Archive for June, 2011
Facebook Photo Fetcher Test
Posted by Jonathan Kinney in Photography, Website Software, WordPress on June 24, 2011
Here is my first attempt to work with a WordPress plugin. It is pulling the pictures from my Facebook account, which is actually quite neat. Looks like I need to include captions in order for it to really look good. Also seems a little buggy with the lightbox javascript code, the first row and all links above will loose the ability to be clicked on, except for the bottom part of the image, so I will have it disabled for now, you will have to live with having to use the back button for now. I may be able to find a way to fix it.
From Edmonds Waterfront, posted by Jonathan Kinney on 6/22/2011 (12 items)
Generated by Facebook Photo Fetcher
Beautiful Day, Beautiful Wife!
Posted by Jonathan Kinney in God, Life, Love, Photography, Relationships on June 21, 2011
This is the view from my office on a sunny day.
Yesterday was a wonderful day (2011-06-20)! Kathy and I have been going through some hard transitions, hard choices, a lot of work, and a lot of stress, so we needed a day to play. It started out being one of those rare sunny days, blue sky, warm wind, just beautiful. Anyone who knows Seattle knows how rare those are. Right now we live in Shoreline, a beautiful neighborhood with trees, near a beach, in the view of the sound, and lots of well kept yards. From our living room area we see a full flower bed, in full bloom. God had really blessed us with a beautiful place to live! I do hope we can stick around for a while.
When Kathy made it home, we decided it would be best for us to get the hell out of the house! We decided to head down to the Edmonds waterfront, the first place we started to really get to know each other, and also the place I proposed to her, well also I believe we went down there for a while on our wedding day, after our wedding if I remember correctly. So we have some history there.
Kathy at Edmonds Waterfront
I brought my camera, the trusty little Cannon PowerShort SD600, which has served me well these many years. It still surprises me how good of a camera it is, with very clear shots, minimal grain, and a decent resolution. Eventually I do want to upgrade my camera, to something more than a point and shoot. A full on digital SLR (maybe a Nikon D3100) is what I am looking forward to getting, and we are slowly saving money so I can pick one out eventually. It will have a dual purpose. Since Kathy is going to be starting to do freelance soon, she will need a good photography source, and I can be that source, as long as I have a high enough quality camera. I have also wanted a chance to take some more professional shots, and many of the features I am needing for that are not possible with this point and shoot camera. I would like to be able to even sell some photos if possible.
My beautiful wife, Kathy.
We picked a perfect time to head down, the lighting was wonderful and it was warm enough I could run around in just a t-shirt and sweats. We ended up roaming from the ferry dock all the way up to the dog park at the other end. I was stuck on the idea of checking out all the beautiful plants that were in bloom and I wanted to hang around until sunset. Eventually we got tired of wandering around, and it was getting close to when the sun would duck behind the clouds above the mountains, so we just sat down near the water, talking, and watching the fish jump. I was having a lot of fun with the lighting from the sunset, and pulled a few really neat shots off with my beautiful wife as my subject.
A nice reflection shot off of Kathy's glasses.
Today is not quite as nice, but nice enough to leave the windows open, which is a very nice change. Baby (our cat) is going insane wanting out every door and window she sees, and constantly whining while I am trying to work. I am looking forward to more fun in the sun this summer, maybe even some vacation time. With the future so unknown, and unpredictable right now, it is not really something we can plan for like many people do, but God will provide, yes, even for our enjoyment. We will see what happens, life is good, and God is great!
Finally, A Real Hosting Account
Posted by Jonathan Kinney in Routers, Server Administration, Technology, Virtualization, Website Software on June 17, 2011
I am so happy to finally get my wife’s sites (kdesign007.com and others) off of the Godaddy.com hosting account! It really didn’t seem all that bad, I mean, it did its job, but it sucked how they charged for everything, even having an email account looked to be billable. I guess it is good to be able to quantify a service into an actual billable value, but it gets really annoying to have to worry about if you will have to pay extra for something as simple as an email account.
Her hosting was on a Linux system, and that was neat, but it was lacking a bit. PHP was shown as version 4.x, though I am sure you could have had that changed to a version 5.x support, it said so in the help. I had to enable SSH for her account so I could transfer them over here easily, and that for some reason required them to transfer the site to a different server. What ever, I can live with that. But they had to call me and give me a pin number to do it, and it can take up to 24 hours, this time it took only around an hour (guessing). The server I found it on was running at a load of 5 at the time, and though responsive, it was a little sluggish when responding to any sort of IO request, and the transfer speed from this server to my hwVPS 2009 account was quite sad, it looked to be around 60 to 70 kilobits a second, and I do hope that was a specific bandwidth limit Godaddy.com hosting set for SSH data, because for a website loading speed, that would just suck.
Thanks to BlueOnyx, setting up the accounts and users took a minimal amount of time, and I love our DNS management system. By the end of the night yesterday, I had all but 3 domains fully setup with live websites and DNS settings for the new location. I am moving away from anything using FTP, so I have SSH enabled which allows SFTP access, which seems to even be supported by Dreamweaver! I simply used SCP to transfer all the site’s files to their respective places, and it went through perfectly!
With some custom hacks, I have IPv6 enabled for some of the sites on my VPS, and am going to setup a script that will automate that for me. At the moment I have IPv6 connectivity through a tunnelbroker.net / he.net account, which allows me to run a IPv6 6in4 static tunnel. I also modified dovecot, sendmail, and the rest of the software to run full dual stack. It is not really needed yet, but it is neat seeing all of my server backups and connectivity showing up on the six0 interface graph on my Asus RT-N16 router (I love that thing!, with it running Toastman’s build of TomatoUSB).
Now she gets to deal with me for support, muahahahaha! It is just really good to have the sites on a system and network I know I can trust! I also have the comfort of knowing that she will not be charged for simple things like email accounts, and she will be getting good support from someone who knows what they are talking about.
Good Works?
Posted by Jonathan Kinney in God, Life on June 17, 2011
I was just reading the bible this morning, and after completing John, Jesus’ words echoed in my head, as He said in several different ways
“If you love Me, you will keep My commandments” (John 14:15).
It should be very simple to ascertain that when Jesus repeats Himself several times in several different ways, especially in the critical time just before He was betrayed and gave Himself over to be executed, that it is very important. It is also important to note that moments earlier He said:
“A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another, even as I have loved you, that you also love one another. By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.” (John 13:34, 35).
I believe that this “new commandment” He gave is to add back the lost frame of love that all the commandments were intended to have from the beginning, and all of these commandments He is referring to should be framed in this same love for one another.
On to my main point. I decided to head back to Matthew, and read all of Jesus words, searching out what His commandments were, so that I can keep His commandments in the most real and practical way that I understand and have the ability to do. So I read through “The Beatitudes”, which I have come to understand are more of a section of speaking where Jesus gives the true orientation of God, His kingdom, and His people. It is not a list of things to do, or I would quickly go find someone to morn, try and find a way to become poor in spirit, or find a situation where I could become persecuted for righteousness, and insulted because of Jesus, and that just does not make sense. Orientation of the hearers is very important, and so Jesus blesses them with the revelation of the true reality, quite opposing to what they have been shown by the world they lived in at that moment.
The first section that looks to be an actual command is Matthew 5:16, where He says:
“Let your light shine before men in such a way that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven”
So how do I put this into practice? What good have I done? What good works? I have been studying for some time and have learned that God is at work all around us, all of the time. I am blessed to have been able to see God powerfully at work around me each time He has shown me, and He has sown me several times. But that is His work, not mine, I did not do it, but I was graced to see it. I do my best to join Him where ever I see Him at work, but so often those are not public activities, but more of private situations and conversations with random people. I do help out with the church website for Edmonds Adventist Church (edmondsadventist.org), and I also put the Weekly Sermon Podcast and other special series up online. I also do this blog, and I do have some mention of God in it, and what ever else comes to mind that I am working through with Him or in life. I think that is as close to this first commandment that I can get right now. I am not doing it for myself, at least I do not think that I am. I really do hope that if someone were to read the things I write, that it will do them some good, maybe bring them to think, and it would be totally cool if people would look to God and thank him for something that they got in any relation to something I did.
On to the point where I turn what I have done to God, for His glory. I enjoy being able to make available the sermons and special series from Edmonds Adventist Church. It is a blessing to me to be able to put these things up online knowing that God can use it for His will, if He chooses to do so. It is exciting, and priceless to hear that God has used some of the things I put online, to change or better someone’s life, where they were able to move forward with God in some way, or forward in life in a good way. This is one of those “treasures” that no one can steal, it will never rust, and moths will not destroy it. It is one of those “treasures in heaven”. It is a blessing to me, and I pray it is a blessing to others. It is exciting to join God where He is at work, and I do know that He is at work in the Edmonds Adventist Church, that is why I am there.
Keep your eyes open for where God is at work, and then join Him where you find Him working. It is not easy, it takes a lot of work, time, and willingness to change, but most good things are not easy, and take a lot of time and effort. The cool thing is, nothing can ever take it away from you, it will never get old, these joys will not need an upgrade in the future in order for them to be of any use, they will never burn up in a fire, and you can never loose them. It still seems very odd for me to look at things this way, but I would just suggest you try it.
Asus RT-N16 as NAS
Posted by Jonathan Kinney in Routers, Technology on June 7, 2011
Asus RT-N16 Router and WD MyBook 500GB
Loving my Asus RT-N16, just setup a 500G USB drive to it, partitioned it for 512M of swap, 1G for Optware, and the rest for Samba network share (custom hack for multi-user authentication). Auto mounting and setting up handled by a script loaded from the drive itself! Tested tcpdump install from Optware, works perfect, now looking to make it an Asterisk VOIP server! Totally cool! My nerd hairs are standing on end!