How To Stop Unwanted Solicitation of your Browsing History

I've known for awhile that the css :visited property on elements can allow me or others to detect whether or not a certain link has been visited by the user on the other end of a browser.

What I didn't realize is that the browsers have already done things to help us out. If you can forego the need for links you've already visited to change color or background, then the safest option is to turn off visited links. What The Internet Knows About You describes both the underlying issue and some of the possible preventative measures. My favorite...

Firefox 3.5 users will be happy to learn that their browser has a configuration option which disables visited links. To enable it, type in about:config in the address bar and set the layout.css.visited_links_enabled option to False.

I'd much rather remember which links i visit, than have to discard my browsing history and lose the awesome bar.

Amazon 2 Day Shipping Free

I was happy to see how easy this worked out on checkout. If you're like me and just want the free 2 day shipping, don't be scared. You can go into your amazon account immediately and choose a setting to end your free trial.

It's easy to sign up for all the free trials, but normally not so easy to quit. So if you're struggling shutting of your new Amazon Prime free trial because you don't want to fork over $79.

You can manage your Amazon Prime settings by going down the lefthand navigation into Amazon Exclusives. Then click the orange manage my membership button in the lower right. Then click the Do Not Upgrade button and turn off auto upgrade.

So now you got some free 2 day shipping even if you're not interested in Amazon Prime. Thanks Amazon :)

Stand Up for your Right to Healthcare Data

Just heard about HealthDataRights.org today.

This organization is trying to help progress our ability to and rights to our data. The healthcare system needs reform and this is the most important step of them all. Give the patients their data for free or minimal cost.

Give us our data.

Appengine + Django 1.1

So i got past my previous post with a different cell phone number. Now I know getting an appengine account is a more difficult than most online accounts. It makes sense too given free website hosting is at stake.

Anyhow, after a short time i was able to get django 1.1 up and running on appengine. For a little clarity, this provides all the glory of django templates, urls.py, middleware, forms, settings. But because of the big table db implementation of appengine, the admin tool, auth, session, and anything else built-in and dependent on django models will not work.

I found some other blogs that were close, but none of the step by steps worked for me. I followed instructions found at goole python libraries - django.

Since i learn best from code, I checked a basic project into github that i'll continue to update on git as i make updates.

Browse the code on git.

Best Chocolate Chip Cookies

Back before Christmas, i made some chocolate chip cookies off that used pudding as an ingreadient. They were unbelievable! Don't be scared by the pudding. The texture of these cookies was fantastic and they kept their moist deliciousness for two weeks.

You're probably wondering...if they're so good, why did it take two weeks to eat them? Well, my wife gave up sweets to prepare for christmas, so i saved her a few cookies. Nothing special to keep them, two weeks in a cookie jar and dropped them in a gift bag.

Enough already...here's the recipe - Award Winning Soft Chocolate Chip Cookies

I went for chocolate pudding and a little extra vanilla. Eat up!

HTC Hero Review

I've had the HTC Hero from Sprint for about a month now and i've had enough time to digest all the features.

Advantages:
1. Extremely well integrated with twitter, facebook, and flickr.
2. Very flexible customization with seven pages of personalized layout
3. No keyboard means lightweight and small (I've no problems using the touchscreen keyboard)
4. Phone, especially Speaker Phone, work better than my old LG phone.

Cons:
1. Shaky software. i.e. Alarm Clock crashes instead of alarming and calendar app crashes.
2. Advanced Task Killer App is needed to control usage and save battery life ( couldn't android have a built in way to kill apps?)

All in all, I love this phone. My wife has the samsung moment and my preference is definitely for the hero over the moment.

Appengine Disappoints

So i got excited a couple weeks ago about appengine and how easy it could make hosting a simple domain. And i am still excited....but there are some major usability issues with the way they allow you to sign up for appengine accounts.

First thing they require is that you verify via SMS. Okay no problem. right. Unless you're me, then apparently they can't send a message to my sprint phone. Then the form confuses me by making it look like i submitted a different carrier (SouthernLink Wireless) making me try multiple times.

Then i do some web searches to find that not only are other people struggling with the same issue, but their security only allows one account to one phone. Therefore if you play around with appengine using your gmail account, you're screwed if you buy a domain name, sign up for google apps, and then want to host a site with appengine.

This is an embarrassment to google. A company who i was a real fanboy of until recently( see eric schmidt on privacy to learn when i dropped my fanboy stance).

PhoneGap Initial Thoughts

Phonegap a big success. I tried out phonegap for android this morning. Those guys at nitobi have done a great thing for web devs wanting to write mobile apps.

Check them out on Twitter @phonegap

Warner TD Ruled Lateral & My Fantasy Season Is Crazy

http://fantasy.foxsports.com/fantasy/football/commissioner?nicmp=FANFIX&nichn=FFB&niseg=TXTLNK

So i had lost in the semifinals 126-119 and given up all hope. Then, midweek the nfl changes the ruling on kurt warner's td and my opponent dropped back 7 points making it a tie. I won in the tiebreaker sending me to the super bowl.

Only problem...i didn't know it had happened and i failed to set my lineup for the Super Bowl. I lost...obviously. Peyton got benched and two of my starters should have been swapped out.

Not sure how to fix this...is there a setting somewhere to get real time updates from the NFL when they make an official scoring change?

I believe in Santa Claus

My wife and i had this debate a little before christmas so i'll share my point of view.

The retail industry has made a mockery out of christmas and trumped up santa to the point where many people are stressed out, frustrated, and sick of christmas. Many Christian groups are calling for devout followers to give up the tradition entirely; i disagree.

Santa claus is a great metaphor for what Christmas is all about. Santa claus is God and the metaphor flows easily from there. All those tales about the naughty list and gifts of coal never pan out in the end. Santa brings gifts and glad tidings to all. Likewise, we christians believe that God gave his son to all, sinner and saint, that we may achieve salvation through him.

With this understanding, santa claus is a great tradition. It is unfortunate how often this goes overlooked and unless we teach our children this metaphor, santa will continue to be seen as just another part of the modern decadence.

Remember, all things in moderation.

Android Website Development Anyone?

I know chrome runs on android and i've got no problems running the emulator with the sdk. But where are the tutorials to help us make a website run well on the android browser?

something like this one for the iphone....http://www.engageinteractive.co.uk/blog/2008/06/19/tutorial-building-a-website-for-the-iphone/

Google Fade In

Anybody notice google behaving strange lately?

Seems that google is trying an experiment with their search page. Extreme focus is placed on the search box with google's logo as the only other thing on the screen for awhile, and then all the familiars come in after a second or two.

Here's a google forum discussing:

http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Web%20Search/thread?tid=70ca8ab28e3df1ae&hl=en

Personally, even though it may look good, I hate it. I don't want things coming and going on a page based off timing events. I actually go to google.com and access other parts of my google persona from the navigation that's there...i've never once been distracted by this navigation when trying to perform a search. please take it away!

Obama Bows Again

Is our president serious? First the king of Saudi Arabia, now the emperor of Japan. At least now we know it isn't only Islam, but apparently any foreign head of state? That's a relief...well, not really.

What a joke!

Google App Engine

So i just recently began playing around with google app engine for the first time.

Let me list the reasons this platform is great for starting up a web site

• no capital needed
• python ( i know, i know, they now support java...)
• easiest way to get a site live to the world
• will it scale? only if it needs to...and only if i can pay for it...fine by me
  

Digital Photos Orientation

If the cameras know that they're horizontal/vertical when you're taking a picture, why aren't the pictures oriented correctly when i upload them to my computer?