Recently in geek stuff Category

Or, in this case, a complete reformat and 114 Windows updates.

I just completed a 'restoration' job on a laptop. What was supposed to be a quick installation of MS Office at a Starbucks turned into a 4 hour nightmare, followed up by me taking the man's laptop home. After a Knoppix LiveCD (indispensable, IMHO) to save the data, pulling the hard drive and reformatting, then installing the OS from scratch, this Toshiba Tecra 9100 runs as good as new. Actually, better than new, since I tweaked the BIOS a bit.

Oh, and I placed a trade for over 20 million dollars today. But the laptop excited me more. Is that sad?

Geek on, my friends. Geek on.

By now, email has become a primary method of communication. In our personal lives, email makes it possible for ongoing conversations between friends and family, who are more and more stretched across the country and the world. Gosh, I remember the days of using AOL 2.7 on my old Macintosh Performa. Seems like a decade ago…oh wait. It was. Those emails were few and far between, and the structure and flow went just about everywhere.

But as I grew up and joined the business world, I can see how this cavalier attitude, coupled with an older generation attempting to learn new technology, has created a wasteland of bad emails. Writing a business email shouldn't be difficult, nor should it end up being the mess that many of our inboxes are filled with. By now, we should all know the basics: don't blindly use "reply all", use your spell check, use a standard font type and color, etc. But what about the rest? Here's a few things to remember:

4. Attach nothing, unless absolutely required – We all know the risks involved with viruses in email attachments. This goes hand in hand with the idea of brevity. What's worse than reading a 3 page email on a Blackberry? Trying to read a 10 page PDF. While there are times where the file is required, don't just attach them with a simple "see attached" message, unless you're on the phone with the person and they're waiting for it. It's always a good idea to give people an idea what is in the attachment, if they're in a situation where they can't immediately access the file.

5. Use the signatures – Most companies use Microsoft Outlook as an email client. If that's the case, then use the functions! One of them is allowing for multiple signatures. I have my default signature, but I also use about 10 others. I've incorporated some "standard" responses into signatures, and using a quick right-click over an email signature will give you a list of all the ones you've created. You can even go as far as to include company logos. Simple, effective, and saves a lot of wasted time typing the same things over and over again. Also, depending on what your business is, you may want (or be required) to include a disclaimer or other policy statement.

Sorry for the lack of blogging. It's been quite a month. Between my wife and I both getting sick, her taking the Florida Bar Exam (because she's fucking awesome), and my son cutting some teeth, I've barely had time to breathe.

I've come to the conclusion that, more often than not, I don't play nice with others in the workplace. While I'm an overall fun guy, good group of friends, and enjoy explaining and teaching most things, I found my weakness: dealing with uninterested people. In specific, people who (a) ask a question, (b) ignore the response, then (c) continue asking questions. I spent about 45 minutes on the phone with a woman today explaining the account numbering system (accounts held in the trust company have multiple numbers, due to reasons I won't bore you with). Well, after about the 5th explanation, I could see she just wasn't listening.

I realized, right then and there, that I am not cut out for Corporate America. And that probably won't change.

Now, I'm going anywhere. I haven't quit my job, nor have I attempted to sabotage my situation in the hopes of getting fired. Actually, I'm doing quite well. I've been solving problems and putting out fires left and right. I've been commended numerous times on my quick thinking and problem solving. And, all things being equal, the nice office with the window and door, the respect I've gotten from (some) of the people I work with, and the seemingly endless opportunity to endear myself to higher-ups is enjoyable. But I can't shake the feeling that, sooner or later, I'm not going to bite my tongue when I should and let my naturally sarcastic nature show its somewhat mean face to the wrong person. It's gonna happen. So I've begun preparing.

I've started my own business. Reboot Computer Systems & Web Design is my new venture. It makes so much sense it hurts. For years I've told myself that I shouldn't get a computer-related job, because then I wouldn't like them anymore. So what better way to test that theory than do it, while still enjoying the benefits of my "real" job? I've already made a few dollars on some jobs, and I'm currently in the process of rebuilding a 600 page site for someone. That's word of mouth advertising right there! I even bought a used rackmount server (making 6 machines, plus 2 smartphones running Windows Mobile 6.0), and I'm in the process of turning my garage / cigar room into a workstation of sorts.

So this blog may start taking a turn into my experience with starting a one-man business. Worse thing that could happen? Nothing. Best bet? The business takes off, and I can actually work for myself, doing something I actually enjoy and have a passion for.

Ryan Paugh over at Employee Evolution recently posted some tips for new bloggers. What he mentions (contact info, RSS feeds, and search functions) seemed strange. Not because they are bad ideas, but because I thought that was automatic. But as I went and looked at more and more blogs, I saw what he was talking about. While there are some fantastic sites out there, some are just crap. So to carry the torch, so to speak, here are some additional tips & tricks I've found to be relevant. Keep in mind, these are all based on the assumption that (a) you already have an idea of what you want to blog about and (b) you own a computer. If you don't have those, then I can't help you. I'm certainly no muse.

What are your plans for the blog? What blogging platform are you going to use? Where / how will it be hosted? Custom domain name? Individual or multiple users? Content other than the actual blog? These are all questions that need to be answered before you start sharing with the world.

• Decide on a domain and a hosting structure

For me, this was pretty easy. I built and maintain my own server, so I contacted my hosting company (me) and worked out a deal with my blog user (me) and we all agreed that it would go well. I purchased a domain name via GoDaddy, because they were the only name that I could remember. Advertising works, what can I say. And I've actually found them to be pretty good, both on the customer service route and the DNS record setup (geek stuff). Google offers a "custom domain" service that I used for a while. Basically, you buy the name, but Google still hosts the data on their servers.

While this did work for me, I wanted more hosting functionality since I actually OWNED my server. People who actually have to pay hosting fees have a difference decision to make, since they have to pay money. So I was left with two viable choices: Movable Type and Wordpress. Which brings me to my next point.

• Decide on a platform and stick with it

Other than a LiveJournal from years ago, and a few MySpace blog entries here and there, I didn't have much experience in blogging. Since I'm a big fan of Google, I thought that their Blogger platform would be just fine. And, for you basic blog, it is. Frankly, any of the free options (Blogger, TypePad, Wordpress) will work just fine with little effort. But if you plan on doing anything more with it, the free options may not be enough. Now, you can always get started, and then migrate when things start growing. But from my experience, that's a real hassle.

Now, from what I gather, Wordpress is used quite a bit in the blogging community. Granted, I wouldn't know. I use Movable Type. And I came to that decision for one main reason: Wordpress didn't work on my server. Without getting too geek on everyone, here's the short story: It involves almost an act of god to get Wordpress working on a Windows-based server running IIS. And I tried, dammit did I try. But it was to no avail. After 2 weeks of installing, configuring, forum reading, and overall fist pounding, I was no farther along than I had been when I started. And I didn't feel like completely rebuilding my server using Linux and / or Apache Web Server. So I installed Movable Type, MySQL, and a few plugins, and I was ready to go.

• Think about your design

Yes, they have default templates. But unless your blog is basic and you're not expecting many readers, don't use them. Yes, they're easier. That's the best reason NOT to use them. Take some time, see what the different parts do, how the modules interact, and then start the design. I went and looked at a lot of blogs to get design ideas. Not to rip them off, but to see layout schemes. And Rebecca Thorman orver at Modite was nice enough to critique my blog setup once I had finished. Which brings me to...

• Avoid the urge to use all the bells and whistles
  

More isn't better. Cramming as much information you can into a single page only makes people want to read it less. If you have a decent amount of "about me" information, create a separate page for it and link to it. The calendar on the main page? I still don't know the reason, unless you're a band on tour. And while the lure of advertising dollars sounds great, try to keep it to a minimum. In my blogging time, I've generated a whole $0.26, so unless you're HUGE, don't think it's going to amount to much other than a cup of coffee every 5 years or so. So avoid the glitter and rotating GIFs, please. The last thing you want to do is have people confuse your blog with a 14 year old girl's MySpace page.

• Tell everyone what's there

Buttons are your friend. They make life easier. There's even a free website that will make buttons for you that you can save and use on your site. I have one for the "About Me" section, my email, my LinkedIn profile, and the RSS feed. Nice and easy to find. The archives, search tool, and categories are also listed, but smaller and further down the page.

• Test, test, test

I can't stress this enough. Once you've got your layout and design set up, write two or three quick "test" posts. Make sure to include whatever functions (tags, categories, keywords, etc) that you plan on using going forward. Once the posts are done, look at it. Then look at it again. Then look at it in another web browser (sites often times look different in IE than they do in Firefox, and I'm sure Safari is the same way). The have a friend at another location check it, preferably on another operating system (Macs & PCs NEVER act the same. Ever). Then...well, you get my point. You can't test it enough. Check all your links and your contact info. See how your page looks in an RSS feeder (I happen to use iGoogle). Because buttons that don't work or layouts that drastically change in different settings (archive vs. main page, etc) just reek of unprofessionalism.


Just like anything else in life, the more effort and care that it put in on the front end will save numerous hours and headaches later on. So do the research, create a plan, and follow through. Oh, and have something worth saying.