So I finally got around to fixing my blog. It had been sitting around horribly broken for a while, which a blank white screen on the page. Looks like the past couple of years haven’t been kind with this place being updated, but that should probably change in the near future. After I finally got my blog back up and running, I checked out the drafts for blog posts and I had one sitting in there that was about my ‘new apartment’ that I was moving into. Well now the one-bedroom apartment which was a giant upgrade from my last place is too small, mainly because it has two people’s worth of stuff in it. I just bought a house in Maineville, and am closing on it with my wife (oh yeah… I got married in between now and the last blog post) on the 26th.

If I ever get around to it, I’ll put up some posts about some of the stuff that I didn’t have time to post about here, but more than likely it’s just going to be a bunch of new stuff.

It’s really amazing how fast technology moves. I’ve been working on a lot of things recently. In liue of like 8 blog posts, I figured I’d split this up between what I’ve been up to recently, some technology news that has interested me, and what I’d like to work on in the future.

Things I’ve been up to recently:

We are finishing up a sprint at work. A “sprint” is a unit of time/work in the SCRUM methodology that we use. I’d been working a lot of overtime in the past week or so, but that is coming to an end. Also, things have been interesting around work recently because my previous employer (Software Architects) was bought by Sogeti. As of April 1, I officially became a “Sogetian”. I’m still kind of apprehensive about the acquisition, but hopefully things will work out.

Things I have been following closely lately:

• Apple has had a couple of interesting things happen recently. First of all, they released the Apple TV. Normally this wouldn’t be a product for me, because I don’t buy video content from the Apple store. I do have a bunch of TV shows archived on my hard drive, but they are not encoded in H.264/MOV/MPEG so I wouldn’t also be able to get the content onto my TV. Within days of the Apple TV being released, however, the hacks started flowing. It seems like Apple almost intentionally left it very hackable. I might have to pick one up, with all the possibilities that a 3-inch tall $300 computer with builtin TV outputs / WiFi could bring to the table when some of the hacks become more mature.
• Another very interesting thing that Apple has announced was that they will being to sell non-DRMed content in the iTunes Store. It seems like the first instance I have heard of where a large company is actually trying to stop screwing over consumers with the content that they buy! Things bode very well for the future. Apple may achieve its goal of taking over my living room if they continue with this kind of strategy.

I’ve also become hooked on a variety of google services

• GMail - I’m not sure why I’ve been using this. I’ve been using all the other google stuff and it seemed like a good thing to do.
• Google Docs / Spreadsheets - Very useful just to be able to share some simple spreadsheets with other people(mainly my fiance).
• Google Calendar - A friend from work got me hooked on this. It seems like the easiest way to maintain a calendar from anywhere. There are even a few tools out there to sync with iCal.
• Google Maps(My Maps) - This is a really sweet new feature. Check out the “My Maps” tab at Google Maps. You can add your own locations to a map, add paths, shapes, etc. It seems like you can do a lot of really cool stuff with it. Also, the friend who got me hooked on Google Calendar is the one who showed me this as well.
• Google Reader - Really the only way in my mind to read RSS feeds. I’ve tried using various desktop RSS readers, the RSS readers built into Safari, Firefox, IE… but I always run across the same problem. I check the news on multiple computers, and there was no way to keep track of what I had already read in sync. Thanks to Google Reader, I don’t have this problem anymore. I think I’ve gotten a couple people hooked on this as well. The things that I think are interesting should be displayed at the top of the blog if you are viewing my main homepage at alexargo.com.

Finally, I’d really like to work on a couple projects in my spare time. I hadn’t had time recenetly with the acquisition and being busy at work. The two projects are:

• WIG - A javascript framework that me and a friend came up with. We had a really nice demo going that was a nice ajax-y database designer tool. I want to extend it and iron out some issues, and hopefully it will be useful to other people.
• Mag-Games - A java framework that lets you play a bunch of simple two-player board games. It is also going to be extended so that you can create AI for the various games and test them against other AIs. I’m doing this mainly because I never got to do a similar fun project in CSAA 486(Articial Intelligence) when I was in school, that a bunch of people I know enjoyed when they got to do it.

Well thats about it for now… check back soon because I hope to start posting more.

I took a day off of work today, but it turned to out to be pretty exhausting day for some reason.

I got to spend the day with Liz and her mom going to a couple placing that we were checking out as candidates for our wedding reception (which will probably be May 25, 2008 if anyone was wondering… that is the Sunday of memorial day weekend… plan ahead!). I figured I would try to be productive too, so I took my MacBook Pro to the Apple Store to get it’s SuperDrive replaced, got my oil changed, bought some new clothes at Kohls, and even made some plans to see the movie 300 with some friends tomorrow, installed Vista on my Dell in my apartment…

I wanted to play around with my friend Dan’s new project “Forefront“, a Windows Vista clone of the Mac OS X feature Exposé. I’m not a big fan of the name, and think he should change it to Dansposé, but we’ll see what happens. Looks like there are current some problems with the installer, but if you are one of the 2 people out there using Vista, I would keep watching Dan’s page. No Slashdot or Digg though, please. It’s hosted on my small little Dreamhost account

Also, getting my oil changed was a pain because they told me I should change my fuel filter, but couldn’t find the right filter to put on. They tried one that they had, went down the street to get another one to try, and finally just put my old one back on and gave me my money back. I did get my oil changed, but my service was not very express-like. I’ll be nice and not say the name of the place.

A lot has happened since I last updated(October of 2005). I graduated from college, got a real job, and got engaged. I’ll post some follow up posts about all of these things in the coming days. Currently, I’m on a nice family vacation with my family in Weston, Florida (it is close to Miami/Ft. Lauderdale).

Well I haven’t updated since the beginning of the summer. Lots of stuff has happened since then. Beginning of the semester started out kinda crappy(i.e. girlfriend and I broke up), but it has gotten better I’d say. I’m real busy with class, work(for the Miami University Computer Science Department… developing some software), and job hunting. It seems like ever Wednesday I have 2 or so interviews. Its definetely taking up a lot of time, this whole job search thing… and I still have 8 or 9 months until I graduate.

When I have free time, I just do a lot of hanging out with my friends and stuff; normal college kid type things. Band formal is coming up this weekend. It should be interesting. Also, it was hopeless for a while, but it is semi likely that our football team(and the band) will get to go to a bowl game again this year. I love free trips, where they give you money to do stuff. The free time is unfortunately getting less and less as crunch time has come upon us already this semester.

On another side note, through some classmates I’ve found the most addictive game ever: N. It is very challenging and fun flash game where you play as a ninja with an unquenchable thirst for gold, jumping off of walls, and avoiding killer robots. I’d call it an old school platform game with is refreshing with all of the crazy games we have nowadays. Check it out.

I know I don’t post often anymore, but I figured I’d mentioned that I officially have a job this summer, and it doesn’t involve vomit, roller coasters, or double shifts. It helps that it pays about twice as much as my job last summer at PKI. I’m working at Ohio Casualty Insurance in Fairfield, which is conveniently right down the road from my house. It should be a good experience…

Worst day. Ever.

So I promised Josh that I would post this image from his phone even though I look like a fool. Maybe I was eating something sour?

Anyways… here it is:

It’s a picture of me in this cool lego sculpture they had at Johnny’s Toys at the Cincinnati Mills(forest fair until a few months ago) mall.

Microsoft has a rather entertaining article by my standards that discusses so-called “leetspeek” and tell parents how to determine if their kids may be participating in illegal activities. It worth at least a quick glance through if not just to laugh at Microsoft…

Click here to check it out.

I guess school is back in and in fact pretty damn busy already. As you can see I’m messing around with my website some right now. It is currently available at both here and here but we will see what happens in the future… lots of stuff going on… thats about it for now. ttyl