solrevdev

Moving my website away from Blogger

2016-07-06T15:45:00.001+01:00

I've migrated this blog away to a GitHub hosted Jekyll driven static website.

The new blog is now hosted here.

http://www.solrevdev.com/2016/07/06/my-new-jekyll-git-website/

Cheers John

full-time carer and very very amateur boxer

2016-02-15T21:29:00.001+00:00

So this is just a little placeholder for a blog post I want to write about my transition from being a full-time developer and DevOps guy into being a full-time carer for my elderly mother and my brother who had a stroke. And how going teetotal learning how to box and clean eating has changed my life for the better.

I still like to program with C# but now using a Mac and Xamarin Studio, Write front-end code using sublime text and still like to play with Amazon Web services, technology like Docker, etc.

I listen to podcasts about technology and software and still read lots of blogs about code infrastructure and all things development, tech and DevOps.

But now I also subscribe to boxing and mixed martial arts podcasts and took a keen interest in fighting and clean eating and living.

It has helped me physically and mentally, and I want to write a lengthier blog post about this when I have time.

I haven't written a blog post for a very long time, so this will have to do for now!

12 more likes and I've hit the 100 mark! I would love some help hitting that milestone so if you have any friends that would like what i post here please do share the page please X

2016-01-19T23:21:00.001+00:00

Solrevdev Tech Radar http://ift.tt/1ELo697

Pomodoro and Bulleted Lists

2015-11-27T10:14:00.001+00:00

Productivity and moving away from App Todo Lists

I have tried them all, every new app or system and always digital. Some better than others and some work well but do not sync across devices or lose data. And I always have the feeling that an analogue (paper!) system might suit me better.

At the very least it would not run out of battery and my handwriting since I became a programmer would put a doctor to shame.

So after a stressfull week leaving me behind with goals and feeling pressured with everthing I decided to utilise the flow mentioned in one of the posts I am about to link to that will help me get stuff done and feel good about it.

The two methods essentially are using the flow that the pomodoro technique will give me

http://lifehacker.com/the-bullet-journal-productivity-method-empowers-your-pa–1169313228

And the second here is how to set up a paper todo and project management list on paper

https://medium.com/life-learning/how-to-work–40-hours-in–16–7-the-simple-technique-that-gave-me-my-life-back–8f98ec011862#.crp5szwdq

November 26, 2015 at 05:38PM

2015-11-26T19:08:00.003+00:00

i wrote a blog post about responsive logo design. http://ift.tt/1NwmJ27
http://ift.tt/1ELo697

i wrote a blog post about responsive logo design. http://ift.tt/1NwmJ27

2015-11-26T19:08:00.001+00:00

Solrevdev Tech Radar http://ift.tt/1ELo697

Responsive Logos

2015-11-26T17:15:00.001+00:00

Responsive Design and Responsive Logos are important right now. Google likes mobile friendly sites and me personally I probably browse more websites on a mobile or tablet than I do on a laptop or desktop hooked up to one or more large monitors.

I haven't won this battle personally yet proof being that my own blog (Google blogger based) http://solrevdev.com doesn't handle this too well by the fact I don't have a logo as such and it has too many words and therefore doesn't respond!

So not being a designer it's something I am trying to learn and adapt to even though i could shield myself away as being a "DevOps" guy or a "Developer".

But I've always cared about the front end .The front end is the application for the user not the super fast IOC container or funky ORM framework being used.

So with that in mind I'll try and find things on the web to help websites snap and look right when "responding" to device screen real estate.

Here is the first useful link but I shall probably find an expert on

https://uk.fiverr.com to do this for me :)

That said here is a good link to get me started:

http://justcreative.com/2015/11/19/the-problem-of-the-logo-in-a-responsive-design-world/

Dropbox Paper Invite

2015-11-18T22:00:00.001+00:00

So it's been a while since I've posted here. I've been busy looking after family and trying to get back into boxing and health recently.

Anyway what's shiny?

Dropbox have given me access to the beta program Dropbox Paper.

So hold tight for a review soon. I'll try and do a better review than my last techie review which i think was an Amazon AWS review.

Mac OSX Terminal Permissions Issues

2015-10-06T16:39:00.002+01:00

So with Node Package Manager, HomeBrew, PIP and various other package managers that throw errors on my aging development Mac the following rightly or wrongly fixes most if not all of the issues.

I am posting here to save me searching every day for the syntax and answer

sudo chown -R :admin /usr/local

Numi ‒ Beautiful calculator app for Mac

2015-09-21T05:12:00.000+01:00

I use Soulver on the Mac/iOS to do natural language style calculations on my finances and software startup ideas and bootstrapping costs but there is a new similar application that's worth having a look at and that's Numi - The beautiful calculator app for Mac

http://numi.io/

Amazon Web Services goes down, taking Netflix, Reddit, Pocket and more with it

2015-09-21T05:06:00.001+01:00

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Amazon Web Services goes down, taking Netflix, Reddit, Pocket and more with it
// The Next Web - International technology news, business & culture

If you're having trouble accessing several parts of the Web today, it's because Amazon Web Services is having a bit of a glitch this morning. A server issue in Virginia is affecting most of the northeast, killing the infrastructure for many popular products and services including Netflix, Product Hunt, Medium, SocialFlow, Buffer, GroupMe, Pocket, Viber Amazon Echo and more. The outage occurred around 6 AM ET. Amazon DynamoDB goes down. Takes down Netflix, Amazon Instant Video, Nest, Medium, Mediacom, IMDB, and 21 other AWS services. Ouch. — Adrian Jimenez (@AdrianJimenez) September 20, 2015 At The Next Web, we use SocialFlow as our tool…

This story continues at The Next Web

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3 Small Discipline Habits You Can Train

2015-09-08T23:04:00.001+01:00

3 Small Discipline Habits You Can Train
// Zen Habits

By Leo Babauta
While I'm not a fan of trying to be disciplined every moment of the day, there's no doubt most of us could use a little more discipline in our lives.
We procrastinate, we waste time with online distractions, we go an entire day without getting done what we really wanted to get done.
How do we overcome this?
With training. Practice small, effective habits, and practice some more. Don't expect yourself to be perfect at skills if you don't repeatedly, deliberately practice.
If you want to get good at these skills, don't worry about not being motivated. Just enjoy the joy of practicing something that you can get good at. It's amazing when you're learning something new, and that wonderful feeling is what can motivate you.
What should you practice? Three simple skills that can be turned into habits with repeated practice.

The 3 Small Discipline Habits
The habits that work for me are all about talking to myself:

Tell yourself, "This is what I'm going to do next.". Instead of having a long to-do list of things you want to do today, have just one thing you want to do right now. Instead of saying you're going to do this important task sometime, say you're going to do it right now. Instead of allowing yourself to randomly open websites that give you distraction, deliberately figure out what you want to work on next. Pick one thing. It doesn't matter what it is, but try for things that are important in your life.

Ask yourself, "What is the smallest step I can do?". Most of us look at something on our (mental or digital or paper) list and subconsciously think, "That's too hard." So we put it off. But that's because we're thinking about an entire project, which has many tasks. You can't do a project right now, you can only do a task. Instead of saying, "I'm going to write that paper that's due," you should say, "I'm going to write 3 things in the outline of the paper." If the smallest task stills seems too hard, say you're just going to do 5 minutes of that small task right now. Or just two minutes. Make it ridiculously easy.

Ask yourself, "What is stopping me from focusing on that small step?. Even if you figured out a task to focus on, and you've broken it into the smallest step, there will still be distractions or resistance. If you're not immediately doing the smallest step of the next task, ask yourself why. What's stopping you? Can you resolve this issue, close all browser tabs, shut off your phone, ask co-workers or roommates or family members to give you 30 minutes of focused time? Can you ask for help, get some accountability? The easiest solution is usually to close all distractions. Then get moving on the smallest step.

Once you've done that, repeat this process two more times, taking a few minutes' break between each round. Then take 20 minutes off as a reward. That's your training session. If you can do several training sessions a day, you'll get good at this in no time. And as you get good, the cost of doing anything will begin to seem miniscule.

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Raising money for cancer research UK by going booze free for a month.

2015-09-03T21:17:00.002+01:00

So I have joined the #dryathalon movement where people give up booze for a month and raise money that goes to cancer research UK.

I'm posting this as my own father died of cancer and also suffered from cirrhosis of the liver due to alcohol so it has personal meaning to me but also I am trying to lose weight for health reasons and to get fitter for my boxing training where I am aiming to take part in some white collar boxing again for charity.

I would appreciate any donations you can afford. If not why not do something similar yourselves.

Do some good and get healthy at the same time.

Thanks for your time.

Cheers!
+John Smith

#boxing #fitness #cancerresearch

Windows 10 will not run on this PC" error due to the issue with Parallels Display Adapter (WDDM)

2015-08-07T05:47:00.001+01:00

Not sure if I will upgrade for free yet but here is the article and downloads on how to fix the error

How to upgrade my virtual machine to Windows 10?

Microsoft Certified Professional

2014-07-23T02:07:00.001+01:00

Longer than I thought I passed some Microsoft Developer Exams and just received an email to login to keep them valid.

So I thought i would share my qualifications with friends, strangers and colleagues.

I need to provide my Transcript ID (670391) and the Access Code (microsoftmcp), and direct you to https://mcp.microsoft.com/Anonymous//Transcript/Validate

And here is a the PDF version of the transcript

apple-developer-program-renewal

2014-07-21T03:14:00.001+01:00

Apple Developer Program Renewal

So ive just renewed my Xamarin Indie subscription so it was time to do the same with my Apple Developer Program as well.
Not a cheap month software wise but both are for a year and this will be the year I publish a few apps to the store both Mac and iOS.

xamarin-upgrade

2014-07-18T18:24:00.001+01:00

Hooked on Xamarin Studio / Monodevelop / ServiceStack

So one year later my indie subscription to the Xamarin Indie product was expiring . An ide to rival Microsoft Visual Studio, uses my language of choice c# and allows me to build web, console, services and apps all cross platform.

It hurts paying for software sure but I am now more comfortable on a Mac in Xamarin building all sorts or cross platform goodness with .NET and just testing on a windows virtual machines.

Add in the well thought out ServiceStack framework and various open source peojects and when my subscription reminder came round it was an easy decision to make.

Compare to an MSDN license for example..

The other thing of note was chatting to a WPF dev the other day and while we both loved MVVM and the language and various other Microsoft tooling, when i explained i was using the same language to deliver cross platform apps from a Mac and still getting a blank stare shows how much more Xamarin can offer.

Big fan. you have my cash again this year as does ServiceStack

amazon-zocalo

2014-07-18T04:25:00.001+01:00

Amazon Zocalo

While busy coding away on some API endpoints and refactoring some code and making some schema changes, I realised I had not opened my email client all day and after a quick scan for anything requiring my immediate attention I noticed that Amazon had given me early access to the new Zocalo product.

First thoughts

Initially I thought this is Dropbox with Sharepoint and that with web, mobile apps, Windows and Mac clients with promises of browser plugins this could be pretty cool.
“Amazon Zocalo is a fully managed, secure enterprise storage and sharing service with strong administrative controls and feedback capabilities that improve user productivity.”
Intro Video

Benefits

typical amazon storage in the cloud
low cost initially if you are a start up for example
easy to get started
most importantly active directory support

Active Directory

Amazon Zocalo can integrate with your existing Active Directory. This means that your users can easily access Amazon Zocalo using their existing Active Directory credentials. This is a big win for the enterprise.

Amazon Workspaces

Not 100 percent sure but when linked to Amazon Workspaces you could have a team all working on a Windows 7 experience with office apps and Zocola.

More later when not as busy!

In the meantime have a read of the docs and look at some screenshots of the iPad app. Ok break over back to the code!
Documentation
Screenshots

CloudCheckr Review

2014-06-12T15:42:00.001+01:00

So as I’ve progressed to living in the Visual Studio and Microsoft Windows eco system to using a Mac and Xamarin building cross platform apps to also being a head of devops and using the Amazon Web Services Cloud to setup 3 new start ups now there have been some tools and services that have stayed with me and improved and been a vital part of my toolbox.
CloudCheckr is one such tool and has come on in leaps and bounds since I started using it for a single use case back in the day so I thought I would post about this application and what it did for me then. I went from the free use teir to a paid one I think its that good even though I am just using it to monitor some personal projects.

Best Practices

My first and still an important use case as I was getting to know AWS was best practises. Is my cloud setup secure, available and am I under or over usage?
This was and is still a very useful tool as it’s easy to forget to lock something down or forget that you fire up 1000 servers somewhere as a test.
Have I left ports open? Having a service send you best practises is worth every penny spent.

Spend Optimization

This was next up once I knew things were secure. Getting warning and potential cost savings especially important with start ups was invaluable.

More Features

Since then they have added new features which are explained better on their website so I shall finish by just linking off to them and suggest you give them a free trial you will not be disappointed.

Home Page

Cost Allocation

Resource Reporting

You Tube Video

amazon-workspaces-review

2014-05-07T02:40:00.001+01:00

Amazon Workspaces

So during an insomniac night I had a play with Amazon’s new workspaces feature that provides a fully managed virtual desktop experience fully controlled from their web based console.
Being a long term but ex windows guy now I am quite interested in the possibilities of pay as you go and more active directory linked virtualised machines now provided by Amazon for testing and one off tasks but the value for everyone from one man operations to something much larger are clear.
They have a very good Workspaces intro
With more detailed information available
So using the closet data centre to me I created a workspace using the web console by providing a username and email address and about 20 minutes later it was provisioned and I got the intro email with all the information I needed to connect to my instance.

Once I followed the instructions and entered the password I got to download the client from this page

Being on a mac I downloaded and installed the mac installer and was soon connected to a very fast desktop client machine.

A very nice experience indeed Not the most complete test but it is very late and I am very tired right now. More later on this new and shiny feature.

build-failed-could-not-find-type-system-globalization-sortversion

2014-05-05T19:04:00.001+01:00

Yak Shaving

In the middle of quite a few bug fixes and some heavy refactoring of some early code and this is where I have ended up. Time for some food and a break I think!

Build failed. Could not find type ‘System.Globalization.SortVersion’

There seems to be a post on stackoverflow about the issue so I’ll take a look next up.

http://stackoverflow.com/questions/23448795/build-failed-could-not-find-type-system-globalization-sortversion

microsoft-remote-desktop

2014-05-05T18:51:00.001+01:00

Microsoft Remote Desktop for Mac

So while I wait for the latest Xamarin Studio to install and a remote windows machine to restart I thought I would test out Byword as I am a huge Markdown fan and use it for all text that isnt code although thats possible too.

I use IA Writer, Mou, Day One and now I am trialling ByWord as it hooks into Blogger and Wordpress and a few more.

I use a Mac these days but for 12 years I was a Microsoft Guy and still need to use Microsoft machines and up until now I have been using the old version that looks like this

It sort of worked but now I am using the latest version it’s a treat to use. Especially on a Thunderbolt display, Go get it now!

I’ll leave the links up to the reader to google as my machines should have restarted now and Xamarin has updated!

Opserver – Stack Exchange’s open source .NET monitoring system

2013-11-07T13:06:00.001+00:00

A good find from jokecamp - a windows specific set of monitoring tools for the DevOps guys built and open sourced by the stackoverflow team.

"This is a repository to keep your eye on. I can easily see it become the devops dashboard of choice for .NET environments."

Just spotted Opserver – Stack Exchange’s open source .NET monitoring system | Joe's Code:

Every upgrade of iTunes on windows I need to fix sqlite3 error

2013-11-06T11:03:00.001+00:00

So everytime there is a new version of iTunes I always have to fix an sqlite3 error. So to tell help me and anyone else with the same issue here is the solution I found on the following helpful page:

First the error is "The procedure entry point sqlite3_wal_checkpoint could not be located in the dynamic link library SQLite3.dll."

And the fix: Hummie's World of Digital Scrapbooking Tutorials: iTunes sqlite3 dll error - How to Fix

Create a Virtual Tape Library Using the AWS Storage Gateway

2013-11-06T04:21:00.001+00:00

This looks interesting ...

Shared via feedly // published on Amazon Web Services Blog // visit site

The AWS Storage Gateway connects an on-premises software appliance with cloud-based storage to integrate your on-premises IT environment with the AWS storage infrastructure.

Once installed and configured, each Gateway presents itself as one or more iSCSI storage volumes. Each volume can be configured to be Gateway-Cached (primary data stored in Amazon S3 and cached in the Gateway) or Gateway-Stored (primary data stored on the Gateway and backed up to Amazon S3 in asynchronous fashion).

Roll the Tape
Today we are making the Storage Gateway even more flexible. You can now configure a Storage Gateway as a Virtual Tape Library (VTL), with up to 10 virtual tape drives per Gateway. Each virtual tape drive responds to the SCSI command set, so your existing on-premises backup applications (either disk-to-tape or disk-to-disk-to-tape) will work without modification.

Virtual tapes in the Virtual Tape Library will be stored in Amazon S3, with 99.999999999% durability. Each Gateway can manage up to 1,500 virtual tapes or a total of 150 TB of storage in its Virtual Tape Library.

Virtual tapes in the Virtual Tape Library can be mounted to a tape drive and become accessible in a matter of seconds.

For long term, archival storage Virtual Tape Libraries are integrated with a Virtual Tape Shelf (VTS). Virtual tapes on the Virtual Tape Shelf will be stored in Amazon Glacier, with the same durability, but at a lower price per gigabyte and a longer retrieval time (about 24 hours). You can easily move your virtual tapes to your Virtual Tape Shelf, by simply ejecting them from the Virtual Tape Library using your backup application.

The virtual tapes are stored in a secure and durable manner. Amazon S3 and Amazon Glacier both make use of multiple storage facilities, and were designed to maintain durability even if two separate storage facilities fail simultaneously. Data moving from your Gateway to and from the AWS cloud is encrypted using SSL; data stored in S3 and Glacier is encrypted using 256-bit AES.

Farewell to Tapes and Tape Drives
As you should be able to tell from my description above, the Storage Gateway, when configured as a Virtual Tape Library, is a complete, plug-in replacement for your existing physical tape infrastructure. You no longer have to worry about provisioning, maintaining, or upgrading tape drives or tape robots. You don't have to initiate lengthy migration projects every couple of years, and you don't need to mount and scan old tapes to verify the integrity of the data. You can also forget about all of the hassles of offsite storage and retrieval!

In short, all of the headaches inherent in dealing with cantankerous mechanical devices with scads of moving parts simply vanish when you switch to a virtual tape environment. What's more, so does the capital expenditure. You pay for what you use, rather than what you own.

Looks Like Tape, Tastes Like Cloud
Here's a diagram to help you understand the Gateway-VTL concept. Your backup applications believe that they are writing to actual magnetic tapes. In actuality, they are writing data to the Storage Gateway, where it is uploaded to the AWS cloud:

Getting Started
The Gateway takes the form of a virtual machine image that you run on-premises on a VMWare or Hyper-V host. The Storage Gateway User Guide will walk you through the process of installing the image, configuring the local storage, and activating your Gateway using the AWS Management Console:

As part of the activation process, you will specify the type of medium changer and tape drive exposed by the Gateway:

You will need to locate the Virtual Tape Drives in order to use them for backup. The details vary by operating system and backup tool. Here's what the discovery process looks like from the Microsoft iSCSI Initiator running on the system that you use to create backups:

Then you create some virtual tapes:

Backing Up and Managing Tapes
Once you locate the tape drives and tell your backup applications to use them, you can initiate your offsite backup process. You can find your Virtual Tapes in the AWS Management Console:

As you can see, the console provides you with a single, integrated view of all of your Virtual Tapes whether they are in the Virtual Tape Library and immediately accessible, or on the Virtual Tape Shelf, and accessible in about 24 hours.

Gateway in the Cloud
The Storage Gateway is also available as an Amazon EC2 AMI and you can launch it from the AWS Marketplace. There are several different use cases for this:

Perhaps you have migrated (or about to migrate) some on-premises applications to the AWS cloud. You can maintain your existing backup regimen and you can stick with tools that are familiar to you by using a cloud-based Gateway.

You can also use a cloud-based Gateway for Disaster Recovery. You can launch the Gateway and some EC2 instances, and bring your application back to life in the cloud. Take a look at our Disaster Recovery page to learn more about how to implement this scenario using AWS.

Speaking of Disaster Recovery, you can also use a cloud-based Gateway to make sure that you can successfully recover from an incident. You can make sure that your backups contain the desired data, and you can verify your approach to restoring the data and loading it into a test database.

Bottom Line
The AWS Storage Gateway is available in multiple AWS Regions and you can start using it today. Here's what it will cost you:

Each activated gateway costs $125 per month, with a 60-day free trial.
There's no charge for data transfer from your location up to AWS.
Virtual Tapes stored in Amazon S3 cost $0.095 (less than a dime) per gigabyte per month of storage. You pay for the storage that you use, and not for any "blank tape" (so to speak).
Virtual Tapes stored in Amazon Glacier cost $0.01 (a penny) per gigabyte per month of storage. Again, you pay for what you use.
Retrieving data from a Virtual Tape Shelf costs $0.30 per gigabyte. If the tapes that you delete from the Virtual Tape Shelf are less than 90 days old, there is an additional, pro-rated charge of $0.03 per gigabyte.

These prices are valid in the US East (Northern Virginia) Region. Check the Storage Gateway Pricing page for costs in other Regions.

-- Jeff;

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