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Displaying entries tagged: Discomentary
Blog Entry Title
Date
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Superman
June 29, 2008 - 9:57
- UEFA - Superman - Discomentary
After another weekend leaving me feeling like I need another weekend to recoup, I already find myself facing another busy yet exciting week/weekend. I used the word "another" three times in the preceding horribly written ramble of a sentence....uggg to me being super lazy right now, pointing out mistakes but not willing to fix them. I have to wake up super early tomorrow AM to catch a train...waking up earlier than normal is rarely fun.
The UEFA Euro 08 finals were today; I will miss the world class games the tournament provided over the past weeks. There wasn't one game I watched that wasn't fantastic.
This weekend, I learned what the word Superman means when used as a verb. I was surprised to learn that a term has been coined for the scenario it describes. Better judgment prevents me from discussing it further but I cut a clip from the Discomentary Volume 1 intro that uses Soulja Boy.
Yet another super boring blog post, uggg to me.
I need to figure out some softball stuff and then get to sleep.
Here are a few random pics from the weekend:
Good night.
The UEFA Euro 08 finals were today; I will miss the world class games the tournament provided over the past weeks. There wasn't one game I watched that wasn't fantastic.
This weekend, I learned what the word Superman means when used as a verb. I was surprised to learn that a term has been coined for the scenario it describes. Better judgment prevents me from discussing it further but I cut a clip from the Discomentary Volume 1 intro that uses Soulja Boy.
Yet another super boring blog post, uggg to me.
I need to figure out some softball stuff and then get to sleep.
Here are a few random pics from the weekend:
Good night.
Feliz Navidad
December 27, 2007 - 10:17
- EyeTV 250 - American Choppers - Discomentary
Belated Merry Christmas. I hope everyone had a great holiday with great food. Our Christmas meal was excellent, just like every other meal at home.
I carefully placed a few select tech items on an Amazon wish list for any interested parties. The only interested party picked up 3 of the top items, leaving me with some very cool new thing. The only one I'll briefly mention right now is the Elgato EyeTV 250 Plus . The device has a ton of features, with the most exciting to me being the instant ability to watch cable TV on my computer. Plug in the coax cable and your done. It has a program guide so I can easily find something to watch, and if nothing is on, I can just watch the news. It's also like a DVR on steroids, you can record, save, and burn anything you want. It also includes an import for another source, such as a DVD player or Xbox360. It has HD capabilities I haven't fooled around with yet as well. As you can tell, I am a big fan of this device.
Other things I am a big fan of include:
-American Chopper: I have had a marathon running in the background for the past few hours. This show represents my favorite reality TV series. I'm not really into any aspect of motorcycles, but I think it's super cool how they design and build some creative bikes. The people on the show also seem more down to earth than anyone else I ever see on reality shows, which is nice.
-my recent work on Discomentary Volume One. I have been digging pretty deep into a level of video effects I previously didn't really get into. It's pretty cool, but I still have a ton to learn about and do.
-days off
-and the fact that I can use my new photo album in IE (with only a few minor nuances).
Things I'm not a big fan of:
-waking up early and boring blog posts like my recent ones.
Thank you and good night!
I carefully placed a few select tech items on an Amazon wish list for any interested parties. The only interested party picked up 3 of the top items, leaving me with some very cool new thing. The only one I'll briefly mention right now is the Elgato EyeTV 250 Plus . The device has a ton of features, with the most exciting to me being the instant ability to watch cable TV on my computer. Plug in the coax cable and your done. It has a program guide so I can easily find something to watch, and if nothing is on, I can just watch the news. It's also like a DVR on steroids, you can record, save, and burn anything you want. It also includes an import for another source, such as a DVD player or Xbox360. It has HD capabilities I haven't fooled around with yet as well. As you can tell, I am a big fan of this device.
Other things I am a big fan of include:
-American Chopper: I have had a marathon running in the background for the past few hours. This show represents my favorite reality TV series. I'm not really into any aspect of motorcycles, but I think it's super cool how they design and build some creative bikes. The people on the show also seem more down to earth than anyone else I ever see on reality shows, which is nice.
-my recent work on Discomentary Volume One. I have been digging pretty deep into a level of video effects I previously didn't really get into. It's pretty cool, but I still have a ton to learn about and do.
-days off
-and the fact that I can use my new photo album in IE (with only a few minor nuances).
Things I'm not a big fan of:
-waking up early and boring blog posts like my recent ones.
Thank you and good night!
Today is November 11th
November 11, 2007 - 10:32
- ELevens - Guitar Hero 3 - Halo 3 - Discomentary
11/11, what a cool date. Eleven eleven, rhymes with heaven, in one hour and and 37 minutes it'll be eleven eleven, eleven eleven PM. Can't wait!
If the time stamp on my site worked correctly, I'd post a comment during that special minute, freezing it forever for just for you and me. A time stamp is such a simple yet important feature of almost everything in life, I vow to fix this element of my site sometime before eleven eleven eleven.
My friend has been up visiting this weekend. She wanted me to pick up Guitar Hero 3 because she got to play her sisters' boyfriends' (is that the appropriate use of the apostrophe there??) and "couldn't stop thinking about it". I have had two notable run ins with this series, once during a weekend gathering with a bunch of college buddies and the other every night from about 6pm - 1am when my 2nd floor tenant is playing it (minus the time he is making relations with his GF, which also fills the room with sweet sweet melody). Neither got me very excited about this game. I think the main culprit to blame for my lack of interest in this game is my lack of appreciation for certain aspects of music in general. I love music, but I'm usually not interested into the actual performer about 95% of the time, and not really interested in the actual lyrics about 55% of the time. Hmmm, this is puzzling, I like putting percentages on personal feeling, because it makes me see in numbers how weird I might or might not be. Anyhow, bottom line, wasn't going to get this game, fast forward to finding the game sold out at the first five retailers and not at the sixth, got the game, the real story begins...
To my knowledge, the only other game I have ever seen like this in my life is Dance Dance Revolution. By "like this" I am referring to a video game that relies on and therefore builds upon muscle memory to a degree that requires a qualified "expert" user to actually bypass any strictly rely on the muscles in your fingers to react to the colors your eyes see, without actually comprehending any of the in between. I am about half way through the "medium" level and there are some songs that I need to go through twice to complete, so I don't even know if I'm physically capable of competing at the "expert" level of play. There have been a few instances of my fingers and eyes taking away control from my brain, but that is probably only around 5% of the time so far. When we first loaded up the game and started to play, I blasted the stereo, hoping that my tenants would embrace the fact that I embrace all of the passions they embrace. It worked, they came down and the one who plays the game all the time played a song on expert. Maybe it was all of the Sake I drank during dinner, but watching him play was the most amazing musical performance I have ever seen. The button combinations that he was consistently nailing was simply un human. Just to think, so many people are probably capable of doing what I saw him do, this game is going to turn it's players into super humans. It's like, if you goto an Olympic ping pong championship game, you expect to see some pretty crazy feats of hand eye coordination, but when you are just sitting there watching someone play a guitar video game, you aren't expecting to see something so amazing. I think it is funny to think about all of the kids out there who are absolutely sick at video games. They can sit there in their living room blasting away enemies in Halo 3, with their parents only getting out of it that there is a lot of violence going on, and not that what they are doing is actually pretty hard. But now, the kid could be like, "Try out this guitar game, just hit the buttons who colors correspond to the notes", and the parent might not be so quick to dismiss the game for it's aesthetic value, opposed to the skills required to be successful at it. After playing probably semi decently at an easy level, then getting destroyed at a harder level, watching their child breeze through those same hard levels would probably incite a feeling of simple appreciation of that ability, much like I gave a ton of props to my tenant for being so nasty at the game. I think my example of the "parent and child" could actually be a tad off, I think there are a lot of parents who probably do think that what their kids do in video games is pretty cool, let's just replace "parent" for "anti video game politician". That sits better with me. I want there to be studies done of people playing this game. Take some pro athletes, some kids, some gamers, non gamers, adults, musicians, and watch them all play this game, and monitor their success, because I really think this games pushes the envelope on hand eye coordination, and I think those results would be fascinating!
OK, enough about that! I think that was almost a tad overboard of a video game discussion....but, since we are on the topic, I have finished Halo 3 on Heroic, and I've been a level 20 Second Lieutenant online for about a week now [pat on the back, pat on the back please].
Time to wrap things up with some multimedia and a favor!
First, a picture of me, Pugsley, my sweet Les Paul wireless controller with stars and stripes faceplate, and my new coat. I have been looking for a new winter coat for about 2 years now, I finally found "the one" during my day off on Friday...that bad boy is going to change the entire season of winter!
And second, a clip, that I would like your help on. Long story short, this is a brief clip from some stuff I did last week. I knew it spun too fast, and I didn't mind, because I think any good performance makes the user go through the entire spectrum of emotions...except maybe nausea...confusion=fine but puke=bad. Please let me know if this is simply too fast to really grasp any of the pictures, or too fast to sit there comfortably and watch it. Thanks in advance.
OK, that's all you get from the inside tonight.
If the time stamp on my site worked correctly, I'd post a comment during that special minute, freezing it forever for just for you and me. A time stamp is such a simple yet important feature of almost everything in life, I vow to fix this element of my site sometime before eleven eleven eleven.
My friend has been up visiting this weekend. She wanted me to pick up Guitar Hero 3 because she got to play her sisters' boyfriends' (is that the appropriate use of the apostrophe there??) and "couldn't stop thinking about it". I have had two notable run ins with this series, once during a weekend gathering with a bunch of college buddies and the other every night from about 6pm - 1am when my 2nd floor tenant is playing it (minus the time he is making relations with his GF, which also fills the room with sweet sweet melody). Neither got me very excited about this game. I think the main culprit to blame for my lack of interest in this game is my lack of appreciation for certain aspects of music in general. I love music, but I'm usually not interested into the actual performer about 95% of the time, and not really interested in the actual lyrics about 55% of the time. Hmmm, this is puzzling, I like putting percentages on personal feeling, because it makes me see in numbers how weird I might or might not be. Anyhow, bottom line, wasn't going to get this game, fast forward to finding the game sold out at the first five retailers and not at the sixth, got the game, the real story begins...
To my knowledge, the only other game I have ever seen like this in my life is Dance Dance Revolution. By "like this" I am referring to a video game that relies on and therefore builds upon muscle memory to a degree that requires a qualified "expert" user to actually bypass any strictly rely on the muscles in your fingers to react to the colors your eyes see, without actually comprehending any of the in between. I am about half way through the "medium" level and there are some songs that I need to go through twice to complete, so I don't even know if I'm physically capable of competing at the "expert" level of play. There have been a few instances of my fingers and eyes taking away control from my brain, but that is probably only around 5% of the time so far. When we first loaded up the game and started to play, I blasted the stereo, hoping that my tenants would embrace the fact that I embrace all of the passions they embrace. It worked, they came down and the one who plays the game all the time played a song on expert. Maybe it was all of the Sake I drank during dinner, but watching him play was the most amazing musical performance I have ever seen. The button combinations that he was consistently nailing was simply un human. Just to think, so many people are probably capable of doing what I saw him do, this game is going to turn it's players into super humans. It's like, if you goto an Olympic ping pong championship game, you expect to see some pretty crazy feats of hand eye coordination, but when you are just sitting there watching someone play a guitar video game, you aren't expecting to see something so amazing. I think it is funny to think about all of the kids out there who are absolutely sick at video games. They can sit there in their living room blasting away enemies in Halo 3, with their parents only getting out of it that there is a lot of violence going on, and not that what they are doing is actually pretty hard. But now, the kid could be like, "Try out this guitar game, just hit the buttons who colors correspond to the notes", and the parent might not be so quick to dismiss the game for it's aesthetic value, opposed to the skills required to be successful at it. After playing probably semi decently at an easy level, then getting destroyed at a harder level, watching their child breeze through those same hard levels would probably incite a feeling of simple appreciation of that ability, much like I gave a ton of props to my tenant for being so nasty at the game. I think my example of the "parent and child" could actually be a tad off, I think there are a lot of parents who probably do think that what their kids do in video games is pretty cool, let's just replace "parent" for "anti video game politician". That sits better with me. I want there to be studies done of people playing this game. Take some pro athletes, some kids, some gamers, non gamers, adults, musicians, and watch them all play this game, and monitor their success, because I really think this games pushes the envelope on hand eye coordination, and I think those results would be fascinating!
OK, enough about that! I think that was almost a tad overboard of a video game discussion....but, since we are on the topic, I have finished Halo 3 on Heroic, and I've been a level 20 Second Lieutenant online for about a week now [pat on the back, pat on the back please].
Time to wrap things up with some multimedia and a favor!
First, a picture of me, Pugsley, my sweet Les Paul wireless controller with stars and stripes faceplate, and my new coat. I have been looking for a new winter coat for about 2 years now, I finally found "the one" during my day off on Friday...that bad boy is going to change the entire season of winter!
And second, a clip, that I would like your help on. Long story short, this is a brief clip from some stuff I did last week. I knew it spun too fast, and I didn't mind, because I think any good performance makes the user go through the entire spectrum of emotions...except maybe nausea...confusion=fine but puke=bad. Please let me know if this is simply too fast to really grasp any of the pictures, or too fast to sit there comfortably and watch it. Thanks in advance.
OK, that's all you get from the inside tonight.
New Orleans Video Slide Show
November 4, 2007 - 12:28
- video - Discomentary
I got a good amount of work done on a segment for Discomentary Volume 1, about 1 minute 20 seconds to be exact. I knew I wanted to get something done on that project, I just didn't know what to work on, so I started fooling around with an idea I've had for a few weeks. I primarily used Illustrator, Photoshop and After Affects; and I'm happy with what I got done. I think I will use this project for part of the videos beginning.
I always have internal debates about what best drives many projects like this (or a website), content or layout. I often find that the content will end up dictating the layout, so getting carried away with layout during the initial phases could be time wasted, but unlike many of my recent projects, the content is often already ready in one form or another, so layout is one of the only areas still left to be worked on. To be fair to this topic, I will not even discuss it any further, there is really so much that can be said on it, and I am way too tried to even think about something like this right now :)
I've been having another internal debate about whether or not I would post much video for Discomentary on the web using a third party service such as YouTube. My primary reservation in doing so is due to my desire to have everything I work on and then display to be shown in as close to the original resolution/quality that I intended on it being shown in. I decided to post the New Orleans video slide show tonight. The quality did get butchered a bit, but it actually isn't all that bad. It will be nice for some of my friends to see who were on that trip, which was ultimately the deciding factor in me uploading it.
Here is the clip:
Well no more internal debates to be discussed this evening. This is neither the time, nor the venue, for more interesting conversation.
Leaving you with a filtered view of life on the inside, out,
good night.
I always have internal debates about what best drives many projects like this (or a website), content or layout. I often find that the content will end up dictating the layout, so getting carried away with layout during the initial phases could be time wasted, but unlike many of my recent projects, the content is often already ready in one form or another, so layout is one of the only areas still left to be worked on. To be fair to this topic, I will not even discuss it any further, there is really so much that can be said on it, and I am way too tried to even think about something like this right now :)
I've been having another internal debate about whether or not I would post much video for Discomentary on the web using a third party service such as YouTube. My primary reservation in doing so is due to my desire to have everything I work on and then display to be shown in as close to the original resolution/quality that I intended on it being shown in. I decided to post the New Orleans video slide show tonight. The quality did get butchered a bit, but it actually isn't all that bad. It will be nice for some of my friends to see who were on that trip, which was ultimately the deciding factor in me uploading it.
Here is the clip:
Well no more internal debates to be discussed this evening. This is neither the time, nor the venue, for more interesting conversation.
Leaving you with a filtered view of life on the inside, out,
good night.
very boring
August 9, 2007 - 12:21
- Adobe CS - Discomentary - New Orleans Video
I can't sit at my computer without working on the video sideshow I started a few nights ago. My desire to finish it could not be stronger. I thought I had hit a wall tonight, and was actually pretty excited to possibly watch TV, or maybe do some website work, or just do something normal, but then I was just sitting here, with a head full of nothing, and then an idea popped into my head, and then I started working on the video again. I have 50 seconds complete so far, which has taken at least 10 hours. That time is not a realistic representation on how long these 50 seconds should normally take. I spent a lot of time learning new ways of doing different things in a variety of the programs I got with the Adobe package. I would say, under normal circumstances, these 50 seconds should take about 5 hours of straight computer work. Luckily, a lot of "Discomentary, Volume 1" won't be still pictures, so I won't feel the need to constantly have things changing about on the screen. This current project has given me a very good opportunity of trying a ton of different ideas out. With that said, I am excited to be done with it, hopefully soon, I have a few projects on my website, as well as others, that need some tending to in the not so distant future.
another incredibly exciting screen shot of about 10 minutes ago....
and good night.
another incredibly exciting screen shot of about 10 minutes ago....
and good night.
as the dust settles...
March 22, 2007 - 7:20
- Splash 8 - Discomentary - Rome - LOST
After about 2 weeks of site downtime, I am happy to report that the war against my old domain registrar has ended. I have emerged victorious. Due to the fact that I have deemed this website "The Official Homepage of Seth DeSantis", the official public record of everything me, I periodically need to blog about topics few would find interesting. This is one of those times. In the future, you likely will not get such a bold warning, instead, you will have to learn to identify a potentially boring topic, and skip it on your own. However be warned, as with this responsibility comes great risk, failure to correctly identify which topics are truly "un-interesting" will result in you missing out a potentially life changing idea. Proceed with caution.
My adventure through the process of changing registrars began on Sunday, February 18th, of this year. My reason for changing the registrar that has hosted this prestigious site since 2003 was simple; I was unable to upload files via PHP from the browser to my server, the fundamental step I needed to accomplish in order to proceed with various functions I will be writing to do an assortment of things but most importantly uploading pictures to this blog via the blog editor page I wrote a few months back. I also liked the idea of having all of my sites hosted and registered with one company. I began using godaddy.com about a year ago, as my portfolio of domain names and hosting packages grew, so did my confidence in their ability to provide long-term/reliable service to my sites. I initially attributed the problems I was having with my old registrar, registerfly.com , to the fact that they would likely hide the option to transfer your domain name to another company deep within user options. As I searched and searched, I realized I needed some help, so I started a support ticket with registerfly. After a week of it going unanswered I wrote a follow up to my ticket, inquiring if anyone was going to help me. No one responded, another weeks goes by, so I start exploring their support section again. This time, I found a letter from a third party administrator stating registerfly has been experiencing some major problems, and they are working around the clock to answer pending support tickets and apply account changes. About another two weeks go by, weeks filled with tons of calls that rang to busy with registerfly and a handful of calls made to godaddy. Even though the problem wasn't with godaddy, I figured it wouldn't hurt to run the problem by them for any possible advice. It turned out that their tech support staff had been getting emails about issues with registerfly and possible solutions to remedy them. After a few different conversations with godaddy, it was determined the only solution was for me to email ICANN and ask for their intervention. As I wrote an email to the organization in charge of "the internet", I started to have doubts. I am just one humble man with a humble site, who is ever going to read this email within the next decade, and when they do, what are they possibly going to do? Much to my delight, I received a personalized response the next day. The person told me that if the problem wasn't resolved within the next 2 business days, to email her back. Surely enough, 2 business days later, I get an automated email from godaddy stating that the transfer has completed. Still having doubts, I typed in sethdesantis.com and the parking page changed from the horrible advertisements the rats at registerfly had put up, to the pleasant yet dull godaddy "Oops" page. The internet goddess who responded to my email performed some crazy ICANN magic and saved the day. Now here we are, chatting about the one month drama that shook life as I know it.
Sooo...here we are, I have a ton of ideas and a site with a ton of problems. Sure, you don't see the problems, you look at my site every day and put it up there with greats such as ESPN.com, FOXNEWS.com, DIGG.COM, and APPLE.com...but you don't see what I see. I have folders upon folders of files filled with pages that will never again be included. Pages of functions who's glory days are just a thing of the past. My unwillingness to perform mandatory housekeeping on my root directory has really done a job on my ability to efficiently add and update this site. If you saw what I saw, you would be so disgusted, you would likely never speak to me again.
So, I got the site back 2 days ago. Primarily due to a softball coaches meeting that took 2 and a half hours too long, I have only been able to get the site to it's "previous state" (with the exception of a new header image indicating things to come...). I have re-transferred all of the MySQL databases from the old host to this one. I have updated all of (I think) the code to access my new databases. This adventure through tons of different included files spread in many different folders has confirmed that it is near time to start re-writing the site from the bottom up. Luckily though, few to none of the major functions that make up the behind the scenes backbone of this site will need to be re-written, rather, I need to re-write the pages that call these functions...which can actually be considered fun to people as dorky as myself. With all the nasty code out of the way, I can focus more on the aesthetic aspects of the site, something the kids like to call "the eye candy". One would think that after painting such a horrible picture of the "state of the site" this re-writing would be for my first priority. Well that one would be wrong. I have WAY too many things I need to do before I can even consider aesthetics!
-Did you know users can't change their passwords, they can't even choose nicknames!
-Did you know that there is an album in my photo albums with MULTIPLE vertical pictures, being displayed horizontally!
-Did you know that all of my blog posts have Tags, yet there is no where to play with these Tags?
This is just a sampling of countless flaws of this site. These are the reasons I can't write an email to everyone I know to tell them to check it out. It would be like inviting the world over to my house after a Christmas Party! Come on, we can get crazy, but let's not be stupid here.
In closing of this chapter, filled of despair with just a hint of hope, I ask everyone to calm down and take a deep breath. This site will prevail. The functions will get written and the directory will get cleaned up. Someday you, the modest user may be able to upload your very own content! Far fetched you mumble to yourself, but you don't see what i see. I am sitting in a pretty sick office with a lot of really cool new equipment. I feel very confident that this site will progress nicely over the next few weeks, months, and years.
**Almost done with "un-interesting" talk...
The period of site downtime actually came at a rather convenient time. I have had the pleasure of working on a few other projects for some other people. It has been mostly web sites, but I did get to work on some video and audio stuff. I am very excited about really digging deep into some video projects in the near future. I have thus far transferred 8 DV Camcorder tapes to the computer. While it is unfortunate that some of the best footage is "too good" to ever be made public, I do have a few second here and there of my friends doing funny things, that wouldn't get anyone arrested, fired, or divorced. Look for Discomentary Volume 1 to hit shelves within the next few months.
**OK, done, please start reading again...
-ROME: I am saddened to say that one of the best television series ever created has only 1 episode left. This Sunday it will all come to an end. I would like to propose that rather than mourn the loss of such a good gladiator themed drama, with tons of naked people having sex and killing each other, we celebrate the good memories we have been provided with over the past few seasons.
-LOST: It continues to proceed strongly. It appears the two weeks of weak episodes a little while back was a fluke. The story line is strong and my curiosity is peaked.
-In conclusion, I would like to once again welcome everyone back to the site. I look forward to writing more about nothing for a very long time to come. From the inside, out, good night.
My adventure through the process of changing registrars began on Sunday, February 18th, of this year. My reason for changing the registrar that has hosted this prestigious site since 2003 was simple; I was unable to upload files via PHP from the browser to my server, the fundamental step I needed to accomplish in order to proceed with various functions I will be writing to do an assortment of things but most importantly uploading pictures to this blog via the blog editor page I wrote a few months back. I also liked the idea of having all of my sites hosted and registered with one company. I began using godaddy.com about a year ago, as my portfolio of domain names and hosting packages grew, so did my confidence in their ability to provide long-term/reliable service to my sites. I initially attributed the problems I was having with my old registrar, registerfly.com , to the fact that they would likely hide the option to transfer your domain name to another company deep within user options. As I searched and searched, I realized I needed some help, so I started a support ticket with registerfly. After a week of it going unanswered I wrote a follow up to my ticket, inquiring if anyone was going to help me. No one responded, another weeks goes by, so I start exploring their support section again. This time, I found a letter from a third party administrator stating registerfly has been experiencing some major problems, and they are working around the clock to answer pending support tickets and apply account changes. About another two weeks go by, weeks filled with tons of calls that rang to busy with registerfly and a handful of calls made to godaddy. Even though the problem wasn't with godaddy, I figured it wouldn't hurt to run the problem by them for any possible advice. It turned out that their tech support staff had been getting emails about issues with registerfly and possible solutions to remedy them. After a few different conversations with godaddy, it was determined the only solution was for me to email ICANN and ask for their intervention. As I wrote an email to the organization in charge of "the internet", I started to have doubts. I am just one humble man with a humble site, who is ever going to read this email within the next decade, and when they do, what are they possibly going to do? Much to my delight, I received a personalized response the next day. The person told me that if the problem wasn't resolved within the next 2 business days, to email her back. Surely enough, 2 business days later, I get an automated email from godaddy stating that the transfer has completed. Still having doubts, I typed in sethdesantis.com and the parking page changed from the horrible advertisements the rats at registerfly had put up, to the pleasant yet dull godaddy "Oops" page. The internet goddess who responded to my email performed some crazy ICANN magic and saved the day. Now here we are, chatting about the one month drama that shook life as I know it.
Sooo...here we are, I have a ton of ideas and a site with a ton of problems. Sure, you don't see the problems, you look at my site every day and put it up there with greats such as ESPN.com, FOXNEWS.com, DIGG.COM, and APPLE.com...but you don't see what I see. I have folders upon folders of files filled with pages that will never again be included. Pages of functions who's glory days are just a thing of the past. My unwillingness to perform mandatory housekeeping on my root directory has really done a job on my ability to efficiently add and update this site. If you saw what I saw, you would be so disgusted, you would likely never speak to me again.
So, I got the site back 2 days ago. Primarily due to a softball coaches meeting that took 2 and a half hours too long, I have only been able to get the site to it's "previous state" (with the exception of a new header image indicating things to come...). I have re-transferred all of the MySQL databases from the old host to this one. I have updated all of (I think) the code to access my new databases. This adventure through tons of different included files spread in many different folders has confirmed that it is near time to start re-writing the site from the bottom up. Luckily though, few to none of the major functions that make up the behind the scenes backbone of this site will need to be re-written, rather, I need to re-write the pages that call these functions...which can actually be considered fun to people as dorky as myself. With all the nasty code out of the way, I can focus more on the aesthetic aspects of the site, something the kids like to call "the eye candy". One would think that after painting such a horrible picture of the "state of the site" this re-writing would be for my first priority. Well that one would be wrong. I have WAY too many things I need to do before I can even consider aesthetics!
-Did you know users can't change their passwords, they can't even choose nicknames!
-Did you know that there is an album in my photo albums with MULTIPLE vertical pictures, being displayed horizontally!
-Did you know that all of my blog posts have Tags, yet there is no where to play with these Tags?
This is just a sampling of countless flaws of this site. These are the reasons I can't write an email to everyone I know to tell them to check it out. It would be like inviting the world over to my house after a Christmas Party! Come on, we can get crazy, but let's not be stupid here.
In closing of this chapter, filled of despair with just a hint of hope, I ask everyone to calm down and take a deep breath. This site will prevail. The functions will get written and the directory will get cleaned up. Someday you, the modest user may be able to upload your very own content! Far fetched you mumble to yourself, but you don't see what i see. I am sitting in a pretty sick office with a lot of really cool new equipment. I feel very confident that this site will progress nicely over the next few weeks, months, and years.
**Almost done with "un-interesting" talk...
The period of site downtime actually came at a rather convenient time. I have had the pleasure of working on a few other projects for some other people. It has been mostly web sites, but I did get to work on some video and audio stuff. I am very excited about really digging deep into some video projects in the near future. I have thus far transferred 8 DV Camcorder tapes to the computer. While it is unfortunate that some of the best footage is "too good" to ever be made public, I do have a few second here and there of my friends doing funny things, that wouldn't get anyone arrested, fired, or divorced. Look for Discomentary Volume 1 to hit shelves within the next few months.
**OK, done, please start reading again...
-ROME: I am saddened to say that one of the best television series ever created has only 1 episode left. This Sunday it will all come to an end. I would like to propose that rather than mourn the loss of such a good gladiator themed drama, with tons of naked people having sex and killing each other, we celebrate the good memories we have been provided with over the past few seasons.
-LOST: It continues to proceed strongly. It appears the two weeks of weak episodes a little while back was a fluke. The story line is strong and my curiosity is peaked.
-In conclusion, I would like to once again welcome everyone back to the site. I look forward to writing more about nothing for a very long time to come. From the inside, out, good night.