My Electronic Sheep

Woo Hoo! St. Patty's Black&Blue!!!! http://twitpic.com/18gfoc #
Had to turn on some NIN… Finally I'll be able to get some work done! #
My New @empireave DarkHorse: ALLAN This is the StockOfTheWeekend!!! This Endorsement courtesy of BillShatner! #empireave #empireavenue #
Just made some nice cash from my Darkhorse stockoftheweek ! Thanks @m0mmagee #empireave #empireavenue #
Morning World… [...]

I'm at Kaladi Coffee (1730 E. Evans, Gilpin, Denver). http://4sq.com/74vGSl #
Time to open a Beer and get to work! #makingstufflookcool #
RT @EvolveTom: Yahoo! Video Games covers @EmpireAve: http://bit.ly/aIdXIa #
RT @jill_pr: Have IE7? Not working on #EmpireAve ? Buy some GKAT stock direct from the influencer page…seems to solve the problem. HAHA #
I just [...]

So, is watching AC/DC live in the states just as good as in Australia? #shoottothrill #random #
I have a plan… to come up with a plan! Now that's a Plan! #Brilliant #
@misterniall Where is that? #beautiful in reply to misterniall #
@dups Ah the life of a CEO trying to take over the world [...]

CURLING!!! #
Trying to teach @alicupcake Photoshop for her new blog… God help me! #
Oh… this is the GREATEST WEBSITE I've ever seen! EVER!!! http://bit.ly/ce7j58 #
Shut up and play Golf! #tigerwoods #
@JenHarris09 @EmpireAve @smashingmag @bdnt @OneRiot #followfriday #
@EmpireAve if I start today can I hitch hike to Edmonton from Denver in time? in [...]

Just installed a new fan in the bedroom http://twitpic.com/131mvn #
Just installed the Background Check iPhone App… VERY DISTURBING. Good thing that arrest I had was sealed!!! #
@dups they're afraid Shawn White is gonna show his nipples! in reply to dups #
Good thing I was up before 8am, this thing is loud! Won't [...]

Today is my first day of being recently un-employed… This post isn’t about how am I dealing with it or how am I finding a new job, although those are great questions I want to focus on more technology and Web Design.  The first thing I had to do was buy a new laptop.  When [...]

Friday the 6th was my last official day being employed at MySQL (Sun we’re now extinct Microsystems)… sorry, couldn’t resist.  Although I had to return my nice trusty Macbook Pro, New Belgium Brewery Sticker, Chewbacca in ‘09 sticker, VPN password generator, Sun branded pen, mousepad… ok, so I kept the pen and mousepad
I [...]

Today is my last day working for MySQL…  These are 8 words that I never imagined I would have to say or write when I accepted the position almost two years ago.  I have been told that MySQL the product and MySQL the web properties will live on, however I’m not sure in what form [...]

I'm feeling a bit boxed in… Maybe it's all the boxes filling up my house!!! #
Do not buy a fridge from Factory Appliance Wharehouse in #Denver… Or you will walk out with ALL BRAND NEW APPLIANCES Just like ME!!! #
@TalkToQwest having serious issues getting my DSL transferred to new address. Ordered 2 weeks ago, [...]

Last week MySQL Announced Founding Sponsorship for the 2010 Users Conference and are now Accepting presentation proposals.  You can find more information about the Conference here: http://en.oreilly.com/mysql2010/public/content/home
You can register now to get $250 off admission, or submit a stunning proposal and become a speaker at the 2010 event.  Good Luck!
-Big A

Today I was able to spend my time in Paris with @cupcakelady (the Wife), we didn’t really have a plan of what we were going to do or when to do it.  I think the lack of planning and allowing Paris to dictate our day was a good thing.  A word of caution that this [...]

Today my feet are officially mad at me! Started out a bit early today (caught the 8:15am train) with the Arc de Triomphe with the sun coming up the views were spectacular! I kind of remember Mr. Steves talking about roughly 400 steps to get to the top of the Arc, once again he’s full of [...]

Today was the first full day spent in Paris. The goal for today was to purchase a 2-Day Paris Museum Pass and follow Rick Steves’ Old Paris Tour in the Morning, then visit the Louve and the O’rsay if time permitted in the afternoon. Of course there would be stops for Cafe’ aui laite, biere, [...]

RT @mysql: To celebrate @MySQL's 3000th follower, we're giving away 2 #MySQLtShirts per day this week ReTweet this msg 4 a chance to win! #
France Day 1… My First Impressions http://bit.ly/2zfRG0 #
French Lunch… http://twitpic.com/o4bgr #
Finally found free WFi & Cafe' au lait, only been wondering around Versailles for hours… #
France Day 2… [...]

I chose to work Mon-Wed to get a sense of French Life/Culture, Traveling to the Sun Velizey office to work on Monday where I visited the local Shopping Mall and flirted with the girls at the Sandwich counter  I guess I’m not surprised at how much America & France are… Big Box stores, [...]

Note to self… next time you travel CHECK THE WEATHER REPORT!  All the rain that is needed in various parts of the United States (ie. California, parts of Texas, Arizona, etc…) has decided to vacation in Western Europe, namely where ever I decide to hang out for the day.  We decided to walk into town [...]

I arrived in Paris on Saturday around 8:30am local time and surprisingliy wasn’t too tired.  I attribute this to flying a United 767 Business Class from Chicago to Charles Degaulle.  Recently United upgraded thier Business Class to full lay down seats which made the 7hr flight quite enjoyable.  Getting out of the airport took some [...]

RT @OneRiot: Dressing up your dog is cheesy, but this one is F*ing awesome. http://bit.ly/4floLy #
Just received my Google Wave invite! Woo Hoo.. wait, now what do I do? #
#Denver Weatherperson at 6:30am: "We've already hit our high for the day…. we're expecting 9-18" of Snow by Thurs. evening" #Redonculous #
RT @bbcomCIO: RT [...]

Up early still wrestling with my Macbook. Had to revert to 10.5 and am now restoring my old data… Seems that Monday is 6 days a week. #
RT @boagworld: RT @rakesh314: Have you seen my latest HTML5 page: http://bit.ly/1xCYej It kicks butt!… #webdesign #html5 #css #
no power, no vpn, not much going on at the [...]

Not sure if my blog turning into a place where I keep my notes about how to fix things because I can’t remember everything is a good thing or not, however I like to think somebody out there will find this stuff useful…
After I did a clean install of Snow Leopard I spent some time [...]

I just updated my Macbook Pro to Snow Leopard and decided I needed a new Wallpaper, and since I have a TON of photos I took when in London a while ago I figured why not use these images.  So I’ve added a couple evening shots I took of the London Eye & the London [...]

Does anyone use Second Life anymore? My work is hosting a meeting IN second life!… #redonculous #
RT @danielcktan: [WEBDEV]: The myth of the page fold: evidence from user testing | http://bit.ly/D6Kum #webdesign #usability #
I love when the Network decides to take Canadian Thanksgiving, eat too much Turkey and take a NAP! #highlyproductive [...]

RT @smashingmag: Mastering CSS Coding: Getting Started – http://bit.ly/3cG4Ci (please RT) #
RT @tweetmeme MySQL :: Windows and MySQL Webinar Series http://retwt.me/tBkY #windows #mysql #webdesign #database #opensource #
Sync your files online and across computers with @Dropbox. 2GB account is free! http://bit.ly/Yuwf7 #awesome #webdesign #TmobileSucks #
Started using Dropbox today… Love the ease of use & the iPhone [...]

I’ve been thinking about this post for a little while and over the weekend I finally had some time to pull together a mock-up for a side project I inquired about doing a few months ago.  I was attending a local Tech event in Downtown Denver and met the Owner/Salesperson type for CollarCard.com and they [...]

I’ve been stock piling some screenshots of various design related content I’ve seen on the web and in this case training I’ve had to complete.  throughout the next few days/weeks I plan on writing about my thoughts/complaints about Annoying Design.  And here we go:
Last week I had to complete some compliance training for work… HAD [...]

This is the second time I’ve encountered this issue… I run my development server in VMWare Fusion, Fedora for Work & Ubuntu for my personal stuff (Mainly Wordpress) and every so often I’ll start my VM, open Safari and get a spinning wheel.  Website Un-Reachable!  Huh? What? I’m pulling an IP address, I can ping [...]

Yeah, this has been by far the craziest summer of my life.  There are things which I’m not allowed to discuss (just google who I work for & EU), some product launches, a re-design and lots of other things have occupied my time this suumer.  I plan on writing very soon about some Design related [...]

UPDATE 08/25/2009: I reloaded my Macbook Pro this weekend and install the latest VMWare (Version 2.0.5 (173382)) and did not have to make the below change to the page.c file… it seems VMWare has fixed this issue.
I received a Tweet the other day about how the use of Ruby in the US has exploded. I’ve [...]

It always amazes me how busy someone can become and where blogging falls in the list of Priorities.  Obviously it’s pretty low and I’m trying to remedy that as best as possible.  There are a Ton of things going on right now, one of which I’m legally not allowed to discuss in the blogsphere (read [...]

I’ve started to create a Wordpress theme and plan on displaying my progress here.  Now I’ve been hacking Wordpress themes for a while and find it to be pretty easy, especially for the common user.  The best thing about Wordpres IMHO is the community and the availability of plugins to customize your blog/site (ie. I’ve [...]

This post is a few weeks overdue… mainly since I shot EVERYTHING in RAW when the wife and I went to London.  I’ve come to love and despise shooting in the RAW (not to be confused with nude, in the buff, naked) for it’s versatility, amazing quality, higher TCOS (total cost of ownership), time it [...]

Today is the first day of the 2009 MySQL Users Conference.  http://www.mysqlconf.com/mysql2009/public/content/home
This is a huge event for MySQL and the Open Source Community… One of the neat events at this years conference is the Certification testing is only $25 at the conference.  Should be  a good time!
-Big A

Mark your calendars… April 8th & 9th Duleepa “Dups” Wijayawardhana from the MySQL Community team will be at CU & CSU talking about MySQL.  These Meetups should be a REALLY good time, there might even be free food!  Besides that banners ROCKS! (insert shameless self promotion)
-Big A
UPDATE: 04/06/09  (9:37am MST) – I just spoke to [...]

Just a few hours ago www.mysql.com surpassed 7 Million monthly vists, I don’t have a final number since we still have a fews hours to go.  I’m so excited about this, our team works extremely hard to deliver a solid web presence and the world is taking notice of our products.  There are a lot [...]

I’ve been working on a major project and wanted to share a similar piece of Navigation.  For the site I’m working on requires Flexible Navigation in regards to the Web 2.0 style Tabs.  This means when you increase the font size of your browser that the background images grow with the text and the page [...]

I’ve been working on a site ‘re-alignment’ for www.mysql.com and in my travels for ideas and inspiration I came across a few resources for ‘font replacement’.  Basically this is where you specify in your CSS a font that more than likely the user doesn’t have installed by default.  In the code you provide the URL [...]

You can file this post under Random, but I could not resist sharing my shock.  Today Starbucks announced that they are going to unveil an F’n Value Menu.  Yes the company that brought the no-foam, half-caff, skinny, vente latte out of the drudges of the whole in the wall beatnick coffee houses of the pacific [...]

This has been a crazy week for the IT industry…  My Company (Sun Microsystems) started letting people go yesterday (1st round was bout 1,400), Microsoft, IBM and others announced large reductions in staff as well.  Yesterday morning I got up early to post some artwork and an Interview with a Sun collegue (David Van Couvering, [...]

Last week was the one year anniversary of the MySQL Acquisition by Sun Microsystems, so our Community team is running a ‘5 Days of MySQL & Sun’ promotion, where yours truly created some nifty Banner artwork. Everyday is a different theme… I found these kickass ‘Robot’ illustrations on iStockphoto that worked really well with [...]

The Digital Short IMHO has saved SNL…

So I’ve been spending a lot of time working on my Photoshop skills.  After I created the calendar icons, I ran across this great PS Tutorial site (http://psdtuts.com).  There are a TON of tutorials, examples and full .psd files.  There is a great tutorial on creating shields (not exactly sure what I would use this [...]

Here are some photos from Christmas Day.  The 25th was pretty awsome, I made breakfast for everyone… however the waffles turned out a little thicker than normal.  Other than that I think Christmas turned out pretty well.  I wish I could have gotten a couple shots of the Ribs that were slow cooked for about [...]

So I’m home (Wife’s Family) for the Holidays and wanted to get some new photos of Houston my Chocolate Labrador. As most people will attest to, getting any animal to sit still and stare at the camera is a difficult task. I have disovered the trick at least for a Lab… go [...]

Man, this recession has finally hit everyone.  Not even Santa Claus can avoid it…

“Santa and Bleebo Save Christmas” with Jessica Biel and David Koechner by Dave Koechner

-Big A

So, today is my 31st Birthday… Woo Hoo… but a little while ago I discovered that my family fish had passed… ‘Murph the Faiche’ Al and I picked up Murph at the Old Town Aquarium in Chicago in Sept. 2007. I was super excited about getting the Aquarium and it took 2 days to [...]

X-MEN ORIGINS: WOLVERINE HD

I am SO excited about this…  For as long as I can remember I have always used other people’s images, artwork, wallpapers etc…  Well not any longer.  Today I FINALLY get to give back to the community!
I have created a set of Calendar icons to use, well anywhere you like.  My original intent was to [...]

So, this is a little bit un-eventful… Everything  worked as planned!   This is the 3rd Wordpress upgrade I’ve done in just about 1 month.  I’m using GoDaddy shared hosting which  a lot of people bash on, but I have never had any issues.  The GoDaddy default was version 2.6.3 I believe, and I [...]

Wordpress 2.7 (self-hosted) has been released.  Which is a good thing, although I wished they would have done this about a week ago.  I’m working on a couple install for the MySQL Replication & Backup and spent a ton of time getting 2.6.5 up and running.  2.7 has a bunch of interface features that would [...]

So the original title to this post was going to be: ‘SVN – The BANE of my existence…‘  however upgrading our SVN Server to 1.5.4 (Latest Release) has proven to be well worth the time and made the Launch a piece of cake!
I guess I need to let you know that about 6 months ago [...]

Today I have officially signed off from my old Blogger Blog…  I have configured my new Wordpress BLOG at least as a good starting point.  In the near future, I will be adding some new posts to the Photography page, updating the main page with a plethora of new posts.  Actually I have a ton [...]

So For my first photography submssion I thouht I should share the photo I used to make my banner image.  The photo was taken on Sept. 19th 2008 in Chicago, IL.  I used my Nikon D40 with the 18-55mm lens (this is currently my only setup).  As I’m fairly new to this, I don’t really [...]

UPDATE: This post was translpanted from my old Blog…

So a little over a month ago I hastily wrote about a story how Comcast has officially instituted Bandwidth limits on their customers. Now I am a former Comcast customer who does not believe in certain practices they have instituted officially and un-officially (namely packet shaping [...]

I’ve learned that my blog has been hijacked, so you will be able to see these there, but not quite as timely.  I am doing well and I hope that you all are too.  I’m already looking forward to coming home     Love you all!
Ali
Day 3 evening
We had our first good meal tonight. By [...]

Rest of Day 2-Monday November 11
So, today at work went fine. I talked to one of the payroll ladies and while it was somewhat difficult to understand her we made due. We later learned that the head guy here, who sounds like he is from Texas, has lived here for the past 14 years and [...]

Mrs. Cupcake is currently in Moscow, Russia for her new gig. So Mr. Cupcake (that would be ME) has decided to share the hilarious emails I’ve been getting from the Mrs. since they seem to revolve around food and electrical fires… I hope you enjoy the following as much as I did…

-Mr. Cupcake

We are currently staying in an apartment that is attached to the same building that the office is in, so we are avoiding any kind of cold walk early in the morning, which is just fine with me. We will be staying in the apartments the first 10 days that we are here and then will be moving to a Marriott that is downtown Moscow.

We went out yesterday after we arrived to pick up a few groceries and get something to eat. The ’store” we thought was the grocery store, was actually a health club. English is hardly spoken by anyone. We did not encounter anyone who spoke English until we arrived at the office this morning-which made yesterday even more interesting.

Welcome to my BRAND NEW BLOG via Wordpress! Woo F’n Hoo!!! I am currently in the process of moving my former blog (http://www.sudoaptget.blogspot.com/) to my new branded domain Blog using WordPress. There are a couple reasons for doing this… mainly I’m an IT Nerd (according to the wife), I’ve always wanted to use [...]

I am SO excited about this…  For as long as I can remember I have always used other people’s images, artwork, wallpapers etc…  Well not any longer.  Today I FINALLY get to give back to the community!
I have created a set of Calendar icons to use, well anywhere you like.  My original intent was to [...]

So I’ve been spending a lot of time working on my Photoshop skills.  After I created the calendar icons, I ran across this great PS Tutorial site (http://psdtuts.com).  There are a TON of tutorials, examples and full .psd files.  There is a great tutorial on creating shields (not exactly sure what I would use this [...]

Last week was the one year anniversary of the MySQL Acquisition by Sun Microsystems, so our Community team is running a ‘5 Days of MySQL & Sun’ promotion, where yours truly created some nifty Banner artwork. Everyday is a different theme… I found these kickass ‘Robot’ illustrations on iStockphoto that worked really well with [...]

Wordpress 2.7 (self-hosted) has been released.  Which is a good thing, although I wished they would have done this about a week ago.  I’m working on a couple install for the MySQL Replication & Backup and spent a ton of time getting 2.6.5 up and running.  2.7 has a bunch of interface features that would [...]

So, this is a little bit un-eventful… Everything  worked as planned!   This is the 3rd Wordpress upgrade I’ve done in just about 1 month.  I’m using GoDaddy shared hosting which  a lot of people bash on, but I have never had any issues.  The GoDaddy default was version 2.6.3 I believe, and I [...]

So, today is my 31st Birthday… Woo Hoo… but a little while ago I discovered that my family fish had passed… ‘Murph the Faiche’ Al and I picked up Murph at the Old Town Aquarium in Chicago in Sept. 2007. I was super excited about getting the Aquarium and it took 2 days to [...]

The Digital Short IMHO has saved SNL…

Yeah, this has been by far the craziest summer of my life.  There are things which I’m not allowed to discuss (just google who I work for & EU), some product launches, a re-design and lots of other things have occupied my time this suumer.  I plan on writing very soon about some Design related [...]

I’ve been stock piling some screenshots of various design related content I’ve seen on the web and in this case training I’ve had to complete.  throughout the next few days/weeks I plan on writing about my thoughts/complaints about Annoying Design.  And here we go:
Last week I had to complete some compliance training for work… HAD [...]

RT @smashingmag: Mastering CSS Coding: Getting Started – http://bit.ly/3cG4Ci (please RT) #
RT @tweetmeme MySQL :: Windows and MySQL Webinar Series http://retwt.me/tBkY #windows #mysql #webdesign #database #opensource #
Sync your files online and across computers with @Dropbox. 2GB account is free! http://bit.ly/Yuwf7 #awesome #webdesign #TmobileSucks #
Started using Dropbox today… Love the ease of use & the iPhone [...]

Does anyone use Second Life anymore? My work is hosting a meeting IN second life!… #redonculous #
RT @danielcktan: [WEBDEV]: The myth of the page fold: evidence from user testing | http://bit.ly/D6Kum #webdesign #usability #
I love when the Network decides to take Canadian Thanksgiving, eat too much Turkey and take a NAP! #highlyproductive [...]

Up early still wrestling with my Macbook. Had to revert to 10.5 and am now restoring my old data… Seems that Monday is 6 days a week. #
RT @boagworld: RT @rakesh314: Have you seen my latest HTML5 page: http://bit.ly/1xCYej It kicks butt!… #webdesign #html5 #css #
no power, no vpn, not much going on at the [...]

RT @OneRiot: Dressing up your dog is cheesy, but this one is F*ing awesome. http://bit.ly/4floLy #
Just received my Google Wave invite! Woo Hoo.. wait, now what do I do? #
#Denver Weatherperson at 6:30am: "We've already hit our high for the day…. we're expecting 9-18" of Snow by Thurs. evening" #Redonculous #
RT @bbcomCIO: RT [...]

I arrived in Paris on Saturday around 8:30am local time and surprisingliy wasn’t too tired.  I attribute this to flying a United 767 Business Class from Chicago to Charles Degaulle.  Recently United upgraded thier Business Class to full lay down seats which made the 7hr flight quite enjoyable.  Getting out of the airport took some [...]

Note to self… next time you travel CHECK THE WEATHER REPORT!  All the rain that is needed in various parts of the United States (ie. California, parts of Texas, Arizona, etc…) has decided to vacation in Western Europe, namely where ever I decide to hang out for the day.  We decided to walk into town [...]

I chose to work Mon-Wed to get a sense of French Life/Culture, Traveling to the Sun Velizey office to work on Monday where I visited the local Shopping Mall and flirted with the girls at the Sandwich counter  I guess I’m not surprised at how much America & France are… Big Box stores, [...]

RT @mysql: To celebrate @MySQL's 3000th follower, we're giving away 2 #MySQLtShirts per day this week ReTweet this msg 4 a chance to win! #
France Day 1… My First Impressions http://bit.ly/2zfRG0 #
French Lunch… http://twitpic.com/o4bgr #
Finally found free WFi & Cafe' au lait, only been wondering around Versailles for hours… #
France Day 2… [...]

Today was the first full day spent in Paris. The goal for today was to purchase a 2-Day Paris Museum Pass and follow Rick Steves’ Old Paris Tour in the Morning, then visit the Louve and the O’rsay if time permitted in the afternoon. Of course there would be stops for Cafe’ aui laite, biere, [...]

Today my feet are officially mad at me! Started out a bit early today (caught the 8:15am train) with the Arc de Triomphe with the sun coming up the views were spectacular! I kind of remember Mr. Steves talking about roughly 400 steps to get to the top of the Arc, once again he’s full of [...]

Today I was able to spend my time in Paris with @cupcakelady (the Wife), we didn’t really have a plan of what we were going to do or when to do it.  I think the lack of planning and allowing Paris to dictate our day was a good thing.  A word of caution that this [...]

I'm feeling a bit boxed in… Maybe it's all the boxes filling up my house!!! #
Do not buy a fridge from Factory Appliance Wharehouse in #Denver… Or you will walk out with ALL BRAND NEW APPLIANCES Just like ME!!! #
@TalkToQwest having serious issues getting my DSL transferred to new address. Ordered 2 weeks ago, [...]

Friday the 6th was my last official day being employed at MySQL (Sun we’re now extinct Microsystems)… sorry, couldn’t resist.  Although I had to return my nice trusty Macbook Pro, New Belgium Brewery Sticker, Chewbacca in ‘09 sticker, VPN password generator, Sun branded pen, mousepad… ok, so I kept the pen and mousepad
I [...]

Just installed a new fan in the bedroom http://twitpic.com/131mvn #
Just installed the Background Check iPhone App… VERY DISTURBING. Good thing that arrest I had was sealed!!! #
@dups they're afraid Shawn White is gonna show his nipples! in reply to dups #
Good thing I was up before 8am, this thing is loud! Won't [...]

CURLING!!! #
Trying to teach @alicupcake Photoshop for her new blog… God help me! #
Oh… this is the GREATEST WEBSITE I've ever seen! EVER!!! http://bit.ly/ce7j58 #
Shut up and play Golf! #tigerwoods #
@JenHarris09 @EmpireAve @smashingmag @bdnt @OneRiot #followfriday #
@EmpireAve if I start today can I hitch hike to Edmonton from Denver in time? in [...]

So, is watching AC/DC live in the states just as good as in Australia? #shoottothrill #random #
I have a plan… to come up with a plan! Now that's a Plan! #Brilliant #
@misterniall Where is that? #beautiful in reply to misterniall #
@dups Ah the life of a CEO trying to take over the world [...]

I'm at Kaladi Coffee (1730 E. Evans, Gilpin, Denver). http://4sq.com/74vGSl #
Time to open a Beer and get to work! #makingstufflookcool #
RT @EvolveTom: Yahoo! Video Games covers @EmpireAve: http://bit.ly/aIdXIa #
RT @jill_pr: Have IE7? Not working on #EmpireAve ? Buy some GKAT stock direct from the influencer page…seems to solve the problem. HAHA #
I just [...]

Woo Hoo! St. Patty's Black&Blue!!!! http://twitpic.com/18gfoc #
Had to turn on some NIN… Finally I'll be able to get some work done! #
My New @empireave DarkHorse: ALLAN This is the StockOfTheWeekend!!! This Endorsement courtesy of BillShatner! #empireave #empireavenue #
Just made some nice cash from my Darkhorse stockoftheweek ! Thanks @m0mmagee #empireave #empireavenue #
Morning World… [...]

So the original title to this post was going to be: ‘SVN – The BANE of my existence…‘  however upgrading our SVN Server to 1.5.4 (Latest Release) has proven to be well worth the time and made the Launch a piece of cake!
I guess I need to let you know that about 6 months ago [...]

Man, this recession has finally hit everyone.  Not even Santa Claus can avoid it…

“Santa and Bleebo Save Christmas” with Jessica Biel and David Koechner by Dave Koechner

-Big A

Last week was the one year anniversary of the MySQL Acquisition by Sun Microsystems, so our Community team is running a ‘5 Days of MySQL & Sun’ promotion, where yours truly created some nifty Banner artwork. Everyday is a different theme… I found these kickass ‘Robot’ illustrations on iStockphoto that worked really well with [...]

This has been a crazy week for the IT industry…  My Company (Sun Microsystems) started letting people go yesterday (1st round was bout 1,400), Microsoft, IBM and others announced large reductions in staff as well.  Yesterday morning I got up early to post some artwork and an Interview with a Sun collegue (David Van Couvering, [...]

Just a few hours ago www.mysql.com surpassed 7 Million monthly vists, I don’t have a final number since we still have a fews hours to go.  I’m so excited about this, our team works extremely hard to deliver a solid web presence and the world is taking notice of our products.  There are a lot [...]

Last week MySQL Announced Founding Sponsorship for the 2010 Users Conference and are now Accepting presentation proposals.  You can find more information about the Conference here: http://en.oreilly.com/mysql2010/public/content/home
You can register now to get $250 off admission, or submit a stunning proposal and become a speaker at the 2010 event.  Good Luck!
-Big A

Today is my last day working for MySQL…  These are 8 words that I never imagined I would have to say or write when I accepted the position almost two years ago.  I have been told that MySQL the product and MySQL the web properties will live on, however I’m not sure in what form [...]

So For my first photography submssion I thouht I should share the photo I used to make my banner image.  The photo was taken on Sept. 19th 2008 in Chicago, IL.  I used my Nikon D40 with the 18-55mm lens (this is currently my only setup).  As I’m fairly new to this, I don’t really [...]

So I’m home (Wife’s Family) for the Holidays and wanted to get some new photos of Houston my Chocolate Labrador. As most people will attest to, getting any animal to sit still and stare at the camera is a difficult task. I have disovered the trick at least for a Lab… go [...]

Here are some photos from Christmas Day.  The 25th was pretty awsome, I made breakfast for everyone… however the waffles turned out a little thicker than normal.  Other than that I think Christmas turned out pretty well.  I wish I could have gotten a couple shots of the Ribs that were slow cooked for about [...]

This post is a few weeks overdue… mainly since I shot EVERYTHING in RAW when the wife and I went to London.  I’ve come to love and despise shooting in the RAW (not to be confused with nude, in the buff, naked) for it’s versatility, amazing quality, higher TCOS (total cost of ownership), time it [...]

I just updated my Macbook Pro to Snow Leopard and decided I needed a new Wallpaper, and since I have a TON of photos I took when in London a while ago I figured why not use these images.  So I’ve added a couple evening shots I took of the London Eye & the London [...]

You can file this post under Random, but I could not resist sharing my shock.  Today Starbucks announced that they are going to unveil an F’n Value Menu.  Yes the company that brought the no-foam, half-caff, skinny, vente latte out of the drudges of the whole in the wall beatnick coffee houses of the pacific [...]

It always amazes me how busy someone can become and where blogging falls in the list of Priorities.  Obviously it’s pretty low and I’m trying to remedy that as best as possible.  There are a Ton of things going on right now, one of which I’m legally not allowed to discuss in the blogsphere (read [...]

Yeah, this has been by far the craziest summer of my life.  There are things which I’m not allowed to discuss (just google who I work for & EU), some product launches, a re-design and lots of other things have occupied my time this suumer.  I plan on writing very soon about some Design related [...]

Friday the 6th was my last official day being employed at MySQL (Sun we’re now extinct Microsystems)… sorry, couldn’t resist.  Although I had to return my nice trusty Macbook Pro, New Belgium Brewery Sticker, Chewbacca in ‘09 sticker, VPN password generator, Sun branded pen, mousepad… ok, so I kept the pen and mousepad
I [...]

Mrs. Cupcake is currently in Moscow, Russia for her new gig. So Mr. Cupcake (that would be ME) has decided to share the hilarious emails I’ve been getting from the Mrs. since they seem to revolve around food and electrical fires… I hope you enjoy the following as much as I did…

-Mr. Cupcake

We are currently staying in an apartment that is attached to the same building that the office is in, so we are avoiding any kind of cold walk early in the morning, which is just fine with me. We will be staying in the apartments the first 10 days that we are here and then will be moving to a Marriott that is downtown Moscow.

We went out yesterday after we arrived to pick up a few groceries and get something to eat. The ’store” we thought was the grocery store, was actually a health club. English is hardly spoken by anyone. We did not encounter anyone who spoke English until we arrived at the office this morning-which made yesterday even more interesting.

Rest of Day 2-Monday November 11
So, today at work went fine. I talked to one of the payroll ladies and while it was somewhat difficult to understand her we made due. We later learned that the head guy here, who sounds like he is from Texas, has lived here for the past 14 years and [...]

I’ve learned that my blog has been hijacked, so you will be able to see these there, but not quite as timely.  I am doing well and I hope that you all are too.  I’m already looking forward to coming home     Love you all!
Ali
Day 3 evening
We had our first good meal tonight. By [...]

Welcome to my BRAND NEW BLOG via Wordpress! Woo F’n Hoo!!! I am currently in the process of moving my former blog (http://www.sudoaptget.blogspot.com/) to my new branded domain Blog using WordPress. There are a couple reasons for doing this… mainly I’m an IT Nerd (according to the wife), I’ve always wanted to use [...]

UPDATE: This post was translpanted from my old Blog…

So a little over a month ago I hastily wrote about a story how Comcast has officially instituted Bandwidth limits on their customers. Now I am a former Comcast customer who does not believe in certain practices they have instituted officially and un-officially (namely packet shaping [...]

Today I have officially signed off from my old Blogger Blog…  I have configured my new Wordpress BLOG at least as a good starting point.  In the near future, I will be adding some new posts to the Photography page, updating the main page with a plethora of new posts.  Actually I have a ton [...]

X-MEN ORIGINS: WOLVERINE HD

Man, this recession has finally hit everyone.  Not even Santa Claus can avoid it…

“Santa and Bleebo Save Christmas” with Jessica Biel and David Koechner by Dave Koechner

-Big A

Mark your calendars… April 8th & 9th Duleepa “Dups” Wijayawardhana from the MySQL Community team will be at CU & CSU talking about MySQL.  These Meetups should be a REALLY good time, there might even be free food!  Besides that banners ROCKS! (insert shameless self promotion)
-Big A
UPDATE: 04/06/09  (9:37am MST) – I just spoke to [...]

Today is the first day of the 2009 MySQL Users Conference.  http://www.mysqlconf.com/mysql2009/public/content/home
This is a huge event for MySQL and the Open Source Community… One of the neat events at this years conference is the Certification testing is only $25 at the conference.  Should be  a good time!
-Big A

This is the second time I’ve encountered this issue… I run my development server in VMWare Fusion, Fedora for Work & Ubuntu for my personal stuff (Mainly Wordpress) and every so often I’ll start my VM, open Safari and get a spinning wheel.  Website Un-Reachable!  Huh? What? I’m pulling an IP address, I can ping [...]

Not sure if my blog turning into a place where I keep my notes about how to fix things because I can’t remember everything is a good thing or not, however I like to think somebody out there will find this stuff useful…
After I did a clean install of Snow Leopard I spent some time [...]

I’ve been working on a site ‘re-alignment’ for www.mysql.com and in my travels for ideas and inspiration I came across a few resources for ‘font replacement’.  Basically this is where you specify in your CSS a font that more than likely the user doesn’t have installed by default.  In the code you provide the URL [...]

I’ve been working on a major project and wanted to share a similar piece of Navigation.  For the site I’m working on requires Flexible Navigation in regards to the Web 2.0 style Tabs.  This means when you increase the font size of your browser that the background images grow with the text and the page [...]

Just a few hours ago www.mysql.com surpassed 7 Million monthly vists, I don’t have a final number since we still have a fews hours to go.  I’m so excited about this, our team works extremely hard to deliver a solid web presence and the world is taking notice of our products.  There are a lot [...]

I’ve started to create a Wordpress theme and plan on displaying my progress here.  Now I’ve been hacking Wordpress themes for a while and find it to be pretty easy, especially for the common user.  The best thing about Wordpres IMHO is the community and the availability of plugins to customize your blog/site (ie. I’ve [...]

UPDATE 08/25/2009: I reloaded my Macbook Pro this weekend and install the latest VMWare (Version 2.0.5 (173382)) and did not have to make the below change to the page.c file… it seems VMWare has fixed this issue.
I received a Tweet the other day about how the use of Ruby in the US has exploded. I’ve [...]

This is the second time I’ve encountered this issue… I run my development server in VMWare Fusion, Fedora for Work & Ubuntu for my personal stuff (Mainly Wordpress) and every so often I’ll start my VM, open Safari and get a spinning wheel.  Website Un-Reachable!  Huh? What? I’m pulling an IP address, I can ping [...]

I’ve been stock piling some screenshots of various design related content I’ve seen on the web and in this case training I’ve had to complete.  throughout the next few days/weeks I plan on writing about my thoughts/complaints about Annoying Design.  And here we go:
Last week I had to complete some compliance training for work… HAD [...]

I’ve been thinking about this post for a little while and over the weekend I finally had some time to pull together a mock-up for a side project I inquired about doing a few months ago.  I was attending a local Tech event in Downtown Denver and met the Owner/Salesperson type for CollarCard.com and they [...]

Today is my last day working for MySQL…  These are 8 words that I never imagined I would have to say or write when I accepted the position almost two years ago.  I have been told that MySQL the product and MySQL the web properties will live on, however I’m not sure in what form [...]

Today is my first day of being recently un-employed… This post isn’t about how am I dealing with it or how am I finding a new job, although those are great questions I want to focus on more technology and Web Design.  The first thing I had to do was buy a new laptop.  When [...]