Category Archives: General

I’ve been too busy to blog but earlier in the week I had an opportunity to work on a web site design using Photoshop. I did not create a new design from scratch. I had to modify an existing web … Continue reading →

Today I installed DotNetNuke 4.4.0 on my local web server. DotNetNuke is a web application framework written for ASP.NET. The installation gave me considerable problems because the installer could not establish a SQL Server database connection. Then I created a second … Continue reading →

Today I received my boxed copy of Adobe After Effects 6.5 Standard from eBay. I was really glad to get this because the book I am reading Creating Motion Graphics With After Effects – Volume 1: The Essentials was written … Continue reading →

I’ve upgraded to Microsoft Office 2007 and discovered that Outlook 2007 can export emails to Access 2007. I don’t think this was possible before. It is certainly useful because a lot of data comes in via email. When you export … Continue reading →

I’ve found a few interesting web sites that are taking Internet video in new directions. Podzinger attempts to index the audio of YouTube videos so you can search for a word that has been spoken by a video blogger. This … Continue reading →

My hosting company finally upgraded my WordPress version to 2.0.4 after I complained about the old version I was forced to use. This was important to me because I have done some work creating custom WordPress designs and I wanted … Continue reading →

Video bloggers are abandoning YouTube in favor of a new video sharing site, LiveVideo, which can be found at: http://www.livevideo.com/. YouTube users have been frustrated by problems with the site’s messaging system. Many people have had problems posting comments on … Continue reading →

I am learning how to do text animation using Adobe After Effects. This video was created by applying the Tinderbox T_LensBlur effect to make the text appear out of focus to start and then come into focus. I changed the … Continue reading →

Last week I went downtown and shot some video of landmark buildings in Williamsport to serve as stock footage for my video editing projects. I got this idea from my After Effects book which includes some stock footage on DVD … Continue reading →

Today I got a new video card for my computer, a Diamond Stealth S120 Radeon 9550. I needed a better video card to play more games but it is also supposed to improve the quality of video. I also recently … Continue reading →

I’ve started studying Adobe After Effects. I’m currently reading Creating Motion Graphics with After Effects, Vol. 1: The Essentials (3rd Edition, Version 6.5) by Trish Meyer and Chris Meyer. I’m only up to page 20 because the first chapter is … Continue reading →

In an Active Server Pages script, you can reference a type library using the METADATA tag. This automatically imports the constants from a DLL. It is usually used for ADO constants and eliminates the need for the adovbs.inc include file. … Continue reading →

Today I had to troubleshoot a mail problem on a web server. I needed to determine if the SMTP Service was running. I used to have an ASP script to list Windows Services and their status but I needed something … Continue reading →

Today I installed Microsoft’s Virtual PC 2004 SP1 to solve a problem I’ve been having with my printer. There are no Windows XP printer drivers for my Sharp FO-3800M multifunction printer. In order to print anything I’ve had to shut … Continue reading →

I recently worked on a project that required updating a specific line of text in a file. This proved to be surprisingly difficult because I’ve never done that in ASP.NET before and I could not find any sample code on … Continue reading →

I have been working on a web application that can send me text messages using MSN Messenger. It works pretty well except I have to double click the contact to join the conversation before I can receive the message. I … Continue reading →

Today I learned that Google prefers dashes in web page file names rather than underscores. If you use dashes, Google may include your web page in its search results for each word in your file name. However, if you use … Continue reading →

Due to client demands and needs, I’ve been learning a lot more about web site marketing and search engine optimization than most web developers are required to know. Although there are many purely technical aspects to configuring and customizing an … Continue reading →

Today I learned how to create a 301 Moved Permanently web server response in Internet Information Server. This is very important if you change the filename of a web page that has already been indexed by the search engines. You … Continue reading →

I finally have the audio gear I need to do decent voice recordings. I received the Studio Projects B1 Large Diaphragm Condenser Microphone but could not get any sound out of it. That microphone requires phantom power which the PreSonus … Continue reading →