Now we are looking at $540.00 for his birthday. Now his birthday is in August around other people’s birthdays of people I want to get stuff for and then after that we have Black Friday and Christmas. Oh did I mention I was planning to get engaged to my gf (I do not want to look at rings again) now fiance that year too. So yeah I’m on a budget now. So not backing down by the pressure I figured he has other kids (6 including me lol), I so called them up told them the price and we teamed up to buy him the ipad. My fiance teamed up with me too. By doing this the price was split 7 ways leaving me to  $540/7 = $77.14 and saving me 540 – 77.14 = $462.86. In the end he was happy and we got him the ipad and he still uses it to this day. Funny thing is I think this is the only gift that he has received from my brothers and sisters and I that he still uses.

Now after going to this process you have to ask yourself why do I have to go through this continuous cycle every year not only with my father but friends and family? Than I have to guess what they want which they may not like and spend all this money! It would explain why the majority of the population gives gift cards and hallmark cards or nothing at all. With all this technology and the rise of social networks how come this has not been combated in a graceful way yet?

In comes nobadgift.com! Nobadgift.com was born out of this frustration of birthdays, weddings, father’s day, mother’s day, christmas, going away parties, house warmings, ANYDAY. Now how does it solve this problem. I wanted to first tackle the main problem what do people want? So when you log onto the website, you create a wishlist. After you create a wishlist you add gifts of everything that you want. Next you want to spread the word through facebook, twitter and email. 5 easy steps:

1. Click wishlist tab
2. Create a wishlist of your choosing
3. Add gifts
4. Let your friends and family know
5. And let the good times roll

If you have a Mac there are certain things you need to have: something to play videos, a good music player and a good file explorer to find all these items. Of course you can use the finder that comes with the Mac but what if you want tabbed windows like Google Chrome? Or display two Finder windows side-by-side in dual panel mode? Better yet, what if you wanted to get rid of those pesky .DS_Store files? If any of these apply to you, this is why you should check out the TotalFinder.

The Total Finder is a simple yet elegant application that solves a multi-taskers dilemma with the file explorer which reduces clutter of all the finder windows that you have to open on every day tasks with your Mac. If you bought a Mac, you think quality. So why not keep such ideals with applications as well and get the Total Find, TotalFinder.

Lately I have been doing alot of research on how to make an exceedingly fast website. So in order to accomplish such a task I had to identify all the components I use when making a website and what they depend on. So let’s do a break down of the components you use when developing a website:

• Programming Languages – PHP, Java, Perl, Python, C#, C++, Ruby, etc

• Browser – Safari, Firefox, Chrome, Internet Explorer (this browser is not worth mentioning but it is popular so it shall remain) client technologies are HTML, Javascript, CSS and Images (Not a client technology but is loaded by the browser)

• Database – MySQL, Oracle, Microsoft SQL Server

• Hardware – CPU, Ram, Hard Drive

Programming Languages

This has always been a common debate amongst programmers, what is the fastest programming language? I have heard and heard this time and time again and when I hear the debate it’s something that can be easily SQUASHED! You have two different types of programming languages. You have compiled and interpreted languages. Compiled programming languages (C++) are faster than Interpreted languages (PHP, Python) period. The reason why is because compiled languages go from source code to machine code which is what the computer understands. Interpreted languages have to be read by an interpreter and than changed into machine code on the fly every time it is executed. Better example is imagine a compiled language as a person who speaks English and the interpreted language as a person who speaks Spanish and the computer is a person that speaks English. When the compiled language speaks to the computer it already speaks English helping the computer quickly understand what it is saying. With the interpreter you have to have a person who is the translator aka interpreter to translate the Spanish to English so to the computer can understand. So hopefully at this point you can determine who is faster. COMPILED LANGUAGES!!!

You may ask why do people use interpreted languages instead of compiled languages? Mostly because they make it easier to accomplish complex tasks with less code base on them being created at later times than compiled languages and being made to accomplish more modern tasks with website design. Still there are ways to still use interpreted languages and get around the speed issues. Facebook has came up with an interesting solution. Facebook uses php to fun their famous web application but in order to speed up there website and use less resources they created something called hip hop php. Hip hop php translates php into a compiled language. By doing this Facebook has nearly doubled their performance gains. Python even have frameworks that when started by the server changes the python into a compiled version of the original code creating a faster version of the website.

Browser

Well you may be asking yourself why is he bringing up about the browser since we can’t control what browser the user is using. As true as this is we can control what code the browser sees. The browser interprets HTML, CSS, Javascript and Images from the web server and loads it for your eyes to see. Now the question is how can we speed this up? Well one word compression. For HTML, CSS and Javascript you can use gzip compression. Gzip compression works by finding similar strings within a text file, and replacing those strings temporarily to make the overall file size smaller. This form of compression is particularly well-suited for the web because HTML and CSS files usually contain plenty of repeated strings, such as whitespace, tags, and style definitions. It works by first checking to see if the browser supports gzip encoding. If the browser approves it will send a compressed version of the web page to the browser to interpret it. Here is a better example here if you like pictures. It’s pretty easy to use, just check and see if your programming language supports it and than implement accordingly.

Another type of compression you can also do that works whether the browser needs to approve it or not is minifying your css or javascript files. Just like Gzip compression but eliminates spaces, tags and style definitions within the file so if a request is sent over the internet your browser can download it quicker without any type of approval process and regardless of how old your browser might be. Yahoo has developed program to minify your files here. Jquery uses the same method for their files also. They mention it here

Images are probably one of the main things that take the most time when downloading a website. Especially with newer and newer cameras coming with bigger mega pixels. Usually after you take a picture on today’s camera it will be usually over 1 megabytes which is way too big for a website. So what you do, you guessed it right you need to compress it. My favorite method for compressing files is using photoshop save for web function and resizing the images can reduce the size of a image that is 2.0 megabytes to under 50 kilobytes or less. Another option if you do not wish to buy photoshop for several hundred dollars (understandable) you can use an online program called Image Optimizer. There are other alternatives out there but I have tested them.

Databases

With databases I have tested and played around with such as MySQL, Oracle, SQLite run pretty good considering how optimized the query is and how many results you are fetching. Also it depends on the hardware (read the hardware recommendations) and if it is a 32 or 64 bit version. If you read one of my earlier articles you see that 64 bit is faster than 32 bit versions. But in order to use 64 bit programs you have to first have 64 bit operating system which is offered by every known manufacturer nowadays. I will even recommend that you always get the 64 bit version if it is available, unless it is unstable or not in its final version.

Hardware

This is probably the MOST important aspect with the speed of your website. Programming languages, databases, every thing software related depends on hardware. Even though every thing depends on the hardware you need to know what aspects of the hardware correlate to the software. Since we are talking about the speed of the website the most essential thing with speed of the CPU. The faster the CPU the faster your programming languages, databases run. I would suggest a CPU that has multiple cores.

The next thing is memory, memory can run out pretty fast on high end systems. With hard drives I really like solid state hard drives but they are really expensive for the size you might want. They are the fastest drives on the market right now and you will definitely will see the increase in speed. I would personally suggest getting sata 3.0 drives and sticking with that until the price of regular hard drives drop, because you probably be making several backups of your site and database.

Another aspect of memory to remember is Ram. With the server, database and website running ram can get used up pretty fast but it always depends on what you are doing. If you are just experimenting you really don’t have much too much to worry about but if you are running something the whole world is going see I suggest getting ram that is pretty fast and over 4 gigabytes of memory. Also remember there will be several other applications and plug-ins that you might install to complement your website so we didn’t even factor this into the equation yet but that can vary greatly. Other than that have fun! Feel free to leave any questions or comments.

I looked at alot of laptops coming out lately and the main thing I have seen is upgrading, no further innovation from last year to this year. Laptops are getting more and more powerful but after a while you have to ask the question, are they really using this power? I seen alot of average computer users never fully tap into the power of their technology. So if you are not really utilizing your computer’s full potential is there really no reason for you get another computer when your not really utilizing your old one. I say save your money and stop drinking the cool aid these companies are feeding you.

I feel as though if you really going to get a new computer in which you can really recognize a nice increase in performance (that you actually use) and innovation. You need a computer that solves one of the most common problems that computers are facing, the speed of memory. Even though they are constantly increasing the speed of the CPU, it comes to a point that regardless of fast your CPU is you are going bottleneck your system. Imagine that you are running a track relay you have three people on your team that run real fast but the last runner runs slow as you know what and his name is memory. So if you are going to buy a new laptop I would save wait till the price of solid state drives drop and usb 3.0 comes out.

Solid State Drives

Solid State drives are one of the most needed things to improve speed and battery life on computers. Right now the most popular hard drive to get nowadays are the ones with rpms (revolutions per minute). These hard drives have disc in them that spins to access memory. These hard drives use more power by spinning and if drop can mess up the disc inside of them which can prevent you from access memory on the drive. SSD (Solid States drives) are superior in every way to these drives. They use up to significantly less power and can kick and smack the heck out of it and it will still work. Their main disadvantage thats keeps them from being widely use is cost. The cost for a ssd drive that is 256 GB is approximately over $400.00 compared to the rotary hard drives that are 250 GB might be around $50.00 – $100.00.

USB 3.0

One thing that is continuously happening is the price of external hard drives is continuously dropping but the speed of them are not catching up. As you keep giving people larger and larger access to store terabytes of information the demand to want to transport bigger and bigger files onto the external hard drive will increase. There is firewire 800 which is better than usb 2.0 but you need have special access on your computer to use it. But the most common way people transport information is usb 2.0. Thats when usb 3.0 comes into the picture usb 3.0 will have a big increase in speed. It is 10x faster than usb 2.0 and will be able to really give you the edge you need.

Lately there has been a large influx of attacks in the cyber world. I don’t know if you heard but there has been attacks on the 32 of some of the biggest companies in America including, Google, Adobe, General Electric, and many others. Google even went as far as pulling out of China, http://online.wsj.com/article/SB126333757451026659.html, which has the single biggest population out of all countries. Google has been making the biggest fuss out of all the companies it seems. I’m guessing they stole something that was very precious or highly secretive. It was said that the attack was very highly sophisticated and has not been seen to this degree before on commercial companies but only in the defense industry.  People in the government of the United States and defense having been opening admitting that the US is not ready for an all out cyber attack.

Ways to Protect yourself

So I guess your wondering now how does it effect me. Well chances are if a big company such as Google can be comprised by the same can happen to you. But I believe you have a better chance at defending yourself than Google. Why? you may say well because the companies are bigger entity which renders bigger holes than an individual which have lesser holes to close but requires education to close them.  In order defend yourself against hackers and people trying to compromise your information you need to know the mindset of hackers.

• Weaknesses! When hackers are trying to get hack someone the first thing they will try to do is find known weakness in your software. For example if I found out that someone that I’m trying to compromise is using the browser internet explorer 6 I will look through list of known vulnerabilities and execute attacks on the browser to get what I want. Sometimes it that simple! So they gather information on you and exploit your weakness.
• Attack the biggest market share! If I was hacking I would want send out an attack could affect the largest population of users. For example if I know that windows has the biggest market share of users in the operating system world, I would attack them because I know would get the greatest return in information.
• Brute force and Dictionary Attacks! When attacking peoples accounts they use programs to first guess the typical names people use for passwords and usernames. You will be surprise at how easy this works. If this doesn’t happen to work the next step is to brute force your password. This involves trying a combination of letter combination’s to guess your password. How would you defend against this? Have password that are at least 8 to 15 letters long with caps, numbers and special characters. It won’t stop them but it will be difficult for them to crack it and may make them move to an easier target.
• Wealth of Information! With social networks and almost finding anything you want on Google, you could really get a nice synopsis on a person and what they are about. By doing finding your information on social networks this could give someone an good idea of how to go about attacking you. So adjust your facebook privacy settings!
• Social Engineering! This is probably one of the most effective way of hacking people is through social engineering.Why always go about things the hard way when you could just ask. Always question people asking for your information before they ask you something question their credentials. One of the most famous hackers wrote a book called the art of deception which talks about to get information that you want out of people by talking, being friendly and asking the right questions.
• No protection! Here is my previous article on viruses
• Lack of Education! Self-explanatory! Read and stay updated on new attacks and technology!.

Here is some more information on Security

Your Router: Here is my previous article on securing your router

Your Website: Here is my previous article on securing your website

Your Computer: Here is my previous article on removing viruses

My quote:

Some believe that the Third World War will be fought with guns, missiles and nukes I believe it will be through cyberspace.

References:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB126333757451026659.html

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/02/business/global/02hacker.html

http://www.thecowl.com/world/american-companies-hacked-by-chinese-schools-1.1173974

add a couple of attributes in your manifest file
<activity  android:name=”(Put in your activity name if not already entered)”  android:screenOrientation=”portrait or landscape (choose one)”  android:configChanges=”orientation|keyboardHidden” />

place the following code into the class that extends Activity

@Override

public void onConfigurationChanged(Configuration newConfig) {

super.onConfigurationChanged(newConfig);
}

That it!

References:

1. http://developer.android.com/reference/android/app/Activity.html#onConfigurationChanged%28android.content.res.Configuration%29
2. http://developer.android.com/guide/topics/manifest/activity-element.html

Clean Eats uncovers the dirty secrets of your favorite restaurants. These reports are compiled by state and local governments and Clean Eats aggregates this data to make it more convenient for you. Based on your location, Clean Eats delivers this information directly to your iPhone or iTouch. You will be empowered with a letter grade {A,B,C,D,F}, list of violations, and any comments the inspector may have noted. Some locations may even include more establishments such as grocery stores, schools (elementary, middle, and high school), and many more! Here is a video on the unique application.

Clean Eats 2.0 iPhone app demo from patrick jackson on Vimeo.

Click here to download from iTunes

Supported areas:

Los Angeles County, CA
New York City, NY
Virginia (All cities)
Plus More!

I just wanted to thank all the people that supported people and plan to take things to another level for 2010.

SO THANKS EVERYONE!

I always thought that in order to really use utilize or to get what I want out of my phone that I needed to jail break or root my phone.  But there have been two applications that disapprove my thought process. I really wanted to be able to have multi touch and to tether my phone and computer without rooting the Droid and have been successful in my search. Check it out below

Dolphin Browser (Multi Touch)

Well here is something to rub in the faces of Iphone users. I always hear about how the Iphone has multi touch, but little do they know that even though android phones doesn’t come with multi-touch applications the hardware just supports multi-touch. So the only thing that needs to be done is on the software side. So one application who has accomplish this task is the dolphin browser. It works for the HTC Hero and the Droid phone. Here is a video of it.

PDAnet (Tethering)

For tethering for the droid I was always under the impression that I needed to root my phone to even come close to this but PdaNet has changed my perception. PdaNet has made an application for android and for windows and mac. PdaNet uses the application they created for your phone uses your phone’s internet connection and make it seem like the browser is using when in actuality it is redirecting it towards your computer. You can check out the site here. They also support Iphone, Blackberry, Palm OS and Windows Mobile phones.

This morning I was getting a ready for this meeting had which is a hour away. I’m running around making sure everything is good and studying the night before to make sure I’m on point with my information. I finally get there and find out the meeting is canceled after I get there and it was a ruff drive getting there. Turns out the lady sent me an email stating 2 hours before I got there that it was canceled. I didn’t find out because I have been having trouble getting exchange active sync for the server to work with the droid pre-built application for emails. So someone that I know has the android phone and suggested I use the program that he had that came with his phone for the HTC called work email. As soon as I downloaded and inputted the information for the server IT WORKED!!! I was so happy because it will keep me from missing very important emails and keep my constantly up to date.

So I wanted to share it with everyone so everyone don’t have to go through what I went through. Here is the download. After you download it make sure you have your information for the server handy and active sync for your account activated and you are good to go!