the finger-keyboard synapse - November 2004 Archives

November 2004

OS Libraries and Development (16:57) - One of the questions I get asked when others find out that I work on Windows, Linux and OS X is "Which platform is your favorite to develop for?" I haven't really had a good answer until today. The criteria for my choice: the amount of time spent fighting the compiler, the OS, or standard system libraries. From this perspective, my favorite platform for development is OS X. Back story: regardless of how you feel about Microsoft, you have to... | 4 Comments

I'm thankful for old BitWise screenshots (23:14) - I hope that everyone in the States had a wonderful Thanksgiving. I've certainly been enjoying some time off, but I thought I'd post a fun little set of screenshots of BitWise version 0.1.7.9, released October 1st, 2002. As primitive as it was, I still have some very fond memories of those early versions... Click on any thumbnail for the full size picture. Buddy ListChat WindowFile Transfer PS: The file transfer shot was taken with only a single router between the...

Czech translation of BitWise now available (21:05) - I want to thank user Volt for translating BitWise into Czech. It is very exciting to be able to add Czech to the list of languages already available (Spanish, French, German and Dutch). The Conquest game phrases have not yet been translated, but we wanted to make the translation downloadable so that it could be used ASAP. The file on the web site will be updated once the translation is finalized, including any "bug fixes." The Windows setup program has...

BitWise Chat #1 result on google search for BitWise (17:50) - Most individuals like to google themselves to see where they are mentioned on the Internet. I would bet that most small or mid-size companies (maybe even some large ones) also google themselves to find "the buzz" on the Internet about the company. Every once in a while, I try searches for "BitWise" or "BitWise Chat" or other various related word combinations. For a long time, a search for "BitWise" by itself listed BitWise Chat as the #2 result. BitWise is... | 4 Comments

Microsoft joins the free IDE crowd (19:34) - Some developers use only command line software and tools, but many developers, myself included, find many benefits to using an Integrated Development Environment (IDE) that provides a GUI editor, a source file editor, project management, a debugger, build configuration management, and more. Linux has several good IDEs available, my preference being KDevelop. Apple released XCode (previously ProjectBuilder) with OS X 10.3. Both KDevelop and XCode are excellent IDEs, and are available for free. Microsoft Visual Studio is the de facto... | 2 Comments

Spam, spim and now... spit (09:30) - Apparently the world is getting ready to "spit" on us with "Spam over Internet Telephony." Maybe I'm just slow on learning this new technology acronym, but a USA Today article last week brought this one to my attention. It's bad enough that we're getting spam in our email, in our IMs (except on BitWise, I might point out), in our snail mail (how many credit card offers do you get per week?), and on our landlines (yes, please, consolidate the... | 3 Comments

Take that, blog spammers! (10:00) - The spam attacks in my comments have decreased since enabling the comment approval, especially from attacks that previously resulted in 4 or 5 posts all at once. Even still, I was getting 3 to 6 spam comments per day and it was getting old deleting these viagra-endorsing comments. I began to notice that all of the spam attacks were taking place in older posts, sometimes going back months. Using this information, the spam problem has been "solved," at least for... | 5 Comments

Firefox hits the front page of USA Today Money section (09:10) - I'm not particulary anti-Microsoft, but I always like to see a healthy dose of competition. I was really thrilled to see a front page article in yesterday's USA Today Money section about Firefox, which this week released the long-anticipated Version 1.0. It is almost unanimous among users and experts alike that Internet Explorer is beyond stagnant: it is dangerous. I hope that you will join with me, millions of users worldwide, and the companies and governments that have denounced Internet... | 12 Comments

The FAQ as documentation (22:12) - Much my delight, I was speaking with a user the other day who told me that he had actually read through almost the entire FAQ because it contained a wealth of useful information. In my dreams and wildest fantasies, every user reads the FAQ. ;) Back here in reality, though, he pointed out that the FAQ isn't very friendly for someone who wants to read through all the questions and answers as pseudo-documentation because you have to click on each... | 4 Comments

Fixing BitWise by fixing wxWidgets (22:53) - About 7 weeks ago, I posted that I had been "wxPromoted" and had the capability to track and close wxWidgets bugs and patches. It wasn't too much longer before that led to additional rights, and for the past month or so I've been a "wxWidgets developer" with the ability to commit changes that I make to wxWidgets back to the library itself. This certainly is not only a great honor but a great responsibility. I thought I would share how...

Websites, Blogs, Forums oh my! (10:05) - I've realized that there are three "main" BitWise-related areas: the main site, the forums, and this blog. I'm sure that there are those who have discovered the blog, but not the forums, or have discovered the forums but don't see the immediate value. Well, let me give you an example! One of the most significant areas of the forums is the New Feature Ideas forum where others and myself post new ideas for BitWise. Some ideas are minor, some ideas...

Dear blog spammers (17:39) - Congratulations on discovering my blog, which must now be popular enough to attract spammers. I would urge you to notice that comments must now be approved, so no one is seeing your spam comments because they are being deleted before made publicly available. I hope that you possess enough brain cells to stop wasting your time. And if you think that I want cialis, imported drugs, loans from the UK, gay porn, or any of the other things being posted,... | 3 Comments