Joped.com

I just pushed up a minor release of Linkped.  Its a mostly rewrite of the backend that handles the buddy list.  Much of the code is in a kinda crappy state.  This is why I am doing a major overhaul of it.  User facing, there are no changes only a few minor bug fixes.

I have not enabled SSL on the site yet, few more small tests I need to perform before I set it live.  Next overhaul is going to be with user accounts, there is a few things its doing currently that is holding me back on feature development, more on that later.

Fairly random and not that exciting, decided to do some sky diving in WoW.  Just flew up as high as I can and jumped off.  Yes, my graphics are turned down since I am boxing.

Not sure why I didn’t post this sooner, however I have moved to using Twitter instead of identi.ca.  Although identi.ca worked well, it was missing far too many features and none of the iPhone apps tie into it.  There are so many twitter applications that its hard to ignore.

At some point when I get time I will post my twitter feed on joped.com.

Most of the code on Linkped is pretty much in a prototype state.  Many of the tables are fairly unoptimized and are hard to work with right now.

So, I started a complete rewrite a last week.  However, a few days into the project I realized I am trying to do way too much at once.  The code requires a major overhaul and with my very busy schedule it could take a few months to get it to a respectable level.  I have now taken a step back and archived my work to start over in smaller chunks.  Although I “lost” a good week of coding, the code will be usable when I reach those areas.

I should start pushing some updates to the site in the next week or so, no new features will be introduced though.  Much of the work will be backend, but will fix a few quirks on the site.  For example, the buddy list system is slightly clunky.  Sometimes it doesn’t display the proper labels for users and defaults to their email address.  Its a rather annoying inconsistency.  This is going to be the first thing I tackle followed by user account system.

After I finish a few minor changes to Jokeped (Mostly SEO shit), I am going into a full development cycle on Linkped.  I totally rewrote Jokeped reducing the code base a ton and really optimizing the crap out of it.  It now has ultra high use of memcache to the point it can run without a database being present.  Keep in mind, it normally does have a database driving it.  The only time the database won’t be present is if the site was getting slammed or the server was having trouble.

I just finally got checked into my hotel and its been an adventure already.  Except for my shuttle not showing up and taking a cab, the trip started out ok.  However, when I got into Vegas I knew something had to go wrong.  Yep, US Assways lost my bag.  Its amazing how an industry that goes to great lengths to create some annoying levels of security and policies, can’t seem to keep track of baggage.  That really frightens me, how is this possible ?  I can understand it happening once in a while, but its just far too common.

Needless to say, I need to sleep in dirty cloths tonight and need to wear them tomorrow as well.  With some lucky maybe my bag will appear tomorrow morning.  They have a limited number of flights here per day, and I was on the last one of the day.  Great.

What pisses me off more then anything is that I have no clean socks.  After wondering around my hotel for a while, I was able to purchase some dress socks.  Guess what, that is good enough for me. (For now)

I asked what the airline expected me to do about brushing my teeth and what not.  They responded with this small bag of stuff to get me through the night.  I am happy they provided it for me, but not happy I needed to beg for it.

So far Circus Circus has been an annoying hotel.  It took far too long for me to find my room.  I love how they have maps all over the place, and none of them indicating “You are here”.

I was told they have internet access in all the rooms, however I can’t find a jack and no wifi signal.  Good thing I brought my EVDO card.  The connection speed is far faster then it was last year, so I am just going to stick using it.

I am off to find something to drink and maybe a light snack.  I have a bit of a headache that I need to shake.

I _tried_ to buy a track from Amazon and it was the worst experience. Not only finding the track that I wanted was a pain in the ass (compared to iTunes). I had to download an application, that doesn’t work with Firefox. (I didn’t fiddle around with it much) So, fired up Safari and went through the whole process again.

Well, the CC they had on file was wrong. Rather then just re-checkout, I had to go through the entire process again.

Needless to say, I went back to iTunes and purchased the tracked I wanted in a fraction of the time.  Screw Amazon and their tax evading ways.

Stephanie introduced me to Pandora Radio on the iPhone.  This application allows you to search for music you like, then recommends music based on your vote of the music.  The voting is a very simple thumbs up or thumbs down.  However, pay attention to the information of why you are being asked to vote on that track.  Remember, its tring to figure out what music is fitting you.

The great thing is this application has a channel model.  It allows you to create multiple channels for whichever mood you are in that day.  This is great because I am into a large range of music.  Everything from The Doors, to Aerosmith, Type O Negative, Robert Miles, Led Zep, Disturbted, Guns N Roses, etc.  For those that don’t know, I absoultly hate country music.  The very thought makes my ears bleed.

Yet, I also suck at categorizing music.  Robert Miles is very sweet coding music, he has pulled me through some complex coding headaches.  The problem comes down to, I have been in a “club” a total of 3 times in my life.  Each time more uncomfortable then the other.  I don’t dance, so I will never attempt to.  Trust me, the world is better off if I don’t.

Pandora allows me to find new music that I like and didn’t know existed.

Its not limited to the iPhone, they also have the same service on their website.  I have not played around to see if there are any “syncing” features.  NetNewsWire has an excellent syncing feature that syncs my RSS feeds on the desktop to my iPhone.  I subscribe to a large number of RSS feeds, some of which are critical for my job.

I can pretty much guarantee I will be using it at work.  My limited music collection is starting to get a bit tired.