In the Year 2010...

I like statistics and start of new year always brings opportunity to summarize previous one. :)

There were 132 new posts for year 2010 and around 40% were about programming. Next 30% were about virtualization, SQL and general IT topics. Rest of posts were either me presenting new versions of my programs (MagiWOL, QText and VHD Attach) or being annoyed over something.

Total number of page views was around 65,000 which is quite an improvement over 20,000 that was for last year. Total number of visits that I saw was around 54,000. Search engines still bring me around 75% of traffic with Google as a clear winner (over 70%). U.S. visitors are strong at 30% with all other countries bringing less than 10% to the table. My own country (Croatia) is not even within first 10.

Internet Explorer is winner with 39% (same as last year) with Firefox being close second with 35% (43% last year). My personal favorite Chrome is at 19% (from 10% last year). 95% of my visitors are running Windows (62% being Windows 7).

Judging by the number of visits, most interesting posts for last year were instructions on screen replacement for HTC S740 and setting up debugging on HTC Desire.

Year 2010 was also last one on Blogger platform. This post starts new era of self-hosted WordPress. Let’s see what else this year brings us.

Moving Is Complete

My blog is now at www.jmedved.com.

Feed is available at /feed/. Old feed will work for some time but I will turn it off eventually.

Thanks for following.

New Home Page

From my very first home page somewhere in 1994 to my current one (that is, until yesterday) I always did every aspect of design myself. My home was always handcrafted.

Last big update I did in year 2006. Then I made .NET based solution that enabled me to ease my way into updating content. Every year from then I started new design and then abandoned it because lack of time.

In meantime I started writing blog on blogger.com and using it’s infrastructure and I was annoyed. Part was because blogger.com lacks some basic functionality and part was because I could not change anything in it’s code.

Next year will be different. I finally got off my ass and did some WordPress investigations. Before I knew it, WordPress was already running on my test domain and it took only one day for it to move to my main domain. In next few days I will also migrate my blog.

It was an impulse decision to do this so do expect some down time while I get to know the platform.

Comments

For long time this blog dwelled in sub 50 visitors range. I was basically writing for my friends and occasional bystander. Comments were few and far between. As time went by and Google did it’s magic, I got more visitors and, unfortunately, more comments. Why I say unfortunately? Because most of comments are pure spam.

I like seeing comment. I like it even more when I get e-mail with some insight. However, these comments just contain text that is designed to massage my ego (e.g. “Aw, this was a really quality post”) and link at bottom is designed to grab occasional nervous clicker. Do not misunderstand me, I like my ego massaged, I despise link that follows.

Blogger platform helps me here with “great” spam filtering capabilities. I wrote great in quotes for a reason - this great platform hasn’t caught single spam comment. And thus all comment handling stays my chore.

I have no idea how to efficiently handle this. Going through all comments and deleting spam seems like only way to do it. However, do not hold it against me if I miss one or two.

Just don’t click them.

Wireless Wake on LAN

While roaming through TechNet (yes, I do have weird habbits), I stumbled upon explanation how wireless Wake-On-LAN (WoWLAN) can be used with Windows 7.

Since I often connect to my network from far-far-away, I do have a way to wake networked computers. Using MagiWOL and having them connected via cable is perfectly fine. Issue here is that not all my computers are connected via cable.

This article gave me perfect solution. Unfortunately, Broadcom card in my laptop (HP 6730b) was not capable of this. There is some power management included but not a waking ability. This came to me as surprise.

This is rather new computer and Broadcom does create network cards that have this ability (just check Apple’s computers). I would bet that even my card internally supports this. However, PC manufacturers are lazy bunch. If nobody is forcing them, there is no way that they will include new stuff in driver by them-self.

Where that leaves us? Well, my personal opinion is that Microsoft should mandate wireless wake-on-LAN for it’s WHQL driver testing. Only once they start to require it, some improvement will be done.

And, now, historical moment - first question ever on this blog!

Does anybody have a Windows 7 computer with Wireless wake-on-LAN capable network adapter?

Color of My Eyes

As I went to subscribe to EETimes Europe, one form question did give me huge surprise. They were interested in color of my eyes.

I am not sure what surprises me more - their question or explanation for it. They say: “Normally you are asked to sign a registration card to validate your free subscription, but this is not possible on a web page. Instead we ask a qualifying question that must be answered:”.

At what time did naming of color became substitute for signature? Have I overslept that moment?

P.S. If someone is interested, they are brown. :)

P.P.S. Don’t steal my identity now!

Windows Mobile Developer in Android-land

Lecture is over and I hope you were there! :)

In any case here is presentation and samples.

Do not miss KulenDayz next year.

[2010-09-05: Additional (5 minute) presentation is also included in download.]

Windows Mobile Developer in Android-land

Best conference in these parts of world is almost upon us. Yes, I am talking about KulenDayz 2010.

Conference will be held (as usually) in Beli Manastir (near Osijek, in Croatia) at hotel Patria and attendance is completely free of charge although you do need to register. There is small additional fee if you wish to have dinner there but, trust me, it is well worth it.

This is first year when I will not give Microsoft centric talk - title says it all - “Windows Mobile developer in Android-land”. It will be about how well can Windows Mobile Developer adjust to new environment and how much it hurts. It will be experience and question driven so do not expect much of code.

As always, PowerPoint will be available for download.

P.S. Pun on Alice in Wonderland is quite intended. :)

Technical Talks

What do you get when you cross Mark Minasi and Mark Russinovich?

You get one great presentation. It is named “The Secrets of Effective Technical Talks: How to Explain Tech without Tucking Them In!” and it is mandatory for any presenter-wanna-be.

I might not agree with some things they say (mostly PowerPoint related stuff) but there is lot of things to take home.

300

After more than two years of writing I finally cannot fit all my posts on single Blogger page. Magic number was 300 posts. Hopefully there will be much more.