Monthly Archives: January 2009

Bug Hunt

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The story so far: yesterday was exasperating, because things remained the same—I couldn’t get my custom widgets (like Feedjit and Alexa) to display in themes other than Tarski. I was so desperate that I foolishly “reinstalled” WordPress 2.7 (I made backups first). No luck, the problem still lingered. Until I came upon this page in the WordPress.com forums (big thank yous to the members who posted there). Turns out that it could have been a bug in the latest release of WordPress.com (I was told it was fixed) and I had the suspicion that it was present in WordPress.org too.

Anyway, this is how I solved it:

  1. I activated the Tarski theme, and went to the widgets page.
  2. I deleted all my custom widgets. I copied the codes to Notepad before deleting them.
  3. Once this was done, the deleted widgets appeared on the left-hand side, with a clickable add link. This meant that I could add them to other themes. I tried it out and it worked. Success at last!

This had me a little perplexed; I’d used Tarski before in WP versions prior to 2.7 without any problems. Or could it have been the latest version of Tarski (2.4) conflicting with WP? Whatever it is, I will be a little more careful whenever I play around with themes; I was fortunate that I was able to solve this problem.

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The strange case of Mr. Tarski

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OK, now I’ve figured it out somewhat. The problem with my custom widgets started when I did a manual update of the WordPress Tarski theme to version 2.4. Before doing that, all my custom widgets appeared in my blog. However, after deleting the old Tarski files and then replacing them with the new 2.4, all my custom widgets vanished from my blog. If I use any other theme besides Tarski, they won’t show up at all.

I did check out the Tarski support forums, but couldn’t find much useful advice there. Guess I’ll have to write a new post to the authors about this. It’s strange how only Tarski 2.4 allows my custom widgets to be seen. Or perhaps I could or should revert back to an earlier version of Tarski and see what happens. If anyone has any ideas or suggestions please let me know. Thank you.

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Attack of the Killer Tomatoes

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These things are relentless!

Today’s the first day of Chinese New Year. As always, on this important day we have some vermicelli for breakfast (washed down with my favorite java), put on some nice clothes, and go out for some visiting. It’s only to a few places: my mother and mother-in-law’s house, my aunts, and a friend or two. Food is always plentiful, so I’m not worried for my stomach, but I do need to get my 30 laps tomorrow.

Came back after lunch, had an afternoon siesta, and then booted up the computer (what else would you expect a geek to do?). I had a nice feeling inside me, knowing that I’d settled all my client’s computers before the New Year, so everything seemed to be coming up roses. I underestimated those computer bugs (or buggers).

One of the daily routines I do is to check my blog, to make sure that it’s up and running for all the world to see. I click on it in my bookmarks, and it loads. Hey, wait a minute—my custom widgets aren’t showing! The only widgets that appear are the default ones like Pages, Archives, Categories, Blog Roll, and Meta. My MX counters were shot for the past few days; OK, I can live with (or without) that for now, but all my other custom widgets like Feedjit—gone! Poof! Vanished into virtual air.

Logged into my WordPress admin and checked the widgets page. My custom widgets are still listed but they seemed to have put on an aura of invisibility in my blog—the killer bugs strike again! The only course of action I’ll do now is to wait. It doesn’t seem like the error’s on my side. Fingers crossed about that.

On the plus side, and I hate to admit it—my sidebar does look cleaner without all those additional widgets. Is somebody up there trying to tell me something? Coupled with the slick Acid Rain theme from MB Web Design UK, my blog feels like it’s shedded a few pounds or kilos.

Such is life in the computer world. It can be frustrating at times, there are moments when I feel like pulling my hair out, but I can say one thing for sure—there’s never a dull moment. Now excuse me, I have to go and stock up on my ammunition.

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Another New Year approaches

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2009 is the Year of the Ox

Chinese New Year, I mean, which falls on January 26 this year and goes on for the next 15 days. However, nobody takes a break for that long; I resume work on January 30 but that still gives me a couple of days to relax. This is what I’ve been doing since my last post:

  1. Settled all my bills (a very important New Year custom).
  2. Got a haircut.
  3. Completed repairing all the computers sent to me. Funny how computers seem to break down just before an important occasion.
  4. Threw away some junk in my cupboard (another New Year custom, but I call it spring cleaning).
  5. Last but not least, writing this post, just to let you know I’m still alive and kicking, LOL.

Since it’s my male offspring’s birthday on January 27, we’ll be having dinner at Tao Cuisine, a very nice Japanese restaurant here in Penang. Guess who’s footing the check, but what the heck, the food’s yummy.

To my Chinese readers, GONG XI FA CAI, and may the Year of the Ox bring all of us health, wealth, happiness, and prosperity!

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The Year of the Ox

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No sooner have I recovered from Christmas and New Year then Chinese New Year comes rumbling in around the corner on January 26 with the Year of the Ox (2008 was the Year of the Rat—my year, but it was bleh) I’ll be on holiday from January 25 to 29; less than a week, but I’ll take every break I can get. Again this will be another occasion where food and drink will be abundant, but of the Chinese variety. Don’t worry, I plan to squeeze in some pizza somewhere.

Unlike the Western horoscope, which is based on a monthly cycle, the Chinese horoscope is based on a 12-year animal cycle. Here’s the story in a nutshell, quoted from Infoplease:

Legend has it that in ancient times, Buddha asked all the animals to meet him on Chinese New Year. Twelve came, and Buddha named a year after each one. He announced that the people born in each animal’s year would have some of that animal’s personality.

Want to find out which animal year you were born in? Glad you asked.

Chinese animal years, courtesy of Infoplease

And here’s a quick rundown of your personality. I never take this stuff seriously, it’s just for fun. But (ahem) the traits of the Rat do apply to me Happy

  • Rat: quick-witted, smart, charming, and persuasive
  • Ox: patient, kind, stubborn, and conservative
  • Tiger: authoritative, emotional, courageous, and intense
  • Rabbit: popular, compassionate, and sincere
  • Dragon: energetic, fearless, warm-hearted, and charismatic
  • Snake: charming, gregarious, introverted, generous, and smart
  • Horse: energetic, independent, impatient, and enjoy traveling
  • Sheep: mild-mannered, shy, kind, and peace-loving
  • Monkey: fun, energetic, and active
  • Rooster: independent, practical, hard-working, and observant
  • Dog: patient, diligent, generous, faithful, and kind
  • Pig: loving, tolerant, honest, and appreciative of luxury

The above personality traits are from Infoplease.

Famous people born in the Year of the Ox include Barack Obama, Warren Beatty, Jon Bon Jovi, Jeff Bridges, Richard Burton, Barbara Cartland, Charlie Chaplin, Bill Cosby, Sammy Davis Jr, Walt Disney, Dustin Hoffman, Anthony Hopkins, Don Johnson, Jane Fonda, Jack Lemmon, Heather Locklear, Eddie Murphy, Jessica Lange, Paul Newman, Jack Nicholson, Robert Redford, Rod Steiger, Peter Sellers, Sissy Spacek, Bruce Springsteen, and Meryl Streep.

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Going potty over SSID

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What’s an SSID (Service Set Identifier)? As defined in about.com:

An SSID is the name of a wireless local area network (WLAN). All wireless devices on a WLAN must employ the same SSID in order to communicate with each other.

If I read correctly, here are some of the golden rules of securing a wireless network:

  1. Change the router’s default admin name and password.
  2. Enable wireless encryption.
  3. Disable SSID broadcast.

I completed the first two earlier on, and found myself at #3. Why should we disable the SSID? Again, to quote about.com:

Wardrivers (aka hackers) sometimes scan for the SSIDs being broadcast by wireless LANs, then set that SSID on their client to attempt to join that WLAN. Knowing the SSID name does not necessarily mean that rogue clients will be able to join the network. It depends on how the network administrator has configured their WLAN, particularly WEP security.

OK, so I oblige and dutifully disable SSID broadcasting in my Linksys WRT54G2. Male offspring boots up his computer yesterday and complains that he can’t connect at all. I’d forgotten about this SSID thing and my stress levels rise up bit by bit—rats. At times like this, it pays to step back as I’ve always said. So I go to the hotel and play some music. And mid-way through my playing it hits my brain like a sledgehammer—you disabled SSID broadcast, dummy.

Went straight to my computer after returning from the hotel. Enabled SSID in my router and male offspring was able to connect; right, got that. Then disabled the SSID. Rebooted male offspring’s computer and he was still able to connect. One more issue resolved!

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WALL-E wins in the 2009 Golden Globe Awards

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Woot! I was pleased to see that WALL-E was picked as the winner in the 2009 Golden Globe Awards category for Best Animated Feature Film. The other nominees were Bolt and Kung Fu Panda. Peter Gabriel’s song “Down to Earth” was nominated but didn’t win; never mind, one out of two ain’t bad. And boo hoo—Thomas Newman’s fine music score wasn’t even among the nominees for Best Movie Soundtrack. Dang.

Here’s the clip of The Jonas Brothers announcing the award for Best Animated Feature Film in this year’s Golden Globe Awards. Director Andrew Stanton gives a quick but descriptive acceptance speech, and my-oh-my, I didn’t know Sigourney Weaver (as the voice of the computer in the Axiom spaceship) was in the cast! *knocks head*

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