SilentGap

Ok, for all of you that like to laugh, here’s a new scam (or an old one, repackaged). As many of you know, I’m all mac now, at home and at work. I also set up Google Alerts for my work and church (and a few other things too). Well, spammers (or a new breed) are now setting up plain sites that have business names in it, there’s no text, just a really long title, with all of the business names. » Read the rest of this entry «

So i’ve taken a fairly big brake from the internet (a whole 3 days) by going up to my family’s cabin in the Black Hills (pictures and video yet to be posted). There’s no internet, and well, when your up in the mountain, there’s not much else, except for a few other cabins. I arrived on a Wednesday, only to find myself waking up on Thursday to 10 inches (and then some) of snow.

It was the perfect mini-vacation (except for the fact that I could still receive text on my phone and everyone decided it would be a good idea to check up on me EVERY day to see how i was doing – you know, if I’m alive, breathing, or dead). Our families cabin is a 2 bedroom, one full bath, with kitchen, dinning, wrap around porch, sleeping cabin (sleeps 4ish), and a huge slate fireplace. The carpet is a short green shag carpet, the kind you can feel the carpet fibers slip in between your toes when you’re not wearing socks).

It was a good time, complete with 2 channels on the tv, and a dvd / vcr player. I watched, Crocodile Dundee I & II, Die Hard I, George of the Jungle, Young Guns and a few other movies, all on vcr tapes, all of them in bad shape. There were Tonka Toasters you could make yourself some toasted desert pies – but you have to be careful, the toasters themselves melt if you leave them in the fire too long (a whole storry right there that i won’t go into). And I brought my MacBook Pro along & managed to get the majority of new mock done for this blog site.

The one problem I’ve noticed when you’re doing something for your own site is that you are your own worst critic. This isn’t anything new, but this past week, it really hit home. Especially since my photoshop skills are not up to par and my creativity doesn’t like to be stretched (unless i’m playing guitar).

So, in just a week or two SilentGap will be sporting it’s new skin & the new platform will be WordPress instead of Blogger (sorry Blogger, not a fan of your features – you just not my type and you don’t do it for me. It was a good time while it lasted, but I must break it off w/ you. Take care), which I’m quite supprised that a producted owned by Google isn’t done up better, but oh well, they can’t be perfect either.

Tim Schoffelman of SilentGap

My next question is – how expensive is it.

http://www.nikkor2d2.com/

Tim Schoffelman of SilentGap

Ok, so i came across this site in a magazine (yeah, that’s right, i was reading something that wasn’t online – it had ton’s of art and pictures in it) called http://www.mono-1.com/monoface. If you’ve never been there before, i suggest you stop by when you get a break in the action. You can spend an endless amount of time trying to come up with different faces. Below is a screenshot of one that i came up with.

Tim Schoffelman of SilentGap

A question arose here at work, can you grow an avocado here in the north. Well the short answer is yes, and the site http://faq.gardenweb.com/faq/lists/seed/2002114535011263.html tells you how.

Here’s some interesting nutritional facts about avocados:

• Avocados contain just 5 grams of fat per serving.
• Avocados contain NO cholesterol and NO sodium.
• Avocados contain 60% more potassium per ounce than bananas!
• Avocados are high in fiber, vitamin B6, vitamin C, vitamin E, potassium and folate.

anyways – enjoy the day!

~tj

Last weekend I read an article from Smashing Magazine on “How To Communicate Design Decisions to Clients?“

In it, Brian Armstrong lists out five points a persons should consider when creating a web design template for a client. After reviewing the list, I thought that they are a few good points for clients to review when looking to redo or restructure their site. Below, are the five points that Brian lists:

1. Pretty doesn’t mean effective: statistics are your friend!
2. Every design should have a measurable goal
3. Your site should have one clear path
4. Remember the swiss army knife
5. Provide performance metrics

What you, as the client, needs to know:

1. From the clients perspective, think about this point. Ask yourself – “What static’s do we currently have on our site?” “What is our site demographic?” “How many of the people visiting our site are returning visitors or new visitors?”

If you’ve thought, “I don’t want to implement anything new on our website until the new design is ready”, you’ve thought the wrong thing. Start collecting stat’s on your site, today! Many don’t want to pay for stats, but how can you tell what your ROI (Return On Investment) is if you don’t have a way to track, analyize or measure the results of your “message”. There are many services out there that are cheap and will give you more infomation then you know what to do with.

If you still don’t want to pay for stats, you can check with your hosting company. Many times they’ll have some sort of free built in stats available. If they don’t, Google Analytic’s or FeedBurner (for blogs) provides free services to start recording these stats. Just sign up for their account, and they’ll walk you through what you need to do.

2. Measurable Goal – Ask yourself – “What do I want to accomplish with this site?” Unfortunately, the answer “Attract more people” is not a very good one. Stop. Think. What do you really hope to accomplish with this site? If your thinking about your church site, maybe the answer could be “I hope to use our site as a social networking tool, so that the people under 35 at our church can stay connected with each other, and meet new new people who will encourage them to live for Jesus”. Now that’s an answer & a measurable goal.

What a client then can do is go back to the statistics they have in place and analyze the results to see how close they are to this goal. From there, they can talk with the designer and communicate with them the results and any ideas they may have to reach this goal.

Stay tuned for Part 2…

Tim Schoffelman of SilentGap

On July 31, an article was posted on ZDNet.com about some worms on the web, squirming there way through Facebook and MySpace. The actual method of attack seems to be through,… [long pause] … Social Enginering (which means, you’re curiosity get’s the best of you and someone tricks you into thinking you’re doing one thing, when you’re actually doing another).

Some of the messages and comments posted to the social network sites include:

- Paris Hilton Tosses Dwarf On The Street
- Examiners Caught Downloading Grades From The Internet
- Hello; You must see it!!! LOL. My friend catched you on hidden cam
- Is it really celebrity? Funny Moments and many others.

The messages and comments include links to a fake YouTube-like site. Clicking on the link redirects the targer to another YouTube clone fitted with a note to download the latest version of Adobe’s Flash Player.

However, instead of the latest version of Flash Player, a file called codesetup.exe is downloaded to the victim machine; this file is also a network worm. Kaspersky said [from Kaspershy Lab's]its security suite detected the threats proactively and signatures were added to the database on July 31, 2008.

In short – don’t download anything unless you read the file name and know exactly what it does.

Original article can be found here

Tim Schoffelman of SilentGap

Working late – ok, so one night, i was working late (well so i think i was working late, it had been a while since i first took this picture and started this entry, i just never got around to getting this post up) and thought to myself, “hmm – while I’m at Taco Johns i should take this guys picture and post it on SilentGap” (although, i had no idea what i was going to use it for – or even what subject to write on).

You can see him holding my credit card – fortunately enough, i don’t think you can read anything off of it.

But now this picture get’s me thinking, “who else is working late/early”? And, I think a more important question is, “why are you working late/early”?

For a number of years i’ve worked the crap jobs, always telling myself, “Some day, things will be different” and moving towards that goal. But never knowing how it would be different, or where i would end up.

When i would work until 3am / 4am delivering pizza’s and closing down the Domino’s store i worked at, i remember thinking, I can’t wait until this season is done and I’m working a normal job with normal hours. Well, folks, it’s 4am, I’ve been at work since 2:30ish, and “the Blend lady w/ the dog” who happens to be walking her dog at the same time asks’ me “Are you supposed to go in there?” (as i was turning the key to unlock the door, and thinking to myself – “Nope, i just happened to find this key 8 feet down in the storm drain, fished it out with some floss and ducktape that i just happened to be carrying in my pocket, tried unlocking every door downtown with this key, and finally having it work on this one” while carrying some work stuff. And then I turned around and locked the door behind, and she looks at me with a look of disgust – THINK WOMAN) (sorry, a little outburst right there, i’ll try to keep it under control).

So, I’ve accepted the fact that i won’t have normal hours (esp. with a kid on the way), but the main difference is that the hours i’m working now, i choose to, i want to and i enjoy. I consider myself very fortunate to have the opportunity to work my tail end off at Domino’s (and the 10 other jobs not listed), at school, at PCS, at church, at L&S and now, at a job that I absolutely love.

I look back and ask myself, was it worth it? Was it worth going through all the things i have to end up here (will list items noted in future posts), I say – absolutely. I just praise God that I have a wonderful wife who has supported me through all of this (thanks Carissa, you’re my gift – my bride, and I couldn’t of asked for a better wife and best friend).

So, for the Taco Johns dude, keep on pursuing your dreams man, and don’t give up. Eventually, with any bit of luck, prayer, fun and a lot of hard work, you’ll see your dreams come true!

Tim Schoffelman of SilentGap