http://www.secretelite.com/michael collected Sun, 13 Jul 2008 04:44:56 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en There's a fun television show on the Fine Living television network. It's called I Want That! and it's probably not a TiVo season pass pick for anti-consumerism activists. The show is pretty much explained by its title - they showcase a lot of "cool stuff". I thought I'd post some ... http://www.secretelite.com/michael/2008/07/13/i-want-that-picks/ Several months ago I wrote about using my personal Mediawiki as a Document Management System.  I am writing to follow up on my experience with that.  It's actually working out wonderfully.  I am always tempted to make things more complicated than they need to be, but for my needs using ... http://www.secretelite.com/michael/2008/07/01/follow-up-on-using-mediawiki-as-a-personal-document-management-system/ When I started at my current place of employment, we were just transitioning support of a medium sized UNIX environment from another company which had been supporting the installation previously.  Unfortunately there was no system automation in place and all changes and updates had to be done manually. Having been a ... http://www.secretelite.com/michael/2008/06/30/cfengine/ Still alive.  Still busy.  Still no time to make much progress on the super cool projects I want to work on.  Story of my life. The job is going well, although I am completely swamped from the moment I walk in to the moment I go home.  Sometimes I have 15 ... http://www.secretelite.com/michael/2008/06/06/time-for-another-update/ For the past few years I have used speakeasy as an ISP.  Although they are pricier than other DSL options, I don't mind paying a premium for the excellent support and service they provide.  A week or two ago my DSL went out.  That almost never happens.  I called Speakeasy's ... http://www.secretelite.com/michael/2008/05/09/customer-service-technology-that-actually-makes-life-easier/ I've started my new position doing HP-UX systems engineering for a large defense contract.  Normally I shy away from government contracting as it tends to be more politics and less work.  But in this case, I'm really enjoying the position.  The people are great and there actually is plenty of ... http://www.secretelite.com/michael/2008/05/05/new-job-new-car/ I saw this article in CIO Insight and I thought it was worth reading.  The article is an interview with Anthony Williams, co-author of Wikinomics: How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything.  I enjoyed the book and I was interested in his thoughts on the subject. A lot of "CIO type" interviews and ... http://www.secretelite.com/michael/2008/04/18/wikinomics-author-on-web-20-technologies-in-government/ I have been an avid Firefox user for the past several years. While I do use Firefox every day, I am not a heavy consumer of Firefox extensions. There are thousands of Firefox extensions available but I find that the browser suits my needs in its stock form. I don't ... http://www.secretelite.com/michael/2008/04/18/firegpg-firefox-plugin-for-gnupg/ Although Dreamhost gets criticized for occasional service outages, I've been very happy with the service provided for the price charged. At around $10/month anyone, at least in the developed world, can afford to have a personal publishing and development platform. That's incredibly powerful! If I were running a "mission critical" web ... http://www.secretelite.com/michael/2008/04/18/subversion-support-on-dreamhost/ I mentioned my personal wiki the other day. I thought I'd post a quick note about using it as a Document Management System. I'm horrible at keeping on top of documents, electronic and physical. Although I have a filing cabinet, I can never remember where I have ... http://www.secretelite.com/michael/2008/04/17/wiki-as-document-management-system/