Soft Serve Direct

THE THREE BEARS | THE COLORFUL STORY BOOK

2012-02-24T10:45:00.000-08:00

ahh .. a picture book for reading to the (grand)kids ..

THE THREE BEARS | THE COLORFUL STORY BOOK

Time for a new chair or a new diet?

2012-02-23T04:43:00.001-08:00

Much like a butterfly, I like to zoom from station to station as I work. I don't much like waiting for computers much, especially old slow ones like the ones I have and fix - currently 5-6 working computers in the back office with various routers and switches - and the TV. So if a computer is taking too long to do whatever I have told it to do, I move on to the next one and the next task. Today I was working in the office on my rolling desk chair, a favorite that the kids gave me for Christmas a few years back. It is starting to look a bit worn but so far has functioned fine. I was a bit disconcerted when the first plastic wheel exploded on me, but I still had 4 of 5 working wheels. No problem. I kept working and zooming. When the second wheel gave out a few minutes later, I started thinking .. just what gigantic overweight elf had been sneaking into my private office and sitting on my chair. Goldilocks perhaps? At first I thought I could lose the remaining wheels, but then I lose my zoom and about 2 inches of chair height, and I soon found that the center post rides lower than the wheel base. It makes an interesting 360 degree rocking chair. I know that replacement wheels could be installed, but I am cheap. Maybe I will check out my favorite aisle at the thrift store .. or go on a diet.

Family Day / No School Week

2012-02-18T09:21:00.000-08:00

Family Day / No School Week - I have no plans for the big Day Off .. if it were all up to me I would just tell everyone to just go back to school and to work. At least the weather is cooperating for anyone wishing to be out of doors.

My daughter is catching up on Seasons 1-6 of the Flintstones - after some creative photo play. I am updating my websites and blogs. Mrs Me is out supporting our local businesses with a gaggle of girl friends. So, just a another fun week at our home.

The sharpest tool in the toolbox ..

2012-02-17T06:51:00.000-08:00

Reference: CMS Technology Web Usage Statistics

The graphic on this website startled me. Why didn't any one tell me? Wordpress is King? I had no idea. Of course, the statistics only measure quantity not quality. Wordpress may have a huge number of sites (really over 60% ?), but are they being viewed and do they provide useful information? How would you or I know? Are they all created by pre-teen web gurus? Are they being maintained? How many big business sites use them? Do they all 'look' like cookie cutter Wordpress websites?

As a local Chamber of Commerce member, would I recommend your company to rely on a generic 'free' webservice? I suppose, if you are OK with the 'possibility' of web outages or service problems. They seem to be easy to create and maintain for the DIYer. For the past decade, I have run my own webserver (using SMEServer) and hosted my own websites (mostly using Joomla for my business sites). For the most part, there have been very few system outages - the only ones of note have been when power was lost to our entire region or when Shaw Internet fell over and lay there twitching for a day or so. Otherwise, I have complete control over my own content and have much greater flexiblity in terms of storage limits and software. My customers live here. They are my neighbors and friends. If my power is out, likely so is theirs and so I can live with that. Meanwhile, I was noting a sub-site I was setting up for the Magrath Chamber Tradeshow (magrathchamber.com/tradeshow) this past week (hosted by Google for Apps Sites) was broken for a while. The site displayed an error for certain app gadgets that had been installed (from Google). Since they provide the service out of the kindness of their hearts for free to us, I had no clue who to call and start the fix. The problem was resolved a day or so later, but it got me thinking. What is on these sites that I could do without if they decided to discontinue the service or if it suddenly broke or stopped working?

On the other hand, my local webserver is plodding along on a version of linux created in 2006 and last seriously updated way back in 2010 (see smeserver.org) with an update being 'worked on' as time permits by a dedicated but unpaid open source volunteer group. I would love to have a newer version of PHP or MySQL available, but seriously hesitate striking off on my own path for a production system. Why fix what is not really broken? I have started looking at replacement systems (Ubuntu Server for example), but have found nothing that comes close to the elegance and simplicity of the SMEServer system for usability. I have a dedicated test computer running Ubuntu Server and all I get is a blank terminal to which I am supposed to type in some arcane command at the command line to create new users and their quotas or to set up domains and the appropriate security. On SMEServer, all I do is log in as Admin and I get a control panel where I can just click and command to my hearts delight. Anything more complex than the screen below makes my head hurt and tempts me to go back to my life long project - the completion of the first draft of my proposed book on 'The Power of Procrastination' ...

Maybe the cloud is now the way to go? Don't you already use gmail, twitter, facebook, youtube, and more. Perhaps I need to rethink this whole thing.

Lost on the Net ..

2012-02-17T06:04:00.001-08:00

Lost on the Net ..

I can’t settle on a favorite platform to post my insights on. I like Joomla but all my Joomla websites enjoy the almost exact look and feel. OK for ‘my’ sites, but not everyone wants to look just like me (he he). I am also testing out tumblr and twitter and facebook and google+ and even wordpress and weebly and google sites.This post was originally on tumblr which should have forwarded to twitter which should be passed on my 3 friends at facebook, but getting that content back from those sites to links on my websites is unnecessarily awkward. I usually end up double posting the content back where it should end up .. like here .. when I get time. Joomla is a CMS that I never use as one, because I really only have those 3 friends. So most of my sites end up like a large personal blog. Setting up a Joomla site for others to use has been less than successful due to the need to train users in entering passwords and basic html code. Their eyes start crossing and I have to back them slowly away from the computer screen.

Weebly was selected for the Magrath Museum website and it was easily mastered by the summer intern, but needs some full time tending. Content is king and I don’t have access to it unless I go work at the Museum (although my kids would say I belong there).

Google Sites has been used with some success for Westwinds Soccer. They only update it during the soccer season (a short season in Canada) and last year I convinced them to use an embedded Google Spreadsheet to report the League Standings with some success. It will remain to be seen if they will be able to update the site for 2012 without some assistance.

The Magrath Chamber of Commerce is a site I am donating space and time to. The primary site is on my webserver using Joomla with links to Google Sites for projects like the upcoming Tradeshow. This approach allows for quick implementation and presentation of information for chamber projects without major webdesign project on the main site. I simply include a menu link to the Tradeshow on my main Joomla site and back to the Chamber site from the Google Sites page with similar theme and it seems to work ok.

Finally, a word on Social Media .. Google+ vs Twitter vs Facebook. Still find it awkward to use successfully. I would like to use my multiple personalities but these sites want only to know the actual me. I would like to post as Magrath Chamber when acting as their spokesperson and as Soft Serve Direct when wearing my business hat and only as R Davies when posting my own family news. Similar problem with email: I have Gmail accounts for all these same entities. To their credit, Google is making recent strides in letting me ‘switch identity’ as needed between my various email accounts.

Meanwhile, my webdesign efforts are much like my kindergarten art projects - various interesting pieces of information glued together in awkward ways with occasional missing links, that once in a while could be considered a masterpiece (by my mom).

Is my blog working?

2012-01-01T10:12:00.000-08:00

ismyblogworking.com Is your webpage/blog working? How do you know? Veronica Belmont of tekzilla.com has shown us the way .. again. She reported a new free utility website called ismyblogworking.com that checks for you and reports back all sorts of neat techie info. You just enter in the site you want to check on their main page, or append it to the end for a quick shortcut e.g. ismyblogworking.com/magrath-ab.net/news/blog

Yay .. along the same lines, I like the whatismyip.com website which is extremely handy if you need to know what IP address (kinda like a call display number to the web) you are using. You need this info if you want two computers to find and talk directly to each other over the internet. It is also a quick and easy way to see if your internet connection is still working.

And if it is working .. just how fast is it? Go to speedtest.net for a free utility to measure how long it takes to upload and download a test file. Cool.

Now, how can they afford to provide free services like these? I don't know, but I like using them. Perhaps is is a public service provided by a beneficent business who make their money in other ways .. kind of like the content on this website.

Ratings You Can Use

2011-11-08T07:17:00.000-08:00

Family Movie Time?

Check out kids-in-mind.com (http://www.kids-in-mind.com). It provides parents and other adults with objective and complete information about a film's content so that they can decide, based on their own value system, whether they should watch a movie with or without their kids. It's like a food labeling system which tells you what a food item contains. It is a reliable, content-based alternative to the confusing MPAA (US) movie ratings.

You may also find http://parentpreviews.com/in-theaters of use. Family Movie Reviews, Movie Ratings & More .. links to Expert Studies, Articles and Reviewer Blogs. Only rates movies less than R ratings.

They Googled my Van in Magrath, AB

2010-04-01T07:21:00.000-07:00

I be googled! My daughter informed me today that her friend saw our van in front of my mother-in-laws house on Google Maps. Apparently last spring the Google cam-van was here and I never knew. No one tells me anything.

Googled

To see what YOUR house looked like last year, you can go to Google Maps and drag the little person icon to your street. Street view lets you navigate the same paths the cam-van took and you can look around and up at each point. Click the while arrow heads on the white path line to move along the streets. Click the blue arrow heads on the compass icon to rotate left/right or look up/down. Click the +/- below the compass to zoom in/out. Also, in the mini map at lower right you can move to other streets by dragging the person icon around. Neato.

So go to maps.google.com and search for Magrath, Canada. That should get you to the current map of Magrath or just click here to view our town on Google Maps