Ruby on Rails

I first read it on Wired about Ruby-on-Rails being the next big thing in web development. So, when I went to Borders last week and the geek that I am went straight to the computer's section and checked out the RoR book and bought it.

Most books, actually all books, leave out the error messages that I get. It is never smooth going with me and learning new software or systems. I had great adventures with installing mod chips on my Xbox, installing Ubuntu, installing Beryl on Ubuntu.. the list is long. The interesting thing about stuffing up is the solution is simple and there are many people who face the same issue, but the manuals turn up with blanks for the error messages I get. May be it was because of me not following the instructions (yes, I am the typical male) or just because I say 'Let me try this' and then it goes all awry.

I had to download and install Ruby Interpreter, Rails (the framework), RadRails, MySQL and MySQL Administrator just to start off. The Ruby and Rails went smooth, but MySQL started giving problems.

Errors with MySQL service starting:
When trying to start the service I got this message: "Could not start the service MySQL Error: 0", I looked up and found that running the command, "sc delete mysql" at the command prompt in DOS stops the already running service if it has been installed previously on the PC. I built the PC myself and I am sure that I have not installed MySQL before.

But that did not fix the issue, the "MySQL Server Instance Configuration Wizard" has to be run again, and you will have to select "Reconfigure Instance" and run the wizard all over to start it. That should fix the issue.

Errors with RadRails:
The instructions in the RoR book asked not to use a password, which I did read but did not follow and put in a password anyway. I have to admit I picked up a book in the Dummies series and that meant no password and all the easy options. That threw up a few surprises. When I created the table in the database through RadRails and then run Rake, I got "Could not connect to the database 'root'@'localhost' (using password: NO)", error message, that was simple to fix, as I knew that I did put in a password, when the book asked me not to, I had to go in somewhere and change it. Smart person that I am, I figured it out that the password has to be put in the database.yml file. In RoR parlance it is the yaml file. I had a smug feeling all over after I did that.

But after that I got another error message not letting me go through Rake: "28000Access denied for user 'root'@'localhost' (using password: NO)". This was interesting, I checked the password and it was correct in the yaml file. It had to be put in three times and all times it was correct. The fix is to leave a space after "password:" and then put in the actual password.

After this, I thought it would be all downhill and then I created the scaffold for my first database and tried to run it in the browser. The browser threw up a nice big error about "Access denied" again. Where do I change the password again? What do I do? I had to uninstall MySQL and MySQL Administrator and then reinstalled them, but the browser still will not run.

The solution was the restart the server on RadRails, so that it gets the new password details in, that did the trick. Now, I have to start my real studying of RoR.

My girlfriend was complaining that I was spending too much time with Ruby, little did she know that I was having so much fun. ;-)

I want Sandy too

Ok, a personal email assistant, who wouldn't want one? Technology, laziness blah:

These are the services that you get for free from Sandy:

• Turn your “email to self” into an actual to-do — and get it done.
• Maintain an up-to-date address book without even trying.
• Get appointments into your calendar without wasting time cutting and pasting.
• Automatically gather the web addresses friends email to you.

Go over to http://iwantsandy.com/ and she will do the rest. But only from April.

Cost Life Game

I have recently stumbled across this site where one has to play a family of third world kids trying to make a living. The game is being developed by game lab and has a very good music running through it. It shows the real issues that the family of kids face and one has to pick one of the four targets to play the game, Health, Happiness, Education and Money. The kids have to be taken through four seasons each year while trying to maintain a balance of all.

Game play is good and the music is upbeat. In my first attempt, I managed to drive two kids to seriously bad health situations, making it frustrating for me, but subsequent tries was good fun. If only it was this easy to actually do something about the kids living in conditions like these.
http://www.costlife.org/

Cricket World Cup

About the only sport I follow is Cricket and the greatest tournaments of all has started yesterday. Not all matches are being telecast on free tv, and the ones I want to watch are the ones India play in. So, no chance of that being aired here in Australia.

The time difference doesn't help much, but I am following it. And so are many bloggers. I am not good in predicting and do not have an opinion about cricket at all. But would like India to win this one and give the Aussies here some looking down and rub it in for them. An India-Australia final with India winning it convincingly would just about make my month.

It has been four years since I landed in Australia, and the world cup was on then when I landed. We did not win then, my spirits are up this time. Go India!!

Microsoft over the ages

I have been around computers for pretty much all my life. The best pastime was when I first bought my own PC, the endless times I formatted and reinstalled the whole OS, for Window 98 installing all the drivers all over again. Misplacing CDs, partitioning hard drives, copying large numbers of music files from one Hard drive to another, changing hard drives from master to slave, upgrading to Windows XP and Windows 2000 and also trying out different versions of Linux. All of this without a cheap internet connection, which was used only to check email.

If I had access to cheaper internet, may be I wouldn't have learnt as much about computers.

So, these pictures from Wired of Microsoft OS have brought back fond memories of my PC adventures.



You can see the whole gallery of Windows history here.

How to get lots of traffic to your site

Ask the Age, they posted a story about a python in Malaysia which ate 11 dogs and it has been in the top ten news items for no less than three days. So, how to get good traffic to your site? Post an image like this one..


or may be porn. I will settle for this.

-Picture courtesy http://www.magicalkenya.com

Picasa Web Software

I am just back from a month long holiday and had to organise the pictures from my camera. Logged in to yahoo photos and uploaded about 45 of them. It was painfully slow. Then I downloaded Picasa web software available from Google Pack.

The installation file is only 5 MB. And right after installation finds all the pictures on the hard drive, I found a few photos I misplaced and then gives you very easy options to organise them. Also, this free software has image editing options for novices, the red-eye feature is very easy to use. Another feature I found was the timeline which gives an option to view the pictures according to dates.

The best feature of this software is the web connection feature, where you can upload the pictures to http://picasaweb.google.com if you have a google account. The one touch upload option is cool and very fast way to upload your pictures, beats the yahoo option. You get 250 MB of free space on picasaweb.

-Gyani

How they built Stone Henge

I have seen lots of stupid things on YouTube. This is not one of them:

Mozzies Rule

They are at every corner, every turn, turn of the lights and there they are, turn of the fans and they attack. They are the mosquitoes (mozzies) and they rule.

Epidemic in Delhi, epidemic in Kerala, both caused by the mosquitoes, do you think they care if the government doesn't declare an epidemic yet? I live in Melbourne and am spared by the mosquito bites and also spared from biting the mosquitoes when I accidentally open my mouth while riding my bike. But, I am seriously worried about the state of affairs in India at the moment.

Foresight is not a human thing, humans do not necessarily plan for the future. No one acts on preventing or preparing themselves against future issues. Just look at our environment. I am sure the relatives and friends of the people who have been killed in the Mumbai blasts in July are very upset at what happened to them, but are any of us upset now? It didn't affect any of us did it?

So, why now should we worry about Chikungunya or Dengue? It is happening somewhere in Delhi, and it is happening somewhere in Kerala, the rest of us are not dying, yet. I say it can happen to any of us, we live in the same society, poor mosquitoes do not know the rich from the poor, ask Manmohan Singh.

I have met Indian men here, no doubt very intelligent, came from top schools and got top grades, they will not think twice before opening up their zippers to relieve themselves on Indian streets. The women, will not mind for their husbands/boyfriends doing that. After all, applying that education to some civic sense is not filling up their bank accounts is it? They daren't do that here overseas, they might get fined. Economic sense over Civic sense makes common sense.

Too, the same educated junta will quote the Geeta and try to explain Hindu rituals scientifically. Do not eat non-vegetarian food twice a week, not only is God happy with that, it keeps your digestive system well-oiled, scientific you see. God is also very happy with the cleanliness of your house, as long as you make sure the banana peel is not dropped in your room.

So, when I tell them India is having issues like these epidemics, they do not blink and say, 'Urine and shit does not cause Dengue or Chikungunya', bring on Plague again I say. Then we will do something about it: blame the government.

Funny ads on Radio

On the radio while driving back to work.

Advertise your car to sell for free in our newspaper and you will go in the draw to win a free glass tint

!!!!