Radio, one of the few non-Christian-rock stations available in the Rainy River District. This morning, the day after the Tragically Hip played in Thunder Bay, there was a brief piece on their sponsor for the Ontario leg of their tour

Oct 22
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Ghost in the Shell

Posted on Sunday, October 22, 2006 in Tech Bytes

I just finished watching Ghost in the Shell, a film that many said was a significant influence on the Wachowski brothers in their creation of the Matrix trilogy.
I’m a geek. I get geek stuff. I don’t get this film.
I see the references as noted in the wikipedia article on the film, and their impact on the development of the Matrix trilogy. What I don’t get is the “massive significance” that has been noted by many in the manga/cyberpunk/tech groups who revere this film.
It’s kind of embarassing for me as someone who, if given the opportunity, would wholeheartedly support the embedding of camera and recording equipment in my body

Dec 14
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Simple text entry with PHP

Posted on Wednesday, December 14, 2005 in Tech Bytes

I’m on a new path to get better at PHP/MySQL, now that we’ve got a new programmer on staff, and I can abuse him as a resource. A cool snipped for poor-man’s content management is what I came up with today. If you have a text file that a user wants to edit, but also wants to strip the pesky slashes from, and interpret carriage returns when writing the file, here’s what I came up with. It also prints the file’s modification date as an “Updated last” line:

<?
//Declare the session variable value
session_start();
//declare the report variable
if(isset($_POST['report']))
{
$report = str_replace("\r\n", "<br>", $_POST['report']);

//declare and open the file for writing
$myfile = "myfile.txt";
$fh = fopen($myfile, ‘w’) or die("can’t open file");

//write the form data to the report
fwrite($fh, (stripslashes($report)));
fclose($fh);
}
?>

Then we have the printed text, as well as the form, rolled into one file:

<html>
<body>
<p>
<? echo date( "F d\, Y", filemtime(’myfile.txt’) )." – Last updated"; ?>
</p>

<p>
<? include(’myfile.txt’); ?>
</p>

<p>Write the daily report:<br>

<form action="<? echo $PHP_SELF ?>" method="post" name="report">
<textarea name="report" rows="9" cols="94"></textarea><br>
<input type="submit" name="submitButtonName">
</form>
</body>
|</html>

PHP kicks bum.

Oct 19

Wireless network taking shape

Posted on Wednesday, October 19, 2005 in Tech Bytes

2.5 miles, 6.5 mph, 2.5 degree incline
A few friends and I have been working on a point-to-multipoint wireless network since (feels like forever) April. We’ve run into a number of bumps in the road, which have resulted in spending of cash, pulling of hair, yelling at each other, climbing on rooftops in the dark, and cutting down large trees.
Tonight, we had major success — three-player Halo 2 via xbox with voice mics, and no lag. (yes, we’ve been testing with something other than game consoles. We’re not *completely* stupid

Sep 21
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Six Dumbest Ideas in Computer Security

Posted on Wednesday, September 21, 2005 in Tech Bytes

From the Apple Server list, someone posted a link to this article. Great piece of you’re interested in computer (specifically server-related) security at all. Any article that can legitimately use the word “badness” gets a thumbs-up in my book.
We’re off to Vermilion Bay this weekend for the annual meeting of Cambrian Presbytery (church stuff). Gorgeous location that I’m looking forward to exploring. We’re hooking up with our usual group of teens from across NW Ontario for the annual fall youth retreat.