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Pay per use MS Office on the way?
A new Microsoft patent application was noticed by someone on Slashdot today. They want to offer Microsoft Office services on a pay-as-you-go basis. I took the liberty of fixing it so that everyone can see what this could eventually mean for the church.
If you go with a system like this, you are dependent on the future availability of a particular online service offered by a particular company (not to mention your ability to pay!) for the continued availability of your data. On the other hand, if you use open-standards based freedom software like OpenOffice.org, you’ll always have free access to your work because no corporation can hold your data hostage. Just another reason to pick open standards and freedom software as often as you can for church work.
Some notes on getting MultiUserJingle / Mingle working
I’ve been very excited about video conferencing on Linux for the past few days. Currently the gold standard is, in my opinion, the Jingle protocol, which runs over XMPP (aka Jabber). This is the technology that the video conferencing on the Nokia N800 and N810 Internet Tablets is based on. Jingle is a point-to-point protocol, but a new standard that they’re calling Mingle (MultiUserJingle) is looking to make multi-point video conferencing on Linux a reality.
I haven’t gotten it completely working yet, but I wanted to add a few notes for the benefit of weary Intertubers who may be struggling with the same setup as I have.
- First, I have Google Apps, but my domain is hosted on Dreamhost. I needed to add more SRV records then Dreamhost tells you to. I added:
_jabber._tcp.tedcarnahan.com IN SRV 5 0 5269 xmpp-server.l.google.com. _xmpp-server._tcp.tedcarnahan.com IN SRV 5 0 5269 xmpp-server.l.google.com. _xmpp-client._tcp.tedcarnahan.com IN SRV 5 0 5222 talk.l.google.com.
I also added the four priority 20 records that go with each line, but I’m too lazy to write them here. The last line is key – without it, your Jabber client will do a SRV request, get nothing back, and then revert to a blind stab at an A request (in my case) for tedcarnahan.com, which goes you nothing but an unsympathetic webserver at Dreamhost.
- Secondly, my router at home runs the OpenWRT firmware. Did you know that OpenWRT doesn’t serve SRV records by default? To change this, comment out the
filterwin2kline in/etc/dnsmasq.conf.
I don’t have it all working yet, but hopefully this is helpful to someone.
Happy 4th Anniversary (to us!)
Jennifer and I celebrated our 4th wedding anniversary tonight. I took a picture to commemorate the occasion:
Ted and Jennifer
We went out to dinner at Taiko in Dubuque, which was a lovely time if very slow (we were the only ones in the restaurant when we arrived!). The food was delicious, though, and we had a table and a chef to ourselves. Very entertaining, too.
After dinner we went out to get Culver’s and pick up some Christmas groceries, and when we got home, Jennifer realized that she was missing a lens from her glasses. So we drove all the way back to Asbury Hy-Vee and found the lens on the ground underneath a car!
So yes, all things considered, it has been a nice anniversary. Here’s to many more! (71 more, perhaps?)
Freedom Software vs. Freedomware?
I have proposed using the term “Freedom Software” instead of “Free Software” to describe software which gives its users the same freedom to redistribute or modify the code as the original developer. Of course, not everyone is convinced that that is the least confusing term. In this comment on an article about the Cisco open source lawsuit, “motie38″ suggests the term “Freedomware.” Is that better or worse than “Freedom Software?”
Done with the semester
I finally got my last paper done and printed today. That means I’m officially done with my third semester at Wartburg, and that means that I am officially halfway through the (academic) work for my M.Div.! Just three more semesters of school and a year-long internship to go…
A Cold Day in Iowa
You know it’s a cold day in Iowa (-3F this morning, wind chill of -25F) when, as you walk to school, the moisture from your eyes freezes to your eyelashes.
Introducing ClothesOn
This summer I experienced a sudden, inexplicable drop in visits to my website. I later found that it was due to a spammer hacking my site and changing my WordPress template to include spammy links. I cleared that up (see “Does your website sell Viagra too?“) and moved on with life. But I began thinking: it has taken me months to recover from the lost traffic. How can I prevent this in the future.
Well, the first step is obvious – keep up to date on the latest WordPress releases will prevent a lot of these problems. My site’s defacement could have been prevented.
Nevertheless, seeing the opportunity to procrastinate on my end-of-semester studies (I’m looking at you, Lutheran Confessions paper) I decided to code up a quick, simple keyword scanner that will check any webpage you want, once per day, and email you if something is amiss. I call it ClothesOn.
Give it a shot and let me know what you think in the comments.
Update 29 Dec 2009: Well, turns out that only two people ever tried this out, so I shut it down. Oh well.
Lord Uxbridge’s Leg
I am in awe of Wikipedia. It contains within its august pages a detailed history of the severed lower appendage of an otherwise minor nobleman at the Battle of Waterloo. Go read the article, the poetry (yes, poetry) is really quite hilarious!
Catfish Charlies
Just took dinner tonight at Catfish Charlies. They’ve got an awesome Friday night all-you-can-eat special: fried cod, beans, cole slaw, rolls, and french fries for $8 or so per person. It was really good – try it if you’re in Dubuque.
I’m healed!
Well, not completely healed. I don’t have to wear that sling anymore, though. I had my first physical therapy appointment today, and it went pretty well (despite getting strangely lightheaded at one point). Ed, the PT guy, even gave me a big pink rubber band to take home and do exercises with. I should be mostly recovered by the end of the year. Hurrah!
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