Sometimes you'll have a need to run processes in the background, but not frequently enough to justify a bloated background process system. In cases like that, you can use rake from within your application. For more info, check out <a href="http://railscasts.com/episodes/127-rake-in-background">this screencast</a>. Need to build complicated SQL queries for searching? Check out the <a href="http://blog.inquirylabs.com/2007/01/04/condition-builder-10-released/">Condition Builder plugin</a>. It's pretty solid and pretty awesome. Then there's <a href="http://agilewebdevelopment.com/plugins/model_auto_completer">model_auto_completer</a>, a very nice plugin that allows you to grab the id of a model that you are grabbing text from. 2009-12-18T04:07:44-05:00 7 2009-12-20T12:17:27-05:00 I started my computer career using Windows 3.1. I still remember the first time I installed it and I was totally bewildered by it. Soon after that, Windows 95 came out, but by then it was too late, I had already started using Slackware Linux. Cut to many years later (and many distros later) and I ended up saying goodbye to Linux in favor of using a Mac. Why? I was slowly moving away from systems administration and into graphic design, so my tool of choice was Photoshop. After many years of using a mac and being very happy, I started my own <a href="http://sonnyparlin.com">photography business</a> and buying a new Macbook Pro was no longer in the cards. It would have been nice, but 3k for a new computer was (and still is) too much to spend when you're bootstrapping your own company. That said, I ended up buying a Dell Studio 15, which came pre-installed with Windows Vista and later upgraded to Windows 7. It didn't take very long for me to crave something better, so I wiped out everything and I installed Ubuntu Linux. My only worries were how I was going to go about editing and post processing photos. I figured I would just end up learning about the Gimp, which isn't bad, but it's a lot different than Photoshop, so there's a learning curve. Anyway, after a couple of days of research and a tip from a friend, I decided on two applications. Pixel and Bibble. <a href="http://www.kanzelsberger.com/pixel/">Pixel</a> is what I will use to replace Photoshop and <a href="http://bibblelabs.com/">Bibble</a> is what I will use to replace Lightroom. See <a href="http://twitpic.com/qjjuw">screenshot of Pixel</a>, see <a href="http://twitpic.com/qfkk7">screenshot of Bibble</a>. There's absolutely no substitute for Photoshop. That said, Pixel comes closer than any other app I've used on Linux. It's got a very familiar interface and works in much of the same way as Photoshop. There were a couple of things that I had difficulty doing in Pixel, like creating a tilt-shift effect, but there are other ways to do it. I haven't played with it a whole lot, but it seems to do everything I will need it to do in terms of editing photos and creating mockups for design clients. Bibble, is very much like Lightroom and from what I can tell after playing with it a bit, there doesn't seem to be much it can't do that Lightroom can. Of course, I'll update this post later if anything major changes. 2009-12-04T03:57:52-05:00 6 2009-12-04T03:57:52-05:00 I recently installed <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linux">Linux</a> on my laptop. I've been using it since as early as 1994 when you had to install it using 20 or so floppy disks and a prayer. Back in 94, the average successful Linux installation took about 3 or 4 tries and X Windows was a bonus that people rarely bothered with. It was exciting enough that it was free (as in <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_source">open source</a>) and the idea of running your own server was up there with buying your first home. But over the past few years I had been using a Mac and then most recently went back to using Windows because my first generation Macbook Pro was starting to die a slow death. And because I'm running a photography business, I couldn't afford 3k for a new MBP. But after using Windows 7 (<a href="http://sonnyjitsu.com/2009/10/choices/">which isn't bad</a>) for a while, I started to crave the simplicity, stability and raw power that is Linux, so I installed <a href="http://www.ubuntu.com/">Ubuntu</a> (my favorite Linux distro by far) and man, I'm glad I did. Not only did it bring me down memory lane, but it's nice to see my computer perform at the speeds it was intended to perform at. I need to keep my Windows partition so I can use Lightroom, Photoshop and Photomatix Pro for processing photos, but for casual web and computer use and for web development, it's Linux all the way. Glad to be back! 2009-12-04T03:57:13-05:00 5 2009-12-04T03:57:13-05:00 Check out early footage from the first UFCs where Royce Gracie dominated experts from various martial arts who were all larger than him. <object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/zY6OYSbGRQQ&hl=en&fs=1&"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/zY6OYSbGRQQ&hl=en&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object> 2009-12-04T03:56:42-05:00 4 2009-12-04T03:56:42-05:00 So, as I&#8217;m learning, when you want to work for yourself, it&#8217;s often better to throw multiple lines in the water. I have a couple of talents that I haven&#8217;t <strike>used</strike> marketed in a while &#8212; design and web development. While, It&#8217;s been a little over a year since doing much design or development (I&#8217;ve spent my time building up my photography business, doing a lot of jiu jitsu training and spending extremely valuable time with my son) I have to admit that I kind of miss building web sites. I guess you can take the nerd out of the internet, but you can&#8217;t take the toilet humor out of the nerd. That said, today I&#8217;m launching my design portfolio, <a href="http://73design.com" style="text-decoration:underline;">73Design.com</a>. What&#8217;s the name mean, you ask? Well, I was born in 1973 and all the good domains have already been taken, that&#8217;s what it means. I built the site using Wordpress and the <a href="http://www.dailywp.com/portfolio-wordpress-theme/">Portfolio</a> theme by <a href="http://www.dailywp.com/">DailyWP</a>, which I completely redesigned from the ground up including some of its core functionality. 2009-12-04T03:56:22-05:00 3 2009-12-04T03:56:22-05:00 So I recently made the very tough decision to switch from Mac to PC. I had a first generation Macbook Pro that only had 2GB of ram and couldn’t be upgraded. After a couple of years of use, it started to really lag when editing photos. I knew I had to get a new computer, but after starting my own company, I couldn’t spend the money on a new Macbook Pro. I ended up buying a Dell Studio 15 laptop loaded with Windows Vista. After a couple of months of use, it started giving me the dreaded blue screen of death. I ended up bringing it to a PC group who got me past the problem and then this week, I purchased the Windows 7 upgrade and the computer has been running very smooth. I still love Apple computers, but I have to say, Windows 7 is pretty sweet! Some of the cool features are jump lists, window snapping, much faster searching and a much improved task bar. So far, so good. 2009-12-04T03:51:50-05:00 2 2009-12-04T03:51:50-05:00