Enter Flatterline

And as one door closes another is opened. Chris Chandler and I have started a Phoenix web development company called Flatterline. Our preferred niche is assisting startups in the initial development phase. We’ll certainly consider other opportunities, but we prefer to work with startups

Our clients

We’re currently working with 2 amazing startups to create the first version of their product. These startups are founded by passionate and talented people with the ability to execute. As we’re allowed to tell more about them we will. We believe in the startups we’re working with and want to promote them to help them succeed.

What now?

We’re extremely excited to have this opportunity to create a new venture in Phoenix. Especially one that can help entrepreneurs in Phoenix, and elsewhere, realize their vision.

This has all literally happened in the last 2 1/2 weeks. We barely have an LLC let alone a website, etc., however, you can reach us through curtis or chris at flatterline.com.

So, here’s to new beginnings, we look forward to hearing from you!

Mike Montalvo, the CEO of automotive electronics company Digital Tuning is opening up two of the four rooms in Digital Tuning’s office suite as shared space for creative collaboration. Mike’s vision for CollabLab is to provide a space in North Phoenix where people can escape from the isolation of working from home.

I see CollabLab as place for people in north Phoenix to connect. It’s a medium to connect thinkers with…doers so they can accomplish the unthinkable. Together they can work towards a common goal, be it a better recipe or the next web startup. – Mike Montalvo

And CollabLab isn’t just technology oriented. Mike wants to foster an environment in which entrepreneurs of all kinds can meet, collaborate and thrive.

While there is no doubt tech will be a hot topic, I don’t want to limit CollabLab to just technology. If a chef wants to collaborate with taste testers to improve the recipe, why not? There is no reason coworking spaces have to be tech oriented. – Mike Montalvo

It appears that CollabLab already has several full-time members, but they need the support of the Phoenix community to make this a successful endeavor. Here are some things you can do:

• Follow CollabLab on Twitter
• Visit the CollabLab coworking website
• Attend the CollabLab grand opening on Wednesday, February 18th
• Tell your friends, retweet, write a blog post… share the love Phoenix!

Please spread the word about this space and if you know someone interested in sharing a creative, collaborative environment with some great people, direct them to CollabLab. When entrepreneurs like Mike and great ideas like CollabLab succeed, Phoenix and it’s inhabitants benefit!

CollabLab Information and Hours

23021 N 15th Ave, Suite #205
Phoenix, AZ 85027
623.444.2409
info [at] collablab [dot] net

Hours
8:30am to 6:00pm Mon-Fri

The name we chose for this project is Personality Flatline and you can subscribe via RSS or subscribe via iTunes. Of course, you can always visit the site and catch up on recent episodes.

After the first recording session, which consisted of us talking about random stuff, we ran an experiment for two weeks where we talk about topics suggested by people attending hacknight. We’ll be releasing those episodes over the next few weeks. We’re interested in hearing your feedback on the show, so don’t forget to leave us comments.

To date we have over 23,000 listings in 17 states. We’re excited about the progress made on Freebootr and hope that 2009 continues the progress we’ve made in waste reduction. We hope you’re excited too! We’d love to hear your thoughts or ideas about Freebootr, so please send us your feedback.

Over the summer, my dad (the big guy pictured) and I did some work on my backyard. In this picture, we’re laying the header for the brick patio. Where I’m mixing the concrete in the wheelbarrow became the patio and where my dad is walking became grass. Now that the patio is done, the kids have a great time riding their bikes on the patio, drawing all over the bricks with chalk and playing soccer in the grass.

Now I’m supposed to tag 6 other people… who will I tag?

• Erica Lucci
• Jason Newlin
• James Archer
• Tyson Crosbie
• Remi Taylor
• Chris Chandler

Thin configuration

# == God config file
# http://god.rubyforge.org/
# Authors: Gump and michael@glauche.de
#
# Config file for god that configures watches for each instance of a thin server for
# each thin configuration file found in /etc/thin.
# In order to get it working on Ubuntu, I had to make a change to god as noted at
# the following blog:
# http://blog.alexgirard.com/2007/10/25/ruby-one-line-to-save-god/
#
require 'yaml'
config_path = "/etc/thin"

Dir[config_path + "/*.yml"].each do |file|
  config = YAML.load_file(file)
  num_servers = config["servers"] ||= 1

  (0...num_servers).each do |i|
    # UNIX socket cluster use number 0 to 2 (for 3 servers)
    # and tcp cluster use port number 3000 to 3002.
    number = config['socket'] ? i : (config['port'] + i)

    God.watch do |w|
      w.group = "thin-" + File.basename(file, ".yml")
      w.name = w.group + "-#{number}"

      w.interval = 30.seconds

      w.uid = config["user"]
      w.gid = config["group"]

      w.start = "thin start -C #{file} -o #{number}"
      w.start_grace = 10.seconds

      w.stop = "thin stop -C #{file} -o #{number}"
      w.stop_grace = 10.seconds

      w.restart = "thin restart -C #{file} -o #{number}"

      pid_path = config["pid"]
      ext = File.extname(pid_path)

      w.pid_file = pid_path.gsub(/#{ext}$/, ".#{number}#{ext}")

      w.behavior(:clean_pid_file)

      w.start_if do |start|
        start.condition(:process_running) do |c|
          c.interval = 5.seconds
          c.running  = false
          c.notify   = 'developers'
        end
      end

      w.restart_if do |restart|
        restart.condition(:memory_usage) do |c|
          c.above  = 150.megabytes
          c.times  = [3,5] # 3 out of 5 intervals
          c.notify = 'developers'
        end

        restart.condition(:cpu_usage) do |c|
          c.above  = 50.percent
          c.times  = 5
          c.notify = 'developers'
        end
      end

      w.lifecycle do |on|
        on.condition(:flapping) do |c|
          c.to_state     = [:start, :restart]
          c.times        = 5
          c.within       = 5.minutes
          c.transition   = :unmonitored
          c.retry_in     = 10.minutes
          c.retry_times  = 5
          c.retry_within = 2.hours
          c.notify       = 'developers'
        end
      end

      w.transition(:up, :start) do |on|
        on.condition(:process_exits) do |c|
          c.notify = 'developers'
        end
      end
    end
  end
end

Email through Google Apps configuration

require 'tlsmail'
Net::SMTP.enable_tls(OpenSSL::SSL::VERIFY_NONE)

God::Contacts::Email.message_settings = {
  :from => 'user@domain.com'
}

God::Contacts::Email.server_settings = {
  :address        => 'smtp.gmail.com',
  :tls            => 'true',
  :port           => 587,
  :domain         => 'domain.com',
  :user_name      => 'user@domain.com',
  :password       => '******',
  :authentication => :plain
}

God.contact(:email) do |c|
  c.name  = 'Dev 1'
  c.email = 'dev1@domain.com'
  c.group = 'developers'
end

God.contact(:email) do |c|
  c.name  = 'Dev 2'
  c.email = 'dev2@domain.com'
  c.group = 'developers'
end

References

• God
• A Thin God
• A Gmail God

As a software engineer, I appreciate your focus on technology and how it has helped shaped your campaign (and hopefully your administration). I believe that focus on technology combined with your America Serves initiative could provide a great opportunity for Americans to give back to their country.

Specifically, I would like to see a national challenge of volunteerism communicated through a variety of mediums including a website, social networks, mass messaging (e.g., Twitter), blogs, etc. This message would be constantly and consistently communicated and the website would allow Americans to track their individual, local, city, state and nationwide participation metrics (e.g., # of hours volunteered, $ saved, people helped, jobs created).

Of course, this could be broken into individual and corporate programs. There might also be incentives/rewards to encourage participation (e.g., national recognition award, visit to the white house).

If you ask Americans to volunteer in the same way you asked them to vote for you they will listen and act because they believe in you. I believe in you. Thank you.

Now, it’s time to submit your input to the Obama transition team!

U arent going to give up on me n stop talking to me bc things r complicated on my end, r u?

This person was trying to make a connection with someone who might not be talking with them anymore. They’re having some difficulties in their relationship that I know nothing about, but if I didn’t answer their fear/suspicion becomes reality. In essence, by not answering, the person they were trying to reach decided not to answer them. So I jotted off a quick reply

Sorry, I think you have the wrong number.

Then added

Good luck. I hope it works out.

I’ve often wondered if sometimes people just need to know that someone cares, even if it’s anonymous, as in this case. It’s easy to get wrapped up in ourselves and forget that other people need encouragement and support, too. There are little moments like these everyday that are easy to miss or ignore but that might have an impact in someone’s life. Don’t let those opportunities pass you by.

ultrasphinx: spelling support not available (raspell configuration raised "uninitialized constant Ultrasphinx::Spell::Aspell")

This is pretty easy to get rid of, though. You just need to install the aspell, spell checking library and raspell, the Ruby interface to aspell. The raspell README has instructions for installing aspell and raspell on both Mac and Ubuntu.

After we did this, we got one additional error:

ultrasphinx: spelling support not available (raspell configuration raised "No word lists can be found for the language "ap".")

Follow the instructions for setting up the custom wordlist needed by Ultrasphinx and you should be good to go.

Good luck and happy searching!

ActionView::TemplateError (Define INLINEDIR or HOME in your environment and try again)

The simple solution is to add an environment declaration to your environment/production.rb file:

ENV['INLINEDIR'] = '/path/to/.ruby_inline'

Once that was set, we were in business again… whew!

References

Here’s a relevant reference that took a while to find:

• Problems with God, RubyInline and Rails