Monday, July 25, 2005 SMTP Diagnostics version 1.2 is available for download from the White Peak Software web site. For those of you who don't know, this is a SMTP diagnostic tool that helps troubleshoot problems with outgoing email and aids in configuring SMTP servers. posted by Kirby | July 25 11:48 PM | comments (2)
Thursday, July 21, 2005 The White Peak SMTP Diagnostics program will be released to the general public next week, but before I release it I have been thinking about a name change. While SMTP Diagnostics definitely tells what the program does, the name is a bit geeky. This makes me wonder if I should use a different name.
How about it folks? Should I rename the program with a less geeky name? And if so, what name might you suggest? Or should I leave the name as is? posted by Kirby | July 21 03:57 PM | comments (3)
It seems like the work never ends when it comes to publishing a new software product. At the end of each day I feel like I am one step closer to having SMTP Diagnostics ready for general release. But by the next morning I feel like there is an endless list of to-dos remaining that must be completed before program is ready for release.
For those wondering SMTP Diagnostics is a program that will help you troubleshoot problems with outgoing emails or configuring SMTP servers.
That sentence is an example of the never ending to-dos. I need a consistent message regarding the program's purpose for marketing, and I like the sentence I just typed. Now it is a matter of copying the same message "helps you troubleshoot problems with outgoing emails or configuring SMTP servers" to the program help file, the SMTP Diagnostics web page, to the home page for White Peak Software, and so on. See...never ending to-dos. posted by Kirby | July 21 10:47 AM | comments (1)
Wednesday, July 20, 2005 Congratulations to Ricky and Maureen on the arrival of Gabriel Ethan. posted by Kirby | July 20 02:16 PM | comments (0)
The phone and DSL problem has been fixed. Turns out the wire outside of the building was old so the tech ran a new one. It's good to be online again. posted by Kirby | July 20 11:23 AM | comments (0)
Tuesday, July 19, 2005 Many who know me know I love Vermont and I fantasize about living there some day. As a matter of fact, Melanie and I are planning to migrate to the New England area sometime next year.
There are many things that draw me to Vermont. Snowboarding is great, the fall colors are awesome, and the life style is just my speed especially after living in the Big City. But there is something else going on in Vermont as pointed out in this recent article in the Vermont Business Magazine.
As the article points out individuals and organizations such as Vermont Software Developer's Alliance are working to promote Vermont-based software businesses. This gives me hope that the state may start initiatives encouraging companies like White Peak Software to move to Vermont.
Meanwhile, Melanie and I are planning a trip to Boston this weekend to start looking at towns north of Boston that will serve as our first leg in our migration to New England. posted by Kirby | July 19 01:53 PM | comments (8)
Tommie answers the age old question about the sound, if any, a tree will make when it falls in the woods.
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Kirby
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July 19 12:25 PM
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comments (4)
It seems we are having trouble with our phone line today which is affecting my DSL connection to the Internet. I suspect it will take a couple of days for Verizon to fix the problem. Meanwhile, expect some delays in me responding to emails. posted by Kirby | July 19 09:59 AM | comments (0)
I'm back from my Arizona trek with Shawn. The trip was a blast but the hike was much harder than expected.
Before hitting the trail we loaded up with water and weighed the packs to see how much weight we would each be carrying. My pack came in at 57.4 pounds, which included 13.6 pounds of water (164 oz). This was a day's worth of water for me. Shawn brought a water filter so we could replenish our water supply while on the trail.
To avoid the 115+ degrees temperatures in Phoenix, we headed for higher elevation. We hiked a plateau at 7,000 feet that is part of the Mogollon Rim. Day time temperatures varied based on the weather conditions. Early mornings were in the 60s but by mid-morning the temperature would raise near 90. As the thunder storms rolled in throughout the day temperatures would drop back to the 60s, and night time temperature were in the 50s.
We got a late start on Day 1 since I was traveling from New York to Phoenix on that day. We hit the trail head a little after 6 pm, which only gave us a couple of hours to hike before dark. We made it 2.4 miles before setting up camp on the ridge overlooking a dry river bed.
Day 2 was without a doubt the hardest day for me. We hiked 8.8 miles but the majority of the hike consisted over short accents and descents. We climbed multiple 100 to 500 foot ascents followed by equal size descents as we trekked across the canyon. While the elevation change between Camp 1 and Camp 2 was just under 1,000 feet, we guestimate we climbed about 3,000 feet worth of terrain.
We also found a running spring on Day 2. The timing was perfect as we were almost out of water. We re-filled our water supply with filtered water from the spring, which turned out to be cool and tasty.
Day 2 ended in complete exhaustion. The various climbs throughout the day left my legs completely shot. There was no way I could continue with the 50+ pound pack on my back. Our hope was to reach the rim overlooking the valley from 7,000 feet for Camp 2, but needless to say, we didn't make it. Reaching the rim would have to wait until Day 3.
Day 3 was a short 5.1 mile hike with only 3 major ascents. We made it to the rim and took in the beautiful scenery. We hiked alone the rim back to the Jeep and the trail head were we started two days before.
The trip was a great experience but it did come with some lessons learned. First, it is better to setup camp early than to continuing the hike. By the time we setup camp it was almost dark and because we were total exhausted we went straight to bed after eating dinner. Looking back, the trek might have been more enjoyable if we stopped around 5 or 6 pm to setup camp. This would have given us more time to enjoy our surroundings and each other's company.
Second, if you do not know what type of terrain to expect bring hiking boots. I brought hiking shoes with soft soles. Unfortunately most of the hike was on small rocks, which left my feet very sore. Hiking boots would have saved me a lot of pain. posted by Kirby | July 19 09:46 AM | comments (1)
Thursday, July 14, 2005 I will be out of the office through Monday. I'm backpacking with my friend Shawn in the backcountry of Arizona. Day time temps around 115+ degrees. I'm not looking forward to that, but the rest of the adventure should be fun. posted by Kirby | July 14 10:42 PM | comments (4)
Friday, July 08, 2005 A recent thread on the Business of Software discussion forum criticizes FogCreek's latest project as being simple and something that is easily implemented by an India student for a personal web sites. Personally I think simple software is the better software when it comes to commercial software.
When I see a commercial software product that has me thinking "That is so simple I could implement it myself," it typically turns out to be a very good product. And experience has taught me that such an application is not always easy to implement.
A pro snowboarder makes riding look so simple. He or she floats on the snow effortlessly making perfect turns and controlling the board as if the board were an extension to his or her own body. In reality carving the perfect turn takes skill. And writing commercial software that looks so simple any programmer could implement it also takes skills.
Writing software for personal use is one thing, but writing software that is thrown into the wild and still looks simple to implement is a much harder challenge. Commercial software has to take into account many more variables than personal or in-house software. This fact alone makes the software harder to implement, and let's not forget more time consuming.
Don't believe me? Just try re-writing that simple application and see what kind of effort it really takes. posted by Kirby | July 8 11:39 AM | comments (1)
Thursday, July 07, 2005 I've been heads down all day working on SMTP Diagnostics. I did more work on the print preview, added an icon legend, and started work on the help file. The help file is probably 70% complete. Hopefully I can get the Chief Content Editor for White Peak (a.k.a., my wife Melanie) to review the help file this weekend.
I feel the app is ready for public release but I still have a number of "administrative" tasks to complete before I can release it. For instance SMTP Diagnostics still does not have a home page, and I need to setup the web store so users can purchase a license. I hope to have these things in place within the next couple of weeks.
Shoot me an email if you are interested in reviewing the preview release. posted by Kirby | July 7 09:51 PM | comments (2)
For the last 24 hours I have tracked incoming spam to my email address. During that time I received a total of 225 spam messages. 163 of these messages were properly filtered on the server as spam, but unfortunately 62 spam messages were not caught by the server. This means I need to tweak the server settings more. At one time my server caught approximately 90% of incoming spam which no longer seems to be the case.
Good news is 54 of the 62 spam messages were caught by my email client. The other good news is I am seeing a major reduction in total spam received since I started masking my email address. posted by Kirby | July 7 09:47 PM | comments (0)
I want to include a legend feature in SMTP Diagnostics to give users a clue as to the meaning of various icons used in the program. I initially tried to accomplish this by creating a new borderless window that displayed the legend. When the user clicked the legend link in the statusbar the legend window would popup. But I found an easier way to do this.
Instead of creating a new window and doing all the leg work behind the scenes to display the window, position the window, add shadowing to the window and so on, I decided to use a WinHelp popup. WinHelp popups are used in many applications such as Microsoft Office to display "What's This?" Help. A nice feature of WinHelp popups is content can be formatted. In the case of SMTP Diagnostics, a WinHelp popup topic is used to display the legend with the icon on the left followed by the text describing the meaning of the icon.
The end result. I reduced the code used in my first attempt at displaying a legend to a single line of code. Delphi and WinHelp do all the work of displaying, positioning, and shadowing the legend window.
Click image to enlarge. posted by Kirby | July 7 03:55 PM | comments (0)
The EU Parliament rejects the software patents directive. Click here to read more. Now if only the U.S. could get its act together regard software patents. posted by Kirby | July 7 08:56 AM | comments (0)
Wednesday, July 06, 2005 Attention @thecave.com mail users: A number of you have reported an increase in the number of spam messages received. I have adjusted the spam filter rules in hopes to reduce this number. Please note that messages flagged with spam probabilities of MEDIUM and HIGH are automatically moved to your Junk Mail folder. You can override this to have HIGH messages automatically deleted by going to Settings|My Spam Filtering from the SmarterMail web interface.
If you do not want to delete HIGH probability spam messages right away, you can use the auto-clean feature. I use this to force spam messages to be deleted automatically after a few days. This gives me a few days to check my Junk Mail folder should someone report sending me an report that was mistakenly flagged as MEDIUM or HIGH.
To setup the auto-clean, go to Settings|My Folder Auto-Clean from the SmarterMail web interface. Tick the "Enable auto-clean for this folder" box found under the Junk E-mail heading. Set the size before to auto-clean to 3 MB and the size after to 2 MB. This should keep the message around for a few days to a week depending on the amount of spam in your Junk Folder.
Comment or email me if you have specific questions regarding your @thecave.com email account. posted by Kirby | July 6 09:53 AM | comments (0)
Tuesday, July 05, 2005 I purchased the Greatis Print Suite Pro today so I can add print and print preview features to SMTP Diagnostics. The components are nice but the installation is a pain for those new to Delphi 2005. And unfortunately the documentation does not include how to install under D2005.
Fortunately I was able to find a way to install the components. Here's the steps I followed to install the component suite:
- Created a new package project (File|New|Package).
- Added PrintSuiteReg.pas to the project.
- Added PrintJobsReg.pas to the project.
- Compiled and Installed the package. posted by Kirby | July 5 03:16 PM | comments (0)
