Nickname Too Funny To Pass By...

LOL, I just saw that Rush is referring to my (soon-to-be-ex)* Senator from SC as "Lindsey Grahamnesty"... Too funny! He should continue with his former nickname and call him "Veep Lindsey Grahamnesty"!

* By this, I not only mean that he will no longer be my Senator because I'm a GA resident but that I doubt he will be re-elected in SC.

Now Playing: "Secret Ambition" by David Crowder Band: Cover of Michael W. Smith song

One Down, One To Go

So I guess I'm officially "homeless" for a couple of days as we have closed on the sale of our house in SC yesterday and will be closing down here in GA tomorrow!! What a relief... On Tuesday all of our worldly belongings were packed onto a moving truck (except, of course, for my guitars!!) and will be unloaded on Saturday.

I've been using Quickr some - so cool! Just trying to trap for whether a document is being checked-in for a placebot notification agent. But I don't think this is exactly possible within a placebot...

Now Playing: "Go West Young Man" by All Star United: Cover of Michael W. Smith song.

Every Boat Needs A Name, Right?

boat, originally uploaded by topherssgtp.

I think the name of this boat says it all. It was a great laugh driving down 85 to GA on Sunday!!

Song Redux

One of my favorite bands is Holy 5oldier! I really wish they would put out some new music. Anyway, back in 1995 they released "Promise Man" and they covered Larry Norman's (father of Christian rock) "Why Don't You Look Into Jesus" from 1972.

Well I found copies of both on Youtube, so enjoy.

Here's Larry Norman's (The volume is really low on this recording though):


Here's Holy 5oldier's much more modern redux:


And here's a sample of why I really dig H5. Great music and powerful lyrics in this song!! Their original vocalist, Steven Patrick, is amazing. Does anyone out there have a copy of his solo project Red Reign? I have to find that...:

Great Dinner With Family In NH

I've been working with a client in NH this week and decided to give a call to my wife's uncle Dennis and his wife Linda. They live in Maine only about an hour away from where I am. So I called them up on Tuesday and they called me back yesterday and said they would love to come meet me tonight. I believe I have only met them once at our wedding almost 7 years ago. It was really great to hang out with them. They are involved with their music ministry in their church, so we were able to hit it off talking about that. They're a great couple and really exhibit what Christianity is about (James 1:27). They have taken many kids under their wings - specifically some that may have lost parents when they were young (the orphans) as well as doing some foster care. I really had an awesome time with them!!

Great NOMAD Tip

Judging from my Google hits, I seem to be the Nomad expert. Googling Lotus Notes Nomad yields my review as the #2 site after IBM. So I thought I would follow up with a way I've been using it now as a consultant.

First of all, Nomad is intended to provide USB stick access to the Notes client and it's great. However, you can also install multiple instances of Nomad on larger drives, shares, or local drives. You can check out the full installation procedure from the link to my review above, but below is a modified version that will allow you to have separate Nomad installs for multiple customers (or other needs). This keeps you from having multiple location documents and dealing with cross certificates, etc... It would require you to have about 400 MB free space for each install as well as a bare-bones installation that you would need to use later. Below is a modified installation process.

1. Insert the USB drive into the USB port on your computer and create a "NOMAD\base" folder. This can also be performed somewhere on your local disk. (i.e. C:\NOMAD\base)
2. Make note of the drive letter that is assigned to the USB drive.
3. Extract the C94QIEN.exe file. This is the filename of the self-extracting executable downloaded from IBM. This is just the Notes Client. (The C94QAEN.exe is the Full Client package with Admin and Designer - you can alternatively extract this file.)
4. In a command prompt window, navigate to the folder where you extracted the C94QIEN file (there should now be a setup.exe), and then enter this command to install Lotus Notes on the USB drive:
setup /a /v"NOMAD=1 TARGETDIR=F:\NOMAD\base\ /qb+"
Where F is the drive letter.
The parameters /qb+ allow for the display of the basic user interface and a message box at the end of the upgrade. Don't forget the last quotation mark!
5. Perform the post-install cleanup (from my original review) to free up space.
6. The \base folder now has a copy of the Nomad installation. You can run Notes from here, but I use it to keep a copy of the files.
7. Create a folder \NOMAD\CustomerX.
8. Copy and paste the entire contents of the \NOMAD\Base folder into the \NOMAD\CustomerX folder. This step can be repeated for each customer!!
9. Open the \NOMAD\CustomerX folder and edit the autorun.ini file. You will need to modify the path for the MSI_LOCATION= and MSI_COMMANDLINE= (including the DATADIR= part of this line) options. You will see that they may have F:\NOMAD\Base\... Simply modify this to be the CustomerX path. Save and close the autorun.ini file.
10. The \NOMAD\CustomerX\autorun.inf and \NOMAD\CustomerX\Program Files\Lotus\Notes\notes.ini files will also need to be modified to match the path.
11. Run the command AUTORUN.EXE from the root of any of the CustomerX folders by double-clicking on the filename or by typing the command on the command line. OR
12. Alternatively, create a shortcut to the nlnotes.exe and just run this.

This can provide a good deal of flexibility and gives you a clean Notes install for each customer!

In Honor Of The Silver Surfer Movie

Since it's coming out in theaters today, I believe I will be spinning this album on my iPod for a while!

surfingwithalien, originally uploaded by topherssgtp.

Quick System i Tip

Updated - see information below. I've been meaning to post this for a while, but I'm either crazy busy or just slack. :)

If you're installing Domino (or anything for that matter) on a System i, then you should make sure that your joblog is generated when you signoff. Simply prompt the SIGNOFF command and use *LIST for the joblog option. I think just SIGNOFF *LIST will work. Doing this will make sure that you have a record of all the commands processed during your job. For instance, installing Domino does a lot of background stuff with the RSTLICPGM command you have to use. If anything goofy happens you'll want a copy of the joblog to send to support.

UPDATE:

Thanks to César for a quick clarification to this tip:

I prefer the DSPJOBLOG OUTPUT(*PRINT), perhaps because I’m a developer or because I still use the same session for more things.

What I do not suggest is generate a joblog with the SIGNOFF *LIST when you’re removing Domino from your system, due to some functionality of the system I’ve seen “weird” things appear on the joblogs (you know, *MSGF is deleted and joblog is generated/built afterwards).

Regardless, make sure you get a joblog of the install/uninstall... :)

Great Weekend With Family

On Thursday night my wife and our 3 year old came to Kennesaw to look at houses with our wonderful realtor, Myra Brown! She's been extremely helpful! Anyway, I believe we have narrowed the field to just a few and are working on a contract for one! I knew once SWMBO (she who must be obeyed) came to look that she would be able to find what "we" needed... ;) She's on her way back now and I had a tremendously great time with them. We decided that house hunting wouldn't be too easy with a 3 month old, so it'll be about 2 weeks until I see OT when I head to Rock Hill this weekend. Till then I'll be hanging out in some free wi-fi spots... This Starbucks isn't too bad and the Strawberries & Cream was great for this hot day!

lol, I just overheard a lady say "There are things on that iPod I should be made fun of for, but that's not one of them!" Hope they don't look through mine... By the way, the new Dream Theater album is great and has been spinning a lot on my iPod this week. And I think I'm going to order the Rush of Fools disc. Should have done that while I was sitting here - duh! OK, I'm rambling - catch you all later!

For Those Of You Who Embed YouTube Videos...

Hat tip to the desiringGod blog for this one.

Because of a new YouTube feature, when you embed a video, your users can watch related videos on your site. This is, of course, risky for anyone who wants to be in control of the content of their site. (Wouldn't that be everyone?)

If you want to, you can disable it by adding &rel=0 to the end of the video's URL when you embed it.

That can be kind of scary if something "related" isn't exactly what you wanted to have other people see when at your site. Just the other night while at a Barnes & Noble looking at a magazine I saw where a seemingly orthodox preacher in New England somewhere (I think) was actually fired because of some links from his personal web site. It turns out that he had some links to some occult sites so that people could get information about certain groups. But from just a couple of clicks people at his site could order shirts, etc... from these groups. It appears that the church he was at saw this as something they didn't want visitors to their pastor's site to be able to do so easily.

The moral is, along with the YouTube issue above, that you should probably be aware of what you're linking to and what people may perceive about you.

Now Playing: "Repentance" by Dream Theater

Great First Week

Thanks to those of you who emailed or pinged me about my first week at Lotus 911! It went well - just getting accustomed to things and jumping in where I can. The team is awesome! Of course you all know about Nathan and Tim, but they're just the tip of the iceberg (pun intended!) there. I know I have a lot to learn from everyone and I'm glad to be able to dive right in. It's like a cool geek family (and it's wild knowing that if I need to ask Nathan or Tim something that I can just walk over to their stations - a little surreal).

On the personal front, it's a little tough being away from Jen and the kids during the week until we can all get back under the same roof, but we've seen some great "God things" happening that I hope to write about soon... They say absence makes the heart grow fonder, and I'm really beginning to see that. It's kind of wild.

I'll try not to be so slack here at the blog, but I've said that before!

POWER6

Sweet CPU announcement from IBM today - IBM kicks out energy-efficient 4.7GHz POWER6 processor. The new System i boxes we got this year are the Power5+ models clocking at around 2.2GHz. They are insanely powerful and fast - can't wait to see these in action!

"The device reportedly runs "twice as fast" and packs four times the cache as the POWER5, and boasts a processor bandwidth of 300Gbps....preliminary testing showed that all four of the 'most widely used performance benchmarks for Unix servers' were shattered by its CPU."

They will probably be introduced for the System p first and eventually make it to the System i. Time for another NotesBench record!

Sametime 7.5.1 Information Center

I have always* found the System i Information Center to be extremely helpful with information about the System i platform. In case you've missed it, there is now a Sametime 7.5.1 Information Center. It appears to be something that all Sametime admins can use for some great information.

* - OK, for those of you who used the i Info. Center before around V5R2, it was pretty bad. But after they got rid of the slow java menus and cleaned it up some more it is much better.

Congrats To The Moodys!

This weekend Chris Moody (the perpetual bridesmaid!)and Lottie got married! Congrats you two!! Here's a link to the Flickr tag I posted and below are three pics I really like followed by some stories.


Chris and Lottie's First Dance


Lottie, Chris, Jen, and Me (After an ordeal with getting Cocky to the wedding in humid Columbia, I changed out of the tux...)


Lottie, Cocky (Go Gamecocks!), and Chris

I've known Chris for about 10 years now! I remember him and Seth Dean coming into FCA their freshman year of college when I was helping out with worship. We lived in the same house my senior year. I had to be on campus early for BSU and was one of the few there when Chris came up early too. I helped him move in and we became really good friends that year. I put in a good word for him and we've been working together for the past 5.5 years and we've been really close the whole time. I'll miss him with the move, but I'm sure we'll be back up this way pretty frequently and will hang out with the Moodys.

This entire weekend was amazing. It was like a mini college reunion. We just had a wonderful time and I won't bore you with all of the details. It was a little sad too because I won't be seeing most of these friends for a long time. One of the highlights was being asked to play guitar accompanied by Billy Robinson. I've never actually played a wedding and we had to talk Billy out of retirement! Billy and I go way back - we were friends in high school and college roommates for 3 years! Who knows when we'll get to perform together again? :( He did a great job with the song and I believe I did too... :) It was a privilege to play for the Moodys on this most special day of their lives as they took communion together for the first time as husband and wife.

I guess about now they are in or nearing Hawaii - he pinged me to say they had a missed layover and were put about 4 hours back... Poor kids! It'll be worth it, I'm sure!

We love you guys!!! Congratulations again!!!!

My Big News!

As I've hinted at, I have some huge, exciting news to share!!

Beginning on May 29 I will start my new job with Lotus 911 as a Lotus Consultant!!! Thanks for the warm welcome Nathan!

This is a wonderful opportunity for my family and me. It will be a major shift for me moving from a position as an Admin/Developer for 7 years with a private sector company to a Consultant position. I am really looking forward to the challenge of that change as well as working with some great talent and wonderful folks!

My family will be in a transitional phase for a while as we will be moving from Rock Hill, SC to Kennesaw, GA. In honor of this and through peer pressure, my wife, Jen, has also started a blog! As a bit of background, I have always had the nickname "Nut" because of my last name. With that said, my wife's blog is "The Nut House" and as she posted in her first post, "watch out Bulldogs - family of nuts and Gamecock fans headed your way!"

Won't Be Making It to The VIEW 2007....

I was hoping to meet a lot of you there, but I won't be able to make it. More on that very soon!!! Big changes coming my way... :)

Sametime 7.5.1 Upgrade Failed

Guess I'll try again another day... I was upgrading on an i5/OS V5R4 box from 7.5 CF1. When I started it back up I got a "Meeting Server: Child Process Died". There were about 2 hits on the Lotus Support site that seemed to be close, but neither of the solutions worked. Well, one was to reinstall PASE but I was not at the server to load a CD and that didn't appear to be the problem anyway. I started the whole process at about 8:55 and was starting it back up initially at about 9:00. After looking into the error for a bit I called Lotus support and waited 30 minutes before even speaking to a human. I hung up with them after specifying a priority 1 (server down) and being told it was callback. This was about 10:30. At 11:00 I decided to uninstall 7.5.1 and reinstall 7.5. I'm back up now and haven't heard back from Lotus and the whole "up to 2 hours for a callback" wasn't floating my boat on something that should have only taken 10 minutes... :)

Have You Offset Your Carbon?

It seems that the latest rage is "carbon offsetting". This is where you can buy a credit (around $50 per year per vehicle) and something environmentally friendly will be done with that money (like planting a tree or preserving current forestation). Al Gore does offsets, so I guess anyone who wants to "live green" should be OK doing it too, right? :)

According to the Save the Planet website, six 25-year old pine trees can absorb 1 ton of CO2.

About 20 years ago, we planted about 1,000 pine trees on my parents' property:



This means that (when they are 25) they will absorb 166 tons of CO2 annually. My sedan accounts for about 4.6 tons and our SUV accounts for about 6.6 tons. So at 6 tons average per vehicle (depending on mileage, of course), the 1,000 trees we planted are more than covering the carbon footprint for all vehicles in my family. Actually, this covers about 27 vehicles per year until the trees are gone!

I just feel really good about myself knowing that I'm "green" as far as my vehicles go.... Hopefully you can see the humor in this - if not, then go out and find 6 pine trees to call your own so that you can live green too. That's a whole lot cheaper than buying a "green" car and it's officially sanctioned by our former VP!

Speaking of "green", I saw a car the other week with one of the "Live Green" banners on the bumper. Was it a Prius? Nope. It was a 1995 Mustang GT - the little V8 must be green, eh? ;) Maybe the lady found some pine trees!

Updated Sandbox Application

One of the first applications I downloaded from the Sandbox was the "Staff Whereabouts". It's basically an in-out board to see the status of a workgroup. We actually got the application to replace an AS/400 based! signout application. I have commented at the sandbox that I have reworked the ui and have web-enabled the application. I actually web-enabled it a while back. We only have one or two people that may use it on the web, so not much time was invested in it (it's mostly if you need to signout in a pinch). But about a month ago I completed changed the colors of the ui. It could stand for a complete overhaul, so forgive me if it still looks like a Notes application. :)

Here's what it looks like now:



If anyone's interested, post a comment. I don't want to link directly from here since it's not really my application.

Bella (The Movie)

Thursday night at the Thirsty07 Conference, we were treated to a screening of the movie Bella. Described at the website as "a heartwarming story about friendship, family and our capacity for love in the face of the unexpected," this film was the 2006 winner of the Toronto Film Festival. This puts it in some great company of past winners.

This is possibly the most moving film I've seen since "The Passion of the Christ." But don't just shrug it off as a "Christian" movie just because it was screened at Thirsty (or because I'm writing about it). It really is about our "capacity to love" and all people will benefit from it. The friendship between Jos and Nina is challenged and the way that they make it through is truly amazing and inspirational. I don't want to really talk about it here because the plot would be ruined. I will say, though, that this film has been worth it because two lives have already been saved!!