Doubting Thomas Blog

Archive for the ‘web-2-0’ Category

I use Google’s applications with my domain name WoodsWebDesign.com quite a bit, and I use Gmail separately, so I have noticed that there are some differences in what features are available through those separate services. What I want from Google is for every feature/service that’s available in the low-end version of their free services (i.e., everything that’s offered in Gmail) to be available to users of their mid-range free services (i.e., Applications).

When Gmail came out with themes this week, I was glad to see they had done something to update the Gmail service. And other innovations, such as video chat built-in to the Inbox, are cool, too. But why can’t all of those services be made available to those of us who have made the leap and are using Google Applications?

David Monroe moved to Buffalo and found he missed rockwiki – the people’s guide to Rochester, NY – and decided the way to stop missing it was to create a similar resource for his new home town. He invited me and a few other people to help get it started, and you know how I feel about building new web sites to connect people!

In fact, I’ve been mulling over the idea of a wiki about Buffalo for a while now, but recently, when folks from out of town were going to visit me, they asked me for a list of things to do while in Buffalo, and my Google search didn’t find any one web site that was dedicated to an encyclopedic description of our fair city. So I was ready to help, and that day I set up the framework of a wiki site so that we can start filling in the blanks.

On his blog, David wrote:

To that end, I’ve started a Google Group http://groups.google.com/group/buffalo-wiki?hl=en that is made up of Buffalonians, and computer savvy folks from outside of Buffalo to create a wiki just like the one I know and love. So far, we have some excitement and interest. If you want to lend a hand, join the group and give your opinion.

What do you say, are you the wiki type? Want to start writing wiki entries about the Buffalo topics you love?

Well, what is a wiki type, anyway? To write entries for a wiki, you just need to know about your topic, you don’t have to be a computer nerd. You just log in, do your best writing, and then wait for someone else to come along and try to prove that they know even more about the topic than you do.

Just be sure to proofread your work carefully, because otherwise, you’ll be one of the writers we post about on ShamefulTypos.com.

I have a 2.5-year-old notebook computer, and the cord on the power supply recently went from what looked like perfectly good to frayed and short-circuited in about a second flat. Bzzzt! and a little puff of smoke, and the next thing I know, I’ve got not only a fire hazard, but a notebook computer that wants some power and can’t get any.

A replacement power supply from the manufacturer of my notebook computer was going to cost me $80 plus tax and shipping, so I started Googling for a better price. I found one on some weird web site that was used and refurbished for about half that price, but I had no idea how good the quality would be (although it said it had a 90-day warranty). I kept searching and searching, and eventually I found a blog entry that referred to a FREE replacement program from the manufacturer, because apparently they were quietly acknowleging that there was a design flaw.

I made a request through the manufacturer’s web site, but they don’t ship them out, their customers have to go to a retail store to pick one up. I went in yesterday after work, and the store employee told me that the replacement program was not automatically FREE, that the store employees were making case-by-case judgments to determine which power supplies were damaged due to customer misuse, and which seemed to be broken due to manufacturing defects.

When I took my damaged power supply out of my backpack and handed it to the store employee, he noted right away that the way I had correctly wrapped the cord around the cordwrap built in to the power brick. I am always careful not to put too much strain on the ends of any kind of wire, because when a wire is bent tightly like that, it can wear out the insulation, crack the conductors inside, or both. And then it’s not a good wire anymore.

Because he could tell I was taking proper care of my power supply wire, he determined that I was eligible for the free replacement power supply. So, my advice to you, if you have the same problem with your wire, is to make sure you wrap it properly before you present it to the store employee. If I had had to buy the part in the store last night, it would have cost me $61 (still a bargain compared to the $80+ online, but who wants to pay $61 when free is a possibility?).

I’ve been trying to plan a lunch meeting at a restaurant near work, and I want to show the other two guys at the meeting how to log in and do stuff with the web site I made for our community group, so the restaurant needs wi-fi. I haven’t found (yet) a comprehensive list of wi-fi spots for Buffalo, NY.

I may start compiling my own, but the problem is that it takes a lot of work to keep a site like that updated. I think the way to do it is to set something up with Google’s mapping API so that people can add hotspots via a map interface. If only I had paid better attention in the Java class I took, because that’s the language Google uses.

I’m sure I’ll find that someone else is already doing this… it’s the internet, is there anything new out there? Is there any topic not already covered?

I just can’t decide.

Anyone have an informed opinion?

I know Joomla is newer, but because most developers have already adapted their Mambo projects for Joomla (basically the same source code, so that was a natural move), there are already more Joomla components, etc., than there are for it’s mother, Mambo.

That said, I’ve set up a few different CMS’s for people over the years, and there’s just something about Joomla that I haven’t been able to “get” yet. I know I haven’t spent enough time getting to know its administration toolset yet, but I have this feeling that there are things I want to do that it either can’t do or can’t do without a lot of workarounds.

Take user groups, for example. What I want to do, is set up a site for a group that has all of the Mambo/Joomla features you expect in a CMS, like categories, news articles, Web 2.0 feedback methods, etc., but also old-school discussion forums that use user groups, or levels, to limit public access to some discussion areas but leave other discussion areas open to the public. Not too much to ask, is it?

Hmmmm… now I’m wondering if my friend over at CrowdFusion would let me test out the new CMS he’s working on.

Well I still have a lot of work to do. Hopefully, in the next day or so, I’ll be able to announce that the new site I’m working on is ready. But then again, maybe tomorrow at 1 a.m. I’ll decide to use Drupal instead!