designmudd

It’s temporary while i work on something bigger and better.. Go. It’s my personal work site.

The site will see many features and improvement in coming weeks and months, but it’s out there…. We’re a network of freelance web designers and programmers in northern new jersey (nj). We build complex database driven sites, and the branding is tight. Take a peek.

I was recently poking around trying to figure out the cleanest way to use a php include, yet still have the control to make a down state for the “buttons”. Here’s what i found. Simple & Clean.

I think i’d like to take this just one little step forward and make a variable defining all the php jiberish, so that i can put less “stuff” within the list.

A Note to all web developers… please strip fonts like helvetica out of your websites. It launches the font for me when I visit your site, and often creates a font conflict. I should be the only one allowed to turn on fonts for my computer. If it’s an HTML site, use SIFR… if it’s a flash site, embed the font. Don’t you realize people who don’t have the font you’ve put into your site aren’t seeing your site the way you intended.. and the ones that do have the font (managed by a suitcase) are probably just getting upset that a new font is launched upon visit to your site.

I woke up this morning, made coffee, let the dogs out and got on my computer. I moved the mouse a little bit to get it out of sleep mode, but nothing happened. The screen stayed black.. the case button kept doing it’s pulsing/glowing thing. So i held down the power button to force a shutdown. Then i hit the power button to start up. I got the chime but still a black screen and a pulsing case button. I did this a few times and decided that maybe the lcd crapped out as i never really got beyond a pitch black screen.

Made an appointment at the genius bar. Just got back. The guy tried hooking it up to an external monitor.. but no dice, same thing. Chime, Pulsing, and Black. He says it’s probably the logic board. My computer is out of warranty and i didn’t get apple care… so i’m paying a flat-rate repair which turns out to be $300 and they fix the hardware issue no matter what the problem is. The guy said the logic board costs like $800, so if thats the problem, this flat rate service is a bargain. A new macbook pro starts at $2k, so let’s leave that out as an option.

Sucks… i have most of my files on a separate HD, but i still feel lost without it. Hurry home macbook.. techy says 5-6 days before macbook comes home and i’ll be picking it up at the store that i dropped off at.

So maybe this post helps someone else.. let’s review

• macbook is out of warranty and no apple care
• logic board possibly fried (worth $800)
• apple now has a flat rate repair service for $300 that covers any hardware issue
• repair service takes 5-6 days.

Also – they do make you sign a paper saying they’re not responsible for your data. backup, backup, backup

I’ve always looked up to Ogilvy & Mather as one of the premeire ad agencies out there. It’s like they wrote the rulebook.

I recently bumped into a new minisite posted by Ogilvy specifically on recession. www.OgilvyOnRecession.com. Just another example of their brilliance.

It bothers me that people go on twitter like once every 5 days and tweet like 20 message in one sitting. It knocks all my other tweets off my homepage, can’t you people spread out your tweets a little better? There should be a twittering ethics guide. Maybe i’ll release this as my first publication.

What is the point of twitter? I can see why business’s use it… and i can see why people follow the businesses for important updates and whatnot. But why do regular people send little twitter alerts about the coffee they’re drinking, and the little insignificant thoughts they’re having? Get on wordpress people.. twitter is retarted. Here’s my twitter.

Why are people still buying domain names from network solutions at $35 a pop. They’re under $10 on godaddy, and godaddy is just a better manager.

Even worse.. why are people buying hosting on network solutions? That’s just wrong. Here are my hosting suggestions…

• Shared Hosting - http://www.site5.com/  (shared is shared, there will be problems, but there support is great)
• Shared Reseller Hosting - http://www.site5.com/resellers/ (again, it’s all about support)
• VPS Hosting: http://www.servint.net/ (the site you’re reading is on a servint vps, look how quick.. i’ve got full control)
• Dedicated: http://www.hostmysite.com/ (nothing but good experiences with them)

I just realized that fixing a font conflict in OSX (leopard) actually makes the computer faster. Helvetica was the troublemaker.. i disabled any helvetica and helvetica neue fonts that weren’t “system fonts”. safari now flies. I have “manage system fonts” on in fontagent btw.