After an upgrade from an ancient (1.something) version of WordPress to the latest, there were a few issues with the display and functionality of this site. I’m glad to report that they are now fixed. Kodiak’s Korner is back in business.
My Little Corner of the Net
Blogging from Flock
I discovered a cool new browser while browsing through the March issue of Computer Link magazine: Flock. Flock is built on the Firefox core and is designed to allow easy posting to blogs. It isn’t even in beta yet, but I decided to download it to see what its all about.
So far, so good. All I had to do was run Flock then choose “My Blogs” from a menu. Then I entered the URL to my site and clicked a button. The browser did some thinking and then prompted me for a login. Next I was looking at a list of all of my articles and a big fat “+” button that I clicked to start writing this post.
Flock has a clean interface with a WYSIWYG interface (apparently powered by TinyMCE), the option to edit raw HTML, the ability to add my post to categories or tag it on Technorati, and the ability to save a draft or post outright. Perhaps the nicest feature for me is the spell check, since I am notorious for hitting “Post” and then finding my mistakes.
Flock is NOT stable yet. It isn’t even in beta yet. There will be bugs. Nonetheless, it looked cool, so I downloaded it. Personally, I like being on the cutting edge and I’m not so serious a blogger that I can’t live with a lost post now and then. But if you aren’t like me, you’ve been warned.
Edit (04/13/2006): My first impression of Flock was that it didn’t work–my message never showed up on the blog. I finally noticed, however, that it’s been here all the time. It just had a post date of December 31, 1969. Wow, I’ve been blogging since before I was born! (The current April 1 time stamp is an estimate–I don’t recall exactly when I posted this, but that has to be close.)
I’m the Master of PHP
Last week I noticed that RIT’s E-Learning Zone offered a Brainbench certification exam for PHP 4. I had a little time to look at it today, so I started the test not knowing what to expect. As it turns out, I know PHP pretty well—I scored 4.40/5 and became a Brainbench-certified Master of PHP 4.
I Have No Friends
So I signed up for Facebook the other day. I haven’t done much with it beyond search for a few people, so I can’t really comment on it yet. So far it looks pretty cool, though.
I noticed, on my profile screen after signing in for the first time, that Facebook declares I have no friends. So much for my self esteem.
If you’re looking for me I’ll be with my therapist.
Only the Goverment Could Get Away with This
I have a PO Box that I use to receive mail for my business. I got it because I thought the PO Box address would look more professional than my home addresss (with an apartment number) and because it would be more secure–I don’t have a locking mailbox so anyone walking by could easily go through my mail looking for checks.
Every six months, on or arround the first of the month, I get an envelope in my PO Box in which I can send my renewal. I had a payment due this month, so the process was no different: I got the envelope saying that I owed $35 and that I had until January 31 to pay.
Normally I pay the renewal fee within a day or two of receiving the envelope, but because I had a lot of other things going on this time, my payment got delayed. I payed it sometime around the 15th—well before the deadline. A few days later I was quite shocked to see that, instead of a receipt in my box, the post office had returned my check, along with a new payment envelope that contained a hand written note “Your box rental rate is now $37. Thank you.” You see, on January 8 the post office raised the price of postage and, evidently, the price of PO Boxes as well—but they didn’t bother to tell me this. At minimum, they should have attached a note saying that the price would go up if I didn’t pay by the 8th.
Maybe I should try this approach–charge my clients one price and then, when they pay, say “oh sorry, I just raised my rates.” How long would I stay in business, then?