When it comes to running, I can’t say I enjoy it yet. However, I can say that sometimes it’s the only thing between me and a bottle of Jack. I’ve gotten to the point in my runs, where I can get into a grove. Ok, on most runs I can get into a grove. After the Miracle Miles 4 Kids, I just kept going. I still needed my “graduation” 5k for the Couch to 5k program and I’m running at the Arroyo Grande Strawberry Festival this upcoming weekend. My goal has been to still run 3x per week for 3 miles, but I’m only averaging 2 runs per week. As many have commented on my Facebook posts, at least I’m out there. Some highs: I completed my longest run yet at 4 miles back on May 6th. It felt great. I was surprised I was able to do it and more shocked that it wasn’t as hard as I thought. But then there’s the lows. I had my worst run since starting the program just one week later. I couldn’t complete the 3 miles, not only stopping to walk, but just plain unable to finish. It wasn’t due to an injury or muscles, just a will. I’m still excited about running, but need to think of a new goal after the 5k this weekend.

I can’t say I’ve posted to much about my being a Lakers fan, but if you’re reading my blog, you probably already know that. What you didn’t know, is in that I became a fan when I was 8 years old… Magic Johnson’s rookie year. Yes, I’m a true fan… I was a fan even during the brutal years of Van Exel and Divac. But it does make it easy to be a fan when in those years they’ve won 9 championships! However, with as much as I’ve loved the Lakers over the years, I’ve never been to a game. That changed thanks to a vendor at work.

I was in LA for the 2nd game of the Suns v. Lakers last Wednesday. As you can imagine, it was awesome. Not sure how to put it all into words, but it was great. The seats were amazing, the game was incredible, and getting to take time off from work was just icing on the cake. I can say though that I would never fork over the cash for those types of seats. Even where we sat, the game is more viewable on my TV. Don’t get me wrong… If you offered me tickets to see another game, I’m there… I just won’t pay for it myself. I did have to go with my boss, which made it interesting since he isn’t a Lakers fan, but even that was good.

So yeah, work. Blogging about work has always been pretty much off limits. For one thing, people whom are mentioned, even if not by name, may read it. I’m emotional and don’t always have nice things to say. Secondly, future employers may read it. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to put my name into Google and stumble upon this blog. And finally, we all have jobs, and most of the time, we’re not happy about them, so who wants to read another complaint about work. Heck, if you’re out of work when you read this, then maybe you say to yourself I should appreciate what I have. Which, is true.

This past month though has been a struggle. I’ve been challenged and pushed and didn’t always come out of it the way I wanted. I spent many days agitated and frustrated about what I had to do, often just to appease someone. In the end, everything worked out the way I thought it would, but getting there meant a return to 60+ hour weeks. Looking behind me now, I can be happy I’m done. I know I did a good job and I even learned a few things about myself. There’s some more challenges to come, but, hopefully, I can take some of these lessons and make the journey a little nicer.

I was tasked yesterday with creating a rewrite rule in apache to handle a URI query that need to change for a site. This ended up being an exercise where my head was bloodied from banging it against my desk. Of course it didn’t help any that the client that needed this gave us hardly any time to accomplish it. Read on for more info.

Here’s what the original URL looked like:

http://www.somesite.com/locator/person.aspx?blahId=12345

the new URL should look like:

http://www.somesite.com/locator/cool_person.html?id=12345&people=1

OK, so the first part is pretty easy.

RewriteRule ^/locator/person.aspx(.*) /locator/cool_person.html$1

That would work if the blahId was used instead of just id and if I didn’t need to add &people=1 to the end. After a little playing around, I broke up the URI query and created a QUERY_STRING Condition, then created the rule:
RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING}    ([^=]*)=(.*)
RewriteRule (.*) $1?%2
RewriteRule ^/locator/person.aspx$  /locator/cool_person.html?id=%{QUERY_STRING}&people=1

Of course, my plan was to break arpart the URI into two pieces, but you have to be really careful with RegEx… it can be really aggressive. My testing worked. The rewrite did exactly as expected and I sent out an email to my work team beaming with pride over creative solution…

Then it went live, and nothing worked as expected. Due to the aggressive nature of my rewrite condition along with the proceeding rewrite rule, the next rule was catching the new URL coming through along with the  URI query and reprocssing it. Of course, I wasn’t expecting it to. My testing environment, since it wasn’t even remotely similar to the production one, didn’t catch this problem. The final solution was to not be so greedy with the condition. My coworker came up with the fix while I was out:

RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI}    ^/locator/person.aspx$
RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING}   ^blahId=([0-9]*$)
RewriteRule ^/locator/person.aspx$ /locator/cool_person.html?id=%1&doctor=1

As the rule was much more selective, it didn’t screw with the rest of the site. By only looking at the single query string we wanted, we get the desired result set in %1 without rewriting the whole URL just to be reprocessed by the next rewrite rule.

I hope this helps someone out there, as my original fix was assisted by a good google search.

I’ve been pretty busy with life, work, family and NBA Playoff basketball, so I’m behind in my posts. I have some coming though. Hayden’s B-Day party, a Daniel Whittington show, and fun with apache redirects, all to come.

So first thing is, we start with a working Mini9 running Windows XP. Thanks to Jamie for the hook up!

1st boot

• Intel® Atom Processor® N270 (1.6GHz/533Mhz FSB/512K cache)
• Genuine Windows® XP Home Edition
• Glossy 8.9 inch LED display (1024X600)
• 1GB DDR2 at 533MHz
• 32GB Solid State Drive
• Intel Graphics Media Accelerator (GMA) 950
• Wireless 802.11g Mini Card
• Bluetooth 2.1
• Integrated 1.3MP WebCam
• SD Cardreader

Here it is running Windows XP before we get started.

I didn’t get a CD drive with the Mini9, so before I borrowed a friends, I tried the USB install instructions. So first I needed to download the Linux start-up and put it on a thumbdrive and make it bootable. The next step took much longer than anticipated; make a working OSX install image on a thumbdrive. Making the image itself went quickly enough, but putting it on a thumbdrive took over 5 hours!

After the thumbdrives are ready, the both get put into the the Mini9 and it boots a Linux kernel. It was at this point I ran into my first problem. Of course, reading all the instructions are normally considered a good move, I just skimmed them to get started. As would be expected, I totally missed how to get the Linux system to boot the OSX thumbdrive! After re-reading the instructions, it started to boot the install.

The install went smooth enough.

Soon I found myself looking at OSX on the Mini9! The screen resolution wasn’t quite right, but I knew that the updates needed to be done.

Finally, all was setup. I installed iLife’09, iWork’09 and ran monolingual to remove the languages and other unnecessary items to slim down the installed OS. The 32GB drive now has almost 18GB still avail and it runs great.

So how cool is it? First, all the hardware works; from the webcam to the SD reader. Second, it’s light, has great battery life, and with a SSD HD, there’s no moving parts and is very tough. It does great watching Hulu and AVI files, but not good at showing 720p MKV files.  The 1 thing I miss is the 2 finger mouse control. I also didn’t get the AT&T wireless option, which I might do if I was buying another, but I don’t know if it works with OSX. (update: the 2 finger scroll is now working thanks to this site. I’ve also verified the 3g WWAN works with the Mini9!)

How am I going to use it? Well, it belongs to work, it’s not mine, so it’s going to make a great IT portable. I’d love to get one for me, well, really for Harrison, as it would make a very inexpensive Mac to be his first computer as he gets ready to enter Jr. High.

LEVEL UNABLE TO KEEP BUDGET UNDER CONTROL
Drops Second Straight Shorthanded Game
(For Immediate Release)

Arroyo Grande, CA – Like a nightmare that you can’t wake up from, LEVEL, once again, is watching a good season turn bad. With wins in games 4 and 5, LEVEL looked to change their seasons’ fortune by taking the remainder of this season’s games. Instead, after dropping two straight, LEVEL was looking to turn things around with a Budget(ary) win. So with the season on the line, “Hot Shot” Tom Adamski sidelined and “The Playground” Daniel Parks still MIA, LEVEL would need more than their stellar defense to get back on track.

However, right after tip-off it became clear, like watching Michigan State vs. North Carolina, that LEVEL was just out of their league. Watching shot after shot rim out, LEVEL struggled to find a rhythm that wasn’t a death march. No one on the LEVEL side was getting to the basket consistently. Long-range shots caught iron and fell into the awaiting hands of the Budget Ballers, and when LEVEL finally got to the free throw line, they would shoot a season low 15% from the charity stripe. “Lemons… It was all lemons,” said Hank, who went 0 for 4 from the field and the line. “We threw up lemons. We didn’t come away with a win, but I did make a wonderful Lemon Sorbet.” His sorbet was good, and it’s a good thing, as Hank may find himself looking for a new job if LEVEL can’t find a way to win a game.

LEVEL’s defense, the highlight of the team, kept the Budget shooters under control. Led by Miguel and Phil, the defense would come up with a number of steals. The highlight of the game occurred during a Budget breakaway when “Sasquatch” Grondin executed a monstrous block that sent the ball half way down the court. The block even elicited cheers from the Budget bench. Dan Connolly and Steven Hasagawa would combine for a fantastic defensive effort. “They were strong and physical. Our finesse style didn’t matchup well against them,” stated Steven while handling his taxes after the game. “Luckily for me, I’m getting money back. I’m in the black somewhere.”

LEVEL will have next week off, and hopefully during that time, they can find some answers for their shooting woes, or they may never wake up from this nightmare.