Wow, sorry for the feed dump!

Due to server and software changes my blog paths were no longer the same and I stopped getting aggregated by Adobe Feed/MXNA. I ignored this aside from an email that didn't get me anywhere; until this afternoon. With the new feeds software the feeds list actualy worked and I found out what URL Adobe was looking for my feed at. A quick 301 error inside a cfif tag fixed my problems...

Unfortunetly the result was ALL of my posts showing up in Adobe feeds at the top all at once. For this I apologize, I had figuered it would go off my modified or posted date, not when it read it for the first time...

<cfif url.event EQ "showBlogRss">
    <cfheader statuscode="301" statustext="Moved Permanently">
    <cfheader
          name="Location"
          value="http://www.EmpireGPServices.com/blog/feeds/rss.cfm"
    />
    <cfabort>
</cfif>

0 comments - Posted by Russell Brown at 4:27 PM : ColdFusion | Debugging | Development | General News

Sitemap awareness from Robots.txt

In writig a plugin for Mango Blog, I found out that the big leaguers for search engines have gotten together and decided that sitemap awareness from robots.txt was a good idea. This was news to me despite that this has been out there for more than a year now.

To add your sitemaps to your robots.txt simply add this line:
Sitemap: http://www.YourWebsite.com/sitemap.xml

In my case i used:
Sitemap: http://www.empiregpservices.com/blog/sitemap.xml

Further information:
http://www.sitemaps.org
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robots.txt
http://www.ysearchblog.com/archives/000437.html

0 comments - Posted by Russell Brown at 2:03 PM : ColdFusion | Mango Blog

Site Map Generator: Mango Blog Plugin

I've created yet another plugin for the ColdFusion Mango Blog package. Last night I was suppose to be doing one thing and my ADD kicked in and I did this for some reason.

This new Site Map Generator Plugin will create a sitemap.xml document in your blog's root directory. Sitemaps are supported by search engines such as Google, Yahoo!, Microsoft, Ask.com and Moreover.com and a few more I'm sure at least.

More info after the jump or
Download the ZIP file or view my SVN repository

Read more...

11 comments - Posted by Russell Brown at 1:37 PM : ColdFusion | Mango Blog | My Projects

New Blackberry 9000 Details Confirmed

The new Blackberry 9000 Bold is no longer a rumor. Check out this in-depth review from crackberry.com.

0 comments - Posted by Russell Brown at 2:48 PM : Reviews | Blackberry

New Mango Blog Plugin: Sphere.com Module Plugin

This weekend I stumbled upon a link on CNN for "Sphere: Related Content". Intrigued I clicked the link to check it out and found the results interesting. After some investigation I found that the service was free and not too hard to impliment. To help keep me from working on things I should be, I wrote it as a plugin for Mango Blog. A blurb from their marketing information:

• Enhance your readers' experience by offering related content and connecting on-line conversations
• Enhance site interaction by establishing your site as an information hub for readers
• Acquire new readers by adding your content to the Sphere network of content

Screen shots after the jump
Download the ZIP file or view my SVN repository

Read more...

1 comments - Posted by Russell Brown at 9:36 AM : ColdFusion | Mango Blog

ColdFusion 9 Feature Request: Drop Ajax/JS libraries

Yes, I said it. Going forward I do not think that Adobe should waste time on implementing JS Code libraries. Ext, YUI and others exist so you can easily integrate them into your code already. In the last few months alone I believe there have been 2 or 3 version upgrades alone of the Yahoo YUI tool and a 1 major version upgrade for Ext.

If you want to have an AJAX driven drop down, write it yourself or download a custom tag, or better yet; write the custom tag yourself and distribute it freely. I would much rather see the time spent by engineers working on ColdFusion spent working on the server side portion of ColdFusion vs. doing these seemingly 'cool' integrations. Don't custom tags exist for this purpose alone? Why build it into a server side product?

I'm tired of seeing posts and emails and requests to implement further feature sets, upgrade versions or change libraries all together. ColdFusion does not need to be my meeting ground of technology. If you had spent 2 more minutes writing your code you could have implemented the Ext library yourself, probably done a better job and you won't be beholden to a server side technology for your client side code...

Flame on

 

15 comments - Posted by Russell Brown at 11:35 AM : ColdFusion | Development | YUI | JavaScript

New Version of Feed Ping for Mango Blog

I have made some more updates to my Auto Ping Plugin (1.1). I'm much happier with this version. I've included more hardcoded XML-RPC options as well as adding 5 custom XML-RPC url options. There is now a logging option that was a 1.05 feature. for right now I just put a FeedPingLog.txt into the root of the website. I will probably put this in a better place at a later time.

The new built in list contains: BlogFlux, BlogShares, BlogRolling, BulkFeeds, Feed Burner, Google, Ice Rocket, Moreover, Ping-o-Matic, Syndic8, Technorati, Weblogs and Yahoo.

Download the ZIP file or view my SVN repository

Read more...

1 comments - Posted by Russell Brown at 9:40 AM : ColdFusion | Development | Mango Blog

Colin Edwards' Amazing Lowside Save (video)

This past Saturday Colin Edwards, one of the few Americans in the MotoGP circuit had an amazing save when he lowsided in T1 during qualifing. He actualy crashes, but stays commited and re-rights the bike. Absolutly amazing and lucky...

 

0 comments - Posted by Russell Brown at 2:52 PM : Motorcycles | Racing

Download my Mango Theme

I'm not sure if anyone would be interested but I've wrapped up my enhanced skin and I'm making it available to anyone who wants it. I liked the Nautica 05 skin that came with Mango, but it was just a little too chunky for me.

A few of my changes include

• Shrunk top image giving more room for vertical text
• Added a text-bubble to the image for your blog's description
• Move the search to the top right of the page
• Added links for RSS and Atom instead of just RSS
• I have removed the left nav bar on sub pages and only show children elements
• Main nav bar hight is shorter giving again more vertical space
• And I can't forget my amazing 1bit pedestrian
  

 

Download the ZIP file or view my SVN repository

0 comments - Posted by Russell Brown at 9:38 AM : ColdFusion | Development | Mango Blog

New Mango Blog Plugin: Auto Ping

I've created a new plugin for the ColdFusion Blog Mango. I've recently switched to this blog software and I am very impressed with it so far. I quickly whipped up this plugin last night so I could regain the auto-ping feature I remember having in BlogCFC.

The plugin it's self was VERY simple to write and from looking at thier documentation the limits are endless.

Included is the ability to ping 5 hand written URLs (like MXNA) and several XML-RPC sites, although right now the list is small. I will be updating this in the future and adding many more I hope. I'm certainly willing to take any suggestions on which ones are used the most.

• Technorati
• Ice Rocket
• Weblogs
  

 

Download the ZIP file or view my SVN repository

0 comments - Posted by Russell Brown at 12:12 AM : ColdFusion | Development | Mango Blog

Are all your CFC variables Scoped? Find Out!

I was reading Ray Camden's blog and my interest got peeked by his post on a CF app called varScoper. I downloaded the app from RIA Forge and had it parse my MachBug's source code within about 30 seconds. Depsite how meteculous I try to be with my scoping I was suprised when I found almost a dozen fumbles in my ruffly 320 cffunctions spread across 39 CFC files.

I had never thought of whipping something like this up, but this would be fantastic rehashed as an Eclipse plugin...

Untill then, I definetly recomend you check out this helper app (varScoper).

0 comments - Posted by Russell Brown at 1:04 PM : ColdFusion | Debugging | Reviews | Development

Want an Amazon Gift Card? How can I get rid of this Excel 2007 Nag Screen

I have Office 2007, a purchase I regret every single time I open any Office document. I then have an Excel Spread sheet that is a ".xls" file; the document is encrypted (in my documents) and has password protection. I get this pop-up every time I save this document after making changes trying to get my to save into MS' Open Office format that I refuse to move to. Under no circumstances do I wish to convert this file to Office XML format (or any other format).  I have scoured the web in search of a resolution to this annoyance and I will gladly award anyone who can help me shut this pop-up off with an Amazon gift card.

 

I really think this is going to result in one thing: Uninstall 2007 and go back to 2000-2003 Office. Do you think they offer a downgrade option?

0 comments - Posted by Russell Brown at 9:47 AM : Microsoft

Review: 2004 Mark West Pinot Noir

I will start off by admitting that this is a cheap wine, $10-$12 at your local shop. However I'm spotlighting this one because it seems to be on the wine list at a high number of restuarants that I've been to over the last couple of years. My specific knowledge is on the 04, but the 05 has gotten as many raves for what it is...

This Ruby in color Pinot has some legs with black cherry and raspberry fruit flavors that finishes nicely with a nice balance of acidity and light tannins. This isn't a wine to let sit in your basement for 5 years, but is a fantastic crowd pleaser for company and has a nice balance of sweetness that will attract most levels of conesours.

If your looking for decent priced Pinot to have around the house for company I would certainly recoment it.

0 comments - Posted by Russell Brown at 5:40 PM : Reviews | Wine / Liquor

Install a new SQL Server Instance from Command Prompt

I was having some issues doing a standard install of SQL Server 2005 SP2 (Standard). No matter what I did, the install complained about versioning issues. I knew you could blindly run a full install from command promt but I had never needed/wanted to. Out of desperation I decided to give the install a try from command the prompt and had great succcess.

setup.exe /qb INSTANCENAME=EGPS ADDLOCAL=SQL_Engine SAPWD=***** AGTACCOUNT=ComputerName\Services AGTPASSWORD=***** SQLACCOUNT=ComputerName\Services SQLPASSWORD=***** SQLAUTOSTART=1 SECURITYMODE=SQL

Read more...

0 comments - Posted by Russell Brown at 11:55 PM : SQL | Windows XP | Development

Review: 199 Lives (The Travis Pastrana Movie)

Last night my girlfriend and I jumped on the ZX10 to see the one and only local theater showing of the movie: 199 Lives. The movie is really more like an extended version of Nitro Circus with more commentary and story line. It did a fantastic job of telling a story about a kid who has persevered through a lot, from injuries (100's) to night terrors. Melissa, who knew nothing about him, said that it "did a great job of telling her his story and [the movie] really showed a lot of emotion".

Even though I thought I knew a lot about PT already being a huge fan of the young phenom myself, I learned even more. Lots of the footage was stuff I had seen in the past, but I still say it was worth the $20 bucks for a night out. My only big complaint was some of the footage quality. I'm sure most people will see this on their home TV in which case it will look fantastic, but on a movie theater screen it was definetly pushing the limit of acceptabe for a full prive movie entry.

"If you take Evel Knievel's life and multiply it by 10, you'll get Travis Pastrana's" -La Times

Read more to view the trailer

Read more...

0 comments - Posted by Russell Brown at 11:55 PM : Motorcycles | Racing | Reviews

How to find a table based on a column name

0 comments - Debugging | SQL | Development |

ColdFusion to Confluence Gateway/API

0 comments - ColdFusion | Confluence | Development |

Javascript Date Picker using YUI

0 comments - Development | YUI | JavaScript |

Now Mango Powered

2 comments - Development | General News | Mango Blog |

Colin Powell: Not Sure Who To Vote For?

0 comments - Politics |

We Need More White People

0 comments - Politics |

ColdFusion 8 Hotfix (Flex2 Remoting Patch)

0 comments - ColdFusion |

New Street Bike - 2005 ZX-10

0 comments - Motorcycles | Racing |

Review: Alpinestars One-O-One Riding Shoes

0 comments - Motorcycles | Racing | Reviews |

Confluence Plugin: Advanced Attachment Viewer

0 comments - Confluence | Java | Development |