Wassup Jose

What? Well, we all know that this will never happen in our lifetime. As most know, the end of life for Windows XP is quickly approaching. June 30, 2008 is the end of XP as we know it today. Vista will rule until Windows 7 is released in 2010.

Back to Windows XP Open-Source, I just became aware of the ReactOS Project (I must be living under a technology rock or something). React is an open-source Microsoft Windows XP-compatible operating system. Nice!

The project is still in the alpha stage, but it certainly looks promising in its current state of development. Checkout the product roadmap and screenshots for more details. The React project officially started in 1998 and see it has been a challenge to date.

Good luck to the development team and contributors.

In the never ending quest for Guitar Hero products, tips, tricks, etc. comes to you a post about Slashbot! A robot that rocks Guitar Hero via a conversion box and several electronic solenoids. The robot achieves a 90% accuracy rate. Cheaters! 

I would never have imagined myself writing a post about furniture, but here it is for all to read. I own several Ikea furniture items and recently purchased two television stands. The stands sat in the garage until this afternoon, when I assembled the units.

As I was assembling the first unit, I noticed the quality of the wood and accessories. Very nice considering the frugal price I paid for the stands. All of the pieces fit well and their finish is excellent, what a concept.

I have purchased assemble-yourself furniture units in the past and do not recall assembly being this easy. Assembling the second unit was a piece of cake, look mom no instructions needed here. I really like the stands, good job Ikea.

Don’t be confused. This isn’t a post about how incompetent our dear friend Dave is. No. Instead it’s about my fish. After owning an aquarium for 3 months, I finally got the tank to a point where I believe I may actually be able to sustain life in it. Unfortunately, I also decided that the first fish would also not be the one to sustain. I went down to our local Capital Aquarium and picked out a Damsel fish. At $4 a fish, its the cheapest salt water fish you can buy. It seemed that up to this point my hermit crabs had survived, but they’re very hardy creatures. I tried to step up my game a bit and add a fish. All my levels checked out before I went to buy a fish. This was going to be my first salt fish, so I didn’t have complete faith in my tank. When i brought him home I named him after our good friend Dave. His name is Dedwards. I named him as such, because I was certain that I had missed some detail in the biology of the tank. Unfortunately, one of the previous sentences is incorrect and should be in the past tense. Not 8 hours later and Dedwards lived up to his name.

That was Thursday. Today is Sunday and I’m giving my luck another try. I gave the tank a good scrub down, despite potential algae spread, and gave it a water change. I picked up a new Domino Damsel at the O Street Aquarium and I’m continuing the naming convention onward. The new fish (in honor of Dave, our project, and my Irish heritage) is named Domino O’livewards (read: alive-wards). I’m hoping this change in semantics, which seems like a very bureaucratically managerial decision, will in fact turn the tides and get us that necessary win. After all its not the fact that I bought a different species of fish from a different aquarium that’s important…no. It’s what I named the fish.

With a little luck the fish will survive and the whole project team will live on through this little bugger. He already looks like he’ll fare better than his predecessor. And the whole fish situation will be another “oh in your face Gabe!” The whole situation will be oh so bittersweet. I’ll miss you guys! Come visit your obfuscated project name fish anytime.

I have been learning PHP off and on for the past couple of months and think the past few days have been the most productive to date. In the past week, I have published two sites and I am almost finished with a third site.

The first site is a sample search site developed using the Prado PHP-based web application framework and Google Custom Search Engine. The search site is straightforward and offers basic search functionality at this time. I plan to add new search tools next week.

Integrating the Google Custom Search Engine was easy, so it is time to step my game up. I registered for the USPS web API program and others to consume web services via PHP and Prado. My PHP adventures continue … nice.

Gas prices are outrageous! I just filled up the Expedition and it cost me a kewl $80. It is time to junk the SUV and get a Hybrid or economical vehicle, because this can skyrocket to $100+ per tank.

Of course, the oil companies are going to report record breaking profits … again and the States are not going to give up the billions in gas taxes. I think $3-$4 per gallon prices are here to stay. Greedy mofos and the weak dollar, good job.

I’ve officially broken my drum pedal for Rock Band. If you remember, I reinforced it with Ravi’s gift from across the pond. It happened to work wonders and keep it going for quite some time. I’ve recently kicked my drum playing up to Expert and have been climbing the charts. perhaps it was just too much for the pedal. The song that did it was the feared Blackened by Metallica.

Tonight, was the first chance I have had to sample the never-ending DJ collection. I have been listening to the 70’s music non-stop for several hours now and I must add that is has been nothing short of fantastic!

I am not sure why, but I lost touch of the music I grew up with and adopted the latest and greatest. 50 Cent, Timbaland, Lil Wayne, and the other current artists. The flash back has been great and I am looking forward to listening to the 80’s.

Calling all sprinters, walkers, spectators! Summer is right around the corner, so I would like to propose a summer run on Saturday, June 21, 2008. This gives us out of shape old timers eight (8) full weeks to train for the event.

Since I know darn well that a callout will not get you to the track, I think we need to ante up or shut up. Send in your suggestions for date, time, and prizes. I will order WassupJose trophies for 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place!

Put the remote control down, roll off the couch, and register for the race. Scooter Boy will you volunteer to pace us for the first lap? You can use the scooter of course. If the 1 mile is too much for the old timers, we can consider a fast-paced 800 meter. Nice.

What the heck does this have to do with anything here? Actually, nothing at all but since I am up I felt the urge to post. Today, someone that I am close to was assaulted and robbed in a public place. Yes, it happens daily to others but when it hits home it is a tragedy.

The person is okay, some bruises and loss of some personal items. I was and am still pissed off and want to kick someone’s ass to return the favor to the losers. Yes, the person was assaulted by more than one person.

Okay, here is where the friends and enemies title has its context. Later, I learn that this person’s friends jumped in and helped stop the fight. I also learned that some friends did nothing and by all accounts were laughing during the assault. WTF!

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