I've dumped bloglines (too many crazy bugs) and gone back to RSS Bandit. It's been a while since I used it and I'm really pleased with it's progress since then.

My new blog site is still delayed. I can't complain since the price of free hosting is unplanned downtime.

 

The URL will be http://www.philiprichardson.org/blog and the RSS Feed's URL will be http://www.philiprichardson.org/blog/rss.

 

I was tempted to flag this post as 'Microsoft' - but that triggers cross syndication to Microsoft.com.

 

Rory's monkdom is coming to an end - get your free voucher.

I just unsubscribed from Paul Greenberg's blog. The dancing spidermen pushed me over the edge.

 

So I've pretty much completed my new blog software for philiprichardson.org/blog. My hoster is down at the moment while they fix a nasty storage problem (they are free - so I don't expect five nines) so it will go up for pre-production testing next week.

For those interested here is the feature list:

Blog Homepage + Posts etc

Admin Stats

Blog History Page

Create, Update, Delete Posts

RSS Feed

Bloglines OPML integration (seamlessly republishes the bloglines OPML)

Inbound Trackbacks

Outbound Technorati Ping

 

In the end I was too lazy to use the new ASP.NET master pages and their membership provider. I'll probably add this stuff later on. I also need to wire up a decent editor (maybe InfoPath 12) at some point.

I managed to get most of my new website working. The only thing left is the forms security for administration. I was hoping to use NTLM but the config on my web host is causing problems. I enjoyed the new set of controls in ASP.NET 2.0 and I really love the new set of tools around strongly typed datasets. My hoster suffer a massive disk failure this week (can't complain since I host for free) so the site will go up for testing next week and then probably go live the week after.

 

I still need to write the technorati ping and the incoming trackback code.

Unable shake my cold I spent some more time coding today. It's easier to work on personal tech stuff when sick because there are few consequences for mistakes (while writing specs for 'real' products is another story). I also need to be super familar with these technologies - so consider it 'professional development'.

 

I worked a bit more on the web services and data access layer today. I've used Data Readers for most data access - to give me as much speed as possible. The web services layer simply front ends the data layer. Tonight I think I hack through the regular expressions (gotta have that server side validation) and build a load testing harness.

 

The client issue is still bugging me. I don't want to use infopath as I'm not a fan of the XHTML it produces for rich text (at least it produces XHTML which is more than I can say for freaking Windows Forms). I'm considering an Office Add In for Word (maybe a one of those sexy right hand smart pane things) - but office programming seems so - so - so 1990's. I'll check out Expression to see what they have but I'm guessing it's no better than WinForms. The other option is not to build a client but to use those fancy blogging APIs and then use a standard client. Maybe the new Access 12 has something funky - but that is kind of weird - using Access: now that is 1990's.

 

I'm definately using Excel 12 for the analytics :) BTW - that is definite. Mmmm ... maybe I should write a spec....

 

Random Note: I had a dream last night that as an 'icebreaker' for my Convergence presentation I told the Aristocrats.

I've been lazying around at home today (trying to shake the office virus). Instead of indulging in the apostles of American life (Dr Phil, Oprah, Judge Judy and Anderson Cooper) I decided to dive into ASP.NET.

 

Here is my progress so far on my custom blog project:

- Database Tables + Stored Procedures

- RSS Feed Generator

- OPML Feed Generator

- Blog Homepage Rendering

 

Tasks Remaining

- Front End the Stored Procs with Web Services

- CSS File

- Category pages and category feed

- Image processing

- Client app

OK my mind is made up. I'm writing a custom blog (on philiprichardson.org). My days at spaces are now numbered. Yeah - I know it will screw my google rank - blah - blah - blah. But I can always work to get that back.

 

Here are my features I think I'll target:

- Rich Client for the majority of posting/editing. I'm think Avalon powered by some ASP.NET 2.0 web services.

- Simple Web Client for On the Go Blogging.

- RSS Feeds (Categorized and Complete).

- Categories.

- OPML (it is tempting to leave this out just to stir Alex).

- Image managment (maybe using sharepoint integration under the covers). This has the potential to be most complex feature - if auto thumbnailing is entertained.

- Ping Server Notification

- Technorati Tag Support

- Category specific signatures (eg. disclaimers).

- Referrer log

 

Features I don't care about:

- Trackbacks & Ping Backs: I'm so over these.

- Comments: I would prefer people a) comment in their own blog and link to me or b) email me.

- Integrated Search (i'm thinking of a simple response.redirect to search.msn.com - make their database do all the work).

 

I also don't care to make the source code public. I'm a PM not a Dev - so why would you want it anyway!

This article in the Australian IT is well worth the read: http://australianit.news.com.au/articles/0,7204,18341778^15302^^nbv^,00.html

 

I've always found that the 'maturity' level of IT execs is lower than many other fields....

Paint .NET released version 2.6. Paint .NET is a free C# Paint replacement for Windows. Its for users who want 'more' than basic Paint but without the 'full on' features of Photoshop. I use it for all my screenshot and graphics work and I highly recommend it to any Windows user. The app began as a student project at WSU and is now maintained by some of the original devs in their spare time (I think they also work for Microsoft now).

MJM doesn't make mention of MMORPG as SaaS.

 

Let's take an example: World of Warcraft (WoW) has approx 4M subscribers. Each pays approx $15 per month. Add in the cost of the initial purchase ($50) and pretty much have a billion dollar business. The math is close to SF.com at 399K subscribers at $100 (ish) per month.
 

Google's new toolbar search thing is taking a beating from Gartner. There is an interesting quote from Gartner in the article that deserves a mention.

 

"...its mere transport outside the enterprise will represent an unacceptable security risk to many enterprises."

 

Let's ponder that for a moment.

 

Many mashups also suffer from this problem. Sure I'm happy letting some of my info being 'mashed': say if I'm searching for a restaurant or looking to go see a movie.

 

Let's take an example close to home: in the sales force automation space. It would be very easy for a relatively unskilled programmer to write a mashup which took data from a well known on demand CRM company and splice it with another web service (eg. Ebay, Amazon, Virtual Earth, Google Earth, del.icio.us etc). Since the 'splicing' happens on a server outside the control of the crm provider and the end user the attacker has ample opportunity to steal juicy pieces of data (like ... say... all your sales leads ... which could be promptly sold to your competitors). Some of these mashups even ask you for your username/password to the 'well known on demand CRM company' - which means they can go take whatever they want whenever they want it. Now I don't have any evidence that this has actually happened: but good security is about potential threats. Would you give out your Online Banking Login details so someone could do a geographical mashup of your recent credit card purchases?* I don't think so.

 

Where's that Gartner quote again:

 

"...its mere transport outside the enterprise will represent an unacceptable security risk to many enterprises."

 

Let's ponder that again.

 

Now I'm not against mashups (bloody Alex will come burn my house down otherwise) - but some consideration does need to made for security. When you are dealing with your Personal information and with your Enterprise's data: a different level of trust needs to be applied.

Safe mashing!

 

First check out this article: http://newyorkmetro.com/news/media/15972/

 

MSN Spaces is referred to a "rather lame network of blog sites". For a lame network it's doing pretty well to have 25% of the New York Metro's "most-linked-to-50".

 

Furthermore they describe the venerable Fark.com as "A frenetic mix of Star Trek: The Next Generation tidbits and dorky Photoshop contests". When was Fark ever a 'blog' - it's a news aggregator for f^&k's sake and the comment about STTNG/Photoshop is ridiculous.

 

New York Metro: you suck.

I heard an interesting interview on NPR this morning. This guy outlined the following scenarios:

 

a) You obtain a virtual item and then you sell it for cash. I think we we would all agree that you should pay tax on the money from that sale.

 

b) You barter with another player for a virtual item. You exchange items and go your separate ways. Both items have a market value - however no cash changes hands. In the US (and most western countries) the bartering of goods and services is taxable.

 

c) You kill a monster and 'earn' a virtual item. This item has a market value. You now own an asset which you may realise value for. A case could be made that you need to pay tax on the market value of that asset.

 

So now you have the 'goldfarmers' vs RPGs. If I played a MMORPG (I'm considering D&D Online) I wouldn't be interested in buying/selling items - I just want to pay my monthly fee and have fun. I don't want to have to declare a four +1 longswords and deck of many things to my accountant at the end of the year.

All this fuss over the Google Pack. Google Pack is the Merch.

I have a five new invites available for Windows Live Messenger. Email me if you want one. I could sell them on eBay but I'm sure that would be some kind of gross violation of my employment agreement with Microsoft.

There has been a lot of fuss lately about Wikipedia. For a long time I have been an outspoken critic of the site and the growing acceptance of Wikipedia as a legitimate source. Over the last few weeks I've stood by with a smug 'I told you so look' on my face. I'm not eloquent enough to express the problem - but the guys at Penny Arcade certainly are. Check out their take on Wikipedia.

I've got my homebrewed MCE all bedded down now. I ran into some config trouble (mostly my fault) but everything is now stable. I can certainly understand why this is usually OEM only (I have a 'special copy' from work). The radio certainly rocks (much more 'stable' than internet radio) and pausing live radio rocks. I'd love to see the MCE team add more radio features since I actually spend more hours with NPR each week than I do with TV.

I'd love to pull out the #1 rated drive in a meeting (the Barbie USB drive)....

 

 

via Digg.