[@121]
To 12.42.232.132:

If you think I'm dumb enough to allow javascript in my guestbook, you got another thing coming.

[@109]
Reliability issues…

I'm having some major reliability issues with this site. Spam is the problem. I'm using SpamAssassin's spamd/spamc which have a nasty tendancy to spike up the load.

If the load stays too high for too long, everything else starts dying. Changing the priority on the spamd deamon has had very little effect so far.

I emailed Matt over the weekend and asked him what he was using to monitor/restart Tomcat. He sent me some nifty scripts his ISP wrote for him. They gave me a pretty good idea as to what to look for.

I'm using monit, to monitor and restart services. Here's what I have for Tomcat 5 in my /etc/monitrc:

check process tomcat-apache with pidfile /var/run/tomcat5.pid
  start program = "/etc/rc.d/init.d/tomcat5 start"
  stop program = "/etc/rc.d/init.d/tomcat5 stop"
  if failed host www.thauvin.net port 80
    send "GET /blog/monit.jsp HTTP/1.0"
    expect "HTTP/[0-9.]{3} 200 .*"
    with timeout 15 seconds
  then restart
  every 3 cycles
  alert erik@localhost
  depends on tomcat
  group web

check process tomcat with pidfile /var/run/tomcat5.pid
  start program = "/etc/rc.d/init.d/tomcat5 start"
  stop program = "/etc/rc.d/init.d/tomcat5 stop"
  if failed port 8009 then restart
  if cpu > 80% for 8 cycles then restart
  if loadavg(15min) > 10 for 8 cycles then restart
  if 3 restarts within 5 cycles then timeout
  alert erik@localhost
  group web


So far it has been working like a charm.

Of course it isn't a permanent solution. I need to address the real problem. In the next few days I'll be installing RBLs directly into sendmail which I'm hoping will deal with it once and for all.

Where did the links go? Visit my new Linkblog.

[@200]
TiVO

Marc and Scoble wonder why TiVO hasn't taken off yet.

While I agree with Robert that the technology is too expensive and complex. I think TiVO also suffers from a major case of pathetic marketing.

Ask people who are not technology-savvy about the advantage of TiVO over a plain old VCR. They won't know, and probably won't care. TiVO is marketing itself as a replacement for the VCR, but in fact is nothing more than a companion to it.

“I can't go to my favorite video store and rent a few flixs to play on my TiVO, can I?

You mean I also need a VCR?

How about DVDs? I need a DVD player too?

Sheesh… What is this thing good for?”

You can buy a VCR for around $40 nowadays, versus $200 for a TiVO box. That's another losing proposition.

I've seen a few TiVO units with build-in DVD players, but what about a build-in video player? Last I looked Blockbuster and Hollywood Video still have more VHS offering than DVDs. Everybody has a VCR, yet, TiVo, its wanna-be replacement, is really not compatible.

A few years back, I received a flyer from my old cable company, AT&T Digital Cable, promoting their TiVo-enabled unit. I recall sitting there in my living reading it and wondering what market they were actually trying to target. $10-a-month cable subscribers are not going to spend that kind of money, no matter what.

It's all about technology, but technology is a hard sell. Let me play devil's advocate for a sec…

Commercial Skip — My 4 years old VCR has something called commercial-marking, works like a charm.

Scheduling — Once, again, my 4 years old VCR can easily record a show on a daily, weekly or monthly basis. I just have to remember to change the tape when full. With VCR+ I just pickup my TV guide and find the code, not too hard. I think even my wife can do that. Well… maybe not. (Sorry, honey.)

Pausing Live TV — I can't do that. But I can record a show while watching another live, a single-tuner TiVo unit can't.

Instant Live TV Replay — I really can't do that. Don't call me while I watch TV, please.

Digital Recording — Yeah, cool, but so what?

Of course TiVO makes everything a lot easier, but as far a John Doe customer is concerned it is certainly not compelling enough.

TiVO needs a hook, like Apple with the iPod's coolness factor. Relying on movie stars blabbing about how much they like their TiVO on late night talk shows is not going to cut it in the end.

Where did the links go? Visit my new Linkblog.

[@940]
Where did the links go?

The links have moved to my new Linkblog. Update your bookmarks.

Why the move?

Multiple reasons.

Two of them being that it makes it a lot easier for me to manage, and easier for you to search, categorize, etc.

Are there feeds for the Linkblog?

Of course, look at the bottom of the page for the subscription icons. There are both RSS and Atom feeds.

The feeds are category-aware. If you select a specific category, the feed subscription icons will reflect your selection.

Multiple-categories can be selected by simply separating them by commas, for example:

http://erik.thauvin.net/linkblog/xml.jsp?cat=Java,Mobile

The feed entries are grouped by posting. If you prefer to list one entry per link, simply append view=links to the feed's url, for example:

http://erik.thauvin.net/linkblog/xml.jsp?view=links

What will happen to this blog?

I'll use this blog to post about more personal issues, etc.

[@024]

Tutorial: Developing JavaServer Faces Applications Using WebSphere Studio 5.1.1.

Getting on the open road: Migrate to the Java platform. A three-part series of roadmaps designed to assist developers of .NET, Windows client/server, and ASP applications make the jump to the Java platform.

Java programming dynamics, Part 6: Aspect-oriented changes with Javassist.

Tune Eclipse's Startup performance with the Runtime Spy, Part 1.

A survey of XML standards, Part 4.

Secrets of the wireless elite: Alexei Polyakov. A Russian developer in Japan talks about why westerners are going to be gratified by 3G.

Russ — Jabber Goes Mobile.

Frank — The fastest and cheapest pipe will win content.

Dell Founder Steps Down as Chief Executive but Remains Chairman. Michael Dell, step down as chief executive, but remain chairman.

Neil — JTwister — Now that's what I'm talking about.

Paul — Copying files in Java.

Steve — just where is the Palm MIDP 2.0 public beta?

Matt — JAG - similar to AppFuse, but offers more choices.

Hani — Eclipse LAF: HUH?

Cameron — Looking for a Swing developer ..

Carl — Benchmarks for .append().

Cedric — SGen clarifications.

JMWS 0.0.1, a Java Managed Web System.

TiVo revenue up 85 percent; loss narrows.

Review: Acer Ferrari 3000.

Court stops DVD-copying software. A New York court bans sales of a DVD-copying program, after a similar ruling in California.

[@700]

Merrick — First Impressions of SGen.

CA named as SCO licensee. Computer Associates has licensed The SCO Group's Intellectual Property License for Linux.

Yesterday I received a call from a friend I hadn't heard from in over 15 years. What a rush. It brought back all kind of memories.

PHP or Java Class Code Generator 1.0. A generator of classes for accessing databases in the Java-beans style.

Sweden Adopts EU Ban on Spam. Sweden has belatedly adopted a European Union ban on unsolicited e-mail.

Perl 5.005_04 Released.

Sun Java site running sluggish on decaf. Doctor orders cache injection.

Paul — Pepsi Super Bowl promo failing, Apple's 100 million song goal in serious danger. I've yet to see any of the bottles at my local grocery store.

JTGL 0.65b. Java Tiny Gfx Layer.

Survey: Employees still swapping at work.

Gates downplays Mickey Mouse rumors. No bid, focused on software.

[@632]

Mike — AOL Launches Its Own Social Network Around ICQ.

Mike — Sell Your Own WiFi Access.

Ben — Java agents.

Blitz JavaSpaces 2.0.1, an open source JavaSpaces implementation.

'We're just like the RIAA,' says SCO. Is your daughter safe?

Happy B'day, Sweetie.

GUIFFY 6.0, a diff/merge utility.

New IBM Software PowerPack evaluation program for Java and .Net developers.

Hugo — Is JBoss's source still open?

Kevin — Entity Beans and Me!

jtReversi 0.87, a J2ME Reversi game.

Michael — Configure mobile phhones.

Revealed: the true cost of broadband. Move to Sweden, avoid Switzerland.

How to Render Real-time Situation Displays I0x Faster Than Swing. Interested in a way to accelerate Swing by a factor of ten or even twenty?

World's first Bluetooth 1.2-certified product. CSR's notebook PC.

Daniel — Coming to Java from .Net.

JGoodies Forms 1.0.4 and JGoodies Looks 1.2.1.

Leo — Rethinking attributes.

Email 'leak' suggests SCO got up to $100m from MS. VC and IP deals cited as the route.

[@416]

Joseph — Minimalist Guide to Installing Apache 2.0.48, Tomcat 5.0.19, and JK2.

Interface Tool for Java. A tool that allows Java programs to communicate with ActiveX objects.

Matt — Atom API: I Want My SOAP!

Russ — MySQL JDBC Driver and Tomcat Pooling.

Chris — Eclipse New Look and Feel.

Jesus — Mozilla Thunderbird vs. Ximian Evolution.

Nick — Parsing HTML as XML.

Wolf — Swiml 1.1.

Leslie — Quick Links.

Can a person convicted of a crime serve as president? 35 years old, natural-born U.S. citizen, must have resided in the U.S. for at least 14 years at the time of the election.

Jean-Philippe — Voilà pourquoi je suis nul en informatique.

Jeremy — Amazon.com's new RSS Feeds.

Robert — Did the CIA write viruses to bring down Soviet Union.

Todd — 300 Tweaks to Windows XP.

Today's sponsor is ReportMill Software.

[@138]

Language Features of Java Generics. Get the lowdown on J2SE's new support of generics in the core language of its upcoming 1.5 release.

Using Java to Prevent Attacks. Follow two important rules to prevent your Java application from falling victim to attacks.

Writing a Code Generator in Java. Design and implement a flexible, Java code-generation system that is easy to maintain, intuitive to work with, and based on IOM.

XEsoft Releases XMLFace 1.3. A a toolkit for building Swing and/or SWT based application using an easy to use (and extensible) XML based language.

Another Java Servlet Filter Most Web Applications Should Have. Activate client-side caching.

JCP Releases JavaServer Faces 1.0.

Russ  — What to do about EV1?

Verizon Introduces New Forward-to-Plane Service. $10/month.

Brian — No JavaOne For Me .

Simon — Displaying international characters in JSP.

Dion — iPlanet upgrade on java.sun.com the problem? Ouch.

Mike — Jabber for devices!

Cedric — SGen: an XDoclet killer.

Rui — No Time, Some Links.

iReport 0.2.3 for JasperReports.

Diego — two weeks with a mac.

jTDS 0.7.1. A JDBC driver for MS SQL Server.

Judge orders SCO, IBM to produce disputed code. For a change, the SCO Group had no comment, because Judge Wells told it not to issue any.

Sun Microsystems Names Sueltz's Successor. Marissa Peterson, executive vice president of worldwide operations.

Review: ReplayTV 5504.

Eclipse board names new member. Four new members.

Court that will hear SCO v AutoZone lawsuit itself runs Linux. Presumably, SCO's lawyers filed the lawsuit using a system that it contends infringes its intellectual property.

Mike — Free WiFi Catching On At Airports.

States Bent on Collecting Internet Taxes. Remember all those gifts you bought online during the holidays? Now it's time to pay sales tax on them…

[@750]

Rusty — I'm pleased to announce the release of the XML 1.1 Bible.

SwingWT 0.80. An implementation of the Java Swing and AWT APIs which instead drives SWT applications.

How to hire great open source developers. Many companies have employment policies that stipulate that the company owns anything its employees develop.

Pelle — Open Source like Java CPU.

Rogers — Google: 10,000 dancing Linux servers.

Eric — Getting Started with Eclipse, and Using VSS, Oracle, and Tomcat.

OpenWFE 0.6.1, an open source java workflow engine.

Ex-WorldCom CEO surrenders to FBI. Bernard Ebbers turns himself in.

Mike — RIAA's Latest Tactic To Drive File Sharers Underground.

Dion — WebLogic Configuration: Part 2.

Finder co-designer not keen on current user interface. Steve Capps, co-designer of the Finder. Amen.

Swapping Red Hat for a Fedora. Fedora is meant for those who want to stay on the bleeding edge of Linux development.

Rafe — Will miracles never cease?

[@627]

Carlos — What is the best Java framework for Web development?

Glen — POI 2.5 FINAL Released.

Robert — Visual Studio tips.

JavaPerformanceTuning Newsletter: Fast Random Access.

JavaLobby Newsletter: HomePod in the house, and JavaOne for $24.95.

SCO announces quarterly results, first user target. The lucky winner is AutoZone.

Review: Java Regular Expressions.

Passwords are passport to theft. How secure are you?

Daniel — Getting Testy.

Go Daddy Backs Up ICANN in Fight with VeriSign. Domain registrar Go Daddy has agreed to pay ICANN's legal bills, up to $100,000.

Pelle — Japanese for Nerds.

[@500]

Converting XML to PDF, using FOP. 

Autoboxing/Unboxing. The problem with the collection API is that you cannot put primitive data types into it.

Atlassian releases JIRA 2.6.

Multivalent PDF Tools, a free set of PDF manipulation tools.

Justices Hear Arguments on Internet Pornography Law. The Supreme Court heard oral arguments about Internet pornography.

Alan — Engadget.

Bernard — Tail for Win32. There's also Paul's jLogTailer, on the Java-side.

Daniel — Googlebot doesn't play nice.

Hani — JBoss thoughtspeak.

Anthony — Building Eclipse plugins redux.

Leslie — Quick Links.

Aaron Johnson — Struts & Java Tips: Issue #1.

Ovidiu — Virus attack on Apache committers.

Philip  — Mel Gibson and the Passion movie again…

Review: Zaurus SL-5600 Linux PDA.

IBM open source Java proposal puzzles Sun official. Schwartz stresses platform compatibility.

Third Spider-Man film 'under way'. Sony confirms a third Spider-Man movie is to be made, according to a report.

BBC does Top Ten Gadgets of 2004. [via Mobitopia]

Today's sponsor is ReportMill Software.

[@039]

Daniel — JavaOne Notifications.

Excelsior FlawDetector 1.0 beta 4, a Java static testing and consistency checking tool.

Matthew — Cocoon Portal at CeBIT.

Ewan — Scottish Schools Ban Camera Phones.

Rusty — ArgoUML 0.15.4 and Xalan-Java 2.6.0.

Dion — Oracle Releases OC4J 10g Developer Preview 2.

Marc — Java System.out debugging.

Matt — Anthill 1.7.0 Released!

Talip — Java Serialization Part II: Inheritance.

Norman — JavaOne blues, verse 2.

Cedric — The value of free? Not much.

JSquiggle 1.5, a peer-to-peer wireless sketch pad.

Jobs dominates in Forbes CEO ratings. For over a year, Forbes has been asking its readers to rate the performance of America's most notable CEOs on a monthly basis…

Jess 7.0pre-a1, a rule engine.

8% of Linux developers think SCO has merit. 73% believe the SCO Group's legal attacks on the open-source operating system lack merit.

Palm OS 6 simulator available for developers. From PalmSource for Cobalt.

Mike — Court Says No Go On FCC's Telecom Rules.

Senators Try to Smoke Out Spyware. Three U.S. senators are tackling the growing problem of "spyware".

Chris — How To Add a Custom JSP Tag Library to JDeveloper 10g.

Microsoft Releases BizTalk Server 2004.

[@590]

Erik — MacTech Renewal. We got a couple settlement checks too.

Steven — WebDesktop 2.2.

Tutorial: SpamAssassin-ClamAV-Procmail-Howto.

How to Stop Receiving Credit Card Offers. Tired of annoying "pre-approved" credit card offers?

Martin — Direct Handset Application Downloads.

Luke — Open up Java?

Andy — What is Unit Testing?

JMS Enables Concurrent Processing in EJB. JMS provides an elegant solution for overcoming the restrictions you face when developing concurrent applications with EJB.

Push Your MIDlets to Do a Lot More with MIDP 2.0 PushRegistry. Learn how to push your MIDlets up to first-class status on a range of mobile devices using the PushRegistry.

Guillaume — Heads-up on File/Stream groovy methods.

Lowem — Toyota Volta - hybrid supercar.

Fred — JDJ Makes Last Stand with Last J2ME Column.

Leslie — Quick Links.

Jeremy — Belkin's New iPod Microphone Adapter.

Ted — YAGNI != No planning.

Analyst: iPod to account for $1 billion in Apple revenue.

James— eclipse, groovy and dynaop.

Jxtray 0.1, a Java Database Explorer.

yGuard 1.3.1, an Ant bytecode obfuscation tool.

Audacity 1.2.0. Multi-platform sound editing tool.

Frank — SAP Executive Blogs.

Julian — How To Spot A Fake Programmer.

Sylvain — Apple's hidden X11 installer.

Yahoo Adopts New Fees to Explore Web. Adopting a new system for indexing Web pages that will charge businesses to include more material.

Today's sponsor is ReportMill Software.

[@046]

JIDE Software new releases: JIDE Docking Framework 1.4.1, JIDE Components 1.3.2, JIDE Grids 1.2.1 and JIDE Dialogs 1.0.1.

Cayenne ORM Milestone M3, a unique open source Object Relational Framework written in Java.

"Professional Open Source" - VP Discusses JBoss's Venture Funding Strategy.

Matthew — Collaboration works.

Russ — Spain: Time Europe Special Report and Confirmation and Affirmation.

David — Updated Examples from Java Examples in a Nutshell.

Alan — J2ME TV looks at the Oscars.

Brent — cocoa.mamasam donation.

Rickard — Updating client caches.

Rogers — 2.7 million bloggers doesn't impress AP.

Lance — Atom4J.

Kevin — Charles Miller defends YAGNI.

JMP3Renamer-1.9, a small tool written which renames downloaded MP3 files with the help of CDDB entries.

SCO Reveals its First Linux Licensee and suffered a setback in the German courts. 

Mossad website 'hacker' walks free. And gets pat on head for 'acting in the public good'.

[@790]

Rick — I think I'm done with thought leaders. (For Joe)

Chris — Spring: Telling the framework where to load beans.

JPluck 2.1.2, a Plucker document creation toolkit.

UUNet tops spammer-hosting super league. ISPs harbour world's worst offenders.

Soft drink is purified tap water. Dasani.

Complete List of Academy Award Winners. The list of winners at the 76th Annual Academy Awards.

Structural Analysis for Java. A technology that analyzes structural dependencies of Java applications…

[@701]

Intel Hyper-Threading on Linux: Fact or Myth. Hyper-Threading is a performance enhancement that was an after thought of the original P4 design.

First Misleading Domain Name Jail-term. Luring kids to porn websites brings prison term.

Rusty — jTDS 0.7, ImageInfo 1.5 and JFugue.

Carsten — Is Eclipse M7 usable?

Joey — The Oscars. I agree wholeheartedly.

Paul — Microsoft Xbox 2 Software Development Kit is … Based on Apple Technology?

Apple's Shake at the Oscars. For the seventh year in a row, a film using Apple's Shake compositing software won "Best Visual Effects" at the Oscars…

Forbes: iTunes Vs. Napster.

Netcraft: Most Reliable Hosting Providers during February.

Dave — Today we learn.

Andrew — Using Java For Soft Real-Time Simulation.

JPOX 1.0.0 Beta 2. Java Persistent Objects.

OpenOffice.org for Windows 1.1.1rc and OpenOffice.org for Linux 1.1.1rc.

Matt — AppFuse 1.4 Released!

[@570]

Marrying Java to C for numerical computing.

JNode 1.6 and JasperAssistant 1.0.8.

Java Serialization. Lesson 7.

Diego — feedvalidator bug or feature?

Matt — Katy Rose.

Russ is catching up:

• Mini Addition to the Mobile Family
• Two Years Ago: My First Thoughts on Weblogs
• FireFox: Edit CSS Plugin
• Tomcat Web App Deployment Danger
• NetFlix: So Great While It Lasts
• Microsoft's Mobile Plan
• Moto Redux and PumaTech now IntelliSync
• The Smartphone Universe: New Report

Frank — Joi Ito's $3500 GPRS bill.

SanDisk Reveals Tiny New Memory Cards for Phones. T-Flash.

Tim — Java v. C++ from a different perspective.

Bhagvan — Software Architecture Analysis Method (SAAM).

Kevin — MSDN article about platform selection even mentions Linux and Mac OS.

Rusty — JSwat 2.24.

Carsten — Apache Portals PMC.

J Aaron — Avalon HOWTO's.

David — Static Import Surprises.

Malcom — Adapt the Java style for your own.

Keith — How different browsers interpret HTML font sizes.

Leo — jicarilla-platform 0.4a release.

Mark — GMT vs. UTC.

Cheah — The best list of CSS filters, so far.

Alan — Russell Beattie's Invasion of the J2ME Snatchers.

Weiqi — Subversion: First Impression.

Daniel — Let the compiler help you, Laird!

Daniel — Concurrency Utilities.

Leslie — Quick Links.

Bill — Subversion, Xcode projects, and Diffs.

Bill — Hash generator.

Christian — Getting most out of Series 60 - My selected gems.

Steve — more on palm MIDP 2.0.

Rui — Bayesian.

Martin — One film to rule them all.

FileZilla 2.2.4c, a nice FTP client.

Quartz 1.3.3. An enterprise-level scheduler.

JFCUnit 2.03. An extension to the JUnit framework to execute unit tests against code that presents a Swing GUI based interface.

ICANN Responds to VeriSign Suit. Disappointed.

Netcraft: March 2004 Web Server Survey.

Adrian — Java Coding Style.

Today's sponsor is ReportMill Software.