Big Mutant Blog

OK, when creating applications for your clients, how do you keep your sanity when they insist on changing everything as you are developing?

This is an issue I am dealing with now and have in the past (usually when developing for HR departments). Getting sign offs do no good which usually (read: always) ends up in scope creep and you end up re-coding the same thing 3 or 4 times and end up going back to the way you coded it the first time.

So, let me know my brothers and sisters of the Notes world, how do you stop from losing it?



Oh, I've got a lovely bunch of coconuts..... (oh no too late for me but you might be able to others.)

Last week I sent an email to Yancy over at PlanetLotus and yesterday I got the response that my blog was now added to the site.  Now the numbers of hits on my site were steadily growing just being on BleedYellow, but after getting added to PlanetLotus, my hits grew by 100 in one day!  What a great way to target Notes stuff to Notes people.

Thanks Yancy!

<shameless plug> TakingNotes podcast #79 is out and this time Bruce and Julian are speaking to our own Nathan Freeman and Chris Whisonant about bleedyellow.com. </shameless plug>   If you have not listened to the podcast before (shame on you) this is a good one to start with, these guys have a lot of fun together. And I am still advising people to go listen even though the BAM (Big A** Mutant) wasn't even mentioned, I'll forgive you guys THIS time ;-) The guys explain what it took to get the site up and running as well as what is in store for the future.  So click the link below and start listening! TakingNotes Podcast #79 (.mp3) TakingNotes Podcast #79 (iTunes) LOTUS!  F*** Yeah!  (Nathan cracks me up)

I now have Lotus Notes Client/Developer/Administrator 8.0.1 Gold installed on my laptop and so far so good. I have been playing around with some of the sidebar apps (Activities, My Widgets, etc.) and it looks to be working OK. I was wondering if anyone has used any good (read: useful) widgets that I might want to add into my sidebar?  Let me know!

OK, it's the weekend, time for a personal posting.....

My wife is the best!

For Valentines Day this year my wife surprised me with a new universal remote, the Logitech Harmony 880! This thing totally rocks!  (I am a major gadget geek, so bear with me)

I used to have 6 different remotes to control my various electronics and I know that it irritated her a little whenever we had to hunt to find the correct one. When recording something on TiVo, we needed the TV remote to change channels, but the TiVo remote when we weren't. When watching a DVD, either on the DVD player or the XBOX 360, we needed to find those remotes. Also, when dealing with the Comcast cable box we had that remote and the Psyclone Selector Switch had it's own remote. That's 6 different remotes to keep track of, stock batteries for, etc.

Not any longer, this little baby handles all of those and is totally customizable so I can expand it as items in my arsenal increase. After programming the remote via my computer (which was a cinch), I can now turn on all needed electronics, turn off unneeded ones and select the correct video input with only 2 clicks.

I know this sounds like a commercial but I am just totally thrilled with it and highly recommend it to anyone shopping for one.

Now, if it could only troubleshoot my Javascript. ;-)

Thanks Baby. I love you (and it).

P.S. - The price listed on the site is not what she paid for it (I know, I pay the credit card bill).  Check out Buy.com for better pricing.

Saw this on David DeWell's blog and took the test.  I think I need to think about recovery :)


72%How Addicted to Blogging Are You?

Here is my entry to  Chris Whisonant's task:

The band name came from the article "Special-purpose local-option sales tax" The quote came from "It is difficult to make a man miserable while he feels worthy of himself and claims kindred to the great God who made him. (Abraham Lincoln)" How to make your own random album cover: Go to Wikipedia's random article page. The first article you get is the name of your band Go to the Random Quotations page. The last four words of the last quote is the album title. Go to Flickr's Interesting photo page. Third picture, no matter what it is, is your album cover. Have Fun!

I couldn't pass this one up.

A couple of posts ago I blogged about bad UI design.  A couple of months ago I started a MySpace page just to play around with skinning and messing around with web UI.  And if you visit my page you will see there is basically nothing there, but at least I have 1 friend now.

Which brings me to my entry.  When I was adding Chris to my friends list it came up with a security prompt:



Hmmmm.... Gee I wish I could remember Chris Toohey's last name.  ;-)

OK, looks like the MySpace programmers didn't really think this error message all the way through.

Today is my wife's birthday (yep, Groundhog's Day) and I would just like to take this time to wish her a big ol' "Happy Birthday". We got to spend the whole day together just enjoying the day of her opening her presents, going out to Dinner and having cake and ice cream.

So Happy Birthday Princess. I love you.

Next year we'll make it to Punxsutawney.