I have my Facebook and Twitter account operating from last several months. I have friends and follower on both. But with time I start feeling bored with Twitter. Twitter is where I can post what I am doing, or what I feel in one line. It is good to share what I do exact at the moment, but in a day I cannot share that I am sitting now, and standing up all day. Can you do that? I see most of celebrities just doing that they are going X- place, they are going for lunch, etc etc. What is the use of it ?

On the other hand, if I create a page on facebook, I still can put same comments there and in return my friends can comment on my individual page that are visible to all. On Twitter if I post 10 comments, I cannot see all reply in a “Group” of conversation, but on Facebook it looks better organized. Managing multiple accounts is really hard for a day to day professional, if they are not marketing with their friends.

I am also surprise by the Privacy issue that occur in those public social networking site. But I want to tell that if you are doing Social Networking, then people will learn about you. Don’t they start knowing you when you meet a strange everyday while jogging, or when you meet friend of friend of friend in some meeting or get to gathers. If you are using some public website [especially at no cost/free] you can expect them to use those information for advertise or other stuffs. Why you share most personal stuff there ? Just use it to a limit of been public or don’t go Social at all.

Anyways, Twitter needs to improve its functionality the idea was good, but with like of Facebook, myspace having their own status message with commenting and “like” feature they are more useful as compare to twitter. Twitter account is good if you link it to get auto update from all other site, other than that there is no use of it.

I have always try to write a Validate HTML, but often I have been asked by my staff member what is the need of validated HTML if everything is working. They ask this question to avoid their little effort in getting HTML in proper shape, as they have to concentrate on open and closing tags etc. But recently I got a perfect example for them. We are using Jquery Ajax in our code where applicable, but soon my developer face a problem that whenever they try to load some dynamic content from Jquery Ajax it fails, but it works with their manual written Ajax code [which is indeed bit unsecure ]. But our problem is not limited to this, the problem we face is that when we add a Dynamic field using Ajax it doesn’t get submitted with Firefox, but it works fine with IE8 [yes you read it correct Firefox create problem for a chance this time]. I struggle to find the solution, because I didn’t look in HTML of their but try JS code only. Later I realise that I should check HTML and there I found a little problem.

The code is using DocType for XHTML 1.0 transitional, but what was written is not a valid xHTML, as the developer put <Form> opening tag between two <tr> tags. In XHTML this is not allowed, a Table Cell or Table element cannot take FORM tag as child, It will work for Table Cell [td], but it won’t work if you put FORM directly in Table Tag. Once the problem is solved, my dynamic fields start getting submitted fine on all browser.

Just little more information, that we were indeed using createElement DOM object, rather than InnerHTML to define our HTML, but still have that problem. So a Valid HTML is what I call a solution.

Recently, I talk to a new prospect and he was though want to work with me seen our company profile but still very hesitant to go with us. When I try to know the reason for his hesitance he clarify that he had bad experience with Offshore outsourcing partners in his previous projects. This is not the first time I face this situation, I have often seen that lot of people choose developers in Asia sub-continent and later regret their decision. Today, I want to talk to such people and want to tell them why they go wrong.

Firstly, before a buyer decide to outsource the project he must asked himself, that how ready he is to go with the project. There is a huge number I have seen when a client ask us to build a site and they during the development realize that they are not sure what they need on site and why they need it. I have at least  2-3 such project every year where this happens.

Second most important consideration is budget. We all know that outsourcing is done for two reasons only: A business is not self efficient in performing the outsourced project otherwise, and second is to cut the cost of development/job. However, a outsource project such as Accounts management, or Call Center that runs over the time are pretty secure to outsource if you found a good company, but they have a fixed budget on monthly or yearly basis. They run in same manner over the time. But the project such as Website creation, TV ads creation, Content writing which are one time may have additional cost other then the actual job. This is where most company miss the budget. Making a website from free CMS is less than 3 days job, but marketing it online or offline does have its cost. A TV ad once shoot can still need a broadcast fee by operators.

Thirdly, what I have seen is most often buyers are not able to visualize the outcome of their project, however they know what they need. For example, you can say I need a website for my business with my business Logo and my corporate color. But you are not able to view how will your website look at end of day? What content you want to display there. I remember we recently drop a project because client want us to change the content for third time and since it is still the same website for their business he is not willing to pay for it. These situations are not sellers fault if they ask extra money, and in one sense you are right, because your budget is for one site. But unfortunately buyer forgot to plan the content of his website, because he feel that he can get it done later, first he want to see his website ready.

Fourth stuff you need to decide the timeline and time you can devote to project. In one of my project, client wants to start his simple business website. But whenever we try to show him the progress he never take time to review website and often says “Yes, its good please continue”. Later when we finish the project, he suddenly wake up and says “What have you done, I don’t need this”. Morale of story is your outsourced partner have never seen you, he only read your emails, he is a software developer and not running the same business as you run, so how he knows what is important for your business ? This can only be tested by you. It often take 1 hr in a week to check the progress of your projects. Why not devote that time to save your money ?

Fifth, Plan for future upgrades. It is important that before you outsource any project you plan the future of project, in case it gets success. If it fails you probably close that project, but what is it get success? You may want to modify it, if yes then what will you modify. Answer might be hard to find, but having a vision of future helps you prepare your present.

 These are some tips I would like to share so that you as a Buyer don’t get it wrong. I will write another article soon on how and what quality you should look for your website development outsources partner.

With my dedicated Windows 2003/IIS 6.0 server I want to run latest version of .NET framework on it. Hence I use my Web Platform Installer to install .NET 4.0. Everything goes smooth. It was piece of cake to install it.

Now the time came to run my first .NET 4.0 Framework application, I configure a New website in IIS. Select .NET framework 4.0 from ASP.NET tab in Website property. But what I found is I am getting 404 error. Strangely enough that Default.aspx page does exists and with .NET 2.0 it works just fine. So what goes wrong ? I search and experiment with web.config, but to no avail.

Then I found this article http://www.denalimultimedia.com/info/Articles.aspx?cid=20&topic=IIS-6-ASP-NET-4-0-page-not-found-404, which clearly mention that

• Install framework asp.net 4.0 and restart [Web Platform Installer does it just fine]
• IIS 6.0 console should now display ASP.NET 4.0 under tab “ASP.NET” [It was again done if #1 above is right]
• Under Web Services Extensions (in IIS console) .NET 4.0 framework might be set as: prohibited. This must be ALLOWED otherwise a browser might just return the error 404 page not found which is not very descriptive
• ASP.NET 4.0 applications must be run in a separate process (Application Pool) otherwise you’ll get the error ‘Server Application Unavailable’.

It is anyways always good to run different programming languages in different pool. For Example, if you want to run PHP on same server I use different pool for them. Covering those 4 steps I got my server working with .NET 4.0. Wondering why Web Platform Team forgot to complete 2 step in their installer.

I just realize that wordpress 3.0 is launched some 16 hrs ago, so I thought to give it a try. I got so excited that I forgot to take my backup on my WordPress 2.9.2 [current thus far] and just press automatic upgrade. I wait thinking what if it goes wrong ? But nothing goes wrong !!! All I get after clicking that button is new admin interface. Front end remains the same [Ofcourse I didn't change its theme ].

Hmm I check my Admin, it has new color theme, but what is new here except that ? They says it is major release I didn’t see any big difference. Go to Change list of WordPress. My god they fix more than 1200 bugs… I was using that bugging software.. or they mean over the RC release of WordPress 3.

My theme is very old, probably I should get a new, as it is doesn’t have latest features from wordpress 3.0. But one thing in Change List that excite me is “Menu” or “Custom menu” Nice utility, and shows that wordpress developer did realise that wordpress is more than just Blogging software. It is a Complete CMS now [I install wordpress for more than 50 clients as CMS only in last 2 yrs].

I read about MU merged in WordPress but not really very excited. I am not a SEO guy to build 100 of site to promote my $20 product. But it is good if you are one. I don’t see any real use other than that for MU wordpress. Maybe as a company owner I should use it to allow my developer/team to start blogging..hmm that is nice option for that feature.

Anyways, this is my first post after upgrade hope it works fine when I submit this. Let see how it goes.

BTW GOOD WORK Guys !!! WordPress really worth a shot anywhere everywhere.

This is to bookmark the Motion Tween Class I found for AS 2.0. I have use core Tween classes from Macromedia before, but this class looks better in some respect. though with AS 3.0 in market it looks dead stuff

http://hosted.zeh.com.br/mctween/

Wow, it was hard 48hrs trying to get URL Rewrite for IIS 6.0. Most of solutions are paid and hence not my piece of cake. Especially when I found a great IIRF which is free. However the developer has problem that he doesn’t have 64bit machine to test and fix. Same is with me, but I manage to get a 64bit version of it from original source with almost no change. Here are steps I used to create my 64bit version.

1. Download Latest PCRE version from http://www.pcre.org

2. Download Cmake from http://www.cmake.org

3. Using CMake, I create a Visual Studio 9 64bit Solution from it.

4. Compile PCRE in 64bit.

5. Now download the Latest Source of IIRF from Codeplex (http://iirf.codeplex.com )

6. Open its solution file, change IIRFConfig.c file to by replacing pcre_free function call to free function call [2 replacements only]. [it was otherwise giving linker error to me]

7. Now replace 3rdParty files from your PCRE version [you need to compile PCRE in Release mode only, and make a STATIC Library [by default it is dynamic library, though you need both static and dynamic]

8. Now compile your IIRF version and Bingo!!! it is done, you will get a IIRF in 64bit machine.

Now some interesting facts

1. I use Windows 7 with Visual Studio 2008 to do all this on my 32bit machine only. So I cannot test my build as it won’t run 64bit stuff.

2. I had a 64bit windows 2003 VPS with IIS 6.0 running in 64bit mode, I test it up there and it works.

3. I did all this because I want to move this blog to Windows 2003 64bit. I will do it soon.

Now, your award for reading it out, you can download that 64bit IIRF Release version here