So, the firefox logo makes sense.

A fox, with a firey look. Cool logo.

But what’s that thing behind the fox? Well, with the Deer Park logo, we get a better look.

But if you look closely, you see that the shapes on the FF globe don’t match those on the DP globe. And they don’t look like the continents I know. Maybe it’s just an ordinary circle with abstract shapes? But it’s shaded like a globe. Is it one of those funky extrasolar planets? (They’re planning a Galaxy Wide Web!)

I think I preferred the fox. I also liked the old Red Star mozilla logo, not so much the dino head or the big “m”. And don’t get me started on the ship steering wheel or the big “N”. Even the old NCSA Mosaic logo was better than those.

Why does every iteration of the product need a new logo? Doesn’t seem like the best way to build brand awareness. Compare:

Firefox 1.5 beta 1 (“Deer Park”) has just been released.

This was good timing for me, as I’d just updated GTK+ from 2.4.14 to 2.8.3 in order to get GnomeMeeting working, and that had broken Firefox 1.0PR, so I was back to using the old Mozilla 1.7 I had lying around.

Download pre-built versions at http://www.mozilla.org/projects/firefox/ or build it yourself from the source at http://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/firefox/releases/1.5b1/source/

This will unpack into a directory named “mozilla”, so be careful about clobbering other mozilla builds if you have them. Build directions are at http://www.mozilla.org/build/

The “Starting the Build” directions didn’t work for me, instead I had to do what it has under the box: cd $objdir; ../configure; make

Oh, and the tarball it makes from make -C $objdir/browser/installer is tagged “1.4” still, but that’s minor enough. Now I just need for the extentions and “themes” (skins) to be updated.

Okay, so I now have WordPress working with suphp, which allows for the use of Unix user accounts in php scripts. Steps:

• I made a dedicated jlmphp account, so php won’t have access to my main account.
• The hosting server (ofb.net) runs Debian, so I installed suphp with
  apt-get install libapache-mod-suphp
• In the Apache config, I put the lines:
  

  LoadModule suphp_module /usr/lib/apache/1.3/mod_suphp.so
  suPHP_Engine on

  and

  <VirtualHost *>
  ServerName php.mandelson.org
  DocumentRoot /home/jlmphp/www/data/
  </VirtualHost>

  The first set turns suphp on, the second set makes a virtual host “php.mandelson.org” with its own www directiory in jlmphp’s homedir.

• Made a CNAME aliasing php.mandelson.org to mandelson.org, so that when you look up php.mandelson.org you get this server.
• Changed the blog address to be http://php.mandelson.org/wordpress/
• In the .htaccess file for jlmphp, put
  

  AddHandler x-httpd-php .php

  (which tells Apache to use suphp for .php files in this directory), and put in redirects from the old blog address to the new.

• Made wp-config.php user-readable-only and change the passwords. (Which is the whole point!)

One of the sessions I attended at OSCon was about the upcoming CalDAV standard. As calendaring is a weak spot in the Linux/Free Software application space, advances here are particularly welcome.

There was a panel of implementers there, representing:

• Novell / Hula
• Mozilla Foundation / Sunbird and Lightning
• RPI / UW Calendar server
• OSAF / Cosmo and Scoobie and Chandler

(organization) / (programs)

A lot of the session talked about features of their various products, but I’ll ignore those in favor of looking at the protocol.
CalDAV in a nutshell is WebDAV holding iCalendar files and extended to handle calendar-type queries (“when is Joe Blow free?”). The idea is the basic common protocol one: An open spec will let all these products interoperate, so you can use the calendar app which is your favorite without having to bother with which calendar system is at the other end. (Do you know what software your email server is running?)

The IETF tried to standardize calendaring before, with its CAP (“Calendar Access Protocol”), but no one implemented it. Starting from WebDAV means implementers have less work to do, and hey!, it’s working.

Stuff like room / multiparty scheduling is not addressed, they’re leaving that for a later protocol. “Clearly more research is needed.” Conflicting schedule changes are detected using ETags; resolution is unspecified and left to the clients to decide.

If you’re doing any calendaring, you absolutely want to take a look at it. You’re already supporting iCalendar (right?), and there are WebDAV implementations out there you can use (though alas not particularly cleanly), and from there to CalDAV isn’t a big step for an implementer but is a giant leap for interoperability.

[link redacted] – This is the best site that you will ever find with all the best online Forex news, the lates quotes, and the highest currencies

I feel so special. It’s a real grown up blog now. Not.

Which Aliens Colonial Marine are you?

I’m “Pvt. Vasquez”.

> Spunky token ethnic type.

Ummm…

> Kicked alien butt and didn’t take any crop off of no one.

Yeah!

> Dies in the end.

Well, don’t we all?

So, how did this come about? Well, a Google recruiter found my online resume, thought “hey interesting”, then while checking on me found out that I’d already been working here for a year and a half. Thus I figured it was time to update my web page again. And hey, why not try this blogging thing?

So, after some minor trials and tribulations, I have WordPress set up. Some notes:

• PHP and MySQL don’t get along well. Some key info is at http://dev.mysql.com/doc/mysql/en/old-client.html
• PHP abandons the concept of “users” with different privileges, so there’s no security between one part of “the PHP system” and another part. I don’t like this when one of those parts has a MySQL password in it. So I’m going to work on wrapping this PHP in a CGI.
• I’m going to have to make my own theme, or else this blog will be quickly abandoned on aesthetic grounds.

Welcome to Word​press. This is your first post. Edit or delete it, then start blogging!